Down the Road to Gundagai

by Jackie French

  Blue glanced at Gertrude. She expected wide-eyed amazement. Instead Gertrude’s gaze was intent. She is studying this, thought Blue. Mah and I are just enjoying it, and Fred too. Yes, Gertrude was truly circus, and they were not.

  The Wild West horse act was first: four cowboys in leather chaps and tall, brimmed hats that somehow never fell off. The men stood on two cantering horses at a time, one foot on each rump, cracking their whips as the band kept playing.

  Clowns in white overalls and red pom-poms ran out to divide the ring in two, then dragged out two big cages. One held a tiger, who lay down at his master’s command, opened his mouth, and let the man put his head between the giant teeth before being rewarded with a hunk of red meat. In the other ring the lion tamer yelled and lashed his whip till the cowed and resentful big cats finally crept up onto their stools in the cage, and sat growling at the crowd through the bars.

  Three men on a tightrope with balancing poles; one on the slack rope (even harder to walk on a slack rope than a tight one, whispered Gertrude) walking slowly back and forth — and then a gasp as he steadied himself and somersaulted, landing somehow on the fine wire again.

  That was when Gertrude clutched Blue’s hand. ‘It’s impossible,’ she whispered. ‘He can’t see the wire when he’s in the air. Except he’s done it.’ Her voice was full of wonder.

  Intermission, with ice creams as well as peanuts, lollies and apples. Blue shook her head when Mah looked at her hopefully. ‘They’re all only half the price back at the station.’

  They ate their sandwiches instead. One day I’ll buy us anything we want, thought Blue. Not just ice creams. An automobile for Fred. She bet he’d like that. And Mah … no, not an extravagant gift for Mah. Mah had lived on charity most of her life. The friend who had saved her deserved a share in her inheritance, to do whatever she chose with it.

  Would that be the circus, if Mah had a choice? She glanced at the others, chewing their cheese sandwiches, Fred eyeing one of the young women in the next row, Mah gazing at the fashions, Gertrude silent, intent, waiting for the next part of the show to begin. Perhaps, she thought, but not forever, nor for me either. It’s fun. But it’s not the heart of our lives, like it is with Gertrude.

  The second act began: clowns who juggled; clowns who sang; Professor Fortescue from Oxford, England, who declaimed a speech from Shakespeare; the equestriennes, standing and jumping in much the same act as Gertrude’s. But here there were sixty of them, on white horses cantering anti-clockwise around the ring, so much faster than an elephant, and their backs narrower too.

  ‘The girls lean in to the ring,’ whispered Gertrude. ‘It helps them to stay on as the horses go around.’

  ‘How do you know?’ whispered Mah.

  ‘Back from when I was small. I trained on horses too.’

  ‘Riding an elephant must be easier,’ said Blue.

  Gertrude shook her head, her gaze still on the blaze of horses and riders. ‘Not really. The horse’s speed helps you stay on, if you know how to do it. It looks more impressive too. It’s harder to impress an audience on an elephant. The audience looks at the elephant instead of you half the time.’

  ‘Not when you’re on Sheba,’ said Blue. ‘You can capture an audience even better than an elephant.’

  Gertrude glanced at her, for once no animosity in her face. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I can.’

  A magician in a black-and-red silk cloak came on next, with an assistant in a short blue skirt and spangles. Now Fred sat forwards, watching intently as the magician locked the girl into a trunk, then got a member of the audience to check that the chain and locks were solid. The lights dimmed for just a second, then suddenly the magician stood there, his arms raised, his black top hat in one hand, the empty trunk open at his feet, its chains and locks in pieces in the sawdust.

  Fred snorted softly. ‘False bottom in the trunk. The assistant is just curled up in there.’

  ‘Shh,’ said Mah, then giggled as a pigeon exploded out of the top hat and flapped its way dazedly up above the audience and out.

  False bottom in the hat too, thought Blue. Every city had pigeons to trap, she supposed.

  The magician undid his cloak and threw it into the air. The air glittered, exploding into small white puffs. And suddenly the assistant stood there, the cloak in her hands, curtseying and smiling.

  ‘That wasn’t just a false bottom in the trunk,’ whispered Mah.

  ‘Might have been,’ muttered Fred. ‘Smell that? It’s firecrackers. She could have rolled out while we all watched the smoke and the sparkles. It’s all in the timing …’

  ‘And now,’ yelled the ringmaster, ‘the Great Mondino will make his assistant float in mid-air …’

  Two clowns rolled in on a wooden table, then fell off. The assistant lay down, her head and feet level with the table edges.

  ‘Ahhhhh … one!’ yelled the ringmaster.

  The magician wrenched off one of the table legs. The audience gasped as the table didn’t even shudder, still standing firm on the remaining three legs.

  ‘Aaand two!’

  Another gasp, as yet another leg was torn away.

  ‘Aaand three! And four!’

  Somehow, magically — no, not magically, thought Blue, there’s some technique here that fools the eye — the assistant’s pretty blue skirts hung over the sides of a table top that floated in the air. The audience sat in the silence that was harder to win than any applause.

  ‘Aahhh one, aahhh two!’ roared the ringmaster.

  Swish! With a flash of cape the magician pulled the table top out from underneath the girl. She hung rigid in the air.

  ‘She’s lyin’ on glass,’ muttered Fred.

  ‘Hush!’ said Mah, as the magician picked up two hoops and passed them around the assistant’s body.

  ‘You can’t pass a hoop through glass,’ whispered Blue.

  Fred gazed, intent. ‘Gotta be glass. Nah, there’s a trick there. Has to be the angle he’s holding them hoops. An’ she’s holding herself absolutely straight — look at the tightness of the muscles in her throat. Tell you what, though, I need one of them capes.’

  More clowns tumbled in, dressed like English Lords in ermine capes. The audience roared its approval.

  ‘I say, I say, I say.’ The posh drawl was almost perfect. ‘Do you know I’ve gone one hundred days without sleep?’

  ‘I say, old chap, you must be half dead!’

  ‘Not at all, dear man. I sleep at night instead. Haw! Haw! Haw!’

  More somersaults, while the audience giggled.

  ‘I say, I say, I say, if it takes twenty ordinary men a total of twenty days to build a bridge, how long will it take fifty members of the House of Lords to build it?’

  ‘Don’t know, old chap.’

  ‘No time at all! The twenty ordinary fellows have already built it! Haw! Haw! Haw!’

  The final act was traditionally the flying trapeze. At the Mammoth six men — all men, Blue noted — swung from hand to hand and swing to swing above them, as the marching band below played a roar of triumph with every catch and swing.

  ‘My father was better than them,’ Gertrude whispered. ‘He could somersault three times before the catcher grabbed him. Thee times!’

  ‘Amazing,’ said Blue, partly because she knew Gertrude wanted her to say it, and partly because it was amazing.

  The trapeze artists swung down on their ropes — no ladders for them. They bowed in unison and ran out.

  The musicians raised their instruments. The sound of a waltz burst across the tent for the finale.

  It was like the entrance all over again, the horses and equestriennes, the elephants, the trapeze men swinging on their ropes, the clowns all prancing, striding, capering and marching around the others as the band played and the ringmaster cracked his whip.

  ‘Blimey,’ whispered Fred. ‘Their Galah is more like a ruddy emu!’

  Then, suddenly, with one even louder crack from the ringmaster’s whip, the music
stopped and each animal and artist fell down, the horses and elephants on their sides, the girls in their spangles, the clowns and the cowboys. Even the rope and trapeze artists hung limp in the air.

  Another crack, and suddenly the noise and the animals and performers were up again, marching and waving as the cheering echoed around the canvas. Blue and Mah cheered with the rest. Even Fred clapped, though he still looked preoccupied. Trying to puzzle out the table trick, thought Blue.

  Only Gertrude was silent. Her hands were clasped in her lap now.

  ‘Come on,’ said Fred as the applause still thundered about them and the circus started to file out the backstage entrances. ‘Let’s get out of here before the crowd. Don’t want Blue jostled.’

  ‘I’m all right —’ Blue began as Gertrude said, ‘No. I want to stay till the end.’

  ‘But it has ended,’ argued Fred.

  Gertrude just shook her head.

  Fred shrugged. Madame had said they had to stay together. Blue was happy to stay longer too. The more time they spent here, the fewer hours they’d have to wait at the station.

  The audience left surprisingly quickly. Out in the backblocks there were delays as too many buggies and carts tried to get out a single gate. But here the audience caught buses or trains, or had chauffeurs waiting to pick them up, driving round and round the block, just as Wilkins had done for Mum and Dad, pulling into the kerb and opening the door for them when they finally appeared.

  The last members of the audience trickled out. Suddenly Gertrude leaped to her feet. She hauled off her dress, showing the camisole she wore for her trapeze act. But this time her breasts were unbound, and instead of dark tights, she wore Gloria’s ballet skirt and silk stockings that showed the shape of her legs. This was a girl, not a Boldini Brother. She dropped the dress on her seat and ran down to the now empty ring.

  ‘Stop her!’ hissed Mah.

  Fred sat where he was. ‘How? Drag her back kicking and screaming? They’d call the cops.’ He nodded at Gertrude, now vaulting nimbly over the barrier. ‘Let the Mammoth folk kick her out.’

  Already a man in overalls was running over to her. ‘Hey, miss!’ he yelled.

  Gertrude ignored him. She grasped one of the still-dangling ropes, twisted it about her waist and began to climb, arm over arm.

  The labourer grabbed the end of the rope and shook it. ‘You come down, young lady. Now!’

  ‘Leave that gal alone.’ It was one of the trapeze artists, drawn back from the offstage area by the racket. He looked older now, his brilliantined hair slightly mussed. He still wore his tights but with a blue cardigan flung over his silk singlet. ‘She’ll fall off if you do that.’ His voice sounded just like the American accents Blue had heard on the radio.

  ‘Serves her right.’

  Blue gasped.

  The trapeze man gave the labourer a glance. ‘If she breaks her back, it’ll be in all the papers. Bad publicity.’ He looked up at Gertrude. A smile crossed his face. ‘I want to see what that little gal can do.’

  Gertrude reached the top of the rope. She hung for a moment, then unwrapped the rope from her waist, let it go and grasped the swing. One quick move and she was sitting on the trapeze. She bent down and threw off her shoes, then stood, holding onto the ropes on either side. She began to swing, standing on the bar in her bare feet, each swing longer than the last, getting the feel of the apparatus. Then she let go.

  For a few seconds she stood with her arms outstretched, a small figure in the vastness of the tent, still perched on the swing, balancing by strength and perfect timing. Back and forth and back and forth …

  She began to dance. It was the harem dance, the simple swaying of arms and hips that looked so complex until you knew its secrets. But this was performed sixty feet up in the air, on a thin piece of wood that swung above the ground.

  She was beautiful, her short hair gleaming in the lights, her arms graceful. She was extraordinary, a lone girl dominating the vast space of the Mammoth’s Big Top.

  Blue tore her gaze away as the man below nodded. A small crowd of performers had gathered at the entrance, all looking up at the slender figure above them.

  All at once Gertrude stopped. She dropped, like a diver plunging into a swimming pool. Blue clutched Mah’s hand. But instead of crashing to the sawdust ring, Gertrude grabbed the swing with one hand. She twisted, so that both hands held the swing, steadied herself, then began to somersault, heaving herself over and over the wood …

  So this was what she had been rehearsing, when none of them were around to see?

  … over and over the slim body swung, till even Blue felt giddy, then up onto the swing again. For a moment Gertrude stood erect and still, then she grabbed the rope, twisted it around her waist and wrist again, and slowly let herself down, as graceful as a waterfall trickling down the rocks.

  At last she stood in the sawdust of the ring. She met the trapeze artist’s eye. She curtseyed to him, carefully and daintily, holding out her skirts, then bowed to the Mammoth crew standing in the wings too.

  Someone clapped. The clapping grew. Gertrude ignored them. She looked at the trapeze artist, a small smile on her face, as though to say, ‘Well?’

  ‘You want a job?’ he asked slowly.

  ‘Yes,’ said Gertrude.

  Blue froze. She heard Mah’s intake of breath beside her. ‘Bloomin’ traitor,’ muttered Fred.

  The trapeze artist didn’t even pause. ‘Solo act or work with us?’

  ‘Either. Both,’ said Gertrude.

  ‘Twelve dollars a week. I don’t know what that is in your pounds. Eight? You’ll be paid from when you join up, though might be a few weeks till we can get you up there in a show. You pay your board out of your wages.’

  Eight pounds was a fortune. Blue waited numbly for Gertrude to accept.

  The ringmaster stepped out of the cluster of cowboys and equestriennes. ‘How old are you, young lady?’

  Gertrude hesitated. ‘Twenty-one.’

  ‘She’s eighteen,’ called Fred.

  Gertrude flashed him a furious glance. ‘All right. Eighteen.’

  ‘We’ll need a note from your parents giving you permission. What circus are you with now?’

  He takes it for granted she’s with a circus, thought Blue. Of course only someone trained daily over most of her life could do what she had just done.

  ‘It’s Mum and me and my younger brother. My dad died years ago. We’re with the Magnifico.’

  ‘I don’t know much about the local outfits. Small, is it? Your mom and brother as good as you?’

  Gertrude shrugged. ‘Mum’s all right. Ginger’s going to be good.’ She raised her chin. ‘But not as good as me.’

  ‘Twelve dollars American a week for you then. Five each for your mom and brother, though I’m prepared to raise it when we see what they can do. I gotta say, you’re really something special, sister.’ He looked at the trapeze artist. ‘So you found us a dame after all, Tony.’

  Tony held his hands out wide. ‘She found us!’

  They’ll be rich, thought Blue, and then — I’m rich. How much a week did she have? Was it enough to pay people eight pounds a week?

  And yet she also had nothing, except the ten-shilling note and a few pennies change left from the money Madame had given her, and of course her own two pounds. Her life was the circus.

  But without Gertrude and the other Olsens, would they even have a circus? There were plenty of unemployed people who might take a place in the dance, or as labourers helping to set up the tents. But Magnifico’s needed the Olsens’ core of real talent to shine their glamour over the other acts.

  ‘Mrs Olsen won’t leave,’ whispered Mah. ‘She won’t let Gertrude go either.’

  ‘Dunno,’ said Fred. ‘This is Gert’s big chance. And all that money.’ He gave a slow whistle.

  The ringmaster flicked his fingers. A young woman came running. She handed him a notebook and pencil. He scribbled something in it, and handed it to Gertrude
. ‘We’re heading north. This will reach us while we’re in Australia. We sail from Cairns to San Francisco at the end of March. Cable us before then if you’re interested. We’ll wire you the fares to meet us before we leave.’

  ‘Interested,’ muttered Fred. ‘She’s like a fish about to grab the hook.’

  Gertrude smiled and nodded.

  No one said anything while Fred and Mah helped Blue up the steps of the bus. They sat in silence too, Fred and Blue and Mah on the long seat behind the driver, Gertrude in solitary splendour in the next row. At last Fred said, ‘You oughtn’t to have done that.’

  Gertrude shrugged. ‘Well, I have.’ She turned to look out the window.

  What else was there to say? thought Blue. She looked out the window too. Gertrude must have been planning this for months, waiting for the chance to show a bigger circus what she could do.

  The trolley-bus travelled slowly, stuck behind a horse and cart. A line of people stretched down the road. Another circus? she wondered. Or maybe a moving picture show. She’d only seen one, a silent film called The Sentimental Bloke. It had been funny and sad in bits, with the captions flickering up in between each scene. She’d read that there were moving pictures with sound now — talkies.

  She stared at the crowd. They didn’t look like they were going to the moving pictures. They didn’t look like they were going to anything good or fun.

  She leaned forwards and spoke to the bus driver. ‘What are all those people queuing for?’

  The driver flashed her a look, then turned back to the road. ‘Soup kitchen. They’re waiting for a meal.’ He spoke with the dispassion of a man who still had a job; a man who knew just how precious that job was.