by Jon Berkeley
“She joined Barty Fumble the same month that we did,” said Gila.
“And before long she had won his heart.”
“Yeurgh!” said Umor.
“I’d rather win a gold watch,” said Gila.
“Or a set of copper-bottomed saucepans,” said Umor.
“People whispered that she had a Tiger’s Egg,” said Fabio, “but it was just a story.”
“A tall story,” said Gila.
“Not one of ours,” said Umor.
“We only do short stories.”
“The Fir Bolg believed in it,” said Miles cautiously. “And Doctor Tau-Tau thought I had one because—” He paused, glanced at Little and took a deep breath. “Because I meet a tiger now and then, and he said that usually only happens when you own a Tiger’s Egg.”
The Bolsillo brothers fell silent, and Fabio’s eyes narrowed.
“You meet a tiger?” he said.
Miles nodded. “I’ve spoken to him several times. We’ve even ridden on his back,” he said. “Me and Little.”
Fabio looked at Umor and raised his eyebrows. “A tiger that talks?” he said.
Umor shrugged. “Never heard of such a thing.”
“Stressful thing, meeting a tiger,” said Gila.
“Makes your imagination work overtime,” said Umor.
Fabio stroked his chin. “Who else have you told about this?” he asked.
“Only Doctor Tau-Tau. It sort of slipped out, but I didn’t think he would believe me anyway.”
“Better you keep it to yourself, from now on, Master Miles,” said Fabio.
“Button your lip,” said Umor.
“Tie a knot in your tongue,” added Gila.
Miles nodded. The gecko on the wall had caught a crane fly, whose trailing legs twitched as the lizard munched it with a pop-eyed stare that reminded Miles of Doctor Tau-Tau himself. The evening air was becoming chilly, and he thought about his warm bed, and the prospect of his first early night since leaving Partridge Manor.
“Maybe Celeste really did have a Tiger’s Egg,” said Little, “and that has something to do with Miles meeting this tiger.”
Fabio shrugged. “Beats me,” he said.
“It’s not the kind of thing you ask of a lady,” said Umor.
“Maybe it’s just a big, furry pussycat,” said Gila.
“In that case,” said Miles, “I’ll bring him to meet you next time, and you can give him a tin of cat food.”
Gila showed his pointy teeth and chuckled, but his smile did not quite hide an anxious look as he poured another round of coffee.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
THUNDER AND EGGS
The Circus Bolsillo, steel-boned and canvas-skinned, remained in the port of Fuera for almost a week, filling the big top to bursting point every night, and twice on Saturday. It seemed that everyone from miles around saw the performance at least once, and some of them came two or three times. Miles and Little worked even harder than usual so that they could complete their tasks by midday and spend the afternoons exploring whitewashed alleyways and shady courtyards, ending up at the bustling docks where whistling seamen trotted up and down gangplanks with bales and barrels on their shoulders, the weight bending the planks beneath their feet. By the week’s end Miles and Little knew every corner of the town, and still they felt there were a thousand stories waiting to be told.
The weather broke as the circus packed to leave on the Sunday morning. Miles had been up since before daybreak, helping Gila to prepare the animals for the road, and lending a hand to the tent boys wherever he could. They could see the thunderclouds roll in as the deflated canvas lay flattened on the ground, and they worked with redoubled speed to pack the tent away before the rain. The first fat drops began to fall as the last of the folded canvas panels was stowed away in the truck and the circus people scurried about like ants over the vacated ground, checking that nothing had been overlooked.
Overhead the seagulls cried forlornly, wheeling like slender ghosts against the heavy clouds. Miles stood tall on the back of the tent truck and looked down toward the port. The schooner masts were swaying wildly in the gathering storm, and he could see the agile figures of the sailors who clambered around the rigging, making sure that every line was fast and the sails properly secured. He felt a sudden urge to grab Little’s hand and run straight to the docks and up the gangplank of one of those stately schooners, just to see where chance and the restless winds would take them.
“Time to go, Master Miles,” called Fabio, and Miles turned and jumped down from the truck.
“Someday we’ll go sailing on one of those. What do you think?” he said to Tangerine, but what Tangerine thought we will never know, as he was hiding in Miles’s pocket from the summer storm.
The Circus Bolsillo wound out of the port of Fuera like a multicolored snake, as the skies above split with blue lightning and a deafening downpour hammered on the wagon roofs and streamed from the broad backs of the cart horses, who lowered their heads and plodded at their usual steady pace along the muddy road.
Miles and Little sat with Umor and Gila in the Bolsillo brothers’ wagon. The rain flung itself like gravel against the small windows and the china rattled in the cupboards as they jolted and swayed along the potholed highway. Gila played quietly on his harmonica, and something about his tune reminded Miles of the song that Fuat had sung as they made their way through the great cavern to see the Shriveled Fella. He thought of the Fir Bolg, scratching a living in the darkness and yearning for the return of the Tiger’s Egg that his own mother had borrowed from them.
“Did the Fir Bolg always live underground?” he asked Little. He leaned close to her to be heard over the din of the rain and the ceaseless rumble of thunder.
“I don’t know,” said Little. “I didn’t ask them that sort of thing. I was mainly trying to find out where they were keeping you, and when they would sleep.”
“The stories say that the Fir Bolg once ruled this land from sea to ocean,” shouted Umor, whose sharp ears could hear a gnat’s burp in a bell factory.
“They fought a great battle with the people who came from the east, and most were killed or driven into the sea.”
“But some took to the hills and hid in the caves there.”
“The smaller fellas fared better.”
“And the hairier ones stayed warmer.”
“And the smallest, hairiest ones were the badger’s bootlaces altogether.”
“At least that’s what the stories tell us.”
“But how did Celeste come to borrow the Tiger’s Egg from them?” asked Miles.
“Speaking of eggs,” shouted Umor, “it’s way past breakfast time.”
“My guts are rumbling like thunder,” said Gila.
“I suppose you’re making all that lightning too,” said Umor, taking down a frying pan from its hook on the ceiling. “Carve up some of that bread, Master Miles, and don’t lose hold of any fingers.”
Miles carved thick slices from a loaf of bread while a clutch of eggs sizzled and spat in Umor’s frying pan.
“Did my mother ever mention the Tiger’s Egg to you?” asked Miles.
Gila took down a stack of plates and dealt them onto the table with a clatter, like round playing cards. Umor deftly flipped an egg onto each one, and Little piled the bread that Miles had cut into the basket in the center of the table.
“Celeste had great powers of healing,” said Umor.
“And she could read the future like the morning papers,” said Gila.
“Some said that her powers were greatly enhanced by a Tiger’s Egg.”
“She never told us, Master Miles.”
“And we never asked.”
“She did say that her grandmother had the far eye.”
“And her mother could heal the knots out of wood.”
“Are they still alive?” asked Miles. Finding out about his parents was something that had occupied his mind a great deal in the months since he had first met th
e Bolsillo brothers, but he had not even begun to think about the possibility that he might also have grandparents, aunts and uncles.
“Nobody knows, Master Miles.”
“Celeste never returned to her home.”
“There was a falling out, I think,” said Umor, “though I only heard her speak of it once.”
“She did have a twin sister who used to visit once a year,” said Gila.
“But after Celeste died she never came again,” said Umor.
“A twin sister? How come you never told me that?” asked Miles, though he knew what the answer would be before the question had left his mouth.
“You never asked,” said Umor simply.
Miles sat down to his breakfast, his mind racing. Somewhere in the world there was a woman who could help fill in the blank space in Celeste’s photograph, who might share her laugh or the gleam in her eye, and who knew her heart perhaps better than anyone. He did not think to wonder why his mother’s relatives had never returned to rescue him from Pinchbucket House. He had grown up there with many other orphans who had been forgotten or abandoned by their families, and as far as Miles was concerned there was nothing unusual about that.
He thought over the things he knew and tried to fit them together in a way that made sense, and if you have ever tried to assemble a jigsaw puzzle wearing mittens, with half of the pieces missing and your head in a paper bag, you will have some idea of how frustrating a task it was. He knew that his mother had died and that his father had left soon afterward. He also knew that Celeste was rumored to have borrowed a Tiger’s Egg from the Fir Bolg, and that this stone, if it had ever existed, had not been seen since Barty Fumble’s disappearance. His parents had had the friendship of a tiger named Varippuli, who had been shot by the Great Cortado after Barty left, and a tiger had walked uninvited into Miles’s own life less than a year before. But why had his father left him behind? Had he taken the Tiger’s Egg with him, and if so, why had he not returned it to the Fir Bolg? What was the deal that his mother had struck with the hairy little people?
“If I can find the Tiger’s Egg,” he said aloud, “then maybe I can find my father. Or if I can find my father, maybe I will find the Egg.”
“What you might call a father and egg situation,” said Gila.
Umor shook his head sadly. “You heard what Fabio said. Your father is dead and gone, Master Miles, and you have a life to live.”
“Your shoes are pointing forward and your face to the past,” said Gila.
“You need to turn around,” shouted Umor, “before we tie your shoelaces together.”
“That’s all very well,” said Miles, “but the past kept me in a cave for two days, and still thinks I owe it a tiger’s soul.”
A deafening crash of thunder sounded overhead, and the inside of the wagon was lit with a blinding light. The Bolsillo brothers winced, and Little got up to look out of the window. “There’s trouble in the Realm,” she said, and she shook her head. “I hope Silverpoint isn’t at the hard end of it.”
“I hope he puts a sock in it soon,” muttered Gila, but his words were lost in the noise of the storm.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
HORACE AND PAGI
The Circus Bolsillo, tusked, top-hatted and belching fire, wound its way along the summer coast, tracing a route that circuses have followed since your grandfather’s grandfather was a child. They stopped at Whelk and Carrig and Twelve Bells, and though Miles could not get enough of the sea, none of these towns left such an imprint on his heart as the port of Fuera. He learned about every aspect of the show, until he knew each animal’s favorite treat and every performer’s likes and dislikes and every nut and pulley of the mighty tent’s skeleton. He knew how to cure a sick parrot and fix the ticket machine and clip a lion’s claws and check the trapezes, and how to take care of a hundred other details that made the difference between a circus and a shambles. The sun darkened his skin and hard work made him wiry and strong and popular with everyone, until Gila commented that if he could double in size and grow a beard he would be Barty Fumble himself. Miles pretended to laugh the comment off, but inside it made him light with pride.
By the time they left the coast and turned northward again, Miles and Little were so at home in the circus that they felt as if they had spent their whole lives on the road. Fabio showed them how to juggle and Umor taught them to cook. By night Miles stood against a wooden board painted with his own silhouette while Stranski—crusty and mute—flung knives at his outline with deadly accuracy, and Hector the monkey picked wallets from the pockets of unsuspecting punters. Afterward he climbed into the star-painted box and the audience gasped as he was neatly sawed in half, and Miles himself was still surprised, by the end of every act, to find that his legs were still his own. Little danced like thistledown on the high wire, and flew through the air with such grace that it would be easy to believe her strapped-on wings were real if you had never seen the shimmering pair she had lost. In the daytime she seemed to be everywhere at once, and the music she made sweetened the circus like honey in warm milk, though not a note of it could be written on paper.
They passed through Hamba and Shelduck and Sevenbridge, following the river Volte upstream, and turned west (somewhat to Miles’s relief) before it could bring them to the city of Smelt. The strange caravan made its way back along the road by which the tiger had brought Miles and Little to the Palace of Laughter the previous autumn, and one hot afternoon, as the apples ripened in the orchard, they saw ahead of them the town of Cnoc perched on its round hill.
“That’s where old Baltinglass lives, isn’t it?” said Gila, who was driving the wagon while Fabio took a siesta inside.
Miles nodded, shading his eyes to search for Baltinglass’s house among the jumble of red roofs that covered the crown of the hill. He hoped to surprise his old friend by turning up on his doorstep unannounced, although he knew from experience that surprising the blind explorer was not nearly as easy as it sounded. “I’d like to visit him while we’re here,” he said.
“Better still,” said Umor, “you can invite him to the show.”
“I don’t know if he’d want to come,” said Miles, “not being able to see the acts.”
“He might enjoy the music,” said Little.
“No doubt about it,” said Umor.
“We’ll find him a seat behind a pillar,” said Gila.
The tent boys had already started unpacking the big top into an empty pasture at the edge of town as Miles and Little walked up the winding road toward Baltinglass of Araby’s whitewashed house.
They reached the hobnailed door and Miles pulled the bell rope, bringing the jangle of pots and pans from somewhere inside the house. They heard the thump, thump, thump of a walking stick on a terra-cotta floor, then the door flew open and Baltinglass’s wrinkled face was thrust through the gap, his eyes staring out into eternal fog from under his black knitted hat.
“Well?” he shouted before Miles or Little could say a word. “Whatever it is, I’ve already got half a dozen of ’em, and they bring me out in hives. Come back Tuesday when I’m feeding the crocodiles. They’ll be needing something to chew on.” He reached out and made a quick low swipe with his stick as he spoke. Little jumped nimbly over the cane, but Miles was not quick enough to avoid a crack on the ankle. “Ouch!” he said.
A toothless grin split Baltinglass’s wrinkled face. “Master Miles!” he said in delight. “Why didn’t you say? You’ve grown half a head taller by the sound of it, unless you’re wearing high heels. No doubt you have Little with you, but she’s too quick for me, eh?”
“Hello, Mr. Baltinglass,” laughed Little. “Can we come in?”
“Do that thing,” said the old man. “Doorstep’s no place for a powwow.” He flung the door wide and waved his stick dangerously in the air to usher them inside. The house was cool and semidark as usual. Carved faces grimaced from the walls, and blades of every shape and variety glinted between them. Baltinglass led them along the
hallway and into the living room. “What brings you to an old nomad’s doorstep on an autumn afternoon?” he barked.
“We were passing through,” said Miles. “We’ve been on the road with the Circus Bolsillo all summer.”
“Ah, the circus!” said Baltinglass. “That explains the grunting of wildebeest that I heard in the wee hours. Thought the river madness was coming back to me.”
“But the circus doesn’t ha—,” began Little, but Miles nudged her and put his finger to his lips.
“Did you ever finish making your apple jelly?” asked Miles, as Baltinglass flung open the French windows.
“There was no point,” barked Baltinglass. “It was too late for that batch. I went off gallivanting with Gertrude Partridge at a crucial moment, and when I got back the whole batch was fizzing in the sun. Gave it to old Julio for his pigs. They were drunk for a month, and now they all call me Uncle. Least they would if they could talk.”
“I doubt it,” whispered Little in Miles’s ear. “Pigs call everyone ‘Mum.’”
“Anyway, these blasted crocodiles have kept me too busy to be thinking about apple jelly.” They had emerged into Baltinglass’s sunlit garden, and he headed for a wooden bench that sat in the dappled shade of an apple tree. The old man reached out for the arm of the bench, and when he found it he sat down with a sigh, propping his cane beside him.
“What crocodiles?” asked Miles with interest.
“Those ones,” said Baltinglass, picking up his stick and waving it over his shoulder. “Horace and Pagi. Hungry devils, and you have to keep your wits about you when you’re feeding them. Their favorite food is thumbs.”
Miles got up from the bench and looked in the direction that Baltinglass had indicated. There was a freshly dug pond at the edge of the garden, and half submerged in the pond was a cage of bamboo, lashed together with an assortment of different-colored string. He could see no sign of any crocodiles.