For this reason I took my place beside Boss and gave the appearance of being entirely content, asking him whether he had given any further thought to my role, as he called it. He looked nonplussed for a moment, no doubt taken aback by the change in my mood, then collected himself and told me he had, indeed he had, and it would be no ordinary role. It would be a vital role, an indispensable role, because it required me to help Natty with her work in the ring, as she passed the Rider whatever equipment he needed.
In the same enthusiastic way, Boss then announced that as soon as our meal was finished the whole troupe of us would take it upon ourselves to spread the news that we were performing at sunset. I thought this was fair enough, and for the rest of the morning I walked through the streets squawking about the Rider and Clown and the Spectacle, then returned to my room at noon and decided the best use of my time was to go back to sleep. I had started my day with an effort of will, to forget my jealousy. It pleased me to think I could end it by proving this had become a habit.
The next thing I knew, Natty was knocking on my door saying the rest of our party had already left for Cat’s Field, and she had stayed behind to walk with me. This was so unexpected I thought it must be a lie; more probably, she had fallen asleep as well, and only now woken. But I was so pleased to see her I did no more than thank her and say we should hurry, and with that we set off as though there had never been any difficulties between us, none at all.
Once we had left what I must call the center of town—which is to say: after we had walked two hundred yards from the hotel, and found ourselves in a much more uneven street, among a large crowd of townsfolk now all drifting in the same direction as ourselves—Mr. Vale caught up with us. Although still very talkative once away from his desk, his purpose this time was not to give another history lesson but to ask some questions.
“You know what is expected of you?” he began.
“Oh yes,” Natty said, apparently determined to be as casual with him as she was with me.
“And you, Mister Jim?” Mr. Vale was walking sideways, blinking under his eye-shade.
“I hope so,” I said, and then, because I thought he was only trying to be friendly, I continued more affably: “We’ve got the least to do so we have the least to worry about. It’s really the Rider who carries most of the burden, as you know.”
This was all said very easily, to remind Natty how much I had done to govern my feelings, and show I had forgiven her.
Mr. Vale quizzed on regardless. “And Boss?” he said. “Is he word perfect?”
“More than anyone,” I said.
“I suppose he must be.”
“The Entertainment is his existence,” added Natty.
“I suppose so,” Mr. Vale said again, and stared through the jostling heads to where our road ended in the field. The torches were already lit, but did not yet seem to burn very brightly, because the last oranges and yellows of the sunset still flared on the scrubland beyond them. I closed my eyes for a moment and breathed its sweet smell of sage. I was almost myself again; I was almost happy.
Natty was more distracted. “What are you saying?” she continued with Mr. Vale. “What do you mean, you suppose so?”
“Nothing,” he said, with a startled little flinch. “Nothing at all.”
“Surely you’d expect nothing less of Boss?”
“Quite so, quite so.”
“What, then?”
I was so struck by Natty’s tone I almost interrupted and told her to leave him be. But then Mr. Vale twisted round and faced us directly.
“It is just…” he said.
“It’s just what?” Natty came to a halt, ignoring the crowd that pressed around us.
“I have heard stories,” Mr. Vale said.
“What stories?” Natty said.
“Our town is not so large,” he said. “Not so large yet, at any rate. It cannot keep a secret.”
Mr. Vale smiled, but not with any good humor; previously I had thought his wincing only proved his shyness. Now I was not so sure, and my happiness started to shrink away.
“What are you trying to say?” I asked him. “If you have something to tell us, tell us straight out. We won’t mind.”
“I fear you may,” he replied. “It is concerning you, after all. Both of you. But especially you, Mister Jim. Especially…” He stretched toward the satchel, which I had forgotten to tuck inside my tunic and so hung around my neck in full view; although his fingers did not connect with my skin, I felt a quick sensation of moisture, as if I had been splashed by a raindrop.
“How do you know what’s here?” I asked. “You haven’t seen it.”
“No, but I have guessed,” he replied. “It was easy to guess, knowing what I know.”
“Which is?” said Natty, now very impatient.
“They have been asking about you,” Mr. Vale said again.
“Who?” Natty and I said together, although both of us knew the answer already.
“An Indian man. Two Indian men, in fact.”
“Can you describe them?” I asked.
“I have not seen them.”
“But others have?”
“So I believe.”
“And what did they tell you?” Although I tried to speak calmly, so as not to scare Mr. Vale into making any more evasions, he winced as though I had slapped him.
“My informant is a serving man,” he said, suddenly speaking fast. “In a hotel at the opposite end of town. He saw them arrive—a strong-looking man and another, younger. Both Indian and one of them painted all over, face and arms and legs. A wild pair, my informant says, and when another guest in the hotel tried to shoo them away, wilder still. They pushed this gentleman to the ground and stood over him with a knife. They asked if he knew you, and said they would find you, wherever you were, because you had taken something that belongs to them. They would have killed him, if they had not been restrained. Though only restrained for a moment, I should say. They shook everyone off and disappeared.”
“Disappeared where?” I asked.
“I have no idea.” Mr. Vale swallowed. “They asked for you again before they went, Mister Jim. Not by name, but they asked—did anyone know, had anyone seen, was there any news…That. News of that.” He reached toward my satchel again, but still did not touch it.
“And what were they told?” I said, holding my nerve.
“Nothing,” he protested. “My acquaintance had not seen you, and I had not mentioned you. Why would I do that? I run a respectable house. I do not discuss my guests with anyone.”
“But you mentioned others in our party?” As Natty said this she laid a hand on Mr. Vale’s shoulder, which made him shrink down between us.
“Others in your party have been mentioned,” he murmured. “It is understandable, is it not? They are unusual. You are all unusual.”
“We’re not blaming you, Mr. Vale,” I said. We’re trying to know what you know, that’s all. So we can decide what to do.”
I said this while staring over his head at Natty, silently asking for her advice.
“We can’t leave,” she said, taking my cue.
“You mean we can’t leave at all?” I said. “Or we can’t leave now?”
“Now. This evening. They need us here. We can’t just abandon them.”
“Why not? It’s our lives.”
“We can’t.”
“It’s our decision.”
“We can’t.”
I glanced down and saw her fingers had tightened on Mr. Vale’s shoulder; as her knuckles whitened he wriggled free. Was she slipping away from me again, turning back to the Rider? Was everything I had been thinking, all the reassurance I had given myself—was it just foolishness?
“Shall we walk on?” Mr. Vale asked. He was suddenly much more composed, as if he had begun to enjoy our discomfort and not feel frightened by it.
“We are still deciding,” I told him, then looked at Natty again. I knew what she would say next, and tried to head her
off.
“There’ll still be enough tricks if we’re not there,” I told her. “They don’t need us. They managed before they met us and they’ll manage again.”
“But not the best trick,” she said. “Not the trick with the arrows.”
“No one will miss what they’ve never seen before.”
Natty shook her head; she was also more like herself again, more settled and determined. “Don’t you feel we owe a debt to Boss?” she said. “He took us in, after all.”
“We chose to join him,” I reminded her, then paused because I was about to speak his name. “And anyway—what if Black Cloud comes to the show and sees us? What if they both do?”
“They can’t hurt us there,” said Natty. “We’re among friends and they’ll defend us.”
“But we’ve seen how dangerous he is.”
“It’s two men,” she came back. “Two against the whole lot of us. And the crowd.”
“The crowd won’t care,” I said. “And anyway, have you forgotten what those two are like? They’re cold-blooded murderers, Natty. They’re savages.”
Natty shook her head. She could not forget the Rider; she would not leave him now.
I turned away from her then; I did not want to hear her stubbornness any more, or her excitement. I looked instead at the strangers still trooping past us, the families herding together, and the children running ahead, then back. One of them, a little fellow half my age who was missing a front tooth, broke off his conversation with a friend and asked me: was I all right? Did I need any help?
I told him no, and thanked him, and turned back to Natty. “Very well,” I said heavily. “But this is your decision, not mine.”
Natty sighed. “Sometimes, Jim,” she muttered, folding her arms.
“Sometimes what?” I said.
“Nothing.”
“You know I only want to keep you safe.”
“I understand that.”
“What, then?”
“If you don’t know now, you’ll never know.” Natty seemed about to speak some more, then changed her mind and marched away to the end of the street, where the lights of Cat’s Field simplified her into a silhouette. Here I caught up with her and was about to continue asking her what she meant when Mr. Vale arrived.
“Off you go now,” he said, rubbing his hands together. “You have nothing to fear. I shall be your eyes. Your ears and eyes both.”
I did not answer, dismayed to think my life might depend on someone so fickle and insinuating. Instead, I grabbed Natty by the hand and half-dragged, half-raced her to the edge of the field.
“There you are, my dears, there you are!” Boss shouted as we came into the light, and his racket ended our talk. “We have been looking for you everywhere, thinking every conceivable sort of thing must have befallen you. Stage fright, perhaps. Or spirited away! But no, here you are safe and sound. Safe and sound. Beguiling the time, I dare say, following the trails of whim and fancy! But with us now as promised—our latest recruits!”
When this outburst ended he flung out his arms and embraced us both, squeezing my face so hard against his red coat I felt the buttons scrape my skin. If there had been a moment to think properly, I should have said we were sorry, and warned him about Black Cloud, but Boss rattled on as soon as he released us, and I knew I would never divert him now. He was on the brink of his triumph; he was unstoppable.
“Here!” he boomed, like a cannon firing. “Here you will both be a part of our celebration. A great and glorious part. A part of our creation of civilization, I should say. Our creation of the finest Entertainment in America. Perhaps of the only Entertainment in America!”
This last word—“America!”—turned into a bellow that brought a loud cheer from the crowd. “First in America!” Boss shouted again, in case anyone had missed it. “Finest in America!” And when he felt sure that everyone had indeed heard, and agreed, he gave a deep bow and apologized for whisking us away, but business called, business called, and a moment later we were off through the crowd and across the circle of lights and among the rest of our friends again, with the Wee Man lounging against the tailgate of his wagon. Was everything ready? Boss wanted to know without drawing breath. Was everything perfect?
Natty and I left him to his questions, and still not speaking to one another we faded into the shadows on the farther side of the wagon, where we found the Rider standing by himself, already wearing the headdress he had used during his rehearsal. He had wiped all the charcoal off his body, and was decorated with two white streaks on his cheekbones.
“You are here,” he said.
“Ready and willing,” said Natty, and gave a little smile; she had forgotten her anger the moment she saw him.
“And late,” he told her, which was more peremptory than I expected.
Had he already heard something about Black Cloud; was that why he spoke so sharply? I chose not to ask. As Natty put on her headdress, which was a single white feather standing up from the headband, and he stood close to her to straighten it, I looked away into the distance to watch the sun sink at last—a final blaze of gold and purple. Then the Rider stepped back from Natty and we faced the crowd together.
Eyes and ears, I remembered Mr. Vale saying, eyes and ears—and decided I should use my own very carefully now, in case he failed us. But it was hard, because Natty and the Rider loomed so large in my mind, dragging my thoughts where I did not want them to go. And hard because of the crowd. The children scrambling at the front. The men and women jostling behind them. Here was an ancient pioneer with a scar on his forehead and sunken cheeks. And here was a priest with a brown cassock and a face as dark as an olive. And here was a pretty lady with corn-colored hair, and a husband who never took his arm from her shoulder. And here was a Negro still wearing the striped apron from work. And here was Mr. Vale as good as his word, twisting and snooping. And here was…
The Rider snapped his fingers in front of my face. “Look,” he told me, and I saw Boss taking long strides toward the center of the ring, with the Spectacle bobbing along beside him; a tremendous burst of applause and cheering broke over them both.
I thought I must check the crowd once more, just a glance to be safe.
Which is how I came to see—not a face.
A flurry.
A crease in the air, and gone.
It might only have been a child fidgeting.
I turned back to the ring. Boss was handing the Spectacle up the steps of her platform, where she arranged herself at the center of light so her dress sparkled like star-beams and her head gleamed like a miniature planet.
The audience applauded more loudly than ever, and as its roar subsided Boss seized on the chance to regale them, shouting above their hubbub, introducing himself and the rest of us, explaining how we would entertain them, and how they would want to reward us when he was done, oh yes, reward us most generously.
I hardly listened to a word of it.
Was he here already, Black Cloud? Would he strike at us now in the open?
Boss finished his welcome and Clown stumbled toward him trailing his whip. The audience foamed over again. His yellow costume! His red nose! His staggering and sliding! The whip tingling his ears!
I scanned the faces again but always nothing.
Not there.
Natty sighed; I was worrying too much. The Rider was more interested, leaning toward me; I smelled the horse-sweat on his skin. What had I seen exactly? And where?
Surely I had been wrong again, wrong about Natty and him. The Rider was a friend to both of us, nothing more.
But Clown had staggered offstage and there was no time for that. Now it was our turn, our show, and Boss was waving us forward. The brightness! My body turned almost to liquid. Every footstep, every smile, every frown felt so enormous it could surely be seen from the moon.
“Come on!” Natty managed more easily, and was already arranging the hoops, the bow, and the quiver she had filled with arrows, while the Rider took h
is pony to the edge of the ring and began to walk slowly forward, then to trot, then to gallop, with the feathers of his headdress fluttering out behind him.
“You see,” said Natty, marveling under her breath. “No need to be so careful, Jim, no need at all. We’re perfectly safe here. Safe as houses.”
CHAPTER 22
Our Mistake
Natty passed me the wooden hoops and I set off around the ring to place them on the ground as I had seen her do. It was easy work but it distracted me, and so did the crowd—the children shrieking and laughing, their parents suddenly like children themselves, and loudest of all a drunken old cowboy whose face was pitted with smallpox scars. All he wanted to know was: why was Natty so dark? Was she an Indian—she looked a bit Negro? And what was the Rider up to? Why was he galloping round like that? And what kind of Entertainment was it really, just watching an Indian ride about in circles?
I should have let it pass but looked up and told him in my smartest English voice to watch his tongue, just to surprise him, then cut back to Natty again as the Rider swooped toward us, collected the spear she gave him and settled it in his right hand. Our performance began.
The Rider was circling much faster now and crouched forward like a cavalryman, using the point of his spear to hook the rings from the ground, then flick them to Natty again. It was done in a moment and even the fool cowboy was impressed, saying how clever this Rider was, how nimble, and that was one good thing about Indians, their way with horses. Then it was time for the next trick, and Natty had passed the Rider his bow and the arrows, with the crowd roaring him on. Then roaring again when Natty lifted the target to cover her face, then again when the Rider galloped faster still, and the tail of his headdress swam out behind him, and he took the reins of the bridle between his teeth and fitted an arrow to his bow and drew his bow tight. Then loudest of all when he fired the first arrow, and it struck the target near the center so Natty (who was only a foot or two away from me, and revolving on her heels to keep in line with the Rider) gave a gasp and lurched backward a step.
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