Circus of the Unseen (11 page)

‘Mama!' she said, pointing right into my face.

‘
Darling?
' Fabian cried. ‘You spoke! Did you really speak?'

‘Mama!' she said again, then raced inside the hut and returned waggling her doll, saying something in a language I couldn't understand.

Fabian lifted her up. He was sparkling more than the sun on the lake. He pulled her close, with tears running down his cheeks. ‘This is the first time she has spoken since we came here.'

‘What did she say?'

‘She said that I made the doll, and her mama painted it. She also said you look like her mother. Perhaps it's your eyes.' He glanced at me, then pulled Accordienka close. ‘I never thought I'd hear her voice again. Thank you, Rosie. Somehow, you have given my daughter her voice back.'

I didn't know about that, but I did want to know how a person could just lose their voice. I mean, I thought you were born mute and that was that. I didn't think voices could just go.

‘What made her stop speaking?'

‘It was the shock of being without her mother and twin. Sorry  … ' He broke off, choked up. ‘I cannot  …  Even after all these years I can find it difficult to speak about what happened. But still, we are together here, and you, Accordienka, have found your voice!' He hugged her tight. ‘Let's go back. I want everyone to know; I want everyone to hear her.'

He turned to go, but I couldn't bring myself to follow. I really didn't want to leave. I felt safe here with him, away from the others.

‘Don't be frightened.' He linked arms with me. ‘Don't let their fear upset you. Scarlet and I will look out for you. You can't hide away here forever.'

Fabian's words made me think of what Granny had said about not letting fear stop me from doing things, so I went with them, but with a new, unfamiliar twist in my heart. Fabian's words about his wife and other daughter had really affected me. I'd seen something new here. I'd seen that these people, or Fabian at least, cared about the lives they'd lived and people they'd loved
before
they came to the circus. I mean, he knew what it was to miss people, and he knew of a world outside, which gave me some hope that he'd understand why I had to go home.

When we returned to the Big Top and Fabian told them their news, everyone flocked around Accordienka. I was so happy for her, of course I was, but honestly, I think I was even happier I wasn't the centre of attention. They were only interested in hearing Accordienka for themselves. I slipped into a seat at the side of the ring, feeling massively relieved that no one seemed to have noticed me at all, until Coco called out to me, and I felt all eyes on me again.

‘You must be magic, Rose Girl! Did you make her speak?'

‘
Did
you?' demanded Lola.

Everyone's stare moved from me to the highest point of the Top. Lola and Coco were up there in a birdcage, hanging upside down by their spindly legs, like feathery bats. Coco slipped off the bar and leapt out. My stomach jumped into my mouth as I rushed to where she might land. There was nothing beneath her, nothing to catch her, nothing to soften her fall. But then something crazy happened. After plummeting a few metres, she spread her arms wide and floated the rest of the way down. The sleeves of her feathered dress seemed to work as wings. She landed with a giggle right next to me. Her little face was almost as wrinkled as Mother Matushka's, but her eyes were bright. She plucked a feather from her dress and offered it to me.

‘This is for you, Rose Girl,' she said. ‘A magic feather.'

She might have been one of the youngest people I'd seen here, but she was the least afraid of me, the least hostile, and her being so kind made a big, dry lump rise to my throat. I tried to push back the crying, but I couldn't.

‘Don't cry. I didn't mean to make you cry. I'm your friend. Are you my friend?' She crinkled her nose, and I thought she was about to cry too.

‘Course I'm your friend,' I replied.

The next thing I knew, I was surrounded by people again, all reaching out to touch me, and this time I didn't have Fabian to protect me. I couldn't even see him. Lola appeared at the front of the crowd. ‘Did you make her speak?' she demanded again.

‘I don't think so. I don't see how I could have. She did it herself. I just happened to be there, like everything else. I didn't mean to do anything with the marsh either, I didn't mean to do anything.'

‘But why are you here? Why did you come?'

‘And what can you do?' asked the smaller of the wolf boys. ‘What's so special about you?'

‘What do you mean? I'm not special.'

‘Jacques means that everyone here can do something,' his brother explained.

‘Me and Lolly make music,' said Coco, and to prove it she sang out in an incredible voice that sounded like hundreds of different birds, all singing at once in their own distinct way.

‘Let's see if you can balance,' said Henri. ‘Mother said you're supposed to learn with us, so let's see if you can do that.'

He positioned two barrels a few metres apart and laid a plank between them. Then he leapt onto the plank and turned a few somersaults. ‘The trick to good balance is to fix your eyes on an invisible point directly in front of you. Keep your chin level, and keep your back straight, like this,' he demonstrated. ‘It helps if you imagine the whole world is at your feet. Take hold of me.'

I went to take his hand, but faltered. They must have all seen how nervous I was. I mean, I hated heights, and just the thought of performing in front of all these people was making me dizzy.

‘Give it a go, girl. Don't be scared.' Hearing Scarlet's voice gave me a little confidence. I mean, I felt I could trust her to make sure they didn't do anything bad to me, and the plank
was
just a metre or so off the ground, and even a person who hated heights shouldn't be scared of that. I reached for Henri's hand and stepped up.

‘That's it, honey. Walk the wire, don't look down!' Scarlet called.

Slowly, I drew up my other leg and felt a wave of relief. My knees were trembling like mad, but I was actually standing on the plank! I knew it was nothing to write home about, but I was up there. Feeling a bit more assured, and encouraged by Scarlet's squeals, I took a few shaky steps forward. But then, as I smiled at her, internally congratulating myself on the dubious accomplishment of wobbling along a plank, I slipped and fell into one of the barrels, only to find it was full of murky water. I spluttered to the surface with hair plastered all over my face and my dress stuck to my skin.

‘Hopeless,' laughed Jacques. ‘You're far too wobbly. And weak.'

‘Don't listen to him.' It was Fabian. He came to my rescue by lifting me from the barrel. ‘You have showed great strength, Rosie. You have shown spirit.'

I pulled back my hair and plumped out my wet dress, desperately hoping it hadn't turned see-through. But the funny thing was, even though I felt like a complete clown, and even though this had been worse than all the disastrous audition scenarios I'd imagined that had crippled me since that time I'd frozen on stage – things like freezing again, tripping up, going on stage with my skirt tucked into my knickers, or naked – I felt pretty amazing that I'd given this a go. Yes, I'd cocked up, but I had nothing else to lose now, and I actually felt excited. Granny was right about trying being better than doing nothing.

‘So what
can
she do?' Lola looked to Fabian for an answer.

‘I suppose she can do many things, and I suppose she shall learn to do many things, if she stays with us, for isn't that what happens? Isn't that what happened to you? You were not always the famous high-flying singers, Miss Lola Lemona and Coco Coo. You were not always able to become two little songbirds, and I was not always able to do what I do.'

His words got me even more wound up about learning to do something ‘special', as that wolf boy had put it. I wasn't deluded enough to think I'd suddenly transform into the greatest tightrope walker the world had ever seen, but there had to be something I could make my ‘thing'.

‘What about you?'
I asked Fabian. ‘Show me your act.'

‘Very well,' he replied, rubbing his hands together. When he opened them, there was a little ball of fire throbbing in his palms. He threw it into the air and it split into more balls. He caught each one as it cascaded down and juggled with them. ‘Ludo!' he called. ‘Let us perform the biting of the bullets!'

The harlequin boy who'd lit Dolly Dimple's cannon ran over to a trunk and returned with a gun. ‘Let us play!' he cried with a bow, then he raised his arms and pointed the gun at Fabian. I clenched my fists tight. The blast of the first bullet made me jump. Then another came, and another. It happened so fast, but I felt like I was seeing it in slow motion – Fabian catching a whole spray of bullets between his teeth, all the while keeping the flaming balls in the air. He had a smile on his face the whole time too, like this was nothing, like he hadn't even needed to concentrate.

‘That's incredible,' I gasped. ‘I mean,
really
incredible.'

‘That's nothing,' said Jacques. ‘You should see him become the Beast Who Walks Like a Man. Show her the bear, Fabian.'

My heart flipped. ‘You can turn into a bear?' I asked. ‘Like the boys become wolves?' But, actually, the thing that shocked me even more than the thought of Fabian turning into a bear was how Jacques had described it.
The Beast Who Walks Like a Man
– that's what Granny had called the story about Mashenka and the bear and the basket of pies. I'd never seen it in any books. I'd only ever heard her mention it.

‘Now is not the time for transformations, Jacques. Now is the time to prepare for the sun setting and resting. You will stay here tonight, Rosie, with the others. Coco, will you show Rosie where to go?'

‘Can't I stay with you?' I asked, disappointed I couldn't go with him and Accordienka to their peaceful hut near the lake. ‘Or Scarlet? What if they turn on me again?'

‘This is Mother's wish,' he said.

‘And nearly all of us sleep around the Big Top,' said Coco. ‘
I
do.'

‘Outside?' I asked.

She nodded. ‘Don't be scared. You can lie near me.' She slipped her hand into mine and we filed from the Top. I felt like Fabian had deserted me, but I had to snap out of feeling sorry for myself. I had to keep my guard up. In all the excitement of being in the Big Top, I'd almost forgotten what I was supposed to be doing. I had to stay focused on finding a way to leave. We settled down outside with the others.

‘How long have you been in the circus?' I asked. ‘Are your mum and dad here?'

‘Oh, no,' she said. ‘They're probably still on the island, or maybe they went back to London. We left them ages ago. That's why we're here. We left and we drowned and then we woke up in the circus.'

I couldn't hide my shock. In that single sentence she'd said far too much for my brain to process. ‘You
drowned
? And you woke up here? I don't understand, Coco. How did that happen?' And my mind was also racing at her mention of London. She knew London! Maybe I wasn't that far from the world I knew.

‘How did we drown? Me and Lolly took a boat out to sea and it capsized and we went under the water, that's how, silly. Lolly says we should never have gone to live on the island, but Daddy said we had to because we had no money, and people used to call us names.' She wrinkled her nose. ‘Do you think we look like monsters? That's what they used to call us, because we look like this, because we look old. But we can't help it. We got old really quickly, when we were babies, and none of the doctors knew what to do with us. But we didn't have enough money to pay for them anyway. That's why Daddy took us to the island.'

It hurt to hear how they'd been treated for the way they looked, and then an awful thought flashed into my head. Maybe that's why they were here, in the circus. I didn't think that kind of thing still happened.

‘Well, I think you're lovely.' And I meant it, but I also felt a twinge of guilt about the look of horror I'd had on my face when I'd first seen her and Lola. I hoped they hadn't noticed. ‘Have you seen your mum and dad since you came here? Have they visited you? Is the island far from here, or London?'

‘We can't see them, silly. And the island is
miles
away.'

Coco told me it had taken them months to sail across the sea to their new home in the Caribbean, where their parents worked in the household of the island's governor. It sounded pretty incredible – they'd lived in the grounds of his fancy house, surrounded by lush flowers and exotic birds and butterflies – but I was wondering where this was leading. I mean, how had they ended up in the Circus of the Unseen, so far from their mum and dad?

‘Mr Governor didn't mind us looking old and wrinkly,' Coco went on. ‘He said it was because we were special, but when he was bitten by a snake in his own garden and died from the poison, Mrs Governor said it was our fault. She called us “ungodly creatures” and said we'd put a curse on their house. Then she threw us out and we had nowhere to live and Daddy couldn't get a new job because she'd made everyone believe we were bad. But then Lolly had an idea. She said if we left Mummy and Daddy, they'd be all right because everyone blamed us, not them. So that's why she rowed us out to sea, to find our own island to live on, but the waves were really big and strong and the boat tipped up and we drowned.'

I didn't know what to think. I felt so angry that someone – was it Mother Matushka? Lola? – must have fed her this crazy story as the truth. ‘Are you sure, Coco? How did you get here?'

‘Because we died between the sea and the sky, and between the water and the earth, silly. Mother Matushka said that's what makes us special, and that's why we woke up here. I was sad at first, but it's better than just being dead, isn't it? We didn't do flying before we came here, so being here might even be better than being alive.'

‘Oh, Coco.' I stroked her hair. She really was breaking my heart. I wondered if their parents had died and she was confused, or had been told the wrong thing. ‘That's a funny thing to say. I think you might be mixed up.'

She cocked her head at me. ‘You've only just arrived here, haven't you? Me and Lolly have been here for about one hundred years.' She looked at me with her piercing blue eyes. ‘You still want to go home, don't you? I wanted to at first, but now I like it here. I still love Mummy and Daddy though, and just because we're not with them doesn't mean we don't love them. But I think you should stop wanting to go home. If you keep wanting to go home, and if you try to leave, you'll only end up like Freddie. Don't do that, Rose Girl. I wouldn't want that to happen to you.'

I'd heard that name before. Scarlet had mentioned him when I first arrived. ‘What happened to Freddie?'

She leaned in close to me. ‘If I tell you, it has to be our secret. Do you promise to keep the secret?'