Jack O'Connell - The Resurrectionist

Bruno was brought up short and a little confused.

“Most of us?”

Chick shrugged and said, “We still have a ways to go. There could be more catastrophes further down the road.”

“Is this what your father told you?”

“My father said it’s time for all of us to push on. He said we’re due on the western coast. He said there’s a town called Quaboag that sits at the edge of the ocean. He said he has a mansion on a cliff above the ocean. And that he’ll be waiting for us. And he says that time is running out.”

Bruno brought his hand up to his face and covered his eyes.

“I’m so tired,” he said. “I only want to sleep right now.”

“I understand,” Chick said. “But they’re going to throw us out of here very soon. And I’m not sure what will be waiting for us back at the Jubilee.”

DR. TABER,the medical examiner, was waiting for them outside the clinic. This time he was driving a hearse. Bruno stretched out in the rear and Chick rode shotgun back to the fairgrounds. The freaks were waiting at their trailer, along with Renaldo St. Clare. No one said a word when Chick and the doctor helped Bruno through the door.

Milena and Fatos took charge of the strongman, pushing two cots together, helping him down to the mattresses and covering him with a quilt.

The ringmaster stood at the foot of the makeshift bed and bowed his head.

“I’m terribly sorry this happened,” he said to Bruno. “Believe me when I tell you that the Chief feels just awful. He’s never done anything like this before.”

“You caught him?” Chick said, taking a cup of coffee from Kitty.

“Oh, he’s in his trailer right this minute,” said the ringmaster, “thinking long and hard about this whole matter. He says he’s off the bottle for good this time and, truly, I believe him.”

“He’s in his trailer?” Chick repeated, approaching St. Clare. “What do you mean, he’s in his trailer? Why isn’t he in the town jail?”

St. Clare smiled at Chick and nodded, turned back to Bruno and bent down to pat the strongman’s leg, saying, “If there’s anything at all that you require, Mr. Seboldt, you need only ask and the Bedlam Brothers will be happy to oblige.”

Then he turned to Chick, lowered his voice, and said, “Perhaps you and I should talk outside.”

They exited the trailer and St. Clare immediately began to walk toward the midway. Chick hurried to keep up with him. The ringmaster looked at the rising sun as he began to speak.

“I think you’ll agree that we’ve got a delicate situation here.”

“I think,” Chick said, “that it’s pretty simple. Your strongman lopped off the arm of my strongman.”

“Granted,” said St. Clare. “But the brothers and I are not entirely sure that the best course of action would be to incarcerate the Chief.”

“The Chief,” Chick said, “is an alcoholic psychopath. One of these days he’ll kill a mark.”

“He felt threatened by Bruno,” the ringmaster said. “He thought he was being replaced. This is really management’s fault.”

“Then management,” Chick said, “should do the right thing and bring the Chief to the authorities.”

St. Clare stopped walking next to the elephant track and decided it was time to level with the chicken boy.

“Look,” he said, “we’re out of here in a week. This town is a little goldmine for us. And we’ve got a full circuit booked on its heels. Chief Micmac is one of our headliners. All in all, it would be a financial disaster for us to deal with this situation in an official manner.”

“Your Chief,” Chick said, “attacked my friend and cut off his arm. He needs to pay.”

“And pay,” St. Clare said, seizing on the word, “is exactly what I’ve been instructed by the brothers to propose to you.”

An elephant blew a trunk of water into the air. Chick said, “Go on.”

“It’s just that I spent the night talking to your colleagues,” the ringmaster said, “and it’s come to my attention that, like many people in our profession, you’re all traveling without any documentation. You’ve got no passports. No citizenship papers. No inoculation cards. And worse than this, they tell me you’ve got no money. You’re dead broke.”

Chick sighed and waited for the pitch.

“I’ve been there,” said St. Clare. “I know what that’s like. Which is why I think there’s a better way to deal with our situation. A better way for both of us.”

“Bruno can’t travel for a week,” Chick said. “Doctor’s orders.”

“Okay, so you spend the week with us. Our guests. Food and lodging on the house. And no one need perform. You relax. You take it easy. You tend to your friend. And after the closing ceremonies, we part company without animosity.”

“How much?” Chick asked.

“What did you have in mind?” St. Clare asked.

Chick stared at the man for a second, then knelt down and traced a number in the dirt with his finger. St. Clare looked at it, nodded, and toed it away.

“And some transportation,” Chick said. “A truck or a bus that can hold us all.”

St. Clare began to demur. “I’m not sure we have anything that—”

Chick cut him off, saying, “That’s the deal. The money and the vehicle. And we let the Chief off the hook.”

“I’ll have to talk to the brothers,” St. Clare said.

“You let me know what they decide,” said Chick and, without another word, he walked back to his clan.

THEY TENDED BRUNOround the clock. Not that the strongman needed much nursing. Kitty and Durga changed his bandages when necessary. The others took turns bringing him food and water and a pipe of opium, twice a day, as prescribed by Dr. Taber. Mostly, the giant slept, troubled and mumbling in his dreams, saying prayers, on occasion, in some unknown tongue, and once begging his mother for forgiveness.

When he was awake, he rejected all attempts at conversation. Many of the freaks found this unnerving, but Chick understood the need for silence and repose. It takes time to make the change to a new consciousness, he advised his brothers and sisters. It takes time to get to know the new self.

The troupe stayed away from the Jubilee show. They huddled in the trailers like prisoners. At night they sat by the window and listened to the noise of the crowds and remembered, not without sadness and regret, the adulation they had known back in Bohemia, when the audience had embraced them each night. When the audience had paid homage to their differences.

On the last night of the Jubilee, just before the start of the closing ceremonies, Bruno rose from his bed. Though a little unsteady on his feet, he made his way, with the help of Chick, to the second trailer. The freaks were listening to the sounds of a straw house, a capacity crowd waiting to be amazed one last time. The giant and the chicken boy came through the door like warriors home from a stalemate.

“I think,” Bruno said to the clan, “we should go to the show.”

Everyone looked to Chick, who said, “You heard Bruno. Get dressed. He wants us all to see the show.”

THEY GATHERED UNDERNEATHthe main grandstand, watching through a jungle of legs. Milena had been opposed to vacating the trailer until they left for good. Chick found a compromise — they’d view the finale but from a hidden vantage.

The closeout was a spectacle that handily demonstrated why the Jubilee was the biggest show on the central circuit. In terms of grandeur, bravado, and pure showmanship, it exceeded the opening festivities and raised itself into an event, the kind of performance a child will carry to a distant grave. The wild beasts were more ferocious and nimble than any the troupe had ever known. The acrobats and wire walkers took risks that no sane man or woman would have considered. The clowns were uproarious and innovative. The magicians, nothing short of stupefying.