CHAPTER 43
Lulubelle stood in the wings, clenching and unclenching her hands, taking deep breaths. It was only recently, since joining Mannfields’Circus, that she had been allowed her own solo spot in the show; it didn't last very long but it was a spectacular entrance, a high-speed routine that demanded precision and total concentration on her part. The second part of her act was more familiar, as part of the troupe of acrobats, but she hadn't been working with them very long and the timing of the finale had to be accurate.
This troupe was good, probably the best she had worked with, and their pyramid work was superb; she never ceased to be impressed by it. The secret to getting her own timing right was to watch them out of the corner of her eye, even while she was still cartwheeling round the ring, so that she knew the precise moment Carmel and Lucia launched themselves from the trampoline and landed on the shoulders of the line of three acrobats at the top of the pyramid.
Then it was time to pivot herself on one hand and throw herself into the air in a series of backward flips and hurtle towards the tower of human beings, all precariously balanced on one another. She wasn't experienced enough yet for the trampoline - not to get up to that height and land perfectly poised above Carmel and Lucia, without wobbling.
So, to add to the excitement of the act's finale, they had devised this risk: the little blonde acrobat, circling the ring apparently regardless of the others forming their pyramid, carelessly doing her own thing ... then the shout from everyone in the pyramid, warning her of the risk. One or two of them on the outside of the formation waved their arms. The men on the bottom layer - the foundation - would appear to be the most frightened, would shake and wobble their knees, and the girls on the top - Carmel and Lucia - would shriek.
The audience would be divided in its response. Some, especially the smaller children, would scream. The older ones would laugh. But nobody took their eyes off the scene in the ring.
Then just as Lulubelle, at dangerous speed, hurled herself right up to Ian, standing foursquare and solid in the centre of the foundation row, Manuel above him would grab her by her feet as she performed her final - and apparently lethal - flying handstand, and throw her up to Carlo, who threw her to Sabina and Elsa, who apparently threw her - but in fact passed her quite gently - the right way up, to Carmel and Lucia, who placed her on their shoulders. That was her moment of glory, high above the crowds, waving and acknowledging the applause, shiny-eyed and brilliant-smiled in her jewelled white tutu and sparkling tights.
The other young performers could be a bit jealous. She had to be careful, out of performance hours and at rehearsals, to include everyone in her circle of friends. Feuds arose so easily, with everyone living and working on top of one another. Lulubelle had seen only too clearly, from Lucinda's example, what happened when a star performer favoured one person and alienated another. She couldn't afford to have best friends. She had to be best friends with everyone, for the sake of their future in the circus.
Even so, there were a few who would have been only too pleased to tell Mr Mannfield this evening that Lulubelle Lacosto had got into the lions’ cage and had to be rescued. But there were only a few who knew, and although the circus grapevine was hard to evade, the different groups of workers could form a closed circuit when it suited them.
None of the men who had come to her rescue would breathe a word of the incident to anyone else, because most of them were connected to one another by family ties - so distant and complicated no one could quite specify what relation he was to the next one - but still, tied by blood and bound to silence in cases such as this, where the man who had left the door of the outer cage ajar for a few minutes could lose both his job and his chance of employment anywhere else.
So Lulubelle would not be reprimanded or risk being sacked herself by Mr Mannfield, who would never get to know about her escapade, but that meant that neither was there any chance of being let off tonight's performance. All the tumultuous events in Lulubelle's life in the past twenty-four hours had to be relentlessly banished from her mind now, as her hands clenched and unclenched and she awaited her cue to enter the ring with a rush of energy and a dazzling smile.
Even Arto's promise of contacting his agent on her behalf, and his affirmation of her talent and her potential; even the possibility of being picked for the TV documentary, she mustn't think about now. Nothing must be allowed to distract her attention.
It was only at the successful conclusion of the acrobats’ routine that she felt her concentration waver. That was when, standing tall and proud at the top of the pyramid, her arms outstretched in triumph, she scanned the crowd and, as earlier this afternoon, thought she saw someone she recognized. For a second, she lost her balance and thought she would fall.
Lucia automatically tightened her grip round Lulubelle's ankle, and she and Carmel, who had been chatting casually out of the corners of their mouths, caught their breath and went rigid for an instant, till she steadied herself.
A little more promptly than usual, they reached up and grasped her hands and started her on her descent from the pyramid, catching the performers lower down unawares. But they were trained to react, and their smiles never faltered as they responded to the early cue to send Lulubelle tumbling from hand to hand, followed by Lucia and Carmel, till they all lined up on the ground and gave a final wave to the cheering audience before tumbling and somersaulting their way to the exit.
'Nearly give us a heart attack there, Lu!’ Carmel complained. 'What came over you?’
'My mind wandered,’ Lulubelle admitted.
'Well, don't let it wander again. I've had one fractured bone in my wrist this year already and I'm not planning on another one.’
'Sorry.’
Lucinda passed her on her way back from the changing tent to the caravan. She was never on till after the interval, when the audience were becoming blase about performing seals and wacky clowns and needed a real thrill of fear to get them sitting upright in their seats again. Trapeze acts, high wire, and lions: that was the dessert course on the menu.
'Everything go all right?’ she asked, ruffling Lulubelle's hair. She looked refreshed and smiling; she seemed to have forgotten the incident in the caravan when Lulubelle had disturbed her liaison with Sam, and she obviously hadn't heard about the lion episode.
'Fine,’ said Lulubelle. 'You okay?’ She couldn't smell drink on her now, and Lucinda's eyes looked almost clear.
'Never better, sweetie.’
'Is there anything to eat at home, Mum ... I mean, Lucinda?’
'Don't know, love. Have a look. Shouldn't think there's much of anything. We'll go shopping when we get paid tomorrow. How's your you know what?’
'Okay. Marisa gave me some cotton wool.’
'Oh, that's all right then. Why don't you go and help Bernard's kids on the rifle range? You might get a hamburger out of him if he's treating his own.’
'Okay.’ She wouldn't, though; she didn't feel like company this evening. She would probably just go to bed; it had been a long day. She wasn't really that hungry anyway. 'Oh - listen,’ she said, as her mother turned away. 'You didn't see anyone that looked like that bloke who was at Bepponi's, did you? I thought I saw him around here at rehearsals, and then agains just now. But it might have been somebody else.’
'You mean that guy ...? Would you recognize him, Lulubelle?’
'I don't know,’ she said. 'I know he had dark hair and dark eyes and wasn't all that tall. But all I really remember about him was that he was wearing an anorak hood that was separate from his jacket and a different colour. I couldn't even tell what colour, because it was dark.’
'That isn't much help, is it?’ Lucinda agreed. 'Well, look, darling, have a nice evening and stay close to Fee and Tom and Samantha, okay? Don't go back to the caravan on your own. If there's people around that you know, you can always ask for help, can't you?’
'What time will you be home?’
'Oh, I don't know.’ Lucinda's expression becam
e vague. 'I might go for a nightcap with some of the others.’
'Whose van will you be in?’
'Oh, Lulubelle, how do I know? It depends who's inviting, doesn't it? I won't be that late. Tell you what, I'll pop back home sometime during the evening, just to check you're sound asleep and safe. Okay? Can't say fairer than that now, can I?’
She seemed to have forgotten she'd told Lulubelle not to go back to the caravan on her own. She waved, blew a kiss unthinkingly, and was gone.
Lulubelle thought she might as well go back to the caravan now, before it was late and while the man - whoever it was - was still with the rest of the audience in the Big Top, before they all started milling around in the interval, fetching drinks and ice-creams and candyfloss and sweets.
She would go in and get straight into her pull-out shelf of a bed, drawing the curtains across the windows and leaving no lights on. The door never locked properly and anyway had to be left open for Lucinda, who would come home without a key more often than not, but if she pulled the covers right over her head then even if someone came in they would think the caravan was empty. She was so thin, her form hardly made any hummock under the bedclothes.
She was probably worrying for nothing, in any case. The chances were it wasn't him at all.
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