A Circus of Brass and Bone

by Abra SW

  “Rule Number 14,” Ginger said, quite close to the fortune teller’s wagon, “Eat your fill whenever food’s available.” From the unintelligible grunt that answered, Ginger’s protégé—the new ringmaster—was not a morning person. Ginger’s voice faded as they continued on their way to the cook fire.

  Around the back of the wagon, buttons popped. Tonya’s eyes narrowed. The sound of a steady stream of fluid and a contented sigh confirmed her darkest suspicions. Some bum too lazy to walk into the woods was pissing behind her wagon.

  Tonya’s lips tightened. He’d never dare do that again if she stormed out and berated him, perhaps throwing in a dire prediction or two about what might happen to a man who didn’t keep his fly properly buttoned. Any other day, she would have done just that. Even today, the idea tempted her sorely. Her wagon—but no, she reminded herself. It wasn’t hers anymore.

  His mission accomplished, the errant pisser left. Tonya gave it another few minutes and then pushed herself up from her bunk and lit a lamp.

  The remnants of her former life lay inside a locked cedar box that she kept buried under a mound of shawls. The key hung from a chain that never left her neck. She hesitated for a moment and then unlocked the box and opened the lid. The gray dress, the white gloves, and the black cloak all looked much the same as they had the day she accepted her new job. The clothes were out of fashion, yes, and the white gloves and the bit of lace at the neck of the dress had yellowed, but she would pass. She lifted the dress, shook it out, and winced. A decade’s worth of creases couldn’t be banished that easily. Well, these days there must be plenty of women who didn’t have the time or the starch to iron their dresses properly.

  The dress still fit. It hung a little loose around the waist, but most people had lost a little girth since food supplies began to cost more dearly. She tucked the gloves into her pocket, wrapped the cloak around her waist, and then swathed herself in a billowing, eye-shatteringly garish kaftan. Over that went a trio of mismatched shawls. She was accustomed to bundling up, but with her plainclothes dress and cloak underneath, she felt like a toddler swaddled in so much warm clothing that she might topple to one side at any moment.

  She accessorized with her usual complement: chunky glass-jeweled rings to mask the youth and deftness of her fingers; heavy, ornate necklaces to draw the eye away from her face; a veil to foil keen eyes; and a pistol. The pistol resided within the cedar chest except when she feared matters might become—interesting. Of late, the pistol rarely left its small holster in her boot. Lastly, she picked up the yellowed envelope lying at the bottom of the cedar chest. She would need a letter of introduction.

  Properly accoutered, Tonya faced her veiled reflection. She firmed her lips and saw the shadow of the movement behind her veil. What would it be like to set the veil aside permanently and just be herself again?

  She lifted her veil. Yes, she still looked like herself. It was just a face, much like any other. Though kind gentlemen had from time to time told her that her eyes were particularly fine, there was nothing about her to make her stand out in a crowd.

  Which was a good thing, she reminded herself firmly. She would still be selling gloves at a ladies’ notions shop if she hadn’t been unmemorable enough that the same gentleman came back three days in a row and didn’t realize she was the same shop girl—or if she hadn’t found that little detail vexing enough to point it out to him. To her surprise, he’d been quite pleased, and she soon found herself with a much more interesting line of work.

  She hadn’t been that shop girl in a long time, because what use would a shop girl be? Plain, ordinary Tonya—what could she do?

  Inhaling, she lifted her chin. Enough. She could do enough. But first, breakfast.

  ~ * ~

  Christopher Knall, Ringmaster- and Clown-in-Training

  The Loyale Traveling Circus Campground, Some Distance From New York City

  “Doom! Doooom!”

  Christopher nearly spilled his soup when he heard the mournful wail. He hunched protectively over his bowl. He was of no mind to lose his luncheon simply because somebody had finally cracked. Though—what should he do? He cast a sideways glance at Ginger the clown, who was spooning his own soup up in undisturbed tranquility. None of Ginger’s advice on how to be a good ringmaster and “clown” covered what to do when somebody was wandering through the circus camp proclaiming the End of Times.

  “Doooooom!”

  “What’s that?” one of the aerialists asked, her face perplexed. She fiddled with the spangled purple ribbon in her hair. “It sounds like Michael, the animal trainer.” Her cheeks pinkened as she said his name.

  The other aerialist, the one with an orange ribbon in her hair, finished chewing her bite of cornbread, swallowed, and said crossly, “Then shouldn’t he be tending to his animals instead of—instead of whatever it is that he’s doing?”

  A howl of, “Doooooooooooom!” punctuated her statement

  Christopher shot another sideways glance at Ginger. Should they do something? Lunatics could be dangerous, especially when they snapped suddenly. Ginger looked undecided.

  As they paused in their meal, Lacey the equestrienne strode up. She ignored the cries of doom floating across the campsite. From the precisely pinned angle of her hat to her smooth blonde chignon, immaculate skirts, and mirror-polished boots, she appeared unruffled.

  “Has anybody seen Mr. Ben Doom?” Lacey asked.

  The Indian mahout looked up from his contemplation of his bowl of soup, his eyebrows rising. “Who’s that?”

  “One of the monkeys,” Lacey said briskly. “Black fur, white skin, white fur with a red ruff around his face. Michael’s looking for him.”

  They blinked at her.

  “Hmph,” said the aerialist with an orange ribbon in her hair.

  Christopher still didn’t have the aerialists’ names straight. When the girls were in makeup and costumes it was impossible to tell them apart; the rest of the time it was merely very difficult. Both were short with the tight-muscled build of a gymnast, their faces an undistinguished—and indistinguishable—sort of pretty.

  “He shouldn’t go around shouting, ‘Doom!’ It ain’t right!” Orange Ribbon complained. “Who cares if a monkey’s gone missing?”

  Lacey’s eyes widened. “I do. We all should. In these dreadful times, we need each part of the circus to keep functioning. Each performer. Each tentman. Each hostler. Each talker. Each animal. Without all of us working together, there won’t be a circus. And without the circus, we’ll just be freaks on our own.” She met each of their eyes, one at a time. “I think we all know how well freaks do on their own, don’t we?”

  Christopher sized her up thoughtfully. She didn’t look much like a freak. Heck, she looked less like a freak than pretty much everybody else in the circus. Her accent, her clothes, her mannerisms—they all screamed higher class. Her station should have insulated her from ever being seen as an inferior. But that emotion in her voice came from something personal.

  “I’ll help look for the monkey!” blurted out one of the aerialists—Purple Ribbon, this time. Her ears turned a delicate shell-pink. “We’ll all help.”

  A reluctant mutter of agreement rose from the other diners. The phrase, “Once I’m done eating, mind you,” figured prominently.

  Lacey nodded her head. “I told Michael he could count on everybody’s help. All he needed was a little faith.”

  “In humanity?” Ginger asked dryly.

  She met his gaze directly. “Don’t be ridiculous. In the circus.” She looked at the others. “Once you’re done eating, start searching the woods. We’ve checked at least half the campground. It shouldn’t take much longer to inspect the rest. I’m off.”

  “Hold your horses, Miss! You should eat something before you go,” Cook scolded. “First you won’t sit down for a meal until you’ve tended to your horses, and now it’s the monkeys too? Next thing I know you’ll refuse to eat until the ostriches are content, and they’re never s
atisfied!” Cook scowled. “I should know. Lost my best wooden spoon to one when I wasn’t looking!”

  Lacey smiled, though the smile looked a little startled to find itself there. She picked up a piece of cornbread. “I’ll take this for now, and when we finish searching the campground, I’ll come back and have a bowl of your fine soup.”

  “Before you start searching the woods!”

  One blonde eyebrow rose. “I promise,” she said mildly.

  “See that you remember!”

  Christopher carefully studied his surroundings as he spooned up the dregs of his soup. He wasn’t sure if it fell under Rule Number 6, keep track of your numbers, or Rule Number 7, nobody ever looks up, but he knew that Ginger would castigate him if the monkey was nearby and he didn’t notice it.

  He didn’t spot any monkey sign, but he did realize something else. He hadn’t seen the fortune teller since she left for a constitutional after breakfast. And whatever else she might be, the woman was usually prompt for mealtimes.

  He leaned forward, as if to set his bowl down, and muttered close to Ginger’s ear, “Where’s the fortune teller? I haven’t seen her since breakfast.”

  Ginger laughed as if Christopher had said something funny, but his eyes sharpened. Smiling, he leaned back and slapped Christopher on the back. A casual observer wouldn’t have noticed the way the movement allowed his eyes to roam around the camp.

  “Should we ask if anybody’s noticed her?” Christopher questioned.

  “No,” Ginger said firmly, though the easy smile stayed on his face. “We don’t ask. We wait to see if somebody else asks. We wait to see who doesn’t ask. And when somebody does ask, we wait to see who chimes in.”

  “What’s going on? Did she take the monkey?”

  “If she took the monkey with her, everything’s okay—peculiar, but okay. If she left on her own with no warning, we might be looking at White Rabbit.” With that cryptic utterance, he leaned back and took another sip of the dreadful chicory-coffee blend. “No, what you’re going to do is wait a bit and then go out in the woods as if you needed to shit. Look for a bundle of clothes, maybe concealed. And watch out for monkey-hunters.”

  “What do her clothes have to do with a rabbit? What kind of clothes?” Christopher asked, totally at sea.

  “What was she wearing for breakfast? One of those dreadful bright-colored robes, if I recall. And all her shawls. Look for some sort of marker, above eye level.” In a lower voice, he muttered, “That’s if she doesn’t suspect me.”

  Discretion being the greater part of valor, Christopher didn’t demand an explanation again.

  “After that bean chili Cook served us last night, nobody’ll be suspicious if you’re gone for a good long time,” Ginger finished.

  “Suspicious?” Christopher made a conscious effort to relax his face and smile a bit, mimicking Ginger’s nonchalance.

  Ginger’s smile gained a bit of genuine wry humor. “Oh, yes. If there’s nobody with reason to be suspicious, then a cover story does no harm. If there is somebody with reason to be suspicious, it may save your life.”

  ~ * ~

  Madame Tonya Wershow, Fortune Teller Extraordinaire

  The Outskirts of New York City

  Tonya leaned against a barren maple tree and studied the city in front of her without fear of being studied in return. In her grey dress and black cloak, she would blend into the shadow of the tree, even if the guards were looking in her direction. For there were guards. Two men in the dark blue tunic and pants of the New York City Police stood guard beside the wall growing around the bridge that connected the mainland to New York.

  The wall was why she lingered in the shadows and studied the city. A wall could mean many things. It could mean security, or fear. It could mean war, if there was an enemy to defend against. It could mean peace, if it was a building project designed to give the laborers work and put food on their tables. The wall would not entirely block the road to the bridge. An opening was left—for traders and visitors, she supposed. A good sign.

  There were also corpses dangling from the bridge lampposts. Not such a good sign, and it added a certain emphasis to the question of why the wall existed.

  In most places the wall was no more than a foot or two high. Men and women carried stones and bricks and timbers from the city, across the bridge, and out to the growing wall. Then they dropped them in a pile, and returned for another load. The slow, steady trickle of stone-carriers put Tonya in mind of ants building an anthill. Other men worked building the wall, setting the stones and mortaring them into place. The builders wore clothes practical for construction work: overalls or canvas trousers spattered with ancient paint and mortar, sturdy boots that would protect their feet from falling bricks, hats to shield their heads from the sun, and heavy gloves. The stone-carriers wore a mismatched collection of clothing. Women in ornate walking dresses labored beside men wearing beggar’s rags. Tonya winced when she saw the thin gloves the lucky ones wore. Precious little protection those would provide! The unlucky ones went bare-handed.

  Had the policemen been herding the workers, or guarding against runaways, Tonya would have faded back into the trees and found another way into the city. But that didn’t seem to be the case. They stood with their rifles slung over their shoulders, not paying particularly much attention to the laborers at all. Every line of their bodies was relaxed. They weren’t expecting trouble. They were just doing a job.

  It was still tempting to ease away and look for an unguarded boat that she could paddle across to the city. There couldn’t be enough patrolmen to keep eyes on every foot of the shoreline at all times, not with whatever had gone on inside the city. The close-packed warren of tenement buildings in the Lower East Side and the Five Points Neighborhood … She shuddered. It must have been even worse than Boston.

  That last thought, and the corpses dangling from the lampposts, decided her. She needed to know what to expect inside the city.

  She pushed herself away from the shelter of the maple tree and walked forward.

  A branch snapped behind her. She froze. Her head whipped around and she searched the trees for any sign of what had caused the noise. Nothing moved. Maybe it had been a rabbit diving into its den, or a branch snapping under the weight of snow. She didn’t see anyone.

  She resumed walking forward, though her skin still crawled. It took no effort to adopt the hesitant, nervous stride of a countrywoman coming to the big city for the first time since the world unraveled around her. Her pistol was a reassuring weight in her boot.

  She stepped onto the road and walked toward the city. The guards straightened when they saw her coming, but they didn’t unshoulder their weapons or shout for her to stoprightthere! Another good sign.

  When she reached the intersection of road and soon-to-be-wall, the plumper of the two policemen stopped her with an outstretched hand and a smile.

  “Just a minute, ma’am. We have questions to ask before you can proceed.”

  His partner, a rail-thin older man with hard eyes, asked, “Where are you from?”

  “I come from the country,” Tonya said. It took no effort for her eyes to widen with shock as she stared up at the dangling corpses. “I ain’t been to the city since.” Since what didn’t require stating. “What did they do?”

  The patrolman spat. “Thought they could do whatever they pleased, that’s what. This lot ran down colored people and beat them something terrible, even women and children. They lynched a brave little boy who called them cowards when they knocked his mother down.”

  “A child? That’s awful.”

  “That’s right. The commissioner said the only use they’d be was as an example to the others, so—” he gestured like a man holding a noose and made a kttth sound as he stuck his tongue out, imitating a hanged man. “After the first few, the ones hanged for looting or violence or assaulting an officer or causing a public disturbance, the commissioner hangs quick and then buries proper. It’s just the ones to be made a
n example of that get strung up like this.” He pinched his nose. “The smell’s the worst of it, I tell you!”

  Tonya shuddered. “They make a fine example,” she agreed, her eyes straying to the laborers. Not a one of the workers looked at the bodies or so much as glanced in the direction of the police, despite the novelty of a stranger’s presence. “I certainly don’t plan on making trouble.”

  “A little bit like you?” the policeman said indulgently. “I’m sure not.”

  His laconic partner spoke up. “In the Draft Riots, the women were the worst.”

  His dark gaze raked Tonya. She kept her hands open and harmless in plain view.

  The friendly policeman rolled his eyes. “I keep telling you, we’re not in the Draft Riots! Do you see a crowd of thousands trying to tear us into itty-bitty pieces? No?” He turned back to Tonya with an exasperated sigh. “You got any contraband?”

  She turned wide eyes up at him. “What’s contraband?”

  “Any kind of food,” the suspicious policeman said. “Gunpowder or ammunition. Weapons. Liquor.”

  She shook her head. “No, I’m not carrying anything like that. I had my last crust of bread for breakfast,” she added.

  “Why do you seek to enter New York City?”

  “My sister’s best friend owns a candy store, Hardy’s Candy Confections. I thought she might need a hand. Things are terrible tight in my village. I hoped there might be more food in the city.” Which would be a mighty dumb idea if it were true. “I’m willing to work for it!”

  “Aren’t we all,” the suspicious policeman said, his eyes on the mixed lot of people hauling stones to the wall. “Have to search you before letting you in. That’s orders.” He started forward.

  Tonya hopped back. “I’m a decent woman, sir! Don’t you go putting your hands on me!” Or you’ll find that gun, and certain papers I’m carrying, and I’ll have a hard time talking you into letting me go free.