by Lynda Paige
He ran a gnarled hand through his profusion of wiry silver-grey hair. Time to make a decision over the fair’s future leader was not on his side. He was three score and ten now, in good health apart from arthritis riddling its way through him, but any time now he could be struck down. Only a few weeks ago Harry Sparrow, a robust-looking, energetic man in his late fifties who had worked for him for years, an all-rounder who could turn his hand to anything, suddenly dropped dead as he’d been helping to unload a lorry after arriving at a new site. He needed to discuss the problem. Nell, his beloved wife, had always been his listening ear, whose advice and judgement he had trusted beyond reproach, and she would have helped him arrive at the right conclusion, but now she was gone and her wisdom along with it. Luckily for him though there was one person amongst the Grundy community whose friendship over the years he had come to value highly, especially since Nell’s death when without her to turn to he doubted he’d have managed to get on with his life without her in it. Nell had thought very highly of her too. Maybe it was time he took her into his confidence and asked for her guidance on his problem. He would do that at the first opportunity so he could put this worrying matter to bed and enjoy what days he had remaining to him without it hanging over his head.
He felt so proud though that through his hard work, at times literally shedding blood, sweat and tears, he was leaving his sons a business that was in a far better state than when he had himself taken over. Before he did die, though, he wanted to see Sonny happily settled with a good woman, same as Solly was. But, if he ever did have any relationships with women, he kept them very much to himself. He never actually knew what his eldest son got up to after working hours; in fact, as far as he was aware, he spent his time on his own, inside his van that was parked far away from any of the others. His son’s need to keep himself to himself puzzled him and, considering that Sonny was now thirty-nine, a change of temperament back to the easy-going, kind young man he had been before his sudden, abrupt change didn’t seem likely.
Just then Sam spotted Gemma weaving her way through the high-spirited crowds, heading for the House of Fun. He went to shout a greeting to her but then changed his mind as she would never hear him over the din the punters were making and the reverberating music. Sam and his wife Nell had been furious when Solly, at only sixteen years of age and she only fifteen, had out of the blue introduced Gemma to them as his future intended. Furious not only because she wasn’t one of them and they were well aware of the flak they would have to deal with from the rest of the showmen community for their son’s breach in traditional values, but because Solly had deceived them, carrying on a serious relationship they’d had no idea whatsoever about for over a year.
It transpired that the pair had first met when the then thirteen-year-old Gem had come along with her friend when the fair had been in her town. She had gotten talking to Solly, who had been helping on the ride they had chosen to go on. For both of them it had been instant, all-consuming love. They weren’t to see each other again though for over a year until the fair came back again and this time they vowed not to lose touch. Solly would call Gemma at prearranged times from a telephone box near where the fair was at the time. When the fair was within travelling distance of Gem’s town, she would make excuses to her parents and visit him.
When the relationship was finally revealed – when the pair could not bear to be apart for any longer and decided to get married – Gem’s own parents were equally as outraged as Solly’s were at the proposed union of two people from such differing backgrounds. They warned their daughter that if she went ahead, without their blessing or permission, they would disown her. But, no matter what was thrown at them, the pair were adamant that they were destined for each other and marry they would. Not prepared to wait until they were both of legal age, they did the only thing they could and ran away to Gretna Green. By the time both sets of parents found out it was too late as they were man and wife.
His wise wife knew that if she did not accept Gem into their lives then she would lose her son; another ringmaster would jump at the chance of having someone with Solly’s knowledge and background work for them. After many arguments on the matter, Nell managed to get through to Sam and he grudgingly agreed to accept Gem into the family. After a shaky start, eventually Nell and Gem enjoyed a close mother- and daughter-in-law relationship and Gem was as grieved as Nell’s blood family when she died five years ago at the age of sixty-four. Gem might be an outsider, initially ignorant of showpeople’s ways, but it quickly became apparent by the way she got stuck in not only in her wifely duties but also her eagerness to learn how the fair was run so she could pull her weight, that Nell and Sam’s fears that Solly would regret his choice of partner were unfounded. The rest of the Grundy community, although wary of this unknown incomer at first, soon found themselves warming to Gem’s easy-going nature. Not that she suffered fools gladly! When Nell died, Gem naturally took her place in the care of her husband, making it her business to be sure his living van and clothes were clean and he ate three good meals a day.
Sam couldn’t deny that Gem had weathered well over the years, despite being the mother of two grown-up children and now approaching middle age at thirty-six. She still had a shapely figure and very good legs; apart from a few crows’ lines around her eyes she was still as pretty as she had been when he had first been introduced to her over twenty years ago, although it was now a mature prettiness. Like the men, today she had been up and working since the crack of dawn, cooking a hot meal for the fifteen labourers and twenty gaff lads helping to erect all the rides and safety test them in readiness for opening tonight. Then she’d cleaned their van, updated the business accounts and was now doing her bit manning the pay booth for the House of Fun. Even when the fair closed for the night she would not stop until her family had been fed their supper and everything was ready for when they rose the next morning.
Sheer stubbornness and an amount of still-harboured grudge that he couldn’t seem to let go of, for his son going against showmen tradition and marrying an outsider, prevented him from openly admitting it, but secretly Sam felt Solly had made the right choice in choosing Gem as his partner for life. The pair were perfectly suited and rubbed along very amicably together. They had given Sam two wonderful grandsons who now played their own part in keeping the business flourishing. When all was said and done, Gem must have loved his son very deeply, without any reserves whatsoever, to have given up the future she could have had for the tough one showmen lived.
As he was thinking of his two sons, a momentary wave of sadness washed over Sam. Memories of the three he had lost pushed their way to the surface. Him and Nell had had five sons altogether. Two had died of childhood illnesses then thirty-year-old Joshua had died serving his country in the war, blown to bits by a German Panther tank out in France in 1943. He left behind a wife and two young girls of six and eight, now both teenagers. Nita, sixteen, and eighteen-year-old Rosanna, along with their mother Francine, who they all called Fran. They earned their keep running whatever ride or stall they were assigned to at the time on Sam’s behalf. Solly had been out in France at the time of Joshua’s death, in the same unit in fact, but thankfully had come home safe and sound, the only scars mental ones from the horrors he had witnessed which had taken him a while to learn to bury but, with unwavering support from his family, he had been able to pick up his life again. Sonny had volunteered too. Just how he managed it was a mystery Sonny was keeping to himself as, despite him being a very fit and able-bodied young man at the time, he’d spent the entire war working in the stores at various army camps around Britain. Thankfully, like Solly, he had come home safe and sound.
Losing children, no matter how old, was a terrible happening that was never gotten over. Over time you just learned to live with it and Sam knew that despite the fact that Nell superficially appeared to put all three of her children’s deaths behind her and got on with caring for those living, she never got over their loss. As Sam would, she went t
o her grave grieving for them.
Just then his musings were interrupted by a tug on his jacket and he looked down to see a scruffy young boy of about nine looking enquiringly up at him.
‘Eh up, mister. You the fair boss?’
Hiding a smile, Sam took his pipe out of his mouth and answered in his usual polite but gruff manner, looking at him like he’d a cheek to be accosting such an important figure. ‘I certainly am. And what would you be wanting to speak to the boss about?’
‘A job. I wanna be a fair man.’
Being asked for work was a daily occurrence and it wasn’t the first time by someone so young who believed that running away to work for the fair was a good way of getting out of going to school. ‘You do, do yer.’ Sam looked the boy up and down, then said matter-of-factly, ‘Well come back when you’re fifteen and I’ll see what I can do.’
‘Fifteen!’ the boy exclaimed. ‘Why that’s… that’s…’ Not being able to do the calculation in his head whilst still realising that, regardless, it was many years he’d to wait to reach that age, he then lied, ‘I am fifteen, mister, just small for me age.’
Remembering a comical quip his mother used to make whenever she saw anyone who was on the short side, Sam put his pipe back into his mouth and sucked on it before he said dryly, ‘Your mother obviously didn’t put any horse manure in your shoes to help you grow when you were little, then.’
The boy gawped at him blankly for a moment before he shook his head, dismayed. ‘No, she didn’t. Is that what your mam did for you and why you’ve growed so tall?’
Again Sam hid a smile. ‘She certainly did but I wouldn’t recommend it as it doesn’t smell nice and you can forget having any friends. Best way to grow tall and strong is to eat all your greens. Now you go home, son, and do as I advise. When you’ve shot up another couple of foot or so, then come back and see me and I’ll see what I can do for yer. Now you’d best get back to your mam and dad before they notice you missing and raise the alarm.’
The boy nonchalantly shrugged. ‘Ain’t got no dad and me mam don’t care where I am. She’s gone down the pub with me new Uncle ’arry. When she went out she just told me to behave meself till she got back. She’s always telling me that she wished she’d never had me as I get in her way so I thought if I got a job she wouldn’t have the bother of me no more.’
Sam looked sadly at him. He wondered how many ‘uncles’ this poor lad had had over his short life and, more to the point, how they all actually treated him, which he didn’t expect was in much of a parental way considering how he gathered his own mother did from what the lad had told him. He didn’t look at all well fed and his clothes had seen much better days. Sam’s eyes darkened angrily. He himself might not have been the best of fathers compared to some, but he had done his best; loved, nurtured and encouraged all three of his surviving children and him or Nell always knew where they were, morning, noon and night, until they were both satisfied they were mature enough to take care of themselves. Some people didn’t deserve to have children and it was his opinion that this lad’s mother certainly didn’t.
He looked at him. ‘Had a go on any of the rides, boy?’
The lad shook his head as he took a longing look at the rides nearby before back down at his feet and shuffling uncomfortably on them. He muttered, ‘Nah. Ain’t got no money. I asked Mam if she would bring me but she said she can’t afford it.’
But she could afford to go to the pub, thought Sam. He shoved his hand in his trouser pocket and pulled out two half crowns, went to hand the boy one of them, then changed his mind and held out both, telling him, ‘Go and enjoy yourself and get a hot dog from the stall too, eh. Then get yourself off home as I don’t want you wandering about here without an adult with you when the big boys start rolling in after a visit to the pub.’
The boy looked in awe for a moment at the fortune being offered him, then quickly snatched it before his benefactor changed his mind. ‘Oh, ta, mister.’ Before he dashed off to follow Sam’s instructions he said, ‘Soon as I’m fifteen, I’ll be back.’
With that the he shot off and instantly disappeared amongst the crowds.
His pipe had gone out and as Sam relit it his thoughts were all on the young boy. He so wished he could have offered the dreadfully deprived youngster a home here at the fair. One of the families would have taken him in; fairfolk were generous people when it came to opening their arms to anyone in desperate need, especially someone like that young boy. The life they gave him in comparison to the one he had now might have lacked in certain quarters such as regular school attendance and easy access to medical aid when needed but, overall, it was a damned sight better than the one Sam suspected he was living now.
As he journeyed around, Sam was gratified to note that most of the stalls had people at them, playing the offered games of chance, accuracy of aim, physical strength or buying confectionary, cheap toys, bric-a-brac or fairground glass. All the attractions, amongst them the carousel – or gallopers as the fairfolk knew them – Hall of Mirrors, House of Fun, helter-skelter, waltzers, Wall of Death, the big wheel, boxing booth, sky chairs and several kiddies’ rides. The favourite with the punters at the moment, the dodgem cars, although not full to capacity as it was still early in the evening, were whizzin’ about, generating shrieking and laughing. Even Gypsy Velda Rose – although it was doubtful she actually was a gypsy and just where she did come from no one knew as Velda was very private person, extremely tight-lipped on her past history, but regardless her customers seemed very happy with her predictions – had a queue beginning to form at her red-and-yellow striped, dome-shaped tent with boards outside advertising her talents and announcing, whether actually true or not, that those from the royalty and stars of screen and stage were amongst her customers. Tonight looked set to be a profitable one, not just for him but for all the Grundy community. Sam hoped this was a good sign that the rest of the week here would be too, along with the rest of the season so that they would all be warm, well-fed and have enough funds to repair and re-decorate stalls, rides and living accommodation over the winter break.
Nearby, thirty-eight-year-old, tall, muscular, snake-hipped Sonny Grundy, his skin darkly tanned from his years of working out in the open, was lolling in a chair in the small room in the centre of the Sky Chairs, one foot up on the panel as he operated the controls and changed records on the record player that relayed music through the tannoy system blaring from the speakers outside. Getting a signal from one of the gaff lads that all the customers wanting to ride were strapped into their seats, Sonny pulled the lever for the ride to start. As the chairs started to slowly rotate then lift up, he reached behind his ear to retrieve a half-smoked roll-up which he lit with a battered old brass petrol lighter, a relic from his army days. The lighter had a deep dent in the middle which had happened after he was demobbed when he had accidentally dropped it onto a metal strut of a ride he was helping to erect at the time, squashing it against another. He would brag to women he wanted to impress, amongst other well-practised, persuasive charms that he used on them, that the lighter saved his life in the war as luckily it was in his breast pocket when a German sniper decided to take aim at him. It was a blatant lie as, during all his six years in the army, he never saw active duty; had managed to completely fool a gullible young, newly qualified doctor, and the powers-that-be after, that he suffered epileptic fits. Even he marvelled at how he’d gotten away with it for six years, but he had.
Combing long fingers through his thick thatch of black hair – no grey yet that he needed to disguise with hair dye – Sonny looked at his watch and his ruggedly handsome features twisted in frustration. It was only seven-thirty and he had thought it was at least an hour later than that. He couldn’t wait for closing time so he could make his escape and take advantage of the night life this town offered.
Sonny was far from content with his life and hadn’t been for an extremely long time. It hadn’t always been like that for him. Up until he was approaching his twe
ntieth birthday he had been a happy-go-lucky young man, content with a nomadic lifestyle that his ancestors had lived for hundreds of years, immensely proud of his family. He was especially proud of his father for his hard work in building on the legacy his own father had left him of two stalls, and transforming the business to what it was now. Sonny had willingly worked long, labour-intensive hours doing a diversity of work, from fixing machinery to operating the rides, doing his bit to keep the fair successful.
But his view of life and the future he then envisaged for himself had completely changed.
Even as a teenager, Sonny had always been aware of his good looks and, as his mother was always telling him, he had a charm about him of the sort that attracted the birds from the trees. He took advantage of it when he did have a fancy for the girl concerned, one willing to share their body with him. Regardless, he was in no rush to settle down despite an amount of envy for his two brothers having found themselves good women to share their lives with and enjoying all the comforts a good marriage brought. Deep down he wanted that for himself, so he was always on the lookout for that someone special.
Then, one evening, completely out of the blue, there she was. She was riding on the waltzers with her friends. The most beautiful creature he had ever seen with a very shapely figure; long colt-like legs, large breasts, cornflower-blue eyes and a mane of golden blonde hair that cascaded down her back. She had an invisible aura that drew Sonny to her like a magnet did metal. For him it was instant, unadulterated love. The world around him suddenly faded into oblivion and all he could see was her.