The Flying Circus

by Susan Crandall

  “I lifted her from the water and turned her over,” Henry said, the vision in his head as vivid now as it had been those months ago. Why couldn’t he remember those moments in between? “Her eyes were open, lifeless as two blue marbles. That’s the image that makes my blood run cold, her eyes. I couldn’t help thinking they weren’t all that different from when there’d been life behind them.” He looked at Cora. “Doesn’t that seem strange, that I would have thought that?”

  She just took his hand and held it tight.

  “Those eyes.” He shook his head. “They’re what I see when I close my own. Not the bloody gash in the back of her head.” He took a deep breath. “That comes back as a feeling, not a sight.” He held his hand up and looked at it, his fingers remembering the sensation of gravel where solid rock should have been. “When I cradled her head in my hand, there was a sickening shift of crumbled bone.”

  Cora’s gasp drew his eyes away from his hand and back to her. “Oh, Henry. How horrible. And you’ve had to carry this around alone.”

  “Sometimes I feel like I’ve kept myself on such a short chain that it’s done something to me deep inside. Bottled up all of my anger until it rages like a torrent of water through a broken dam. Maybe that’s what happened.”

  “Of course that’s not what happened.”

  “I appreciate your faith in me, Cora. But I have to be realistic. I could have done it. I was so angry over her treatment of Johanna. And if I did, I need to know it. I’ll pay the consequences.”

  “What about Johanna? Where was she?”

  “I didn’t see her. She usually didn’t go against Emmaline, so she probably had turned back. It had been ten or so minutes between when I heard them arguing and the scream.

  “The fact that I can’t say with absolute certainty that I didn’t do it . . . that’s what really scares me.” He took a breath and pressed on to the end. “I heard someone coming and stood. Violet took one look at me, scratched and clawed with blood on my hands, standing in the water over her dead sister, and took off screaming, ‘He killed her! Oh my God! Henry killed her! Papa! Papa!’ And I ran.”

  “Blood on your hands? From when you picked her up?”

  “I don’t know. It could have been there when I came to.”

  “Surely Mr. Dahlgren didn’t just take Violet’s hysterics as proof. Maybe they aren’t even hunting for you.” The hope in her voice warmed Henry’s chilled heart. “Maybe they discovered the real killer.”

  “I ran, Cora! My history with that girl. A witness seeing me with blood on my hands. And I fucking ran. What more proof did they need? They didn’t look for anyone.”

  “But you don’t know they’re looking for you. Maybe someone saw something that led them to the real killer.”

  He looked her in the eye. “What if I am the real killer, Cora?” He wanted her to really think about it. Right now.

  “I’ll believe you are when you remember crushing that woman’s skull. That’s when I’ll believe it.”

  “The manhunt is for me. It was in the Noblesville newspaper. Name, description, and all. And now that newsreel is out there. It’s only a matter of time before they find me. I have to go back by my own choice. If I wait for them to come and get me, there’s no hope anyone will believe anything but I killed her. I need questions asked if I’m going to figure out what happened.”

  “But it’s been months. They could already have found the real murderer by now.”

  “They had no reason to look for anyone else. If for some reason they found him”—Henry shrugged—“I’ll find out when I get there.”

  “Him?”

  He looked up. “What?”

  “You said ‘if they’ve found him.’ You’re sure it isn’t a woman?”

  “I have no idea who it is! Otherwise I’d have been doing something about it.”

  “So it could be a woman.”

  “No! I guess.” He flung a hand in the air. “It could have been a man, a woman, a band of gypsies, an avenging angel from God for all I know. I. Didn’t. See. Anyone. So it most likely was me.”

  “Did you see any footprints in the mud near her body?” Cora asked, not at all ruffled by his outburst. “That could tell us gender.”

  “I don’t know!” He took a deep breath and answered more calmly, “I can’t recall.”

  “Henry, you told me you live this in your head every day. Close your eyes and move through your memories slowly, not in the rush of reality. There are probably a lot of things you saw that are buried in there. Maybe the reason you said him was because you saw something that made you think that. Your answer was instant. You were adamant when you said it couldn’t be a woman. Then you questioned it. First impulses are usually right.”

  Henry doubted that. His first impulse had been to run. That obviously hadn’t been right. He buried his face in his hands and willed away the urge to throw up.

  “Start with Emmaline and Johanna’s voices,” Cora suggested. “Concentrate on all of your senses, not just sight. Were there any other sounds—maybe so quiet you didn’t consider them important? And when you get to where you see her, think of the bigger picture, not just the hair in the water. She was wearing blue.”

  “She was?” He realized he didn’t even remember the color of her dress. His memory was so sparse, how was he going to argue his innocence?

  “She was. Or at least it had a lot of blue in it. You said her hair ribbon was blue.”

  He focused on the image in his mind: the blood, the hair, shoulders in the water. “She was wearing blue! Sky blue.” With dark spatters of blood down the back.

  “There! It’s working already. Sometimes thinking about what you heard will help, too, or what you smelled. Those things trigger memory.”

  “How do you know?”

  “It happens all the time. You smell oranges and think of Christmas. Or you hear a church bell and think of the end of the war. Whenever I smell the exhaust from the motorcycle, I think of Jonathan. I see his cocky grin, his green eyes. Every time. Even now.”

  Henry nodded. Hope’s sails filled with the recollection of the dress. Then he closed his eyes and went through his memories again. Starting with how hot the sun was on the back of his neck. The sound of the hoe hitting and then shifting the dirt. But once started, the memories came in a flood, one falling over the other. He didn’t even recall the color of the dress; that only came when conscious thought kicked in. “Nothing more.”

  “You’re probably trying too hard. Try it again as you’re falling asleep. Maybe that’ll help. For now, we’re going to assume it was a man because that was your inclination.”

  “Probably because I can’t imagine a woman committing a bloody murder.”

  “Then you clearly don’t know women very well, Henry.”

  He couldn’t argue that.

  “But until you remember . . .” She got up and began to pace the room.

  Henry watched her with a sickness growing in his belly. A small voice called out from deep inside him, You think you’re going to convince the sheriff to look for someone else? Convince the Dahlgrens? You can’t even answer Cora’s questions.

  Then panic launched its own questions: What if they never come to get me? Would I be throwing away my life for nothing?

  But it was more than the film. He couldn’t live the rest of his life hiding, lying . . . wondering. That little voice spoke again: At least you’d still have a life. If he couldn’t convince the sheriff to consider the possibility of another killer, to do a thorough investigation, that life was over—this time not to be replaced by a new one.

  “You can’t go back,” she finally finished. “It’s foolish.” She stopped pacing. “You can’t.”

  “I have to. That newsreel proved that somehow, someday, they’ll find me.”

  “You can’t be sure.”

  “No. But I c
an’t live the rest of my life wondering every day if this will be the day they show up—hell, worse, wondering if I did it. Did we get into a fight? Did she surprise me and I reacted? I need to know the truth. And if there is a killer out there, I want him caught. As long as I’m running, they won’t even look for anyone else.” He dug deep, examining the reasons the need to go back was growing so much stronger and finally understood the one holding the whole stack of others. “And I need to apologize to Mr. Dahlgren for the disrespect of running like a coward.”

  “Then write him a letter.” Cora sounded angry. “We can mail it from Miami. Don’t throw your life away.”

  “I’ve already come to terms with this, Cora. I can’t live with this hanging over me. I should never have run. I’m going back.”

  She was quiet for a moment, staring out the window. Henry was familiar with the look on her face, one that said her brain was buzzing, looking for a way around an obstacle.

  Finally she said, “Not without a good lawyer, you’re not. A very good lawyer. We need someone who will push them to investigate. Maybe we should hire a detective. Both of those will take money.”

  “I have a few dollars tucked back.” He couldn’t believe he hadn’t thought of a lawyer yet. He didn’t even know one.

  “Not that kind of money, Henry. Real money.”

  “Don’t they have to give me a lawyer—if I go to trial?” The word was bitter on his tongue. It started to come brutally clear how ignorant he was about arrests and trials and lawyers. And investigations.

  She scoffed, “Sure they do. One that doesn’t care about anything but getting you checked off of his list so he can go home and have dinner with the family. And if the sentiment around there is what you say, I doubt he’ll even believe you’re innocent. How hard is he going to work to free a man he believes is guilty of murdering a young woman?” Cora paused for a moment. “So, if we assume this murderer is a man, do you have any idea at all who it might be? Even the vaguest notion would be a place to start. She was sneaking around meeting someone. Maybe she jilted him and he went crazy. Maybe someone knows who that boy is. Maybe there was someone else she’d been cruel to?”

  “Emmaline was manipulative, vindictive, and mean. She finally pushed the wrong person too far.” When Cora’s startled eyes met his, he realized how vicious he sounded, that his hands were balled into fists. “I’m not saying she deserved to be murdered.”

  “Of course not.” Cora’s face softened a bit. “Of course not.” She paused. “First things first. We’ll leave the memory jogging for later. Now, we need a plan. And money. Evans is paying me well for flying his plane. We can take that—”

  “This isn’t your problem to solve.”

  She started pacing again. “My cut of the purse for winning the race should be enough to get a really good lawyer. I need to make sure I’m good enough to win—”

  “Cora!” Henry snagged her hand and pulled her down onto the bed.

  She stared at him. “If you think for one minute I’m going to let you go back to Indiana alone, you’ve lost your mind.” Her hands came up to cup his face. “Henry Schuler, everyone in your life might have abandoned you, but I will not.” Tears shone in her eyes. “I. Will. Not.” She leaned in and kissed his lips. Then she hovered close and whispered, “Promise me you’ll wait. At least until after the race. Then we’ll have a fighting chance. Promise me.”

  He looked at her for a long moment. “I promise.” The words were a choked whisper. He was weak. So shamefully weak.

  “All right then.” She nodded. Then she went to the chest of drawers and brought the ribbon-tied box. “I think you should open this now.”

  He took it from her and pulled the ribbon. Inside was a shiny brass box, just a little bigger and thicker than a pocket watch. On the lid was the inscription MERCURY’S DAREDEVILS.

  Cora picked it up. She released the top and it sprang open. It was a compass, its needle quivering from the movement and then settling on magnetic north. She shifted it so the inside of the lid was facing Henry. Inscribed there: SO NO MATTER HOW FAR YOU GO, YOU CAN ALWAYS FIND YOUR WAY BACK TO THE BEGINNING.

  “I may not be able to navigate,” she said, “but I’ll always count on you to.”

  Henry wrapped his hand around hers and snapped the compass closed. He held it and their hands over his heart when he kissed her. “Thank you. For this. For believing in me.”

  She smiled and lay down beside him on the narrow bed. He put his good arm around her and pulled her close. A few minutes later, she was asleep with her head on his shoulder and their hands still over his heart.

  23

  Two days later, the EV-1 showed up. Watching it land, Henry was surprised to see a low-winged monoplane, not a biplane.

  Even before its wheels touched the ground, Cora said, “Well, what do you think?”

  “Nice paint job. Can’t tell more than that from here.” Her faith in a completely unfamiliar craft was far too high for Henry’s liking. You couldn’t take a machine’s performance for granted. Nor could you simply take a man’s word that it was as airworthy as he claimed.

  Henry’s initial inspection of the EV-1 revealed no obvious fault in the plane’s design or quality. He couldn’t wait to get his hands on its powerful Wright J-3 radial, air-cooled engine. He grilled the pilot, who seemed quite experienced, and received a glowing report of the craft. Of course, the man was on Evans’s payroll. Henry’s full approval would be reserved until he inspected it in more detail and flew it himself. And right then he was too weak to get it done. He’d only been out of bed since yesterday afternoon.

  He was shocked by Cora’s uncharacteristic patience as she acquiesced to wait for her chance in the cockpit until after he was sure of the craft. Maybe good sense was finally beginning to counterbalance desire.

  Reece took the plane up on its first trial while Henry talked to Evans’s pilot. When Reece landed and deemed it “respectable,” Reece’s father drove the pilot to the train station to return to Texas. Before he left, though, he had Cora pose with the plane for several photographs. Mr. Evans was going to use them for publicity.

  Henry flew the plane the next morning, after he’d examined the mechanics in detail. Reece was in the front cockpit, just in case Henry’s shoulder gave him trouble. The thing that struck him the instant the wheels left the ground was the lack of noise. It had none of the hum and whine of the wind singing through wires and struts he was used to on the Jenny. Without the drag of the second wing, the responses to controls were so much sharper. Overall it felt smoother. And the power! It was fast. Really fast. A hare to the Jenny’s tortoise—even those JN-4s with the upgraded Hisso engines. He could have flown this beauty all day long.

  When he landed, he gave the EV-1 his official approval. Cora clasped her hands over her heart, giddy as a little kid.

  “Calm down. And take a few minutes to just sit there and feel it, figure out where everything is,” he cautioned as she climbed into the cockpit. He stood on the wing and went over the additional instrumentation that the Jenny didn’t possess.

  “Get a feel for that throttle on the ground, taxi it around a bit before you take it up. Test the response of the rudder, too. Remember it has a swivel wheel on the tail instead of a skid, so take that into consideration.”

  She looked up and nodded, excitement gleaming in her eyes.

  “And, Cora, this plane is fast. The controls sharp. She reacts much more quickly. Don’t forget that. And she doesn’t scrub off speed like you’re used to when the nose goes up. That means you can get into trouble a whole lot faster. Take it easy until you get accustomed to it.”

  Again she nodded.

  Then he climbed in the other cockpit.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m going up with you until you get more familiar with it.”

  She surprised him again by shrugging. “Suit your
self.” Then she signaled for Reece to prop it.

  She actually did as Henry had instructed before she taxied to the downwind end of the field and took off.

  The plane lifted into the air, wheels going silent, bumping ground giving way to silky smoothness. Cora’s takeoff was perfect. Henry wanted to look back, watch her face as she flew, but didn’t want to distract her. She took it around the pattern; not a single herky-jerky movement from the sensitive controls. The air was cold, the sun behind a haze, making the air glidingly perfect.

  He felt the plane’s speed even more as a passenger; he wasn’t sure he liked feeling this out of control.

  Cora kept the plane too low, cutting sharp turns that set the wings nearly perpendicular to the ground. She didn’t know this plane; she needed to give herself some room if something went wrong. Henry signaled for her to take it higher. He was actually a little surprised when she did.

  It ate up miles so fast, they were quickly over unfamiliar terrain. Henry wondered if she’d be able to find her way back. Was she paying attention to all of the things she needed to, not just the handling of the craft, but the 101 other things a good pilot had to observe?

  She must have paid enough attention. In fifteen minutes, they were back in the pattern to land on Reece’s farm. The plane dropped right into place, landing like a feather touching the earth. When she cut the engine, she whooped. “Now that’s flying!”

  They climbed out. “You did great,” he said.

  Cora reached up and linked her hands behind his neck. “Now I have to get perfect. I have to win this, Henry.”

  Pressure could lead to mistakes. “No, you don’t. You only have to keep Evans’s plane in one piece. That’s enough for your first race. I might not need a lawyer. I won’t take your winnings to pay for him, in any case.”

  He could see the wheels turning in her head. “You know I don’t do things halfway. I want to win this. I can make a name for myself. This plane is incredible! This is my shot, Henry. Winning has nothing at all to do with you.”