Read Online Unhappy Hooligan by Stuart Palmer - Free Book Online

the rush.” He glanced at the magic card with the emblazoned elephants. “Oh, you’re with it. Mr. Timken should have told you where to sit. Performers and guests on the other side.” The man pointed, and Rook got hastily up, feeling slightly abashed, and went out to the entrance and in again past the canvas division. This end of the big tent was a duplicate of the other, except that acrobats and other performers were straggling in. At the farther end, partially hidden by a canvas flat, he could see that the freaks, the Strange People, were eating at a special table, the Armless Wonder dexterously scooping up soup with a tablespoon held in his toes next to the Fat Lady with a well-heaped plate. He chose a place in a quiet corner and sat down.
    A waiter came up to him immediately, gave him a peculiar look, and then said in a singsong voice, “Veg soup, beef stew or fried fish?” Rook settled for stew, which appeared in a matter of seconds, along with the soup, coffee, a quart container of milk, half a loaf of sliced bread, and pie. It was a meal that would have staggered a lumberjack, but he did his best with the hunks of meat, the almost whole potatoes and onions. He was almost through when he became conscious that somebody was practically breathing down the back of his neck. He turned to look into the cold, unfriendly eyes of a spare, swarthy, beak-nosed character sporting a large waxed mustache and whipcord breeches with shiny black boots, who demanded, “And what are you doing here?”
    “Finishing my lunch, obviously,” said Howie Rook.
    The man said something under his breath in a foreign tongue, shook his head, then went around the table and plunked himself down in the opposite seat. A waiter appeared and took his order, after which they had a whispered conclave. The waiter went away and came back with the food—and also with a head steward, who approached Rook. “And just what are you doing here, mister?”
    “Eating my pie,” explained Rook. He showed the card. “Mr. Timken—”
    The steward relaxed, but only just a little. “One of those, eh? Well, you should have got a table assignment. Our seats are all reserved, and you’ve taken Captain Larsen’s place. Next time come to me and I’ll seat you somewhere.” He went away.
    The man across the table was soaking bread in his soup and washing it down with copious drafts of milk out of the container, crouched over his food like one of his own great cats. He ate swiftly, efficiently, and noisily.
    “Sorry I took your seat, Captain,” Rook apologized, anxious to make a friend. “You see, I’m new here.”
    “Yes, you are,” said the other through a mouthful. He barely looked up, but Rook caught a glimpse of dark, pinpointed eyes that blinked about once every second from beneath the shadow of the sola topee the man affected.
    “These are magnificent tigers you have; I was just admiring them.”
    This time the glance was purely baleful. “I’ll thank you and everybody else to keep strictly the hell away from my cats,” said Captain Larsen. He rose abruptly, his meal half finished, and stalked out of the cook tent.
    “Don’t mind him,” spoke up a tall, round-faced man with sideburns, who had just sat himself down nearby, “The Captain is always touchy just before a performance; maybe you’d feel the same if you had to go in and wrestle seven tigers.”
    “Completely understandable,” nodded Rook. He noticed that his neighbor wore a silk shirt and bright blue uniform trousers with a red stripe down the sides. “Do you work with the animals?” he asked, still hopeful of making friends.
    “I do—with human animals. I’m boss windjammer, bandmaster to you.” His name turned out to be Leo Dawes; a serene, friendly seeming sort. But his manner changed perceptibly when Howie Rook proudly explained the ostensible reason for his presence here among them. “A guest clown, eh?” Dawes said rather thoughtfully, including the others around the