Down the Road to Gundagai

by Jackie French

  The young woman laughed. ‘Admit it! He’s proved you’re not a mermaid.’

  ‘No, I didn’t.’

  Blue stared at the young man through her pain.

  ‘A girl’s leg shouldn’t move like that. Or hurt her either.’ He stared at Blue’s tail, then at her face, puzzled.

  ‘You hurt her! Belle, are you all right? I’ll fetch Mum …’ Ginger was using his real voice now, not the old-dwarf tones. But the young man and woman didn’t seem to notice.

  ‘No. I’m fine.’ Blue tried not to pant with the pain. ‘Go back out, Ginger. He’s finished here. Haven’t you?’ she challenged.

  ‘Darling, you don’t mean she really is a mermaid?’

  ‘I’m real,’ said Blue, trying not to grit her teeth. The scar had definitely torn; there was a hot trickle of blood along her skin. At least blood was easily washed out, though if the wound kept bleeding she’d have to get Ebenezer or Ephraim to carry her to her caravan before anyone noticed a bloody mermaid. She couldn’t change out of her tail here now, with so many people about. And that would mean leaving the gate and House of Horrors unattended, as well as no main attraction for the Freak Show, all because this stupid young man wanted to show off to his girl. She met his eyes again. ‘You owe us ten pounds.’

  The man pulled his wallet out of his jacket pocket. He counted out single pound notes. He hesitated. ‘I’m sorry, I only have eight.’

  ‘You shouldn’t bet with what you haven’t got.’ Blue held out her hand. ‘You need to send us the extra two pounds.’

  The young man handed the notes over. Blue rolled them up into a small bundle she could keep hidden in her hand. There was no way she could slip them down into her chemise without them seeing.

  ‘Enjoy the show,’ said Blue.

  The young man glanced back as they went out.

  Chapter 14

  Blue sat on the bed where Ebenezer had deposited her and slowly wriggled the tail down. She inspected the damage to her scar with relief.

  Not bad at all, just a tiny tear. Not even a stain on the tail either, just a long smudge of blood down her leg. Which meant she could be part of the dance tonight, which was important, as Fred would get back too late to perform. Gertrude would take his place, but that meant there was no one who could replace Blue.

  She hadn’t seen the young doctor and his girlfriend among the crowd watching Sheba eat her hay and carrots. She wondered if they would be at the show, given the young woman’s disgust and the young man’s humiliation when he had lost his bet. Except he hadn’t, she thought. Her reflex had worked exactly as he’d said it would. Why had he agreed he’d lost it?

  It didn’t matter. They’d paid their three shillings each to see the show even if they were back in Sydney now. She grinned, despite her aching scar. And she’d made eight pounds. That would go a long way to covering the money they hadn’t made from the people at the susso camp today. Eight pounds would pay for petrol for the five trips that would move them to the next camp.

  She nibbled another cheese and tomato sandwich — none of them ate much before the performance — then slipped on her harem costume, the pants, the camisole, the slippers and then the seven veils draped at her head, shoulders and waist. Thank goodness the breeze from the south was cool. Some nights in the Big Top she’d felt she was turning into a puddle of yellow silk butter.

  She pulled on the dark wig, then lifted the shawl from Madame’s mirror to check her make-up. Funny superstition, not leaving a mirror uncovered. Madame was the wisest woman she knew, most of the time. She supposed even the wisest head had freckles of silliness.

  She slipped out of the caravan. The other dancers were already there, including Gertrude, dressed in the harem outfit again. She looked annoyed, but then she usually did.

  ‘Belle?’ Madame’s sightless eyes turned towards her. ‘You had some trouble this afternoon?’

  ‘Nothing I couldn’t handle. And I won us eight pounds.’ She doubted they’d ever get the other two. ‘I gave them to Ebenezer.’

  ‘So he told me. It was well done. But do not bet with the customers again.’

  ‘Why not? It’s good money.’

  ‘Men do not like to be made fools of. The young man this afternoon does not sound like a troublemaker. But it is not good to make enemies.’

  ‘No, Madame.’

  Over the past six months Blue had slowly realised how vulnerable they all were. Ebenezer and Fred and Ephraim, and Mrs Olsen and Gertrude and Ginger too, for that matter, could deal with one or two locals who wanted some sport at the circus’s expense, trying to steal a harem costume as a trophy, or in a more planned crime, their precious generator.

  But everyone at the circus knew all too well that if a small town’s policeman had to choose between local lads and the circus in a real scrap, he’d choose the locals every time. If any one of them was locked up on a policeman’s whim, the circus would have to wait till they were freed.

  They were also dependent on continuing goodwill, for the paddocks they needed to put up the tents, with a dam or creek or spring for water to drink, and grass for Sheba to graze.

  ‘Ready, girls?’ Ephraim cranked up the gramophone and put the needle on the record.

  The audience gasped as the lights in the Big Top went out.

  A curtain of stars above them, a cloak of night around them. Blue counted out the steps as the four dancers began to move, foot in front of foot, hips swaying, arms crossed in front, their veils drifting in the wind from the sea, wind smelling of salt and seaweed, the smell of greasepaint and sweat, the expectation as thick as honey from the crowd.

  Out by the entrance Ephraim pulled the levers that slid sheets of metal with cut-out tiny holes over the floor lights, then clicked the light switch to turn them on again. The starlights seemed to float around the ring. Blue heard the audience gasp again, as they had gasped at every performance since Willow Creek.

  She would never get used to this. Never. It was as though energy flowed from her to the audience. They wanted beauty so much that they needed only the smallest of illusions — the lighting, the greasepaint, the costumes — to transform an elderly woman, a rabbit-faced younger one and a scarred girl into a song of dreams. Tonight at least they’d have Gertrude, with her genuine beauty, instead of Fred. Blue counted again, under her breath, as she began to rotate her hips to the music.

  Arms up. One, two, three, four …

  Sway, sway … seven, eight, turn …

  You could almost touch the silence. The audience was intent.

  We are magic, thought Blue. Every day and every night, we give them magic …

  Three, four, five …

  Turn. Sway. One, two, three …

  Blue caught a glimpse of the pregnant woman at the back, her eyes glowing, her hands resting on the faded dress stretched across her stomach. The little girl sat on her father’s knee, to get a better view.

  This is for you, thought Blue, letting her arms be one with the music. For these minutes you and your unborn child are in a far-off harem, where women dance in gold silk, then lie on cushions by a fountain, eating Turkish delight …

  Arms up … arms down … six, seven, turn …

  And then she saw him. He sat in the expensive front-row seats, just as she’d imagined he would, his tweed-jacketed arms resting on the barrier between the audience and the ring. She didn’t think his girlfriend was with him, but there was no time to stare.

  Turn … seven, eight … turn … arms up … cast off the first veil …

  Her back was to him now …

  Seven, eight … cast off the second veil … one, two, three …

  Seven, eight, turn …

  She could see him from the corner of her eye.

  He stared, like all the other men. No, not like the others. His stare was for her alone. Then she realised he wasn’t looking at her face or even her bosom, but her legs.

  She felt a moment’s panic. Had he recognised her as the mermaid?

 
She forced her eyes to look away, her body to follow the beat and the music.

  It doesn’t matter if he has recognised me, she told herself. What could he do? Call out in front of everyone, ‘That’s the girl who was the mermaid! But she’s not really a mermaid, she has two feet! Give me my eight pounds back!’

  They’d laugh at him. No one would stop Ephraim and Ebenezer hauling a troublemaker away, not this crowd anyway, with their shadowed faces and faded clothes. She felt her practised smile melt into something real.

  The susso camp was the safest gig they’d had.

  … the sixth veil slid to the ground. One more veil and then the ‘blow off’, the finale that left them gasping.

  … six … seven … eight …

  The music reached a crescendo. Blue undid the clip on her harem pants. They pooled at her ankles. For a second only, the audience saw a triangle of silken underpants above two long straight legs …

  It was another silken body stocking, worn down to her knees, laboriously designed and stitched by Mrs Olsen, marked out with paint to show two legs and a gap, to make it seem that she was normal, not a freak. It wouldn’t stand up to scrutiny. But here, in the twinkling of the tiny lights, with normal legs on either side of her, it was enough to briefly fool the eye.

  Then darkness cloaked them. Blue bent and piled the veils and harem pants into her arms, then ran with small steps out into the night, with the others.

  The cold wind hit them as they came out of the Big Top, chilling the sweat from the dance. Blue could hear the sea mutter beyond the dunes. She shivered, but not from cold. The Big Top lights glowed again. Mrs Olsen and Gertrude hurried into their caravan to change into their Boldini Brothers costumes.

  Madame walked slowly and deliberately back to her caravan too. Sometimes she liked to sit with Sheba during the intermission, but tonight the old woman shivered in the damp south wind. Blue watched to make sure she made it to the caravan steps — Madame hated anyone leading her, but sometimes a bucket or other obstacle might have rolled into her path. The door closed behind her.

  ‘Peanuts and lollies,’ called Ephraim from the Big Top.

  There wasn’t really room for two to change at the same time in the caravan. Blue pulled the harem pants on again, then wrapped all the seven veils around her arms for warmth, and sat on a bale of hay near Sheba. ‘What do you think of the crowd tonight, old girl?’

  Sheba waved her trunk expectantly. She still wore her covering of silk and tassels. Blue laughed. ‘No treats till after the show. You know the rules.’ Sheba was inclined to eject droppings when she was fed. The audience might laugh at the wrong moment. Or worse, a performer might slip and hurt themselves badly.

  The trunk went down, as though Sheba understood her. She did know the rules, as well as Blue, or even better. How old was Sheba? Had she always been with the circus? Maybe Sheba’s mother had been the Magnifico Family’s elephant too. Generations of performers and elephants. She would have to ask Madame.

  ‘Excuse me?’

  Blue struggled to her feet. It was the young man from this afternoon, Joseph.

  ‘The audience isn’t allowed back here,’ she said curtly, glad that Madame wasn’t here to witness her lack of charm. Madame always knew if anyone was smiling or not. The smile is in the voice, she said.

  The young man came no closer. ‘I know. I just wanted to apologise for this afternoon.’

  Blue bit her lip. She was a harem dancer now, not a mermaid. Never tell the punters your secrets. She compromised: ‘I heard you had a bet with the mermaid. Not wise. Mermaids always win their bets.’

  ‘I … see.’ Joseph did not smile. ‘It was a stupid bet. Could you pass on my apologies to her?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Blue. ‘Where’s your friend?’

  ‘I took her home, drove back myself to see the show.’ He hesitated. ‘Look, there’s no easy way to say this. I’m a medical student. Not qualified yet, but I’m boarding with one of Sydney’s best surgeons.’ He gestured at her neck. ‘I couldn’t help noticing the scars.’

  Blue’s hand went up to her neck automatically. The thick greasepaint seemed to be still in place.

  ‘I don’t think anyone else could see them,’ he said hurriedly. ‘It’s just the faintest ridge when you turn side-on.’

  Blue said nothing. Not only had he seen through the disguise, he knew the monster underneath.

  ‘They made me think. I wondered if … the mermaid … might also have scars elsewhere,’ he said gently.

  ‘What’s it to you if she has?’

  ‘My sister used to be crippled.’

  Blue hadn’t expected this. ‘I’m so sorry. I’ve lost a brother too —’

  ‘No,’ he said hurriedly. ‘I didn’t mean that when I said “used to be”. Flinty’s alive and well. Very alive,’ he added dryly. ‘I wish I had half her energy. But she had bad medical advice, thought she’d never walk again. That was one of the things that made me want to become a doctor, one who actually looks at his patients as people instead of as symptoms he’s seen so often he doesn’t even really think about them.’

  ‘Sounds good,’ said Blue expressionlessly.

  ‘I don’t know how much medical care someone in a circus can get …’ He was obviously trying to find a polite way to put it. ‘I thought perhaps a second doctor’s opinion might help.’

  Blue sat awkwardly on the hay again. How much should she tell him? Nothing, she thought. She should send him back into the crowd, where he belonged.

  ‘I was in a fire.’ The words flowed even before she knew she was speaking. ‘I’ve got the scars on my neck, the ones you saw. Another big one on my right shoulder — it’s no trouble. But my legs sort of got stuck together, above my knees.’ She stopped. He might be a medical student. He might even be kind, not the arrogant youth she’d thought this afternoon. But he was still a stranger.

  And he knew about her scars. She suddenly realised that those scars could identify her. How many other missing girls would have scars like hers?

  But this was Sydney, not Melbourne. Did the police in Victoria even talk to those in New South Wales? And why should a doctor talk about her scars to a policeman?

  Joseph looked at her, frowning. ‘Scars shouldn’t bind together like that, not if each leg was bandaged and treated separately.’

  But they weren’t, Blue thought. When the aunts had taken her from the hospital Aunt Lilac had unwrapped the bandages on her legs, and made a face at the sight of the blood and damaged skin. Let them dry out, she’d said. Blue had lain in the hot room, pressing her legs together because one big pain was somehow better than two slightly smaller ones …

  ‘They should have cared for you better!’ Joseph’s gaze took in the caravans, the Big Top.

  She wanted to defend them, to tell him it wasn’t the circus people’s lack of care, but her respectable aunts’. But she had given too much away already.

  ‘How long is intermission?’

  ‘About half an hour.’ The actual length of time depended on how well the peanuts and lollies were selling, and whether the circus was staying in a paddock next to a pub. A pub owner would pay a circus that attracted a good drinking crowd. She didn’t suppose it would be a long intermission tonight. ‘The ringmaster will crack his whip when it’s time to go back.’

  Joseph pulled out his watch. It was round, and gold like its chain. ‘Another ten minutes then.’ He put the watch back in his pocket. ‘Look, would you like me to fix you up an appointment with Dr Gregson?’

  ‘What good would that do?’

  ‘If the scar tissue is as you’ve told me, I’m pretty sure he could do something. If you were able to move your legs after the fire, the fusing may be relatively superficial. I couldn’t guarantee an operation would give you full mobility — it would depend on the depth of the scarring — but certainly enough to let your legs move independently, at least.’

  ‘Really?’

  He nodded.

  It was as though the wind no
longer blew the scent of rags and sewage towards them. To be able to walk! Or even run, and dance properly. A whole possible future would open up if she could move her legs. She could marry and have children. She could learn to soar like Gertrude on the trapeze …

  Where had that thought come from? It took years to learn to do that, practice from babyhood maybe. But she could do something, many things …

  And it was impossible. She knew enough about doctors to know they were expensive. Even if she didn’t have to worry about being identified, she couldn’t afford a surgeon’s fees. ‘No. Thank you anyway, but —’

  ‘No need to worry about the money,’ he put in abruptly. ‘Dr Gregson’s a good egg, a friend of the family. He’d do it as a favour.’

  She stared at him and then up at the stars. They winked down at her, as though to say, ‘Life can be so much more than your small world down there.’ It was so tempting … But an operation like that, in a hospital by a well-known surgeon, might be noticed. Until she was twenty-one the aunts could claim her again.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ He’d never know how sorry she really was. ‘Thank you, but I can’t do it.’

  ‘Why not? I know it would mean pain, but it must hurt now too.’

  ‘It’s not the pain. I can’t, that’s all.’

  ‘Just let Dr Gregson have a look —’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Please,’ he said. ‘Give yourself time to think about it.’

  She shook her head. There had been little chance Uncle Herbert or the police would accept she was being poisoned last year. Now she was well they’d be even more inclined to think she’d run off to the circus out of waywardness, not fear.

  She suddenly realised that perhaps she would have run off even without the threat of poison. Could she really have endured the small life of Aunt Lilac and Aunt Daisy, embroidering or sewing petticoat seams, dressed in the clothes as well as the morals of the days of Queen Victoria, filling the time between meals, their only outing to church on Sundays? Day after day, till she was twenty-one and independent?

  Twenty-one, she thought. When I’m twenty-one they’ll have no hold over me.