by Jon Berkeley
“You were very good,” he said to her. “Weren’t you afraid up there, without your wings?”
Little shook her head. “It felt good to be up high again,” she said, “and we have practiced a lot. Were you afraid?”
Miles shrugged. “Not really,” he lied. “Stranski’s never skewered anyone yet. At least not as far as I know.”
He could still feel the glow from the applause that had greeted his act with Stranski the Magician. It was a new experience for him, and he allowed his tired eyes to close so that he could relive his moment of triumph.
There he was, padlocked in a star-painted box with his knees tucked up and only his head showing, while Stranski stood in the center of the ring and held a long saw in the air for all the people of Shallowford to see. The saw’s teeth glinted as the magician turned it under the spotlights, then he turned suddenly on his heel and began to saw vigorously through the center of the box. The crowd gasped, and Miles only just prevented himself from flinching as the saw’s teeth bit through the wood.
Stranski wheeled the two halves of the box apart to show beyond doubt that the boy had been halved. From the other half, Miles knew, a pair of shoes would be wiggling frantically, but Stranski had not revealed even to him whose feet they might be, or how they came to be alive. When the box was rejoined and Miles released, Stranski gave him a curt nod, which was the closest thing to praise that he ever bestowed on his helper. Miles smiled as he stretched his arms wide and did a complete turn under the spotlights, and applause swept through the ring.
Miles was jolted from his reverie by the sound of shouting from somewhere beyond the firelight. There was a thud and a gasp, and a woman’s scream, then a man’s voice bellowed, “Bet you didn’t predict that, Mr. Presents Your Future.”
The fireside conversation stopped for a moment, and Fabio and Umor slipped away toward the sound of the scuffle. Fabio tapped K2, the enormous strongman, on his shiny bald head as he went. K2 lumbered to his feet and followed them into the night. They were back a few moments later. K2 sat down heavily on the end of the log he had vacated, causing Gila, who sat at the other end, to bounce several inches into the air.
“What happened?” asked Little as Fabio sat down beside her.
“Telling fortunes is a dangerous game,” said Fabio.
“Especially when your customer is a pretty girl,” chuckled Umor.
“Tau-Tau predicted she’d find new love in the spring,” said Fabio.
“What’s wrong with that?” asked Little.
“Her husband was listening outside,” said Umor.
“And he didn’t think it was funny.”
Gila produced his harmonica and began to play a comical tune. Other band members joined in, and Tariq the juggler snatched a couple of burning sticks from the fire and began to toss them in the air, the ragged flames sputtering as they wove arcs of light against the night sky. Miles watched for a while, the warmth of the fire on his face, and sighed contentedly. He was in a strange place, surrounded by stranger people, and he had never felt so at home.
“You’re feeling homesick,” said a voice by his ear, “but it will pass in time.” It was Doctor Tau-Tau, his words whistling slightly through a broken tooth.
“No I’m not,” said Miles.
“You don’t have to be shy with me,” said Tau-Tau. “You know your mind is an open book to someone with skills such as mine.” His bulging eyes glistened in the firelight, and he sipped gingerly from a small china cup with no handle, which he refilled from a silver pot that he placed between his feet. A large bruise was spreading across his swollen jaw.
“That must hurt,” said Miles.
“Ah,” said Tau-Tau, “it’s just one of the hazards that attend greatness.”
Miles thought about the irate husband’s words. “Couldn’t you have avoided it?” he asked.
“You mean by looking into my own future?” Tau-Tau shook his head. “Absolutely not. It’s the first thing Celeste taught me about clairvoyance. A fortune-teller can see the paths of others’ lives like veins in a leaf, but his own future remains in darkness, and with good reason.”
“But why?” asked Miles.
“Because it would lead to madness. To madness, my friend, is where it would lead. Imagine you could see all the pitfalls in your life, right up to your own death. You would be forever dodging and turning like a hunted fox, but fate cannot be tricked, and it would master you anyway. To see into your own future would rob you of the ability to live in the present.”
He took another sip from his china cup, and sighed deeply. “Masala tea,” he said, smacking his lips and grimacing with the pain. “The best way that man has yet devised to usher in the night.”
“It smells nice,” said Little.
“And it tastes even better,” said Tau-Tau. “I would pour some for you, but I’m afraid I have a head cold that I wouldn’t like to pass on, and my other cups are in my wagon.”
“I’ll get them,” said Miles quickly. He had been looking for an excuse to see the inside of Tau-Tau’s wagon, but the chance had not arisen on the ride to Shallowford.
“Perhaps another time,” said Doctor Tau-Tau.
“I won’t disturb anything,” said Miles, “if you just tell me where to find them.”
“Very well,” said Tau-Tau. He fished a key from his pocket. It was tied by a ribbon to a small wooden figure with matted hair and tiny cowrie-shell eyes. “In the purple cupboard to the right of the door when you enter.”
Miles got up and faced into the darkness. As he headed in the direction where he judged the wagon to be, Doctor Tau-Tau called after him, “And touch nothing else, my friend.”
Away from the fire Miles could see the stars clearly, twinkling like frost in the moonless sky. His breath made clouds before him, and the grass crunched underfoot. Here and there a lantern glowed softly under the eaves of a wagon, but he was guided as much by his nose as by the little he could see. He left the musty odor of the lions’ cage to his right, and passed by the oily smell that surrounded the llamas’ enclosure. As far as he could remember, Tau-Tau’s wagon was the third one after the swampy reek of the crocodiles’ tank.
When he reached the wagon he thought for a moment that he had found the wrong one. He could hear drawers opening, and what sounded like soft muttering, from inside. He stopped for a moment on the steps, the key raised halfway to the lock. He leaned backward, and read the words that were faintly visible on the side of the wagon. DOCTOR TAU-TAU PRESENTS YOUR FUTURE, they said. He waited for a moment more, but the sounds had stopped, and he could hear only the faint laughter and music carried from the campfire on the cold night air. He shrugged. “Must have been from another wagon,” he said quietly to Tangerine, wishing he had brought a lantern with him. Tangerine, it seemed, was also listening closely. Miles took a deep breath and opened the door.
There was a flurry of movement in the darkened wagon, and the sound of a bottle smashing. He thought he glimpsed someone disappearing through the open window opposite him, and a moment later another figure leaped up onto the sill and turned for an instant to stare at him. He could see its hairy outline, no bigger than that of a six-year-old child, silhouetted against the rectangle of starry sky. Its movements were quick and sudden, like a bird, and two black eyes glittered faintly with reflected firelight. Miles had the odd feeling that if he entered the wagon he would be stepping into a dream, and he froze where he was on the top step. He heard the creature’s feet scrape on the wooden sill, then it dropped from the window and was gone.
Miles stood frozen on the top step of Doctor Tau-Tau’s wagon. The darkness inside seemed to yawn with silence, and he wondered if there might be more of the creatures lurking in it, just waiting for him to make a move. He fumbled inside the door, feeling for a light switch behind the heavy clothing that hung there. The impulse to shut the door and run had almost overtaken him when his fingers found the switch, and he flicked it on.
The inside of the wagon was filled with
a dim red light, and it was a moment before Miles could make sense of what he was seeing. It looked as though a violent storm had passed through the little room. A round table lay on its side in a sea of scattered envelopes. Every cupboard had been ransacked, the drawers pulled out and emptied onto the carpet. A fleet of small bottles had sailed across the slightly tilted floor and come to rest in an untidy pile in the corner. Pictures hung askew, and at one end of the wagon a mattress sagged from the bed to the floor, as though it had tried to escape and been brought down by the sheets that were twined around it. Over all this chaos the faint aroma of the masala tea that Doctor Tau-Tau had brewed earlier still hung in the air.
A sudden movement in the corner made Miles jump, but it was only a tiny bird flying up from the floor to perch on the curtain rail. The bird was gray, with a black head and tail, and it looked at him with curiosity. In the corner from which it had appeared, Miles saw a small wooden cage lying on its side with its door wide open. Miles picked his way across the floor to shut the window. A small pile of books lay in the shadow of the capsized table, and they toppled over as he passed. There were assorted books on numerology and geomancy, and two leather-bound notebooks. The notebooks were old and well worn, blotched with overlapping stains and frayed at the edges. A loose page had fallen from one of them, and Miles picked it up with his thumb and forefinger, as though it might fall apart at his touch.
The paper was thin and crisp like an onion skin, and densely covered with tiny writing and strange diagrams. He looked at it curiously, but the symbols that covered the page seemed to swim and wriggle in the dim light, and he could make no sense out of them. He opened one of the notebooks and carefully inserted the loose page.
It was an uncomfortable feeling to be shut in the ransacked wagon, ankle-deep in Doctor Tau-Tau’s personal possessions. He felt as though he had walked in and surprised him in his underwear. The thought made him laugh despite himself, and it was at precisely that moment that the door swung open, and Doctor Tau Tau stepped inside.
The fortune-teller opened his mouth to speak, a look of mild irritation on his florid face, but as he did so he noticed the sea of wreckage spread across the floor. His bruised jaw dropped farther, and he winced with the pain. Without a word he strode across the floor and snatched the notebook that Miles held in his hand. For a moment Miles expected to be struck, but Doctor Tau-Tau merely fixed him with a wounded stare as he tucked the notebook into his waistcoat pocket.
“Why, boy?” he croaked.
Miles folded his arms and looked at him indignantly. “It wasn’t me!” he said. “It was . . .” He struggled to think of a way to describe the intruders that would not sound like a tall story. He could hardly expect Doctor Tau-Tau to believe that they were small hairy creatures that had escaped through the window like monkeys.
Doctor Tau-Tau’s eyebrows disappeared into his fez. He was waiting for an answer.
“They were small hairy creatures who escaped through the window like monkeys,” said Miles. “I only caught a glimpse of them in the dark. I think there were two of them.”
“Monkeys, you say?” repeated Doctor Tau-Tau. He was staring at Miles with an odd expression, as though something rang a bell that he did not want to hear.
“They weren’t monkeys,” said Miles. “The monkeys are all locked in their cage. I have the key in my pocket.”
“Are you sure . . . ,” whispered Doctor Tau-Tau, leaning close to Miles and enveloping him in his oriental breath, “that it wasn’t your tiger friend?”
Miles was lost for an answer to such a strange suggestion. He was about to ask why on earth a tiger would want to ransack Doctor Tau-Tau’s wagon, when he spotted the little gray bird that had startled him earlier. “Look!” he said, glad of the distraction. “Your bird is loose.”
Doctor Tau-Tau turned to look. “Satu!” he said. “What are you doing out, you little feathered rascal?”
The bird hopped among the small red and gold envelopes that lay scattered across the carpet. She stopped suddenly and tugged one of the envelopes free with her fat red beak, then she hopped forward until she came to rest by Doctor Tau-Tau’s embroidered slipper.
Doctor Tau-Tau bent down and held out his hand, palm upward. The bird jumped on board. The fortune-teller took the envelope and opened it, as though he had forgotten about Miles altogether. He removed a small yellowing card and read it with with a frown of concentration. “Impossible,” he murmured to himself. He glanced at Miles from under his bushy eyebrows, then he looked at the card once more, before slipping it back into its envelope.
“What does the card say?” asked Miles.
“Oh, nothing, nothing,” said Doctor Tau-Tau vaguely. “The cards were scattered, and Satu has had a fright. In such circumstances a mistake is understandable.” He delved into his trouser pocket and brought out a few seeds, which he fed to the little bird, then he crunched his way across his scattered belongings, righted the cage and placed her gently inside.
“What kind of mistake?” persisted Miles. He was curious to know what the card could have said to make Tau-Tau’s anger dissolve so quickly into puzzlement.
“Let’s just forget about it, eh?” said Tau-Tau, forcing a smile. “It’s the wrong card. It couldn’t apply to you. Why don’t you just come back first thing in the morning and help me straighten the place out, eh?” He tucked the little envelope into his waistcoat pocket, beside the notebook, and Miles noticed that his hands were shaking.
CHAPTER EIGHT
A PAIR OF WINGS
Tariq Ali Mohammad III, bare-chested and oil-slicked, opened his mouth and blew a mighty ball of flame that would have put a dragon to shame. The audience gasped—indeed some of them ducked, and he blew another, just to keep them on their toes. Miles loved to watch Tariq make fire, but he had no time to watch now. He was behind the curtain, helping the tent boys to line up the big round platforms on which Tembo and Mamba would perform for the people of Nape.
A roar of applause told him that Tariq was taking his bow, and as the fire-eater marched through the curtain, spitting the last of the paraffin to one side, Miles slipped past him and ran into the ring with a large rake. He quickly smoothed the sawdust as the tent boys came out behind him, rolling the heavy platforms on their sides like hula hoops. Miles ran back through the curtain, ducking under Tembo’s trunk as she ambled in from the darkening field outside, led by Gila in a green suit with gold braiding.
“Steady, Master Miles,” said Gila.
“Don’t knock over the elephants,” added Umor, who was following close behind with Mamba.
“I’ll try not to,” said Miles.
“Can you help me with these wings, Miles?” said Little.
She was dressed in her sparkling suit and white ballet slippers, and a small pair of wings sat lopsidedly on her shoulders. They had been carefully stitched together from goose feathers by Delia Zipplethorpe, the horse mistress. She had done a fine job, but no amount of clever needlework could match the luminous beauty of the real wings that had once graced Little’s shoulders. A tracery of graceful lines in the skin of her back was all that remained of them now; a faint reminder of what she had lost when she sang her real name to release Miles from The Null’s monstrous grip, and in doing so tied herself forever to Earth.
Miles tugged at the elastic straps that held the wings to her shoulders. They made him feel slightly sad, and he wondered how much worse it must be for Little herself. “Are you sure you want to wear these?” he asked.
“Of course,” said Little. “Haven’t you seen the playbill? I’m Little, the winged acrobat.” She smiled at him over her shoulder.
“I know,” said Miles. “But you don’t have to be. I could ask Fabio to change it.” He took a step back to check that the wings were straight.
Little turned and hugged Miles around his waist. She smiled up at him. “Thank you, Miles. I do miss my wings, but wearing these makes no difference to that. This is a circus, and people want to see something magical.
That’s why we’re here, isn’t it?”
Another wave of applause followed Tembo and Mamba as they loped out of the ring and pushed through the curtain. They knew they had performed well and they were in a hurry to find out what treat might await them with their evening meal. As they trotted out under the stars, the slim figure of Etoile, the dark-haired acrobat, strode in past them, patting both their trunks in turn as she made for the curtain. Her sister, Henna, stumbled along after her in spike-heeled shoes.
Although they looked alike, Henna and Etoile could not have been more different. Etoile was immaculately dressed and perfectly made up at any hour of the day. She was always polite, never late, and despite the circus’s harsh work ethic, no one seemed to mind—or to notice—that she never troubled to get her hands dirty.
Henna, by contrast, was usually to be found in overalls, a cigarette dangling from her lips and her hair looking as though the macaws had been nesting in it. She mucked out the animals, shaved and shod the Zipplethorpe family’s fine Arab horses and scrubbed down the wagon, inside and out, that she shared with her sister. She never even thought of getting ready for a performance until ten minutes before it began. She would still be touching up her mascara right up to the moment she walked into the ring, but as she stepped through the star-strewn curtain a transformation came over her. It was as though she could throw on like a costume the elegance and poise that her sister wore all the time, and once under the spotlights it was hard to tell the two apart.
“Vite, chérie!” called Etoile to Little.
“No time for the gossip,” added Henna, making last-minute adjustments to the straps of her costume.