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

by Robert Hough

  It wouldn't work. Rajah just sort of lay on me, panting and shivering and looking around. When the orchestra struck up a minute later it sounded ten times louder than normal.

  Finally, it was over, nothing left but the national anthem and the after-show. Since it was obvious these people weren't about to part with another penny that left the national anthem alone. The orchestra struck up "0 Canada" and it happened: grumbling and yelling and every man, woman and child covering their ears and rushing for the exit. I even watched one woman with a baby trying to cover her ears and the baby's ears simultaneously, finally making do by pulling the sash off her white gown and wrapping it tight around the baby's head. Within two minutes every last one had vamoosed.

  This behaviour inspired a chill in the membership of the Al G. Barnes 4-Ring Wild Animal Circus. We started packing up as quick as we could, the workingmen taking the big top down so fast they were in danger of tearing it in two. Within an hour and a half the last wagon was rolling toward the parked train. Meanwhile, the entire population of Grand Forks, British Columbia, had formed a standing patrol on the far side of the tent, arms folded over bellies and faces locked in scowls. It looked like they wanted to assure themselves we were leaving as fast as was possible, and as far as we were concerned we were going to oblige. The workingmen started poling the wagons onto the flatbeds and ratcheting them into place. Meanwhile, our watchers' expressions never changed, for better or worse, and for a second I wondered if somehow the whole town was taking the same personality-flattening drugs I'd been given in the nervous hospital.

  As if that wasn't weird enough, after the whole train was packed up, not a twitch of hay or a crumb of animal feed left behind, we sat idling, as though we couldn't move without the protection offered by darkness. Rajah and I curled up on the bed and I calmed myself by pushing my face into his fur. We stayed this way for hours, Rajah drifting off and me too nervous to read or knit, so I lay there, smelling his fur and letting my hand comb the thick white hair between his front legs.

  Come evening there was a knock at the door. Immediately I figured it was a posse of rubes, out to get me for the tightness of my uniform and the fact I wore my hair in curls men found pleasing. For a second I told myself I wasn't going to answer. The knocking came again, and because this time it woke Rajah I decided I'd answer after all, figuring five hundred pounds of tiger goes a long way in calming disgruntled townies. I pushed my car door open and saw a great big whitecloaked Doukhobor standing under a hood. He looked like a small upholstered hill.

  A voice came from beneath the bedsheet that didn't at all sound like what I imagined a Doukhobor voice would sound like. Polite, it was, the diction precise and school taught.

  "I was wondering," it said, if I might have a word with you, madam."

  I swallowed.

  "About what?"

  "It's a ... it's a delicate matter. Do you mind if I step inside."

  "Yes, I do mind. You can state your business from right where you are. I've got an animal in here who doesn't particularly warm to strangers."

  He tilted his face upward, something that suprised me for he was clean-shaven and meaty around the jowls.

  "Please ..." he said, and it was his Barnes-like charm that made me involuntarily back away. He had to duck to get under the doorway, and when he was inside his cloaked head practically touched the ceiling. He had to have been six foot three, his body weight triple mine, with dark eyes and prominent lips and a fighter's jaw. He wasn't handsome, but at the same time had a way about him that just suggested importance. I studied his face, exploring the strange feeling I'd met him somewhere before. He pushed his cloak off his head, revealing thick black hair gone wavy with pomade.

  "My goodness. I was beginning to think we would never have the chance to meet. That Al G. Barnes. You have to to hand it to him. One wily customer. Of course, he is a circus owner."

  With that he bent over so he could take the hem of his robe in his hands, an effort that made him groan. He started pulling it over his head, revealing a crisp, beautifully tailored virgin wool suit underneath. It must've cost $500 if it cost a nickel.

  "There," he said, "that's better. Now perhaps we can talk."

  He dabbed his hair, even though it hadn't been mussed, and he evened his tie. When he reached inside his jacket pocket for a double corona I realized how I knew his face. My heart sped, and I felt a rush of heat to my cheeks and brow. In danger of fainting dead away, I took a series of deep, slow breaths to save myself the embarrassment. Meanwhile, he held the flame from a solid gold lighter to the tip of his cigar, the flame dancing and bobbing as he sucked. Within a minute my rail car filled with tobacco smoke so fine you could smell apple and sandalwood.

  John Ringling was pointing at Louis's old scroll desk and saying, "Tell me. Is that real Bohemian pine?"

  One half-hour later I walked the length of the idling train. This being a moment of high emotion, both good and bad, just the way I like it, pretty much everything about that walk made an impression. My feet were making sucking noises in the mud. I could smell elephant dung, dark earth and rain. When I looked up through the drizzle, the fields had a cottony greyness about them. I passed groups of workingmen sitting around playing cards on overturned crates, laughing and passing bottles and not minding the weather for it was better than being in their cars, crammed three to a berth. The sky felt low and thick, like a cozy.

  I made it to the front section of the train and stopped in front of the Holt car. There I waited for a few seconds to get my nerve up, Rajah yawning as if bored and wanting to get out of the mist. I knocked on the door, hoping Dan might peer out the window and see it was me and open up. It didn't happen, so I knocked again, louder this time, calling, "Jesus Christ, Al G., I know you're in there," and when this didn't work I went to the side of the car, underneath a window, and hissed, "Al G., you open the door. Goddammit I know what's going on...."

  The stillness lasted a few seconds more. Then the car door opened, both Rajah and me snapping our heads to the right, where Dan was standing underneath the awning with his worry face. I passed him into the car. He didn't say, How is you this evening, Miss Stark? or even hello, for that matter.

  Al G. was sitting at his desk, a mountain of train schedules and maps and circus paper in front of him; it surprised me to see him hunched over and fretting. He looked up and our eyes met. Leaning back in his chair, he linked his fingers over his stomach and, after looking sick for a few seconds, gave me a pained smile.

  "Found you, didn't he?"

  Rajah was pulling me toward a space of carpet next to the hearth so I let him go and he lay down beside a burning log.

  "He did."

  This made Al G. laugh in the way people laugh when something isn't at all funny. Dan was standing beside me, while Leonora Speeks was sitting on the antique sofa filing her nails. We all just looked at him, worried by the giddiness of his reaction.

  "Let me guess," Al G. said between howls. "He ... he used a costume didn't he?"

  I nodded.

  "Ha! I knew it. You've got to respect a guy who'll go to those kind of lengths to get what he wants. He's been trailing us since Portland, you know."

  "I sort of figured that."

  "I'm sure you did, Kentucky. I'm sure you did. Of course, there was no way I was going to win. A whole circus cannot outrun one man with his own locomotive. With his own railroad, for Christ's sake. Am I right, Dan?"

  "You right, governor."

  "It's putting up the fight that's the fun of it. That's the whole point of it. Remember when he wanted those Peruvian flyers from Cole Brothers a few years ago? The whole circus bribed their way into Mexico. Thirty rail cars worth of circus, and they wandered around Chihuahua and Sonora for a month, four hundred people stuck with Montezuma's revenge and the workingmen all drunk on mescal. They didn't win either but I bet it was worth it. Or the Robbins Brothers. Have you heard this story, Kentucky? They paid a local sheriff to lock up their star wire walker, and then
they spread a rumour he'd been kidnapped by Bolsheviks. The point is they did it, am I right, Dan?"

  "You right, governor."

  "Tell me, Dan. How long did I say it would take John Ringling to catch up with Kentucky?"

  "You said three days."

  "And how long have we been making ourselves scarce?"

  "Five days."

  "So we did all right, didn't we, Dan?"

  "We did, governor."

  "I think maybe Ringling's getting a little old and fat for this game. It's slowing him down. Let me guess, Kentucky. He offered you twenty tigers? Each one Bengal and cage bred and as handsome as Rajah? Plus twice what you're earning here? No. Let me guess. Three times? Plus your own tent on the lot. A tent with fresh flowers every day, like Lillian Leitzel has. Is that the deal, Kentucky? Is it?"

  Was then I noticed something I wouldn't've thought was possible. Al G.'s blue eyes and high cheekbones and thin straight nose somehow weren't adding up to handsome, and it occurred to me he hadn't slept for some time. Frustration and fatigue had ganged up on his features and it'd made them plain. He must've realized it, though, for it didn't last long. Was like he willed it into oblivion, a half-second later becoming the same Al G. who in just over a decade turned a dog-and-pony into one of the biggest circuses in America-as big as Cole Brothers or John Robinson or Hagenbeck-Wallace, all of which had been around since the last century.

  "Ah hell, Kentucky, I'm just a little sore. You can't blame me. I should be happy I'm producing acts John Ringling wants to pirate-it's a sign of progress. No. Really. I'm glad your time's come. No one deserves it more than you. Are you leaving immediately?"

  "I'll join them at winter quarters."

  "So you've got time with us yet."

  "Yes."

  "Well, then. Let's toast your success. We'll have some Calvados, imported from France. What do you say?"

  "Sure Al G."

  With that, Dan got up and retrieved a decanter of greenish liquid from the sideboard, along with four snifters. For the next while, we all sat sipping a warm alcoholic beverage that tasted like heaven, Al G. telling Dan and Leonora stories about how we met. Like a true gentlemen, he left out the embarrassing and compromising parts-like my being a mental institution runaway and a bigamist and a cooch dancer. Come to think of it, there was a whole lot he had to leave out, enough he had to pretty much start making it up: in his rendition I was a talented young dancer with clout instead of a girl earned her living by dropping her harem top in a Superba tent. Seems he'd wooed me with promises of riches and stardom and fancy dressing rooms before I'd even considered joining his woeful little operation.

  When Dan offered me another snifter I accepted, and with each warm sip what'd just happened sank in a little further. Leonora and Dan each had a second helping as well, Leonora growing flirtatious and tipsy and even Dan beginning to smile a bit. Just when I thought Al G. might offer us another, he slapped his palms against the writing pad on his desk and used the momentum to carry him to his feet. He stood, hands on his hips, beaming.

  "Well. No point staying here, wasting coal. If we turn around now we might even make those Chicago shows."

  The next thing you know old Dan was walking up and down the car line ringing the big copper bell that was used to signal the cookhouse was open or it was fifteen minutes to showtime or the train was leaving the station and if you were fixing on coming along now was the time to get on.

  What's more, there was a happiness in the way he was ringing it.

  So we got out of Canada and we got out quick. Burnt an entire ton of lump fuel charging through the northern states. Al G. didn't explain his lunacy of the past five days to anyone else, but he did apologize by stopping the train in North Dakota and having a huge barbecue with steaks and beer. A band of Indians formed a curious lineup a little way off, some of whom were recruited to play whooping parts on the Wild West. While we were stopped Al G. sat next to me and kept my plate filled with potato salad. I reckoned it was to prove there were no hard feelings.

  Of course, a bunch of the workingmen ran off, took up with squaws or got themselves killed in bar fights for all I know, so we had to stop in Bismarck so Dan could go recruiting in the hostels and clap wards. Stopped again in the middle of Minnesota to water the animals, and we all gillied into a local town where Swedish meatballs were on the menu. Then we chugged straight on through Wisconsin and made it to Oak Park, Illinois, for two days' worth of shows come the tail end of May.

  After the first matinee I leashed up Rajah and tickled his ears and said, "You and me and Al G. have something important to talk about. Something regarding you, my baby. Let's go see if we can catch him in." We walked through the lot at the same time the rubes were coming out of the after-show, so Rajah and I attracted a crowd of people trying to get close enough to have a look but not so close they were in danger of getting bitten. Rajah just licked his lips, like he was looking at breakfast, something that made them all laugh. They followed us past the freak banners to Al G.'s tent by the main entrance.

  Dan was there when Rajah and I came in, so as politely as possible I told him Al G. and I had some personal business to attend to. This news doured his expression-suddenly it looked like pea soup brought to a simmer-and he looked over at Al G.

  Al G. nodded it was okay and Dan left.

  "Well, Kentucky," he said. "Caught your finale today."

  "You did?"

  "I did, just for old times' sake. No wonder the Ringlings want you so bad. Scares me every time I see it and I've seen it a hundred times if I've seen it once. Don't you worry Rajah will go rogue one of these days?"

  "Rajah? Doesn't know the meaning of rogue."

  "Let's just hope he keeps it that way. I'd hate to see you torn up before you go off to fame and fortune."

  "Actually, that's what I wanted to talk to you about. Mr. Ringling wants to buy Rajah. He says he'll give you more than he's worth."

  This set Al G. to thinking, though whether it was real thinking or Al G. pretending his plan was spur of the moment I couldn't be sure. He was pursing his lips and making a church steeple out of his fingers and pointing the taller ones into his forehead. He looked up and said: "It's Sunday, Kentucky. No show tonight. Why don't you and I go for dinner? We've known each other for almost ten years now and we've never once had dinner together. We'll paint the town red. Spend some cash. What do you say?"

  Here I looked down at Rajah; my intention had been to spend the evening with him, as he'd been a little unsettled by the hysteria of the past week and had taken to getting into my underwear drawer and ripping what he found to shreds. At the same time, I couldn't bring him into town and there was no way I was going to miss this meeting with Al G. After I'd accepted the offer, Rajah and I went back to the car. While I dolled myself up I explained to him I had to go out, but to make it up to him I'd have one of the butchers bring by a hip bone. Hearing this, Rajah arfed and turned less mopey.

  A half-hour later I inspected myself in the mirror. This was something I rarely did, for looking at myself without getting a clenched feeling in the pit of the stomach was a talent I'd never really developed. Far as I could tell, I had everything right. A drop-waist dress, tight at the top and bottom, with a belt that made my waist look like it was the same thing as my hips. A Japanese parasol made from oiled paper, and why women needed this for evening jaunts I didn't question, my having long accepted fashion as something intended not to make sense. Buckled evening slippers with what they called lavatory heels. (Again, you tell me.) Velvet evening gloves. A chapeau that fitted the head like an elasticized salad bowl, my only opportunity for showing off my best feature being to pomade two tight little curls so they stuck out from the hat edge and curled around my ears. To top it all off, a fox stole with a clamp sewed into its mouth, so that even in death it could prevent slippage by chomping on its own tail.

  Still, there was no denying the bloom was off the rose. The first problem was my arms and legs, which weren't as bad as they a
re today but were still a mess of scars; though the trend was to wear sleeves rolled to the elbows, I had to keep mine tight to the wrists, something that made me look a little grannyish. Likewise with dress hems, which were drifting up toward the knees, though for obvious reasons not on yours truly. And though I had a few minor nicks and scars on my face that could be disguised with foundation, that damn rip to my eye had done something permanent to the muscles in the eyelid. Truth was, it hung a tiny bit lower than its partner, the upshot being if you thought about my face for more than a few seconds you realized it was a little bit cock-eyed. Seeing this, I squeezed my eyes shut and took deep inhalations; there'd been people in Hopkinsville who'd looked this way, and by this I mean just not quite right in the face. Least I had tigers to blame.

  I walked away from the mirror and knelt in front of where Rajah was lying. I cupped that face in my hands, whiskers tickling what little of my wrists were exposed. Two emeralds looked up as I said, "Look what you're doing to me, you naughty tiger. You're going to put men off me...." He grinned and licked his nose and generally practised being an imp and a tiger simultaneous.