Down the Road to Gundagai

by Jackie French

  She didn’t look faint, although her voice wobbled authentically. The constable ushered her out.

  Blue blinked hard to force away her own faintness. Sweat trickled down her face and her legs. She looked down and saw a small rose of blood soaking the fabric at her knee. For the first time that day nausea rose. She pressed her knees together and hoped no one would notice.

  How did you ride an elephant? She didn’t think she could even walk back to the caravan, much less ride through town. But at least the police were leaving, walking far too slowly out of the tent, still casting suspicious glances at each shadow.

  Ebenezer bent down to her. ‘You all right, love?’

  ‘My scar. It’s bleeding. I think … I feel a bit …’

  ‘Here.’ He pulled a flask from his pocket. ‘Take a swig of that.’

  ‘More herbs?’

  ‘Whisky. Well, they called it whisky. But it’ll dull the pain.’ He spoke with the assurance of a man who was used to pain, and how to dull it. ‘Don’t you worry about riding Sheba. The old girl is quiet as a lamb. We’ll heave you up on her, and give you a rope to hold. You sit side-saddle, smooth as if you’re resting in an armchair. Just wave and smile, especially if you see a copper.’ He patted her hand. ‘Best way to hide something is in plain sight, that’s what Madame keeps tellin’ us.’

  ‘Is she really your aunt?’

  ‘She is now. Yours too.’

  ‘Great-aunt,’ said Blue slowly. ‘If I’m your niece or nephew, and she’s your aunt.’

  ‘She’s great all right.’ There was curious emotion in the man’s voice.

  ‘She saved my life,’ said Blue, still halfway between belief and incredulity.

  ‘She saved my life too. Saved all of us,’ said Ebenezer.

  He was gone before she could ask him how.

  Half an hour later she sat on a red cloth with gold tassels on top of an elephant, holding a gold braided rope, waving to the women who peered from the general store, the blokes outside the post office, the children calling excitedly as they peered over the school fence. Even the weary bagmen carrying their swags lifted their tattered hats to her.

  Smile, she thought, smile! She forced back the pain and nausea.

  The red cloth was worn and stained. But Sheba trod as gently as Ebenezer had promised. The faces on the footpath glowed with wonder as they passed, at the elephant, the men in dinner jackets and top hats, the trombone and the placard, and the blonde harem dancer, waving down at them.

  For a while, at least — till her wig and greasepaint were removed — she was the most beautiful girl in all their town.

  Chapter 11

  The police car had gone when Sheba slowly plodded back to the circle of caravans. Blue grabbed the rope to steady herself as the elephant sat on her hind legs then slowly lowered her front half down.

  She had to get off. But her muscles wouldn’t move. The world felt cold suddenly, and dark at the edges.

  ‘Better grab her, Fred.’

  ‘Come on, princess.’ Arms reached up to her. She let herself slide into them. Someone carried her up the stairs of the caravan, into the heat inside.

  ‘I’ll see to her.’ It was Mrs Olsen’s voice. Strong hands lifted off the wig, stripped off the harem pants and then slid off the camisole.

  Blue shut her eyes with the pain. ‘I’m sorry. There’s a stain on the pants …’

  ‘Not to worry.’ The words were gentle. Not Aunt Lilac’s gentle, which seemed to be reining back an inner anger, but the statement of a simple truth. She was not to worry …

  ‘Blood comes out easy enough in cold water. Just don’t you eat peanuts in that costume. Peanut oil leaves a stain for good.’ The hands propped her up, slipped the nightdress down to her waist, then offered her more of Madame’s medicine. She sipped and felt a little of the nausea and shakiness ease. Mrs Olsen lowered her to the feather pillow. ‘Shut your eyes now.’

  A damp cloth wiped the stains from her legs. Another dabbed them dry. She felt the coolness of some sort of cream on the broken edge of scar tissue. Now the cloth dabbed at her face, soothing as well as cleaning off the make-up. She heard the caravan door close, voices outside, something about carrots, and peeling potatoes, and squished flies.

  Squished flies? She must have misheard.

  Once again she dropped over the cliff into sleep, sudden and deep despite the heat. The caravan windows were bright when she woke, but it was the gleam of electricity, not sunlight, the thud of the generator making the whole caravan vibrate.

  The performance in the Big Top had begun. She could tell what was happening by the sounds outside now, the thud of Sheba’s feet, the mutter of Gertrude’s voice, the softer tones of Mrs Olsen, the shout of Ebenezer as the ringmaster.

  She could even hear the crowd’s gasps from here as Glorious Gloria thrilled them, then Tiny Titania enchanted them; she heard their laughter as Boffo the clown interrupted the ‘Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy’, and the heavy plod of Sheba’s feet as she came back. Did Blue just imagine the big animal was glad to get back to the peace between the caravans?

  The harem dancers’ music floated from just outside the performers’ entrance. She hoped they hadn’t expected her to dance tonight. She would have forced her body to do it, but was glad not to have had to try.

  The dance music ended. The dancers must be outside again now. For a moment someone spoke in a language Blue didn’t understand. She sat up, and peered through the window. A shadow stroked the big beast’s trunk, while Sheba crunched what must have been a carrot. She thought it was Madame’s shape and Madame’s voice, but could not be sure.

  Blue lay back again.

  ‘Peanuts or lollies?’

  Blue smiled. That was Ephraim, the ticket-seller who played the trombone and was also Boffo the clown. The crowd noise had broken into individual voices again now, chattering and laughing.

  The sounds faded again. A whip cracked once, twice, three times. Intermission must be over.

  ‘And now, ladies and gentlemen, the Magnifico Family Circus gives you the one and only, the most astounding: the Boldini Brothers!’

  The audience became one again. Screams and then cheers. Blue wished she could go out and look. But she’d need more make-up to cover her scars, and something other than a nightdress to wear.

  She had also learned enough, even in the past twenty-four hours, to realise that she might get in the way. Even Boffo’s act demanded perfect timing. If she accidentally interrupted Gertrude’s concentration as she made her extraordinary flight across the tent, it might be deadly.

  How many years had it taken to be able to soar from one swing to another? How much practice did it take to be so precise that mother and daughter could grab each other’s wrists as one flew through the air? How much courage must it take, night after night, to know that any slip was almost certain death?

  And could a girl with scarred legs ever learn to …?

  Stop it, she told herself. You can’t even stay on your feet for a whole day. Ridiculous to think of flying on the trapeze.

  And yet …

  The music changed. More laughter — Boffo must have another act. Then Ebenezer’s voice offering ‘the Amazing Alonzo, magician extraordinaire’. Blue wondered who the Amazing Alonzo might be. Fred or Ephraim?

  At last a soft voice said, ‘Come on, Sheba girl.’ Sheba plodded past her caravan again as the needle scratched its way through yet another record.

  The trombone blared. The audience gasped and cheered, and laughed at whatever the next act must be. And then applause, over and over and over, and a burst of noise that meant the whole performance was over at last, then the crowd was bumping its way out of the Big Top, over to the carts and automobiles and bicycles, the young men arm in arm with their girls, the mothers holding their children’s hands.

  She could almost see her own family out there, her tall father, with his ginger hair, holding the little boy in his arms, the girl with one hand tucked under her father’s
elbow, the other in her mother’s fingers, happy and laughing at the show they’d seen.

  ‘I wish you could be here,’ she whispered. ‘Just once, I wish we’d seen the circus, all together.’

  An automobile hooted. A boy yelled. Then, surprisingly quickly, there was silence, except for the gentle chomping of the elephant.

  ‘Hey, Belle? You awake?’ Ginger’s head appeared at the door. He was the small boy again, not Tiny Titania or the hunchback. ‘Madame said youse got to take your medicine again, then come have supper. We’re over there.’ He nodded to a newly made fire in the circle of the caravans. The circus family sat around it, on bales of hay, while Sheba munched slowly behind them. Mrs Olsen stirred a large black pot suspended from an iron trivet over the flames.

  Blue tried to control a shiver. ‘Isn’t Sheba frightened of the fire?’

  ‘Her? Course not.’ Ginger sounded insulted. ‘Can’t have dinner without Sheba. Come on. It’s mutton goulash tonight, not rabbit. It’s good.’

  He vanished.

  What was goo-lash? It sounded disgusting. Blue shoved her shoes on, rather than the gold slippers, then glanced down at her nightdress. She found again the thin knitted cotton shawl she’d used that morning — only that morning?! — and tied it around her waist. At least the nightdress was cool and, anyway, the camp was shadowed, the generator off. Only the fire and a single lamp gave light now.

  She stepped awkwardly down into the darkness, then found she could walk slightly more easily than she had done before. The dance must have ripped her scar, allowing her a half inch more freedom.

  It was sore, but a long way from real pain. The night’s coolness stroked her skin. Something smelled good, of meat and strangely of aniseed balls too. How long was it since she’d been really hungry? She forced herself towards the fire. It’s safe, she told herself. Even if the flames spread to the caravans, we’ll be outside. We can run, escape.

  Fred stood up as she approached. He wore neither beard and tattoos or harem pants now, just worn moleskin trousers and a blue shirt, his blond hair combed back with hair oil. ‘Good to see you, princess. That sleep’s given you roses in your cheeks again.’

  Gertrude snorted. ‘No, it hasn’t.’

  ‘Sit down, Belle.’ Ebenezer moved to make room for her on a bale of hay. ‘Feel up to a plate of tucker?’

  ‘Please,’ said Blue. She sat down next to him.

  ‘Goulash and dumplings,’ said Madame, as Mrs Olsen scooped out a plate of food, then picked up a vast frying pan filled with small lumps of dough and held it over the flames. ‘It is my grandmother’s recipe. It is good.’ The accent was slightly stronger as she spoke of goulash.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Mutton stew,’ said Gertrude.

  ‘With paprika,’ said Madame reprovingly, as Ginger passed Blue a tin plate, heaped with shadowed meat and gravy and what looked like lumps of vegetables, and a tin spoon. ‘Lots of paprika. The best that Melbourne can provide. And garlic from an Italian farmer four camps ago.’

  ‘Lemon rind from the tree we passed last night,’ added Mrs Olsen, stirring the pot again. ‘And potatoes and lots of that wild fern stuff that grows along the railway line. What’s its name again, Madame?’

  ‘It is fennel. You must smell it before you pick it, in case it is hemlock. If you eat hemlock, you die fast.’

  Blue halted the spoon halfway to her mouth. Madame smiled, as if she knew exactly what Blue was thinking. ‘Your dinner is safe to eat. If it was hemlock, we all would be dead by now. Goulash is made from what you have. Nettle tops, sometimes, carrots or celery, tomatoes in autumn, or when we go north.’

  ‘Always hard to get enough fresh vegetables,’ said Mrs Olsen. ‘We need to put up a sign at the gate maybe. Wanted: carrots and celery. Sometimes I think I’d give my eye teeth for a box of onions.’

  Madame nodded. ‘Or sour cream. Goulash is best with sour cream. But the farmers give their cream that turns sour to their pigs before it is at its best. How is your stomach?’

  Blue flushed. One didn’t talk about one’s stomach in public. ‘It’s fine.’ It was true. Both the cramps and the nausea had vanished.

  ‘That is good. Now eat.’

  Blue ate. It was strange to eat meat that tasted of black jellybeans and aniseed balls. It was delicious, after the first shock of new flavours, but a little was enough.

  ‘If you don’t want your bones, I’ll have ’em,’ said Ginger. Blue passed him the plate and spoon. He picked up the bones in his fingers and began to gnaw them.

  She had never seen anyone eat bones with their fingers before, nor adults eat anything but soup or pudding with spoons. But then nor had she ever eaten seated on a bale of hay, with an elephant slowly chewing beside her.

  ‘Try a biscuit,’ said Mrs Olsen. She picked one off the dented frying pan, cooling on a bale of hay, and held it out to Blue. One does not pass food with one’s fingers, came Aunt Lilac’s voice. One picks it up with a fork and spoon, or silver tongs …

  Blue shoved the voice into the part of her mind labelled ‘Ignore’ and took the biscuit. It was a circle of dough, flat on top and bottom, with a dark sweet filling leaking from one edge. She nibbled. The pastry was rich and sweet and scented with something familiar she couldn’t quite identify. ‘What is in it?’

  ‘Squished flies.’ Fred’s voice was innocent.

  ‘What?!’

  He laughed. ‘Settle down, princess. Just looks like squished flies, that’s all.’

  ‘Stop teasing the girl,’ said Mrs Olsen. ‘The filling is currants and jam. Raspberry jam this week. Sometimes it’s dates instead of currants, or sultanas. Crystallised ginger at Christmas. Whatever we can get. It’s an old recipe. A friend gave it to me years ago. You fry them instead of bake them. Useful on the road.’

  ‘They’re good.’ She was about to try another nibble when something soft and firm touched her hand. She dropped the biscuit in surprise. Sheba’s trunk delicately picked it up from the trampled grass, and inserted it neatly in her vast mouth. The elephant chewed with obvious pleasure. Sheba, it seemed, like squished flies too.

  Madame eyed Blue critically. ‘Another week, perhaps two, I think, and your hunger will come back. Your strength too. So, the question now is, what to do with you?’

  It was as though a cold wave had erupted from the shadows. ‘But … but I thought I was going to stay with you.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Madame impatiently, as though that had never been in doubt. ‘But to be with the circus you must work, firstly because if you do not someone will notice. A girl who does nothing, they will say. Is she a runaway? Is she a tart? A boy who does nothing, he must be a thief. Always people from the circus are suspected.’

  Blue nodded, thinking of the sergeant.

  ‘Also it is good to work. To work at what you love, with those you love, that is the heart of life. It withers the soul to sit and let others work to keep you. But also you must work to earn your keep. Once …’ Madame waved her hands as though gesturing at the past. ‘We were rich, rich enough for the bracelets to be rubies, not red glass. But that was when my darling Monsieur was alive, before the fire at Gundagai, long before this beast they call the Depression ate away our lives. These are not good days. We are lucky to make enough for the petrol. A dozen eggs and a loaf of bread will let you see the circus now, and Mrs Olsen mends our costumes till they are more darn than silk. So, you must work. But as what?’

  ‘Put her in the House of Horrors,’ said Gertrude.

  Silence fell. Even Sheba seemed to look at the older girl reproachfully.

  ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that,’ she said.

  Yes, you did, thought Blue. Strangely the suggestion didn’t hurt. For she had been a monster when she’d looked in the mirror, back in the aunts’ musty rooms. But today, for a while, she had been beautiful, with the blue sky as her roof.

  Gertrude poked the fire. ‘It isn’t fair! Me and Mum have the only real talent in this show.’
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  ‘And me,’ said Ginger.

  Gertrude gave her first real smile. She ruffled his hair. ‘All right, and you, brat. But we don’t even get any wages.’

  Madame shone her sightless eyes through the dimness. ‘We share what we have. You’d like a star on your caravan perhaps? A sign that says The Glorious Gloria?’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Gertrude, leave it.’ Mrs Olsen’s voice was quiet. It was even almost afraid.

  ‘Why should I? If we’re supposed to be sharing things, then why don’t I have a say in who joins us? We could’ve taken on that juggler in Bendigo. Why take on a crippled girl?’

  ‘I have my reasons.’ Madame could have been Queen Victoria now, a thinner one with a hawk nose. ‘I always have my reasons, and they are good ones.’

  ‘You’re jealous ’cause Belle’s prettier than you.’ Fred reached for another squished fly. ‘Or she’s gunna be, when she gets some meat on her bones.’

  For a second Blue wondered who he was talking about. Then she realised that Belle was her. Beautiful.

  Gertrude glared across the flames. ‘I am not! And she isn’t! She never will be either!’

  ‘Enfants! Behave!’ Madame’s voice was a lash. ‘Gertrude, you are beautiful. Belle, you are also beautiful. Both are different beauties, and both are useful.’

  ‘She can take my place in the dance,’ said Fred. ‘Me muscles are getting too big to be a girl’s.’

  Gertrude’s glare had razor edges. ‘All Fred does is the dance and lie around as the bearded lady. I do more work than anyone in the whole show.’

  ‘An’ you’re asleep while I’m taking down the Big Top —’ Fred began.

  ‘Silence! Fred, you will keep dancing for now. In the new year, I promise we will replace you. Belle, you will take Gertrude’s place in the dance. She is right. She must be fresh for the trapeze. If I could, I would put the trapeze on first. But the audience must wait for it. Belle, you said you used to ride a horse, but we do not have a horse, and it takes years to learn the tricks with one. Do you do anything else that might be useful?’