by Paul Gallico
Across the morass of the tober he saw Joe Cotter and two of the British roustabouts standing amidst the charred ruins. The tent boss was stirring the ashes with his foot and the other two were staring down at the ground.
Marvel, now clad in his daytime garb of fawn raincoat and brown bowler hat, picked his way across to them. Cotter looked up as he approached. The night’s disaster had left its mark upon his rugged face and his eyes appeared to have sunk more deeply into his head.
Marvel said, “It’s over and done with, Joe. You might as well come out of it. We’re insured. Nobody got hurt.”
Cotter said, “I’m afraid that ain’t exactly so.”
“What?” Marvel cried. “What the hell do you mean? We counted noses last night.”
“I know,” Cotter replied, “but I’m afraid there was a feller in the tent.”
“Oh Christ!” Marvel said. “How do you know?”
Cotter replied, “There ain’t much of him left. I was poking around here this morning. I found his false teeth and some of his watch and a ring. That was a terrible hot fire.”
C H A P T E R
1 2
Cotter led Marvel through the debris and pointed with his toe. “There,” he said.
Marvel saw the gleam of some bits of gold and the porcelain white of teeth washed partly free of charred grime by the rain. “Jesus!” he said. “It ain’t one of ours.”
Cotter said, “One of the Spiggoties. He must have been stunned by the first bolt or tripped trying to get out. I never saw him. But they were coming and going and ducking out so fast you couldn’t keep track of ’em.”
Marvel said hopefully, “Maybe the josser lost his watch and his teeth scarpering?”
“No such luck,” Cotter said. “It’s one of ’em all right. Look here.” He pointed to some unconsumed bits of human bone and charred buttons. He asked, “What’ll we do? Gather it up?”
“No, no,” Marvel said, “wait! Don’t touch ’em.” He was frightened and confused again. He could not remember what his insurance policy had said about death due to causes, or what the law was likely to be in Spain. He only knew that in his own country when there was an accident or a murder the police didn’t like anyone mucking about with the remains or touching or moving anything. The sharp mind engaged itself with this new problem and how it might affect the manner of extricating the remnants of the circus from Zalano and getting it back to England.
The flash flood had subsided, leaving only a rill trickling through the mud, and the vans of Fred Deeter and Jackdaw Williams lying overturned in the mud were righted by concerted effort and manhandled back to the tober.
Rose wept bitterly at what the disaster had done to her home, and futilely began to shovel the thick, gluey mud which covered everything and was silted on to the floor to the depth of a foot, with her hands. Jackdaw watched unsympathetically for a few moments until, saying, “You won’t get very far that way,” he walked off in the direction of the clown wagon. As usual, the whole thing had left him unperturbed.
At ten o’clock, Sam Marvel called a meeting of the company.
They gathered at one end of the horse tent. The elephant tub prop was produced and reversed, and Marvel mounted it, as he had once before at Chippenham, his brown bowler hat perched on the back of his head and the Schimmelpenninck pointing, undaunted as ever, from the corner of his mouth. This time he did not carry his ringmaster’s whip but had some papers in one hand. He did not have to signal for silence, for they were all watching him and waiting to learn their fate.
“Well,” he began, “I guess I don’t have to tell you.” He took his cigarillo out of his mouth between two fingers, blew out the smoke and restored it again, and the pause was more significant than any description of the extent of the disaster might have been.
“We’re finished. Napoo. Done for,” he continued. “The tour’s over. You can’t run a show without a tent.” Marvel then raised the papers in his hand aloft and waved them. “But I’m insured,” he said. “Fully covered.”
From one of the clowns who were standing together came a derisive cheer, to which Marvel reacted angrily.
“You’ll all get paid,” he shouted aggressively, so much so that they knew he must have been thinking hard how he might manage to evade it. “Sam Marvel doesn’t go back on his word or a contract. Some of you may even be able to catch on with another show as replacements or something. I’ll help you all I can.” The murmur that greeted this was a more satisfied one.
“Well then,” Sam Marvel went on, “the sooner we get out of here the better, and the quicker you get your wagons cleaned up and going the sooner we can start. Whether we go back to Santander or continue on south depends on what the agents say about boats. Maybe Barcelona would be the best bet. We’ll take the animals with us. The tent lorries will be empty. Joe and Pete say they can rig up one of them to take the elephant. You, Toby, as soon as they get the lorries stripped down start getting her used to going into one. The rest of you get on with what you’ve got to do. I’ll let you know more later. Okay, that’s all.”
But it was, of course, not all by any means, as he discovered when getting down off his tub and emerging from the horse tent he saw the deputation awaiting him on the other side of the tober by the wreck of the tent.
It had come in two ancient 1935 Chevrolet taxis and a high-backed World War II command car, and consisted of four uniformed police, two of them carbine-carrying guardias civiles in their green tunics and black patent leather three-corner hats, as well as a pair of the policía armada, the Spanish national police, who wore grey belted jackets with red diagonal stripes on the sleeves and flat grey caps with black visors. Pistols in black holsters hung from their belts.
The civilians consisted of a dignified-looking elderly man in a tightly buttoned, somewhat out-of-style grey linen suit, wearing a panama hat; two women, one young, one old, their shoulders enveloped in black lace shawls; and a squat fellow in shirt sleeves, whose head was set upon his shoulders in a peculiarly reptilian manner, so that the back of his neck appeared to be missing altogether. He had bad teeth and shrewd wary eyes. This was the alcalde, the mayor of the town, with whom Marvel had had dealings upon his arrival at Zalano when he had visited his office to apply for a licence to exhibit. The mayor was accompanied by his clerk, a little man in shabby clothing.
Marvel had got on all right with the alcalde for they had understood one another on the usual terms of the politican and the showman, but it was the other fellow, the old goat, that worried him, and the women and all the police.
As he reached the group, the elderly man raised his panama in polite salute, revealing a pink skull, bald except for a white fringe of hair around the rim. He had wiry white eyebrows, a spiky moustache with yellowish ends, and kind, gentle dark eyes. The man then replaced his hat, reached into his pocket and presented Marvel with a visiting card.
Marvel took it and read: “Dr. Alfonso Perrera, Juez de Primera Instancia, Zalano.”
At this point the old gentleman stepped forward, removed his hat once more, and addressed Marvel in a formal speech, which to the circus proprietors great relief was delivered in accented but perfectly understandable English.
“Good day, sir. The meaning of Juez de primera instancia is judge of the district. I will speak English with you since before I became judge I was principal of a school. Permit me to express the sympathy of his worship, Señor Contreras, the alcalde, who regrettably is not conversant with your beautiful language, along with my own for the calamity you have suffered.”
Marvel reflected: the old goat at least was being polite and one couldn’t lose anything by being equally so.
“That’s very kind, your honour,” he said. “Fortunately, we are fully covered by insurance.” He thought he would get that one in early.
Dr. Perrera bowed and said, “Yes, as you say that is indeed fortunate. And now I come to a more grave subject.” He removed his hat again. “One of our citizens of Zalano, Jorge Alvarez
, is missing. His wife here, and daughter, Señora and Señorita Alvarez, have told the police he went to work for the circus. He has not returned and they are greatly alarmed. Perhaps you will be able to help us.”
For an instant, Sam Marvel thought of stalling. He knew that Cotter kept no records of the men he hired; each one was simply given a numbered chit when he was taken on and when he presented it at the finish of the job he was paid off. Second thoughts advised him against this. The women were there; they would be able to identify the trinkets. Better, then, to get on with it and have it over with.
He said to Joe Cotter, “Okay, Joe, show them.” To the judge he said, “I’m sorry, your honour, but I’m afraid there has been an accident. I wouldn’t let the women see yet—if you will go with my man—”
Cotter took his cue in politeness and co-operation from Marvel. “If you’ll just come this way, your honour.”
Dr. Perrera followed him, as did the four policemen, stepping gingerly through the mess past the charred circle of the ring to the spot where Cotter pointed and said, “There.”
The judge bent over carefully, doubling in the manner of a jack-knife, and regarded the place and the objects which lay there, half revealed. He studied them in silence for a moment. “Ah yes,” he said, “the fire must have been most consuming.”
“It was bloody hot, your honour. She went up—pfouff! Like a box of matches.”
The judge now brushed away some of the ashes to lay bare the buckled watch case, the ring, and the remnants of the jawbones with their half-blackened teeth.
“And you did not move or touch anything,” he said. “It was most clever and intelligent of you, for had you done so there would have been a heavy fine as well as, I am afraid, a gaol sentence.” And he smiled most winningly at both Cotter and Marvel, his eyes filled with gentle solicitude and pleasure at their escape. “For that is the law,” he concluded.
An unpleasant tremor passed through Marvel. There had been no ifs, ands, or buts about the statement of the judge. He suddenly felt lost and nervous, and wished desperately that he were back home facing an honest, slow-moving British country constable with his little notebook and cognisance of his limitations.
“Have you perhaps a piece of cloth?” Dr. Perrera asked.
Cotter produced a bit of canvas and the judge said, “Excellent.” Carefully he picked up the watch, the ring and the jawbone and placed them therein. He then summoned the two members of the policía armada and said to them, “You will search this area thoroughly and see what else you can find. Perhaps—”
The two men came forward briskly and efficiently. Their faces were hard and expressionless. Marvel made a mental note. The national police, responsible to the federal government, would be tough and implacable. These two who were now poking carefully into the ruins were of another breed from the guardias civiles, and would carry out orders with dispatch and no nonsense. And at the back of Marvel’s head was the unpleasant recollection that he had heard somewhere that if you got into trouble in Spain, they threw you into gaol first and talked it over later, provided you hadn’t rotted in the meantime.
The bush telegraph had spread the word among the circus personnel that something was up which might well affect them, and they all appeared from their wagons or abandoned their tasks and collected about the group.
The judge now emerged from the blackened tent area, carefully bearing the canvas, and came forward to where the two women were huddled together anxiously waiting. To the two guardias he said briefly in Spanish, “Support them.”
At once each of the police stepped behind the pair, slipping a grey-clad masculine arm about their waists. Their eyes filled in advance with sympathy and tenderness.
“And now,” the judge continued gently, still in the same language, “if you could steel yourself, Señora Alvarez, to let your eyes rest for a moment upon these unhappy objects and tell us if—”
The onlookers were in no doubt as to the question he had posed her or the answer given by her reaction, and admired the wisdom of the judge in ordering the women looked after. For the one designated as Señora Alvarez gave vent to a loud and anguished outcry, throwing up her hands and beating her breast and cheeks with her fists. Her daughter released a small torrent of Spanish, and then likewise joined her mother in sobs.
Dr. Perrera turned to Marvel and said, “Alas, the widow has confirmed our unhappy suspicions beyond any peradventure of doubt. The watch—the ring—the ring a gift upon his fiftieth name day, the watch once his father’s.”
The two national policemen now joined the group, one of them carrying in his handkerchief the final gleanings from the site—the bits of bone and buttons.
“This then was George Alvarez,” Dr. Perrera pronounced in English. Thereafter once more, reverting to his own language, he said, “Send these poor women back to their homes. There is no further need to abuse their sensibilities by retaining them here. Perhaps you, Señor Alcalde, will accompany them and see that they are properly looked after.”
The two wailing bereaved were bundled into the ancient taxi cab and joined by the alcalde, who looked dismayed at the prospect of the ride with the pair, and at the same time relieved to be able to quit the scene.
“And now,” said Dr. Perrera, to Sam Marvel, “I am put to the unfortunate necessity of placing you under arrest.” He turned to the two guardias and said, “Detengan a este hombre” They stepped forward and seized Marvel, one at each side, pinioning his arms.
Politeness went out of the window. Marvel was frightened. “What the hell for?” he yelled.
Dr. Perrera assumed the patient posture he had developed in the classroom preparing to expound some difficult bit of learning to a group of backward children, and raising one hand he ticked off the reasons upon his fingers. “A man, a citizen of Zalano and a native of Spain, has died. He came to his death violently in your circus. Therefore, you are responsible since you are the proprietor. Hence under the law I am compelled to have you placed under arrest.”
“That’s a hot one,” Marvel said. “Kick a man in the stomach when he’s down.” He jerked his arm in the direction of the destroyed tent and said, “Take a look at that. I’ve lost every bloody thing I had.”
The judge gazed obediently in the direction Marvel had indicated and reflected gravely. “Yes,” he agreed, “I see. That is so. But so have we in Zalano. We have been ruined. Our economy will be affected for years to come. The grapevines have been stripped bare of the young grapes, and our olive trees devastated. There will be no harvest this year, and perhaps not even the next, and when there is no harvest there is no money. The poor will be poorer and the merchants will be destitute. No one will have anything to sell. No one will be able to buy. All this has come about through this terrible storm. And yet life will go on as it must, and laws wall be obeyed, and when they are not the guilty will be punished.” His melting eyes for a moment rested upon the small, spare figure of Sam Marvel, and he concluded, “We are forgiven nothing in this world, Señor Marvel, and thus regrettably since you are responsible—”
“Wait a minute,” said Sam Marvel. “How do you know I am responsible?”
Dr. Perrera smiled sympathetically, but there was no give to him whatsoever. He now used the other hand for ticking off. “George, or Hor-hey Alvarez as we would call him, was, I gather, in your employ. When the tent was struck by lightning and burst into flames, you did not take proper precautions to see that he was safely evacuated. Thus, he was either burned to death or struck upon the head and killed by falling equipment. Either way, as the proprietor, I must repeat, you are responsible and I have no recourse but to commit you to prison until such time as—”
“Wait a minute,” Marvel said again, and his mind was lashing wildly out in all directions, looking for some way of halting or reversing these inexorable proceedings. “What makes you so certain he was burned to death or killed by falling equipment?”
“Why, what else then?”
“The lightning
bolt that struck the tent, the first one, or the fire bolt which exploded inside immediately afterwards could have done it.” Marvel had not the faintest hope that his argument would be effective, but it was all he could think of at the moment.
To his surprise, a look of extreme consternation passed across the face of the judge as the idea hit home. He removed the panama for an instant to mop the pink patch of skin atop his head. He said, “I’m ashamed. You are right, sir. The thought had not occurred to me. There is indeed this third possibility which would be—”
Marvel jumped swiftly into the breach, “—an act of God we call it where I come from.”
Dr. Perrera bowed. “As you say,” he assented, “the will of a stern and unfathomable God. In which case there will have to be an investigation to determine the exact cause of death.”
“But what about me?” Marvel asked. “Am I still under arrest?”
Dr. Perrera reflected for a moment. “Of course not,” he said. “It would be discourteous to a visitor as well as illegal. Time enough when the inquest has disclosed responsibility.” He turned to the guardias and said, “Suelten a este hombre”
The two at once relinquished their hold upon Marvel’s arms and stood away from his side.
“Then we can get on,” Marvel said. He pointed to the performers gathered close by and said, “These people and what remains of our equipment must be returned to England. I myself must go to London to put in our claim for insurance—no doubt they will send adjustors. We were planning to head for Barcelona.”
Dr. Perrera was shaking his head. “I am afraid not,” he said. “There will be the enquiry. Then there is the matter of compensation to the poor widow for the loss of her breadwinner. I am afraid you must all remain here until these matters are satisfactorily settled.”
