The Clown Chronicles (Stories From The Bayou)

by Lon Frank

  “Blackbear? It’s Chuck. We need to talk. No, no, nothing like that. We... I may just have a little problem, that’s all.”

  * * *

  Inside the studios of KRAP television, ‘The Bayou Country News Leader’, the news-desk set was bustling. A middle-aged man sat behind the desk, wearing a pink make-up bib over a camelhair suit coat of soft charcoal gray. His chair was reclined and he crossed his legs, revealing that the rest of his wardrobe consisted solely of an oversized pair of boxer shorts with a print pattern of little blue microphones and the phrase, ‘Please speak into the mic’. A pair of orange rubber shower thongs completed his working attire as a talking head on the televised news show.

  Another man, very much larger in girth, was dressed in what may have been the world’s largest pair of black leather motorcycle pants, heavy-soled black leather boots, and a huge sweat-stained Tweety Bird t-shirt. His full-faced beard and somewhat untidy, jet black hair hid all of his pie-shaped face but for a slightly misshapen nose and wide-set, but clear and sparkling, blue eyes.

  The Hell’s Angel from Disneyland sat on a low stool behind the newsman and worked delicately with a small pink rattail comb, expertly blending in the edges of the other’s expensive and only slightly noticeable toupee.

  A production assistant walked up briskly and laid six sheets of paper, only the first of which was actually printed, in the center of the desk.

  “Here’s your script. Ten seconds, Chat, okay?”

  The make-up artist gave a last gentle pat to the toupee, returned the chair to upright posture and cast a trained and critical eye on his creation. He quickly removed the plastic bib and long, delicate fingers removed a stray hair from the anchor’s slightly padded left shoulder. He retrieved his make-up tray from the floor and stepped away from the raised stage area with surprisingly athletic grace.

  “Go get ‘em, tiger.”

  The newsman gently cleared his throat and nodded his appreciation. Good make-up people were worth their weight in gold, even if it was somewhere north of three hundred pounds. The lights came up as the production guy held up three fingers, then two, then one, then pointed to the newsman.

  “Good morning. I’m Chat Barkley, and we are live, here in the studios of KRAP television, the bayou country news leader. Continuing our coverage of the disappearance of LaFeet the Clown, we have this breaking news update.

  “We have reports that the body part discovered yesterday by investigators at the bayou meadow where LaFeet was last seen has been positively identified as belonging to the world-renowned and universally-loved old showman. According to a report issued by the FBI forensic laboratories in Washington, the recovered item was a... was a...”

  He scrutinized the script for a moment, looking briefly at the second page, even though he knew it, as well as the remaining pages, were each blank. He smiled weakly at the camera.

  “There seems to be some...”

  He lifted the papers slightly and addressed someone off-stage to his left.

  “Is this... yes... it... it is?”

  Regaining his composure somewhat, he again addressed the camera,

  “Yes, it, again, it has been reported by the FBI forensic laboratory that the, the item recovered is a, a red rubber nose, slightly faded, size large-tall. It has been positively identified as part of old LaFeet’s clown wardrobe, as well as, if this reporter may be allowed to observe, his very persona.

  “This is indeed sad and shocking news, and weighs heavily upon the hopes and hearts of each of us today.

  “Please stay tuned as KRAP, the bayou country news leader, brings you continuing updates on this tragedy of national, even international, impact. Scheduled later today, we will have exclusive, live coverage of a press conference by the investigative team of the prestigious Circus Society of America.”

  * * *

  It was the most people who were ever packed into Sheryl’s café. More even, than when the two busloads of escorted tourists were trapped by an unusually high and persistent spring tide, and relented to the shelter of the eatery, where they absorbed a little local color as well as Sheryl’s entire stock of early-season shrimp.

  In preparation for the press conference, chairs had been placed in short rows for the more important of the federal agency representatives, but people still stood three-deep along the back wall. Big Bubba Babineaux was standing behind the serving counter alongside the front door, accompanied by Junie Lejeaune, whom he thoughtfully charged with the all-important task of making a permanent written record of the proceedings.

  Dr. Leska rose and tapped the yellow Formica top of the single table left in the room. Lights from four handheld television cameras came on as the crowd fell silent.

  “On behalf of the Circus Society of America, and indeed, on behalf of the worldwide community of admirers of LaFeet the Clown, I would like to thank you for coming this morning. Before we take your questions, I feel it expedient to announce that our purpose here this morning is to present our investigative findings of the last two days, to state our conclusions, and to announce the withdrawal of our team from what will surely be an ongoing project for the various police agencies involved.”

  This caused a ripple of murmurs to momentarily sweep through the crowd, and several people who stood in the rear corners of the room took advantage of the disruption to earnestly whisper into cell phones. Dr. Leska raised her voice slightly as she picked up the top copy from a stack of bound reports on the front edge of the table.

  “Please, please, if I may continue... thank you.

  “I realize that this news may seem a little premature, but perhaps an explanation of our status here will clarify our position at this time. When the CSA was first asked to assist, we realized that any attempt at deductive investigation would be redundant in light of the agencies already involved. Therefore, the directors decided to assemble and dispatch a special team to participate on the basis of inductive investigation. That is to say, in layman’s terms, we were sent here not to necessarily determine what happened, but rather to rule out various scenarios of possibility.

  “You see, our team is comprised of experts in a variety of disciplines, each connected to what may have been a solution to the enigma before us. We have each independently and systematically explored our separate target hypotheses, and have found no supporting evidence to support any of our intentionally postulate conclusions. My area of expertise is the surreptitious deployment of chemtrails by the federal government...”

  Rather than whispers, this brought only a wave of confused and questioning glances, as several pairs of eyes sought out the special agent in charge, seated among the other law enforcement officials, who sat unblinking and devoid of emotion as though he were a finalist at the World Championship of Poker at the Bayou Grande Casino and Resort.

  “Andy, on the other hand is a specialist on the activities of the international gold cartel. His involvement was deemed necessary since the directors of the institute were privy to the heretofore undisclosed fact that LaFeet had purchased the remnant properties of the circus, and made payment in a single and significant shipment of gold bullion.”

  Gold. That single word suddenly wiped the image of the old clown’s face from the minds and imagination of every person in the room, as the preprogrammed synapses of their brains instantaneously brought up images of buried treasure. Always the observant lawman, Big Bubba Babineaux scanned the faces of the crowd and immediately realized the fate which awaited the bayou meadow. Within the week, ‘authentic’ maps bearing cryptic clues to the location of the old clown’s treasure would be discovered among the old attic clutter in abandoned low country manor houses, and the local Western Auto, bearing only slightly inflated prices, would sell out of shovels and digging spades.

  Even the next revelation by Leska only gave slight pause to those already mentally burrowing like industrious nightcrawlers through the living soil under the ancient oak trees and beyond the little stone fence.

  “Another membe
r of our team, Chris, is an expert in the field of animal psychology and behavior modification. She has enjoyed a long career as a trainer of large performing animals, including the feline specimens of the Bayou Brothers’ Circus. She has been included because the CSA was made aware of rumors over the past months that LaFeet may have set free some of the circus animals left in his care. Indeed, it was discovered that at this time, no animals remain at the storage area maintained by LaFeet, and it can only be assumed that they are now at large in the vicinity of the bayou meadow. However, as I mentioned before, no evidence was found to indicate that LaFeet was a victim of what I’m sure was his own sincere, if ill-advised, compassion.

  “We might, by way of departure, advise the local constabulary that a general advisory to the local populace may be in order. The animals evidently set free by LaFeet included the large species of African and Asian cats, as well as a small performing troupe of the Ursidae family ...bears.”

  Junie Lejeaune was strangely energized, perhaps by the importance of her official function as she recorded the proceedings for archival in the Office of Protection and Safety. Then, perhaps her excitement came from the glances of obvious admiration by her friends in recognition of her official position, or just possibly by her unaccustomed public proximity to the commanding presence of the sheriff.

  During the entire press announcement, her eyes were intently focused on the lined, yellow legal pad, on which she was furiously taking notes, the last few inches of which read:

  “Released—LaFeet’s compassion—victim-not.—large cats, African— (lions?) and (tigers?) and…bears.”

  She suddenly felt a warm shiver start just below her navel and end in the trembling tips of her fingers, snapping both her concentration and her pencil lead. She lifted her face and allowed herself to look, for the first time, into the depths of the sheriff’s eyes. A large calloused hand imperceptibly moved to gently cover hers. And she felt herself beginning to slip into the beckoning dark irises, as though she were a wandering shade of the bayou mists, returning to rest in the depths of the dark and leaf-stained waters. Her lips blushed with their own biological recognition as she breathlessly whispered the capitulation of her heart,

  “Oh, my.”

  * * *

  The make-up artist had been working double shifts since this whole thing started. But that morning, he asked for a few days off, due to a ‘sudden death in the family’. The station manager begrudgingly approved his request, although he had already made the decision to call off the news coverage of the missing clown. He held an understanding in the very marrow of his bones as to what was newsworthy and what was not. The announcement that old LaFeet had neither been crop-sprayed like some kind of imported pest nor tortured and hacked to kibble by some sun-glassed and oily-haired European gold cartel hit man, nor even provided a quietly romantic dinner for a family of lions by the light of the bayou moon, unerringly signaled the beginning of the end for this particular drama.

  A drama that had, after all, held America’s attention for three days already, which was exactly two-and-a-half days longer than average. That, coupled with the morning’s API wire announcement that Hillary and Monica had gotten into a full-blown, hair-pulling, spitting-and-scratching, rolling-and-screaming bitch fight on the lawn of the Tavern on the Green, settled the fact that the story of the old clown was probably as dead as the geezer himself.

  So, on that particularly brilliant and unseasonably warm morning, first light found the make-up man loading matching black, ballistic-nylon carry-on bags into an equally black four-wheel-drive Suburban. The no-nonsense vehicle’s windows were so darkly tinted that they appeared as metal rather than glass. He moved with an effortless illusion of floating that hinted at a lifetime of physical strength and discipline. Like some gargantuan ballerina, he pirouetted and disappeared into the open driver’s door. He was dressed in dove gray sweatpants, and stenciled across the billboard-sized posterior was the black lettering, ‘Property of cell block 9’. His richly patterned Hawaiian shirt of pink and yellow hibiscus blossoms was slightly open to reveal an unrelenting black mat of body hair, which began an inch below his Adam’s apple and spilled over the tops of his shoulders to end only at the bare, pink expanse of his palms. The cuffs of his sweatpants ended three inches above his pair of size-14 EE sandals, handmade by the wearer from a discarded Uniroyal Eagle. He turned the ignition key, listened to the muted growl of the tooled engine and carefully drove off into the glare of the rising sun.

  * * *

  Jackson Square was already filling with snowbird tourists posing for the cadre of sidewalk portraitists and inadvertently covering their bodices with powdered sugar from the beignets from Café Du Monde’s open-air dining room. Parking spaces were scarcer than virgins in the French Quarter of old New Orleans, which is to say, given the Bohemian propensity of its denizens, that for most visitors, parking was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Finally, the black suburban pulled into a parking spot just vacated by a new Eldorado bearing New Jersey plates and very recently relieved of the burden of its hub caps.

  Half a block away, a tiny hole-in-the-wall establishment displayed a slightly askew and peeling sign, proclaiming to passersby that this was indeed the world famous and original Betty Ford’s Blues and Bikers Bar. As the hairy mastodon-man stepped silently into the darkened interior, his massive bulk filled the door like some gloriously psychedelic hibiscus sunset. He allowed a second for his eyes to adjust in the smoky darkness. Two strides brought him to the bar, where he addressed a chartreuse pinstriped silk shirt, haphazardly draped across the scrawny back of the elderly barkeep.

  “I’m lookin’ for someone.”

  “Yeah, well ain’t we all.” The bartender’s voice was as anemic as his frame. A massive hand gently came to rest on one silk-slippery shoulder, and gained the old server’s immediate and undivided attention.

  “My friend’s name is Bob.”

  “Bob. Bob? You wouldn’t mean Bobbie Blue Socks, would ya’?”

  “Yeah, I reckon that would be him, alright.”

  The barman slowly lifted a long and skeletal forefinger and pointed in the direction of a figure sitting slumped and gently snoring at the far end of the grimy bar.

  “Yeah. I do reckon that would be him alright.”

  The gentle dexterity of such large hands was truly amazing as they carefully lifted the sleeper’s head, cradling it as if it were a prize-winning Pomeranian, to which it bore an unfortunate resemblance in the perpetual dusk of the bar.

  “C’mon, little buddy. We got a job to do.”

  “Eeezz, snarf, whosit? Whaa?”

  Bobbie’s eyes were as blue-veined as his namesake apparel, and blinked rapidly in shock and surprise, as he realized that this was not just another Bourbon-Street-soaked nightmare unfolding in his head.

  “You! ...Is it really you ...Blackbear?”

  * * *

  The darkness of a late-rising, waning moon provided cover as the black suburban slid noiselessly around to the rear entrance of the Center for Peace and Light, Inc. The two occupants, one slightly staggering and the other who seemed to silently levitate over the antique brick walkway, approached the locked steel door. A muted buzzer sounded, signaling the accessibility of the entryway, as well as establishing evidence of discreetly hidden night-vision security cameras.

  Blackbear swung the heavy door open on its tamperproof hinges and held it while his companion blinked still-sensitive eyes into the brightly lit interior. A short hallway led to an arched opening revealing a cavernous auditorium. Mahogany pews padded in soft, dusty-rose velvet marched in acoustically regimented rows over an expanse of sky-blue berber carpet. Above the elevated dais, a magnificent and brilliantly backlit stained glass creation depicted a scantily robed and incredibly beautiful Acadian maiden. She rose from the misty surface of the bayou into the waiting arms of angels, just beyond a sunlit opening in purple and roiling masses of storm clouds.

  Blackbear gave a low whistle and Bob took
the cue.

  “Yow, momma! I’d fish her outta the bayou, too! Any ol’ day.”

  Directly adjacent to the archway, a pair of massive, seven-foot-high Gothic doors, which previously guarded the entrance of a chateau in southern France, suddenly opened. A slightly portly gentleman bearing the tanned maturity of a once cherubic face strode toward them and grinned with genuine pleasure.

  “Blackbear, old friend! Bob! Welcome to my little chapel on the bayou.”

  Blackbear engulfed the other’s hand in his and they pushed and pulled like two lumberjacks with an imaginary saw.

  “Yeah, it ain’t much, Chuck, but I bet it beats sleepin’ in the back of your car, don’t it?”

  The televangelist retrieved his hand from the crushing grip of his large friend and then turned to Bob with a faux Cajun accent.

  “An’, Bob-BIE, ma sha! How it be wid chu, Cuz?”

  The slighter-built man took both of the preacher’s hands in his slightly trembling ones and gently lied, “It be gettin’ better, Cuz, gettin’ better ever’ day.”

  “Well, come in and sit a spell. I am afraid our reunion is not on happy circumstance.”

  The two visitors settled into comfortable sea-foam armchairs, while Chuck rested lightly on the corner of his massive hand-carved desk, previously the property of a minister in the employ of Henry II.

  Blackbear broke the slightly awkward silence.

  “Well, what’s up, Ringmaster, somebody dead ...or pregnant?”

  A chuckle started in Bob’s throat, but seeing the others’ stern looks, he quickly swallowed it.

  “No, no. Nothing like that, big fella. It seems that I just caught a slight case of blackmail, is all.”

  Bobbie Blue Socks was now fully awake and coming rapidly up to speed.

  “Blackmail! For what? By who?”