Carol Birch - Orphans of the Carnival

She’s dead now. Final. And this boy.

It might all come to nothing.

Theo was there when she got back.

‘Where the hell have you been?’ he said furiously, stamping over as she came in the door.

‘I went to the fortune-teller,’ she said.

‘Oh, for God’s sake! You can’t do this, Julia! You can’t just go out without me whenever you want.’

‘Well, you know I don’t. It’s all right, I was covered.’

‘That’s not the point.’

Here we go again. ‘No harm done,’ she said, ‘I’m back now.’

‘It’s just not fair, Julia,’ he said as she unveiled and took off her gloves. ‘It’s not fair on me . What if something happened to you?’

‘I only went round the corner.’

‘You have got to be honest with me, Julia, this is just not fair. You waited deliberately till I’d gone out, didn’t you? Then you sneaked off. I bet you thought you’d get back before me and I’d never know.’

It was so true that she couldn’t help but smile. I’ve done it, she thought. I went out and nothing happened.

‘It’s not funny!’

‘Sorry,’ she said.

He’d sulk for the next couple of days. He was getting it down to a fine art. Here came the first harbingers, the noble suffering face, the downcast brow. He was spinning a little web of woundedness between them.

‘You know damn well I’d have taken you if you’d asked,’ he said.

‘Oh, but you’d have laughed at me.’

‘Well yes, but that’s understandable. Giving your money to some fraud! Oh, Julia.’

‘You really do think I’m stupid, don’t you?’ she said. ‘Like all those other people who think I must be because I have this.’ She pulled on her beard.

‘I know you’re not stupid,’ he said coldly. ‘That’s why it makes me angry to see you behaving as if you are.’

He walked out abruptly. His footsteps echoed in the stairwell. She went to look. No blood.

Instead of a heat haze, there was rain falling softly on willows outside the window.

‘I wish we could go to Vienna,’ she said.

‘Don’t you like it here?’

‘It’s getting cold again.’

Theo took a match from a silver box and lit a cigar.

‘I think,’ he said, shaking the match with the air of a man with nothing to do, leaning back and blowing smoke upwards, ‘if we give it another two years. Till we have enough for a decent apartment somewhere pleasant — Vienna, by all means if you like, or even…’

He broke off and gazed into space.

She picked up that lump of wood, her old doll, and lay down on the bed, turning on her side. ‘Thank God, nothing for a while,’ she said.

‘Nothing at all unless you want to go to the circus.’

‘On Friday.’

‘Why Friday?’

‘Darmody’s juggling.’

‘Fine. I’ll get tickets.’

‘I have friends in Vienna, don’t I?’ she said proudly.

Theo nodded, savouring the tang of his cigar. He’d get them a box, the best he could. She’d walk in on his arm, veiled. Everyone would know who she was but no one would get near. They’d whisper: that’s Julia Pastrana. But if they wanted to see her they’d have to pay.

‘Vienna is certainly a possibility,’ he said.

‘I can’t ride any more,’ she said suddenly in an odd tone.

‘What do you mean?’

‘I can’t ride.’

‘Why not?’

She looked away. ‘I’m having a baby,’ she said.

Theo’s face didn’t change.

‘You’re not serious,’ he said.

‘I think I am.’

Oh God. His face didn’t change. A thousand voices murmured in his head.

‘I’m sure I am,’ she said.

It couldn’t happen. He was always careful. When? Not always easy getting out in time. When? Oh God, after a few drinks. Who cares then? ‘What?’ he said, screaming inside.

‘I’ve missed twice now.’

‘Twice.’ He swallowed, playing for time.

‘A baby,’ she said, meeting his eyes with a wary look.

Time slowed for Theo, his every move, the way his lips formed the shape of opening to allow smoke to drift from them, the way the smoke seemed alive as it played with the air. He closed his eyes.

‘Do you think that’s why I’ve been feeling so tired?’ she asked.

‘Very likely,’ he said.

When he opened them again her eyes were glistening. ‘You don’t want it,’ she said. ‘You don’t want it because you think it’ll be like me.’

His eyes filled with sympathy. His brain went tick tick tick, bring another poor freak into the world, tick tick, as it is they’re all looking at me, tick tick tick, this is impossible. ‘Not at all,’ he said, ‘not at all.’ He knew he ought to go to her but was suddenly afraid. ‘You have to see a doctor,’ he said. ‘Make sure.’

‘You don’t want it.’

‘Don’t be silly.’

The shine of tears under her eye. ‘Will you love it, if it’s like me?’ she said.

‘Of course I will!’

‘You don’t want it to be like me though, do you?’

Tick tick tick. Calm. ‘Listen, Julia,’ he said, pulling sense on like a cloak, walking over to her, caressing the sides of her arms and smiling reassuringly, ‘it’s mine, it goes without saying I’ll love it.’ A hairy baby monkey, he thought. ‘But obviously it would be better for him to be born normal.’

‘Him?’

‘Or her.’

‘But if he isn’t?’

‘Just — I don’t know, Julia, I don’t know what to say, it would just be better if it was normal. But I don’t suppose — I don’t know how these things work. We need to get a good doctor…’

Trailing off.

Think think think. We have — six, yes, six more shows to February. She’d never get rid of it, not her. Catholic. She can sing anyway, play her guitar. They’ll still come. Could she dance? Even if she just stood there, whatever she did, they’d still come, just to see her. ‘It’ll be all right,’ he said with worried eyes. Doing sums in his head. Oh God. We need to rake in as much as we can before. She’ll have to take it easy for a bit. But not for too long. She’s a trouper.

‘We’ll get you to a doctor,’ he said. ‘If we were in Moscow we could get Sokolov.’

Perhaps she’ll miscarry, he thought. No. She’s strong as an ox. He laughed. Strong as a Julia.

‘Don’t laugh at me,’ she said.

‘I’m not laughing at you.’

*

It was confirmed. She was three months gone. The doctor had shaken Theo’s hand and looked him steadily in the eye on parting, and he’d seen it there, the thing he would find in all eyes from now on, the thought: My God, he does! He fucks the ape . Now they’d all know. Looking in the mirror, he practised the smile he would smile back at them. Calm, proud, defiant.

Three months, four, five, still dancing, hardly showing. The sparkle was back in Theo’s eyes, and a weight lifted from Julia’s mind.

‘After these shows we should settle for a while,’ she said. ‘Till the baby’s older.’

‘Sure,’ he said, smiling. ‘But not for too long.’

While not quite at rest, his mind had settled now. First, the child might be normal. Firstborn. My seed. Blood of my blood and all that. It was a tangle. He’d no idea how he felt. Fatherhood had never been a consideration. But then, he thought, if it’s hairy, think about it. If they flock now, imagine. The ape woman and her remarkable offspring. They’ll be trampling over one another to get a look. And the science! God, those doctors salivating. How well they lived now — Theo bit the end off a high-class cigar — but this would be nothing. They could live anywhere. A place here, a place there. The best. Sometimes a creature formed in his mind, a baby monkey with human eyes as soft and sweet as a kitten’s.