The Road to Gundagai (6 page)

It was impossible to look away. Golden hips in shining satin, golden hair, arms that looked like they had been dusted with gold too …

Blue stared more critically now. She had seen pictures of Persian ladies in
The Illustrated News
. Persians had dark hair. Wasn’t the shortest dancer Glorious Gloria? Though Glorious Gloria had black hair.

Blue peered at the ring. The third woman looked faintly familiar. The bearded lady, without her beard? And there was something about the fourth’s wide blue sightless eyes.

Madame Zlosky!

But that was impossible. Madame Zlosky was blind and old …

A blind woman could dance to the beat of the music, thought Blue. A blonde wig over the grey hair, lipstick and eye paint and rouge, the dim lights that shone only on the dancers’ feet and legs and hips, leaving the faces shadowed. But this woman’s body was straight, her waist and arms firm. Could an old woman be as fit as that? And … what was that word? Alluring?

‘Crikey,’ repeated the man in front of her.

The music rose to a crescendo. The dancers touched their waists. The silk pantaloons fell in shimmering heaps on the ground. More gasps from the audience, at a second’s glimpse of shadowed legs and shimmering gold underpants, and then the dark.

Blue counted to five. The lights flashed back on — the harsh bright lights at the top of the Not-Very-Big Top.

‘Peanuts or lollies!’ The moustached man who’d played the trombone lumbered around the ring, a laden tray suspended from his neck. ‘Fresh roasted peanuts!’

It was intermission.

Chapter 4

The smell of freshly roasted peanuts mingled with elephant dung, dust, sweat and canvas.

Most of the audience stood to stretch their legs. A small crowd clustered around the peanut and lolly man. Blue tried to force back her nausea at the smell of hot roasted peanuts, and considered what she’d seen.

It was … interesting. She had forgotten what fun tasted like. But mostly she enjoyed working out how it had all been done.

Half of sales is showmanship, Dad used to say. The factories her grandfather had founded made good shoes, from high heels for ladies to workboots for shearers. But Dad said most customers couldn’t tell the difference between a flashy boot with a glued-on cardboard sole and one stitched properly out of well-dressed leather. You had to show them they were getting quality — arrange the ladies’ shoes on draped velvet in the window, with ostrich feathers and perhaps a string of what looked like pearls, and ask your saleswomen to dress in black silk blouses. The advertising banner for Laurence’s workboots showed a prosperous farmer, with a hundred sheep in the background and a glamorous woman with short fashionable hair and jodhpurs looking over his shoulder. ‘Look at what you’ll get when you buy our boots,’ the poster whispered.

Dad’s boots were solid leather. The circus was lights and promises. How many illusions had she seen tonight? She’d worked out some of them, but which had she missed?

‘Peanuts or lollies, lady? Show starts again in a minute.’

Blue looked up into the man’s face decorated with its shaggy grey moustache. ‘Good peanuts, lady. Nice and hot.’

Her stomach lurched.

‘No, thank you,’ she whispered, hoping she wasn’t going to retch again. Take them away, she thought. Please take them away.

‘You sure? They’re still hot.’

Maybe if she bought some he’d take the rest of the tray away. She could give them to a child or put them under the seat. She reached for one of the coins hidden in the folds of her dress.

‘Here …’ she began.

‘Bluebell!’ Aunt Lilac stood in the open tent flap, in her black dress, sensible black shoes and her evening black hat, Aunt Daisy like a fluffed-up grey hen behind her.

She should have sat on the other side, where she might have hidden in the crowd. But Blue suspected even then they’d have found her. She struggled to stand up without bumping the seat in front of her. ‘Aunt Lilac, I’m sorry. I just wanted to see the circus.’

The man with the peanuts moved away. Aunt Lilac’s gentle smile tightened. ‘We were worried. Your Aunt Daisy was about to call the police when that Chinese girl said you had left a note.’

‘Her name is Mah,’ said Blue. ‘I … I’m sorry I worried you. But Mum and Dad would have let me come to the circus.’

‘Alone? I think not.’ Aunt Lilac’s smile looked like it had been pasted onto her face.

No, thought Blue, not alone. They’d have been here as well, or sent Mah with me, and Mr Jones the gardener too.

‘Not at all the behaviour of a young lady.’ Aunt Daisy glanced around to check that no one had heard her imply that a member of her family had been unladylike.

‘And not when you are so ill,’ added Aunt Lilac. ‘Who knows what you might catch in a crowd like this, in your weak state.’ Her eyes flicked over the farming families around them as though they were fleas on a dirty dog.

Blue took a breath. They were acting like she was five years old. All right, she shouldn’t have worried them. But she wasn’t a child either.

‘The circus is really good.’ She didn’t add that the best bits were working out why it was so much fun. ‘Why don’t you stay and see the second half?’ She wondered if Aunt Lilac and Aunt Daisy had paid a shilling each, just to fetch her, or if the man on the gate had gone.

Aunt Lilac’s smile faded, as if it had at last been used up. ‘I think it best if you come home now. We have Mr Thomas’s taxi waiting for you at the gate.’ Her voice held the unspoken accusation: you have cost us the expense of a taxi.

Blue took another breath. ‘I’m feeling fine, Aunt Lilac.’ It wasn’t true. She felt dizzy and sick. Her feet kept knotting up with spasms and pain ran up and down her legs. But she wanted to see the circus, the flying trapeze. She wanted …

I want to be myself, she thought, just for a night. Not Aunt Daisy and Aunt Lilac’s niece, hidden away up in their attic, the poor girl who had lost her family, her home, who was scarred and sickly.

Suddenly she was aware that the ringmaster was just outside the tent, watching, listening. Was he going to give her the change from her ten pounds? Because if he did that would mean she had to go, the evening was ended. The circus people wouldn’t want a girl who might faint, disturbing the audience.

The ringmaster stepped forwards. ‘Let the lass stay.’ His voice was soft and husky after the strident tones he’d used in the ring. ‘Let her see the Boldini Brothers on the flying trapeze, at least. Nothing like it in the whole of Australia.’

Aunt Lilac didn’t even glance at him. ‘Daisy, fetch Mr Thomas. Tell him Miss Bluebell needs to be carried back to the taxi.’

‘No!’ She’d rather leave than have the embarrassment of being carried away.

‘Tomorrow,’ said Aunt Lilac clearly, ‘we are going to the Ladies’ Temperance Spa in the mountains. The cool air will be so good for you. You need a sound night’s rest before we leave.’

Away again, thought Blue. Maybe they wouldn’t even take Mah this time. They wouldn’t need a kitchen maid at a spa. When Uncle Herbert arrives on Tuesday we will be gone.

All at once she realised that people were staring at them. Blue flushed. Now that they were really looking at her they’d see the scars on her throat, the straggle of hair under her hat, the eyes that looked as if they’d been shoved in her face with a spadeful of dirt. She was also aware of her lack of knickers, as though the watchers could detect that even under her long dress.

‘I’ll walk,’ she whispered, looking at the distance between the Big Top and the waiting taxi, the crushed tussocks and thistles, the crumpled tickets.

‘You will be carried,’ said Aunt Lilac. She gestured to the taxi driver.

Blue submitted.

Chapter 5

The house still exhaled heat. The scent of last winter’s mould battled with lavender polish. Blue stood as Aunt Daisy unbuttoned her dress and replaced it with her nightdress. Aunt Lilac stood by the door. There was no pretence of smiles now.

They don’t love me, thought Blue. They don’t even like me. They smile and say, ‘Dear Bluebell.’ But it isn’t real. It was what everyone wanted to hear, what I wanted to hear, the loving aunts who take in an orphaned niece. But it is less real than the grizzly bear at the circus.

Why did they take me in? Because it was their duty? A duty to care for a sick niece? To pretend they cared?

‘Get into bed,’ said Aunt Lilac. Blue shuffled as quickly as her scarred legs would allow and lay down. Aunt Lilac nodded at the flask of milk on the bedside table. ‘Now drink your milk.’

It was easier to do as she was told. It had been easier for months. She could manage to do it now too. Blue drank. Her stomach clenched. But she was able to hold down her gorge for the few seconds it took for the aunts to leave the room, shutting the door behind them. Blue heard the
snick
of the lock.

‘No! Don’t lock me in! Please!’ She hated how her voice trembled, but couldn’t help it.

Nausea took over. She reached for the washbasin.

She retched till nothing more would come, then rinsed her mouth out with water, over and over to get rid of the taste. She lay back and looked at the ceiling.

She was trapped.

Stop it, she told herself. There won’t be another fire. Aunt Lilac will unlock the door tomorrow. And I won’t let her shut me in again. I’ll write to Uncle Herbert from the spa. Someone will post the letter for me. I’ll ask him to take me away.

There had to be somewhere else she could go. Anywhere, except this stuffy house and its liver custards and aunts who dragged her back from the circus, who locked her in her room like a naughty child.

Trapped …

She forced her mind away from that thought. Could the aunts really force her to live with them till she was twenty-one? She didn’t even know if they were her legal guardians. She had simply done what she was told, like a child, ever since the fire. No wonder they treated her like one.

Uncle Herbert had mentioned a nursing home. A nursing home would be better than this. Patients in nursing homes might be allowed a night out at a circus …

But it would be better to be well. I
will
get well, she told herself. She’d go to a nursing home and drink warm milk and … and whatever else it took.

But she would get better. And she’d leave this house that smelled like a long-closed linen cupboard. After she had got well, Uncle Herbert might help her find somewhere else to live. Maybe there was some way of getting her money before she was twenty-five, if she really needed it. Uncle Herbert would know. It was the sort of thing men
did
know.

But what if Uncle Herbert didn’t answer her letter? What if there were no post offices near the Temperance Spa to even send the letter? What if Aunt Lilac had just
said
they were going to a Temperance Spa, where people might hear her, but they were really taking her somewhere else?

No. She was being hysterical, just because she was scared of a door that wouldn’t open, no matter how much you tugged at it, or how loud you screamed. The aunts had no reason to hide her away, except from those who’d stare at her. They’d just never thought to tell Uncle Herbert where they’d gone.

And if Uncle Herbert didn’t come and rescue her, she’d manage somehow. How did women who had no husbands survive, and who couldn’t work? Invalid women took in sewing, except she was no good at sewing. Ironing then: she’d never ironed anything, but it couldn’t be too hard. Or washing. Would people bring their washing to a girl who was scarred and bald? She could buy a scarf to hide the scars on her neck. If her hair stopped falling out, she could have it shingled. It wouldn’t look so bad if it was cut short …

She shut her eyes and tried to think of hair salons, and not of locked doors and fire.

She woke when someone pulled her toe. She opened her eyes, then opened her mouth to scream.

A small hand pressed against her lips.

‘Shh.’ Someone looked down at her. It was the dwarf from the circus, except there was no hunched back. It was Tiny Titania, but without her wings and blonde hair.

The dwarf and Titania turned into a nine-year-old boy with cropped hair. He gave her a crooked grin. ‘If I take my hand away, will you promise not to make a noise?’

Blue nodded. The boy stepped back.

‘What are you doing?’ whispered Blue. He was obviously not doing what a grown man might be doing, up in a girl’s bedroom. Neither was he trying to steal Aunt Lilac’s silver tea service, not if he’d taken the trouble to wake her up.

The grin grew wider in the moonlight. The curtains had been opened and the window too. ‘I’m kidnapping you. That all right with you?’

‘What! Why?’ She’d read about kidnapping in
The Girl’s Own Annual
. ‘No one is going to pay a ransom for me,’ she added, though she supposed that the aunts or Uncle Herbert might.

‘Not for ransom,’ said the boy scornfully.

‘Then why?’

‘Because Madame told me to.’

‘Madame from the circus?’

He nodded. ‘And me mum says we have to do what Madame says.’

This was unanswerable. Blue evaluated her rescuer. He was small and she was tall. He was strong for his age and she was an invalid, but she still didn’t see how a little boy could carry her off unwillingly. Or even willingly. ‘You couldn’t even carry me down the stairs.’

The grin reappeared. ‘Can’t get to the stairs anyway. The old cows have locked the front door. And your bedroom door.’

‘How did you get in then?’

He gestured at the window. ‘You got to go out that way too.’

She almost laughed. It was a dream. But dreams didn’t smell faintly of face powder and elephant. ‘I can hardly walk. I can’t climb out of a second-storey window.’

‘Don’t have to. I’ll lower you down. Got the pulley set up and everything.’ The boy nodded through the dimness of the room at a contraption of ropes and wheels already tied around the solid bureau.

‘You’re joking.’

‘Nope.’ He looked at her, suddenly solemn. ‘Are you gunna come, or what? ’Cause if you ain’t, someone might catch me here and say I’m a burglar.’ He pronounced it ‘burg-you-lah’.