Philippa Gregory - Meridon

She got well jolted for a lesson, and she started to get a red sore back from the number of tumbles she took wrong into the catch-net.

‘I’ll never get it right,’ she moaned as she bounced unwillingly over to the ladder and went up again.

I had finished with the ponies for the day and was watching them practise by the light of their lanterns, and warming my damp breeches on the back of their stove. I had not watched them much since David had gone and I expected to see Jack calling the time and telling them what tricks they should throw.

He called the time for them, as I had thought he would. And he called ‘Pret’ when he was ready to catch them, and ‘Hup’ when he wanted them to swing from the board out to him. But to my surprise he was not the teacher or leader of the three.

It was my sister, Dandy.

‘Katie’s got to do the angel pass,’ she called across to him. And when Katie murmured that she had done it twice already she said firmly:

‘With a leg cocked like a pissing dog. You do it again Katie and stretch out this time, or you’ll do it over and over.’

I craned my neck to look up at this new, authoritative Dandy. Katie did the pass and Jack took her by her leg and her foot and then tossed her up towards the trapeze. Katie snatched at it, and fell with a despairing wail to bounce harmlessly into the net.

Dandy called across to Jack.

‘That was your fault Jack! She was right as she came over, but you let her go too late. She needs to get away at the crest of your swing or she can’t reach out to get the trapeze.’

Jack nodded, his face dark with irritation. ‘That’s enough for one evening,’ he said. ‘We’re bound to make mistakes late in the day.’

‘We’re not wrapping up yet,’ Dandy said briskly. ‘I’ll try the high pass to you. We’ll just touch hands to see if we’re right.’

Jack nodded and readied himself in his harness, stretching out towards her.

I turned my back and heard but did not look round when he called ‘Pret’ and then later ‘Hup’, then I heard the catch-net twang and I heard Dandy say mischievously:

‘You can look now, Meridon, I’m down in one piece.’

They finished their practice then; Dandy pushed her feet into her clogs and came over to me by the stove.

‘How come you decide the tricks?’ I asked. ‘I thought Jack would.’

Dandy shrugged. ‘He couldn’t see what Katie was doing wrong. I do the tricks, Jack just catches, it’s easy for me to see what’s amiss.’ She shrugged her shoulders impatiently. ‘He’s damned idle, Meridon. If he was calling the tricks we’d be finished by noon every day.’

I nodded, and Katie and Jack joined us and we said no more.

Katie’s nerves got no better as the date of the performance approached. When she laid out her costume for Robert’s inspection on the Friday evening her hands were shaking so much that the sequins rattled. Robert was surprisingly sympathetic.

‘You’ll do,’ he said kindly to her. ‘Just do it as it was in practice.’ He looked at Jack. ‘Is she reliable in practice?’

Dandy answered, not Jack. ‘She’s a bit lazy,’ she said. ‘But she can do it when she works at it. She’ll work at it in front of an audience. I should think she’d be better then, than she is in practice.’

Robert nodded. ‘Good,’ he said. He turned to me. ‘Nervous, little Merry?’ he asked.

I shook my head. ‘No,’ I said. ‘All I have to do is to let Jack knock me off Bluebell, and God knows I’ve done that enough times.’

Robert smiled. ‘Aye,’ he said, ‘I’m happy.’

He had reason. The takings added up to pounds for the gala performance and the pennies of the village people at their show made the sack of money as heavy as a couple of saddles.

The ponies behaved well, even the three bought at Salisbury who had never been in front of an audience before. Bluebell was as steady as she always was, Morris threw his head up at the noise and the cheers, but I had harnessed them so tight to Bluebell he virtually had to breathe in time with her. People laughed till they cried at the act Jack and I did when he pretended to be a drunk farmer. It had never gone better, and at the end when we cantered around the ring with me standing high and Jack going around under Bluebell’s neck the Quality audience got up from their benches and cheered as loud as common folk.

Dandy and Katie were well tipped during the break, but I saw Dandy walk with her head as high as a queen. She kept her eyes open for any likely young bucks, but her mind was on her trapeze act and Robert had no grounds for complaint when she came back with an empty tray and a purse which chinked with pennies.

They cheered my trapeze tricks as if they were something prodigiously skilful and brave. I suppose to people who had never seen such a thing before, the top of the swing when I was above their heads, seemed very high. It did not frighten me, even when I swung back and could see their faces below me. I knew if I hung straight that my toes were only a foot above the ground. I felt safe enough.

The queasy chum of fear in my belly was for Dandy’s flying act. I was such a fool I could not even stay in the barn to watch her. I went out the back to where we had tethered the ponies and I put my arm around Sea’s warm neck and listened to the sounds and guessed what they were doing.

There was the rustle of anticipation as Jack did handstands and chin-ups on his frame, and then a murmur of approval as Dandy and Katie posed at the top of their frame. Then I heard the gasp as either Dandy or Katie gripped the trapeze and swooped down off the pedestal. I flexed my arms around Sea when I heard that. And then there was a great ‘ooh!’ from the audience and a burst of clapping as one of them reached out from the trapeze to Jack’s hands. Then there was another gasp as he swung her out, made that little twist, and passed her up to the swinging overhead bar. A great roar of applause told me that she was safe on the pedestal again.

Four times I tightened my grip on Sea’s neck, sweating even in the frosty air, listening for the gasp as Dandy came off the board, the ‘ooh!’ as she swung, the ripple of applause as she was caught and then the uproar when she was safely back on the board or somersaulting down into the net. Sea shifted uneasily. I was squeezing him so tight, and he could smell my fear. Then I heard a great scream from the audience and my stomach churned bile. Dandy had finished her act by dropping from her bar so she was utterly free in the air, into Jack’s hands and then somersaulted down into the net. There was a roar of applause and another shriek as Katie and then Jack tumbled downwards and bounced safely up to their feet. Then there was a roar of applause as people called for the act again and shouted, ‘Bravo!’ and then I heard the chink of coins as people tossed money into the ring.

Robert Gower called out into the darkness from the barn door.

‘Meridon! It’s over! Come in and see your sister! Come and take your bow!’

They were cheering and cheering as if they would never stop. I heard a volley of curses as a bench was tipped up and crashed down on someone’s toes.

Robert called for me more urgently and then went in to take his bow.

They had their finale without me that night. I was out at the back in the field retching helplessly into the frosty grass. Even as I took care to vomit away from my clean white breeches I could have laughed at myself for my stupid girlish nerves. But my laugh would have been bitter.

Two days later, as Robert had planned, we moved out. We started early, we had packed the night before. All the new gear was stowed in the fresh-painted wagons. There was the repainted picture of Snow rearing before the lady on the side of Robert’s wagon. But he had ordered the sign-writer to paint her riding habit blue and her hair bright copper. She looked like me, so I had my portrait on the side of the wagon with ‘Robert Gower’s Amazing Aerial and Equestrian Show’ written in red curly letters all around. On the back of the wagon was a picture of the little ponies, and on the other long side there was a picture of me and Jack in matching blue shirts and white breeches standing side by side up high on the back of Bluebell and Morris – both looking more noble and a good deal wilder than usual. At the top of the right-hand corner was another picture of me in my short skirt jumping through a hoop of fire – a trick which existed nowhere but in Robert’s imagination at the moment. And there it said, in blue paint, ‘Mamselle Meridon the horseback dancer!’