The Final Confession of Mabel Stark: A Novel (An Evergreen book)

by Robert Hough

  That afternoon I took Rajah for a walk along Pacific Avenue. Every five minutes or so kids would come running up to see what unusual breed of hairless dog I had, stop within ten feet and get scared and run off, a rejection poor Rajah sensed. He'd start arfing, and I'd get on one knee and hug him and say, "You pay those kids no never mind. You'll get your hair back, trust me, and heads'll start turning." To this, he'd start panting and his ears would come forward, a signal he could live with that promise for the time being.

  Every morning I'd give him an egg bath, something he didn't enjoy but seemed to tolerate, for I told him over and over how it'd help grow his fur back. I gave him sulphur for his blood, lime water for his stomach and cod liver oil so if his coat did come in again it'd come in thick and glossy and worthy of stares. On Sundays he got milk instead of meat, which is good for a cat as it gives the digestive tract a rest. I washed his eyes out with sugar of lead whenever I could get him to hold still, a treatment that makes the whites of their eyes as white as clouds, and whenever I put Rajah back in his cage I gave him a little treat, like pig knuckles or the soft end of a rib, so he'd start associating his bars with things pleasant, something we all have to do when you stop to think about it. With these ministrations Rajah's coat started coming back, oddly enough, in places where humans have hair: the top of his head, under his arms, in a soft tuft covering his loins. For a while he looked like a cross between a tiger and a clipped French poodle.

  Here. Let me show you some photos. I took them on Al G.'s old tripod, which tended to let light in and turn things a wash of grainy grey; for this reason they look a lot more melancholy than the moments they were meant to capture. Truth was, they were some of the happiest moments I've known, though I don't think I realized it at the time because I was pent up with aspirations and kept thinking life would really be good once Rajah made me famous. (The problem with ambition? If you let it it'll act like the blinkers on a horse.)

  Notice how in all of them it's twilight, the sun either on its way up or on its way down, for with Rajah getting to be the size he was, I took him to the beach only at times when there weren't many townies around. This one I like. Rajah, just coming out of the ocean, shaking water off his new fur. The way the sun's catching all those droplets and the way those lit-up droplets are framing my tiger, Rajah looking like there's no such thing as problems or worries. Eyes sparkling, and though you can't see it here, they're the green of emeralds. His incisors white as ivory. And his whiskers ... you know if you look close at the black of a tiger's whisker, it turns out it isn't black at all, but a swirl of violet and deep blue and kelp green.

  Or this one: if the beach was deserted, which it often was given the time of the year and the time of the day, I'd let Rajah off his leash and let him charge at the seagulls. Lord, how he loved that, leaping and jumping and pawing at those birds, which is why he's airborne here, back paws all the way off the sand, body twisted and a paw reaching as high as a tiger paw can go. Or this one: looks like he's fixing on doing a back flip, for he'd jumped just as the bird passed overhead and kept on tracking it till his back was arched as a hairband. To me, it's a photo of determination, something me and tigers have in common.

  Or this one. Just an empty beach scene, right? Look harder. Much harder. See that dot, disappearing into the sun's belly? Isn't a dot. It's Rajah, and what happened was I'd taken him off his leash and we were both standing on the beach when he did what tigers do in place of smiling. By this I mean he got himself a look of clear understanding: the ears perk and the eyes pierce and they radiate a purity only tigers have. Then he took off. Just started running at hunting speed, not at all bothered I was yelling at him to stop. This left me thinking, Oh great, there goes fame and fortune, worse he'll probably head into town and kill a child and they'll blame me and throw me in a place where the criminal minded never see the light of ' day. Was such a dour moment I could do nothing but sigh and duck inside the camera bellows, if only to record the moment for posterity. Rajah kept on running. It felt to me like he wanted to find out the meaning of forever, a question bothers animals as well as humans. Finally, and I mean finally, the speck stopped and stayed the same size for the longest time, an orange blip in a blurry gold distance. Then it looked like it was a little bigger, and then for sure it was getting bigger, and then Rajah came back panting and happy and wanting to roll around in the sand.

  I figured I'd better start training him.

  Now. The way you pick animals for tricks is you look for natural behaviours. You get a tiger with good balance, you make him your ball roller. You get a tiger likes waving his paws up in your face, you put him in your sit-up chorus. You get a cat that's heavy and graceless, last thing you do is send him jumping through a burning hoop. With Rajah, the natural inclination was toward bodily contact, for he liked nothing more than jumping on me and lying on me and letting me lie on him, all the while batting at me with leathery paw undersides. So I started encouraging this. Then I started teaching him to do it on signal, something no more difficult than giving him meat every time he began frisking me if I'd whistled first.

  So. February 15, 1917, and the Santa Monica opener is three weeks away. America's official entry into the great war is six weeks away. A smiling and proud Mabel Stark finds a groomer and asks him to tell Al G. to meet her by the training arena in the cathouse. With Red's help, I shifted cages and let Rajah into the arena. After Rajah'd been up on his pedestal for a few minutes I heard feet against floorboards. I looked up, and there was Al G., looking handsome and slightly portly, as he'd been eating a lot of steaks and potatoes fried in butter and ice cream sundaes of late, it being his belief a man larger than life had to literally be larger than life. (Course, it was a belief he'd gleaned from guess which famous circus owner?) Naturally, he was with Dan, who'd recently started wearing three-piece suits himself, though of a slightly inferior quality to the ones worn by Al G. Miss Speeks wore a bright red dress, loose at the bosom and tight at the caboose, all in all a dress engineered to be fetching to men and an embarrassment to women. Seems we were all in costume that day, for around this time I'd started wearing a tight black leather bodysuit. And despite what you might see in old circus paper, in which a hundred different adjectives were used to suggest I had a way of riling men-enchanting was a favourite, as were tempting and seductive-my suits weren't in any way an attempt to outdo Miss Specks in the sexpot department. For me, it was simply a matter of safety, the leather offering protection against claws and the tightness offering nothing to take hold of. My shoulders were padded, shoulders being a favourite grabbing spot for tigers, and I wore a thick black leather hat I'd patterned after the one my second husband wore whenever he drove that Model T of his.

  (And what of Louis Roth? What of the ex-Hungarian military officer turned head catman of the twelve-hundred-animal Al G. Barnes circus? A man who knew how hard I'd been working and who hadn't helped me one iota despite it being his job to govern all cat acts? A man I'd married in the capital of the potato state and who'd been annoying me with his thumbness ever since? Where was he on the day I first showed people the most famous cat act in the history of the American circus? Well, he wasn't there, is all I can tell you.)

  I got myself into the cage. Walked to the middle of it. Stood looking at Al G. and his entourage, all three of them slack-jawed with curiosity. I whistled. Rajah lunged off his pedestal, charged me, and without my so much as turning to defend myself I let him leap up and get me by the shoulders and push me down and start rooting in the space separating a woman's shoulder and jaw. Already he weighed almost three hundred pounds, for despite his runty start Rajah was going to be big for a Bengal, maybe even over five hundred, and with his size he easily rolled me around on the floor with those big paws. Meanwhile, Miss Speeks shrieked and Dan started yelling, "Oh my God, governor, he's killing her!"

  To show them he wasn't I got an arm up and around Rajah's throat and I held him and rolled him over and got on top, and was then I felt those hind legs slip up
to my belly. The disembowelling reaction was what it was, so I got my mouth right close to his ear and said, "No no no, Rajah," in that soothing tone he loved so much. When his hind legs drifted back down I replaced them with my left hand and started scratching his pleasure spot, such that he started arfing and hugging and licking my face with his barbed wet tongue.

  At this point I heard Al G. laugh, for it was then he realized the whole thing was an act and I'd never really been in danger, or leastways not in any danger I couldn't control. Hearing this, I wrestled a few seconds more before pushing myself away and hollering, "SEAT!" Rajah went to his pedestal, looking dejected, and while I exited the arena Red got him out with pieces of horse.

  I looked over at Al G. He and Dan were smiling more broadly than I'd ever seen. Miss Speeks looked at me like what I'd just done was slatternly and disgraceful, which I suppose was appropriate seeing as that was pretty much what I thought about everything she did. I was covered with a layer of sweat, and my face was sticky with cat gob.

  "Will you mix him with the others?" Al G. asked in a voice more a laugh than a question.

  "Oh yeah," I answered, "get him sitting up there, King and Queen and Pasha and Duchess doing all the tricks, until the audience figures Rajah's there to warm the seat and nothing but. Then I'll turn my back and whistle."

  "You know what this means?"

  "Not sure I do, Al G."

  "It means you've broken the first wrestling tiger act in history," to which I said, "Oh, right, that," which was a joke Al G. thought so funny he came over and kissed me and hugged me, something I enjoyed mostly because it made Leonora Speeks's face fold in on itself like an origami horse. Pulling away, Barnes stopped at my ear and whispered, "A wrestling act, Kentucky. I'll be very pleased...."

  Which was code for: do this, and you'll get more kitties.

  Next day, I decided to acquaint Rajah with the other cats. After shifting cages I took the pedestals out of the steel arena, leaving it completely empty, something I figured would encourage mingling. As soon as King stepped inside, I knew I'd made a mistake, for I could see Rajah start to quake and pant while King did slow, quarrying circles around the younger tiger. I was already calling for King to tunnel when he stepped up and growled and hit Rajah on the shoulder, a blow not intended to injure but to leave no question who was boss. Still, it was hard enough poor Rajah got knocked to the cage floor, and when he tried to get back up he was so panicked his hind legs couldn't get a grip on the tanbark, so they kept spinning and slipping as he tried to make it to the side of the cage. There he whimpered and peed and looked for me through the bars. King was already through the tunnel door.

  I stepped inside the ring and went over and soothed Rajah by explaining this was just the way King was, that he'd warm up to him and before he knew it Rajah would be enjoying the company of his own kind. Rajah kept shivering, though this subsided when I put my arm around his neck and hugged him and rubbed his belly spot. After I did this for more than ten minutes Rajah seemed to calm down, a calm I made the mistake of trusting.

  I stood and had Red hand me a pedestal, which I lugged to the centre of the ring. Rajah immediately went over to it and climbed aboard and started grooming. After a minute or so, I decided he was tractable enough to practise a little wrestling, just so the day wouldn't be a total waste. I turned my back and whistled and a second later felt those paws hit my padded shoulders hard and knock me over. Now there's playful knocking a person down and there's let's-make-something-clear knocking a person down and this was clearly the worse of the two. My knees and palms stung and I had trouble gaining my breath. I had the full weight of a tiger on top of me, and while I normally liked this sensation, Rajah chose not to support any of his weight on his legs and forepaws, giving me his full tiger bulk to deal with. It felt like I was drowning in fur and muscle. He bellowed in my ear, and then I felt his jaws take hold of my right shoulder. And while he didn't bite down nearly as hard as he was able-lie could've taken my shoulder clear out if he'd wanted-it was enough I knew I was being held down, something makes the question for what purpose? grow large and loud in the mind.

  Now, I want to make something perfectly clear. Rajah could've killed me if he'd had half a mind to, was nothing Red or I could've done, and though what he did was bad remember in a tiger's mind he was being gentle as he possibly could while still getting his grievance across. What he did was: take a big rubbery paw and stick it in my face. It felt leathery, like the padding on a boxing glove, though coarse with pebbles. The worst of it was I couldn't breathe, for he was holding me hard enough his paw had closed around my nose and mouth, so I panicked. I flailed my arms and legs, none of which made much impression against the weight and strength of a tiger.

  Figuring he'd made his point, Rajah pulled his paw away, and to this day the fact his thumbnail got caught in my left eyelid I put down to accident. Course, I wasn't thinking that then. I was thinking more about the sensation of that big hardened orange nail dragging along the surface of my eye, something that hurts more than you can imagine, the eye being about as sensitive a part of the body as there is. I thought Rajah had torn it plumb out, something a tiger'll sometimes do to disable its quarry. Worse, it was an impression confirmed by all that adrenalin pumping through my body, adrenalin being a substance that makes the mind race and bend and play tricks on itself. In other words: I swore I felt my eyeball pop loose and roll down my cheek and settle in tanbark, and it was this belief that made everything spin and a second later go dark.

  I woke up in our rail car. Louis was above me, and when I peered at him through my right eye he smiled weakly, though his face looked wavy and dreamlike. There were silver clamps closing the tear in my left eyelid, and I knew they must've coated the wound with an anaesthetic, for I couldn't feel any pain (and believe me, it hurt like a raging son of a bitch later on). It wasn't bandaged, the worry being infection, so I just lay there seeping over my cheekbones, feeling foggy headed and strange, Louis periodically wiping one of his disinfected cloths over my slitted eye.

  "Mabel," he finally said, "I sink you must give up on zis wrestling tiger business. It is foolhardy."

  Here I shook my head, causing Louis to withdraw his hand for a second.

  "I shouldn't've put Rajah and King together without pedestals. I was hurrying things, and not thinking of the cats. Was my fault, not Rajah's."

  Louis laughed, and I caught a whiff of Tennessee's finest, though with my head acting up the way it was, I wasn't sure whether I was imagining it.

  "Is funny. All trainers say zat. You know, I vas there when Marguerite Haupt vas killed. A mean old cat did it. Far vorse than King. Put him down afterwards. Vas no one's fault but his. Anyway, Marguerite is lying zer and you can imagine vat iss coming out of her, and vis only a minute or so to live she says to me, "It vas my fault, Louis. I should not haff vorked ze tiger in ziss heat. Vas too hot for ze tiger, Louis."

  "You trying to scare me?"

  "Yes."

  "Guess you know it won't work."

  "Yes." He chuckled. "I am avare of ziss."

  Louis didn't say anything more for a long time. Neither did I, choosing to concentrate on the nice feeling of warm water dripping off the cloth onto my face. After a few more minutes, he decided the worst of the seepage was gone, so he removed the silver clamps and let me sleep a good long time. I slept and awoke feeling fine. Louis had another look at the wound and was so satisfied he replaced the cotton and secured the new cotton with tape. When he was finished, I thanked him, though I suppose I did it a little too formally for he started thinking about the problems we'd been having of late.

  "It has been a while since you and I ver as man and wife."

  "Yes, I know. I'm sorry, Louis."

  "I haf been missing you," he said, and because I'm a woman and that's a state of affairs that comes with duties, I suddenly felt sorry for him. I invited him into my arms and kissed him. After a minute or two of this, he moved down and unbuttoned my blouse and started givin
g me tender little kisses, though I wasn't enjoying the sensation at all for the ceiling was all colourful and bendy and I couldn't figure out what was wrong with me.

  "What did you give me, Louis?"

  He lifted his lips from my chest and said, "Give you?"

  "For the pain. You gave me something for the pain."

  "Oh, yes. Vas some morphine is all. For zee eye. You vill discover nothing hurts more than an eye scratch."

  My heart started pounding. Luckily, Louis didn't notice my galloping pulse, as he'd moved farther south, and I didn't say anything if only because I didn't want to do any explaining. Instead I took a few breaths and told myself I was going to get through this, no matter what it took, for Louis had been deprived of late and he was a man and I was determined to make it up to him. When I heard him lower his jodhpurs and extract himself, a switch got thrown, and here I'm talking about the one that takes unpleasantness and instantly upgrades it to nightmare. One second you're hanging on, the next you're trying your damndest not to scream at the horror of it. See, I was seeing those damn tin soldiers, watery and grinning, red jacketed and on the prowl, taunting me, and the memories they brought back made me start to cry and shake and peep, "Please, Louis, please ..."

  He rolled off and hitched his pants and stood above me while I lay on that bed weeping and nude and not caring. My hands were over my eyes, though I took a second to peek with my good eye through slitted fingers, just long enough to see the worry and confusion on his face.

  "Oh" was the only thing he said, though it could've been air coming out instead of an actual word. Crawling in bed beside me he said, "Zer are sings I do not know about you, Mabel Roth. Maybe one day you will tell me, hmmmmmm?" and was then he put the full weight of a jacketed arm over my chest, a bit of bodily contact I both needed and couldn't, in any way, stand.