Read Online The Pilo Family Circus by Will Elliott - Free Book Online Page B

white and red cloud. There was a sound like fruit being squashed. Blood and shreds of rabbit meat splattered over the first two rows of the audience. A small pile of gore spilled at the magician’s feet.
    ‘HA HA!’ Mugabo yelled. He bent over at the waist, thumping his fist on the table, shrieking something between a laugh and a howl. The audience went completely silent.
    Two figures burst through the curtains. Jamie recognised one of them — it was Doopy the clown, who Jamie understood to be an old acquaintance from somewhere just out of memory. The other was a burly dwarf wearing an eye patch. ‘All part of the show, folks,’ said the dwarf as he threw himself at Mugabo, tackling him around the ankles. Then Droopy and the dwarf wrestled the kicking, flailing magician off the stage.
    The show appeared to be over. The audience clapped uncertainly. Jamie picked some white fur from his shirt and wiped blood from his face. A baby in the arms of the woman beside him had its face covered in rabbit blood; she didn’t seem to mind, or even to notice. She and her husband stood, waiting for a path to clear to the exits.
    There was a faint sound Jamie recognised, like marbles clinking together. It came from below his feet. Looking down, he saw tiny little crystals scattered thinly through the grass.Where had he seen these before? He couldn’t remember. He knew this much: the crystals had not been on the ground when they entered the tent. Now they gleamed around people’s feet as they made their way down the aisle to the exit, like coins dropping from their pockets.
    As they left the magic show, the curtain behind the stage was jerking in accompaniment to the sounds of slaps, grunts, cracks. There was a thud as a body hit the floor. All part of the show.
     
    Outside, through the smell of buttered-popcorn came something stronger, the scent of incense like an invisible finger beckoning him with a long manicured nail. Without a word he followed the scent, Steve on his heels. In the crowd he saw others from the magic show passing by, oblivious to the smears of rabbit blood on their shirts and faces as they chatted and laughed. Steve promptly announced he was going to Sideshow Alley and ran off, shouldering his way through the crowd and nearly bowling people over. Jamie let him go without a care, for he was distracted by erotic visions promised in the sweet scent coiling around him like caressing fingers. Behind his eyes dark-skinned women like Egyptian princesses ran ahead of him, naked bodies in full flight, gesturing for him to follow. Punch-drunk, he did, down a path where the crowd thinned, the background music faded, and the air was cooler.
    A pair of dwarfs wrestling in the dirt beside the path froze as Jamie approached, scowled at him, then ran off. Suddenly the teasing erotic visions vanished and he found himself standing before a small hut with hanging beads for an entrance. He shook himself and looked around in confusion,startled to see there was no one else around. Hesitantly he parted the beads which clicked together like marbles. It seemed to be a fortune-teller’s hut, but somebody was already visiting.
    ‘Sorry,’ Jamie said as the man in the hut turned around.
    Something cold crept over Jamie’s skin. A voice inside told him to run away, very fast, right now. But as that passed he realised the man’s face must be covered in makeup, that’s all — that’s why his eyes blazed with that insane light from beneath a lump of bony brow as dark as a thundercloud; that’s why every contour from forehead to jaw was so wolf-like the man would not have looked out of place howling at the moon, despite the fact he wore a business suit; that’s why he was well over seven feet tall, with hands far too large and yellow nails as long as talons.
    The monster looked down at him from a full foot above. ‘Oh, I do like apologies,’he said in a deep, civilised voice. ‘But, no problem. I was just on my way out. Enjoy your