Catch a Falling Clown: A Toby Peters Mystery (Book Seven) (12 page)

“What the hell is a wombat?” I said.

“Marsupial,” explained Gunther, “large, rodent appearance. Native, I believe, to Tasmania.”

“What the hell has a wombat got to do with this case?” I said.

“Hitchcock may have …”

“Hitchcock, hell. Shel, just stand still and let Gunther finish.”

Shelly went back to his chair, folded his arms, and pouted while Gunther continued. “Therefore, our most likely suspects are Henry, the animal keeper; Agnes Sudds, the serpent lady, and Thomas Paul, the curious double-faced man for whom you have no affection.”

It sounded reasonable to me.

“Therefore, if we also eliminate Emmett Kelly,” continued Gunther, “it would be best to use our resources in watching the three prime suspects rather than trying to anticipate potential victims.”

It sounded perfectly good to me, which made me wonder for a few seconds why I hadn’t thought of it, but only for a few seconds. I hadn’t thought of it for just that reason—it was reasonable. I was not used to operating from reason.

“It has problems,” said Jeremy Butler, “but it seems the most reasonable to me too.”

“I’m sorry to bring you down here,” I said. “Thanks for the help.”

“I welcome the chance to see the circus,” said Jeremy, standing and examining Peg’s posters. “I’ll get a sense of it, perhaps already have, for my life poem. The elephants’ ears like huge leaves. The burning smell of animal life.”

“That’s donkey piss,” explained Shelley.

“Thanks, Shel.”

Shelly looked satisfied.

I got up slowly. A debate then began over how to treat my once again sore back. Shelly had his pain pills and Jeremy his experience. The back wasn’t bad enough for both yet, so I went with Jeremy’s treatment. I got on my stomach and let him work with his powerful grip. A second of pain and then the relief, not perfect but much better.

I deployed the troops by assigning Shelly to Henry Brain-feeble Yew, assuming Henry was the only one Shelly could watch without being spotted unless Henry was putting on an act. Gunther I sent to Agnes Sudds and the slithering Abdul, and Jeremy to Thomas Paul, should the creature show up as he had promised. I would stay with Peg and try to keep an eye on Elder. It seemed reasonable. We called Elder in to help us find our suspects.

“Don’t I know you?” Elder said to Gunther as I explained our plan, at least all of it except the part about my watching him.

“Yes,” said Gunther with dignity and an accent. “I worked briefly in the circus when I came to this country. Our paths crossed. While I respect it, it is not the life with which I wish to be identified. Please do not take offense.”

Elder touched his mustache and nodded politely.

I wondered how painful the experience of coming back to the circus would be for Gunther. I hadn’t thought about it when I sent for him. I had sent for a friend and forgotten that he was a sensitive small human who was trying desperately to achieve some dignity and distance from the public view of midgets as curiosities and freaks. I didn’t think he could do it with people on the street. It takes knowing someone not to see him.

Elder led everyone out after we agreed to meet again at midnight or when we were sure the people we were watching were well tucked in for the night. It was the best we could do for the moment.

Peg came back with a pair of pants for me, a shirt, and my zipperless jacket.

“Coast is clear,” she said. “The sheriff has gone. I think he’s convinced you went back to Los Angeles.”

I started to dress, put one foot in my pants and tore some stitches. Peg sat down and watched me. The band struck a loud chord far off, and the crowd went, “Ahhhh.”

“Martin the Great,” she said. “Sways on a flexible bar fifty feet high. They think he’s going to fall. A good trick.”

“Dangerous?” I asked, buttoning my shirt.

“You’re one button off,” she said. “Not too dangerous. Emmett Kelly told me once the most dangerous act he ever saw was a guy named Fitzgerald at a small circus back in Missouri. Fitzgerald worked a high wire without a net, dangerous stuff, didn’t give a darn for the audience. Didn’t make easy things look hard. Tried to make everything look easy. Wouldn’t play for a bow, just walked off when his act was finished. Kelly says he was the greatest, but no one but the circus people ever knew it.”

“What happened to Fitzgerald?” I asked, getting the buttons right.

“Fell,” she said with a sad shrug. “Kelly says almost no one even noticed when he went down. They were all looking at a third-rate family act in center ring.”

“Tough,” I said, dressed and looking at her.

“Circus,” she said. “What now?”

“As they say on the radio, we wait.”

We talked for a while about my father, my brother, the war, the price of gas, her father, her mother, Elder, and snow. I don’t remember how we got to snow. I do remember how I moved over and sat next to her on the bed, and she didn’t complain. My arm went up to her shoulder while she talked about what she liked about the circus. I don’t think anything much would have happened even if Emmett Kelly hadn’t knocked at the wagon door. I don’t know. I’ll never know, but knock he did.

“Come in,” she called, looking in my eyes.

“Some grippers spotted Greta,” he said, still in his Willie costume.

“Greta?”

“The elephant Rennata took with her, the one on the beach,” he explained.

Peg got up. “Where is she?”

“Trucking her back,” he said, trying to catch his breath. “Someone shot her, but she’ll probably be all right, according to Doc Ogle. It takes a big bullet and a good shot to bring down a bull.”

“That’s one saved,” I sighed.

“Yeah,” agreed Kelly, “but we’ve got a bigger problem. Now a lion is loose.”

I followed Kelly into the night with Peg behind us. I could see circus people running madly and as quietly as they could with chairs and sticks in their hands, poking into corners, into tents, behind wagons, dark figures. The band in the big top seemed to be playing a march just for them. Musical chairs. Maybe “The Stars and Stripes Forever” would stop, and so would they. It stopped, but they didn’t.

Peg was shivering beside me. The night was cold, but that wasn’t why she was shivering. “They don’t know in the top, do they?”

“No,” said Kelly. “I’ve seen a panic. We’ve got to try to find the cat before the show ends.”

Kelly, looking even more worried than in the center ring, hurried off to look for the lion with no weapon other than his prop broom. I didn’t even have my petrified lasso, and my gun had been confiscated by the Mirador police.

“So,” I said to Peg, taking her hand, “we look for a runaway lion. But first we find out what happened.”

We hurried back to Henry’s tent, but Henry wasn’t there. Gargantua was there, but he didn’t seem to recognize me. He just sat on the floor of his cage eating something that could have been a cabbage, a radio, or a human head. Some people were standing near a cage in the rear. A lion was in the cage.

“You found him,” I shouted to Elder, running forward. The blond, tan man at his side was dressed in white tights and jacket. From a distance he looked twenty. Up close he looked fifty. I recognized him.

“No,” said Elder. “Sandoval came in to check on the cats and saw the cage open. Only one cat had gotten out. The other one stayed.”

“Someone opened up the cage,” Sandoval said with a broad gesture. “Why would someone do such a thing? I need that cat for my act. He can do a rollover …”

“Is he dangerous?” I asked, gripping Peg’s hand.

“Of course,” said Sandoval with indignation. “What is the point of working with cats that are not dangerous? I am an artist, not a sideshow trick.”

“Sorry,” I said.

“Sandoval,” said Elder, putting his hand on the performer’s shoulder and looking into his eyes. “You’ve got to keep your act going tonight till I tell you to stop. Do it twice if you have to. We’ve got to have time to catch the cat.”

“Without the rollover?” Sandoval complained.

“I’m afraid so,” said Elder seriously.

Sandoval shrugged and gave a show-must-go-on smile, turned, and hurried out of the tent.

“Chances are the cat will stay nearby,” said Elder, looking at me and Peg. “Well, let’s look. His name is Puddles, but he doesn’t answer to any name. If you find him, let out a yell and get something between you and him.”

“No accident, was it?” I asked.

“You kidding?” said Elder. “Whoever did it pried the damn lock off. Now, let’s find Puddles.”

I found puddles a few feet away, but finding Puddles was another story. Actually, it’s this story.

“Why do they call the lion Puddles?” I asked, moving into a nearby tent. “I thought lions were called things like Rajah or King.”

Peg followed me into the tent. There was a single light overhead, a not-many-watts yellow bulb. It looked like a dressing tent.

“Some animal trainers give their lions and tigers names to be respected,” Peg explained. “Maybe just to remember to respect them. Others give them nicknames like Puddles to make them seem less frightening.”

Something moved in a corner behind an open trunk. I pushed Peg and tripped. “Out,” I yelled.

“Nothing here,” came a voice from behind the trunk, and Agnes Sudds emerged with a red-spangled cap on her orange head.

I got up, prepared to keep my distance from her and determined not to ask about Abdul.

“If I find him,” she said, looking back, “Abdul will hold him till help comes. Don’t worry about me.”

Since I hadn’t been worrying about Agnes, I didn’t say anything. I wondered if Gunther was hovering somewhere nearby, watching her.

When Agnes was gone, I called, “Gunther” softly.

“His name is Puddles,” said Peg when Gunther appeared, and I explained quickly about the plan to tail the prime suspects. Peg said nothing. It wasn’t bright enough to see her eyes clearly, but something troubled her. Maybe she wondered if someone, me, was trailing her.

“Now, wait …” I began but didn’t get far because someone ran into the tent, panting. It was Shelly. He went to a nearby coil of rope and sat down with one hand over the approximate area of his heart.

“Lost … him,” he wheezed. “Saw …, you … come … in … here … and …”

The distinct nearby roar of a very large animal stopped Shelly, who looked around the tent in fear. Sweat had drooped his eyebrows. “What?” he asked, trying to stand. The coil was too low. He sat back down again.

“Quiet,” I said. “It’s Puddles.”

“Puddles?”

“The lion,” Peg whispered, looking into the darkness.

“I don’t see his cage,” Shelly whispered, getting the idea.

“He escaped,” said Peg. “Someone let him out.”

Shelly stood up with several “damns.” The next proud roar was louder than the last one and definitely in the tent. Agnes and Abdul had either done a rotten job of lion searching or had let us walk into a pride of lions.

Shelly’s glasses had slipped to the tip of his nose, and he didn’t see the wooden chair near the door. He tumbled over it and let out a yell of fear.

“My faithful retainer,” I said. Nobody laughed, not even Puddles, who came bounding out from behind a stack of boxes to see what we were making so much noise about. Puddles was big. His teeth were big, his orange-black mane was big, and he was standing about ten feet in front of me. I reached behind me while I looked at him in the dim light and tried to grasp the chair. It wasn’t there, and Puddles took a step toward us.

“The chair,” I said very quietly. Someone, certainly not Shelly, who I could hear going, “Uh … uh … uh …” at the entrance, handed me the chair.

“She’s afraid,” said Peg. “Look at her eyes.”

Puddles’ eyes were yellow with black hatred in their centers, and they were getting bigger and bigger. I put the chair between me and Puddles.

“I’ll try not to frighten her,” I said with what I hoped was bitter sarcasm. It probably came out more like hysterical fear.

Puddles swiped at the chair with a paw and let out a growl. I held onto the chair.

“That’s part of her act,” Peg whispered.