who holds toward heaven the wand of fire and points with his other hand toward earth.
“IF YOU’LL step right over this way, folks, I want to call your attention to the attraction now appearing on the first platform. Ladies and gentlemen, you are about to witness one of the most spectacular performances of physical strenth the world has ever seen. Now some of you young fellows in the crowd look pretty husky but I want to tell you, gents, the man you are about to see makes the ordinary blacksmith or athlete look like a babe in arms. The power of an African gorilla in the body of a Greek god. Ladies and gents, Herculo, the world’s most perfect man.”
Bruno Hertz: If only once she would over here look while I have the robe off I would be glad to drop dead that minute. Um Gotteswillen, I would cut my heart out and hand it to her on a plate. Cannot she ever see that? I cannot get up courage to hold her hand in the kinema. Why has a man always to feel over some woman like this? I cannot even tell Zeena how crazy I am for her because then Zeena would try to put us together and then I would feel a dummkopf from not knowing how to say to her. Molly-a beautiful Amerikanische name. She will never love me. I know it in my heart. But I can tear to pieces any of the wolves in the show such as would hurt that girl. If one of them would try, then maybe Molly could see it. Perhaps then she could guess the way I feel and would give me one word for me to remember always. To remember, back in Wien.
“… right over here, folks. Will you step in a little closer? On account of this exhibit ain’t the biggest thing you ever seen; how about it, Major? Ladies and gentlemen, I now present for your edification and amusement Major Mosquito, the tiniest human being on record. Twenty inches, twenty pounds, and twenty years-and he’s got plenty of big ideas for his age. Any of you girls would like to date him after the show, see me and I’ll fix ya up. The Major will now entertain you with a little specialty number of his own, singing and tap-dancing to that grand old number, ‘Sweet Rosie O’Grady.’ Take it away, Major.”
Kenneth Horsefield: If I lit a match and held it right close under that big ape’s nose I wonder if I’d see the hairs in his nose-holes catch fire. Christ, what an ape! I’d like to have him tied up with his mouth propped open and then I’d sit back smoking my cigar and shoot his teeth out one after another. Apes. They’re all apes. Especially the women with their big moon faces. I’d like to sink a hammer in ’em and watch ’em splash like pumpkins. Their great, greasy red mouths open like tunnels. Grease and filth, all of them.
Christ, there it goes. That same crack. The one woman makes it to the other behind her hand. If I see that same hand come up and that same routine once more I’ll yell the goddamned place down. A million dames and always the same goddamned crack behind the same goddamned hand and the other one always champing on gum. Some day I’ll blast ’em. I don’t keep that equalizer in my trunk to play Boy Scout with. And that’s the dame I’ll blast. I’d of done it before now. Only they’d laugh at seeing me hold the butt with one hand and work the trigger with the other.
Joe Plasky: “Thank you, professor. Ladies and gents, I am known as the Half-man Acrobat. As you can see, my legs are both here but they’re not much good to me. Infantile paralysis when I was a kid-they just naturally never growed. So I just made up my mind to tie ’em in a knot like this and forget about ’em and go on about my business. This is the way I get upstairs. Up on the hands. Steady. Here we go with a hop, skip, and a jump. Turn around and down we go, easy as pie. Thank you, folks.
“Now here’s another little number I worked out by myself. Sometimes in a crowded trolley car I don’t have room enough to stand on both hands. So up we go. Steady. And I stand on one! Thank you very much.
“Now then, for my next number I’m going to do something that no other acrobat in the world has ever attempted. A full somersault from a handstand back onto the hands. Are we all set? Let’s go. It’s a good trick-if I do it. Maybe some of you folks in the front row had better move back a couple steps. Don’t bother. I’m just kidding. I’ve never missed yet, as you can see, for I’m still in the land of the living. All right, here we go-up-and over! Thank you very much, folks.
“And now if you’ll just step right in close I’m going to give away a few little souvenirs. Naturally, I can’t get rich giving away merchandise, but I’ll do my best. I have here a little booklet full of old songs, recitations, jokes, wheezes, and parlor games. And I’m not going to charge you a dollar for it, nor even a half, but a cold, thin dime. That’s all it costs, folks, a dime for a full evening of fun and fancy. And with it I’m going to give away, as a special inducement at this performance only, this little paper shimmy-dancer. Hold a match behind the paper: you see her shadow; and this is how you make her shake.
“You want one? Thank you, bud. Here you are, folks-brimful of assorted poems, dramatic readings, and witty sayings by the world’s wisest men. And only a dime…”
Sis wrote me the kids are both down with whooping cough. I’ll send them a box of paints to help keep them quiet. Kids love paints. I’ll send them some crayons, too.
“Sailor Martin, the living picture gallery. Ladies and gents, this young man that you see before you went to sea at an early age. He was shipwrecked on a tropical island which had only one other inhabitant-an old seafaring man, who had been there most of his life-a castaway. All he had managed to save from the wreck of his ship was a tattoo outfit. To pass the time he taught Sailor Martin the art and he practiced on himself. Most of the patterns you see are his own work. Turn around, Sailor. On his back, a replica of that world-famous painting, the Rock of Ages. On his chest-turn around, Sailor-the Battleship Maine, blowing up in Havana Harbor. Now if any of you young fellows in the audience would like an anchor, American flag, or sweetheart’s initials worked on your arm in three beautiful colors, step right up to the platform and see the Sailor. No sissies need apply.”
Francis Xavier Martin: Boy, that brunette working the electric-chair act is a beaut. Have I got what would make her happy and moan for more! Only Bruno would land on me like a ton of tomcats. I wonder if I’ll hear from that redhead in Waterville. God, I can get one on thinking about her yet. What a shape-and knowing right where to put it, too. But this brunette kid, Molly, is the nuts. What a pair of bubbies! High and pointed-and that ain’t no cupform either, brother; that’s God.
I wish to Christ that kraut Bruno would bust a blood vessel some day, bending them horseshoes. Goddamn, that Molly kid’s got legs like a racehorse. Maybe I could give her one jump and then blow the show. Jesus, it would be worth it, to get into that.
“Over here, folks, right over here. On this platform you see one of the most amazing little ladies the wide world has ever known. And right beside her we have an exact replica of the electric chair at Sing Sing prison…”
Mary Margaret Cahill: Don’t forget to smile; Dad always said that. Golly, I wish Dad was here. If I could only look out there and see him grinning up at me everything would be hunky dory. Time to drop the robe and give them an eyeful. Dad, honey, watch over me…
Dad taught Molly all kinds of wonderful things while she was growing up and they were fun, too. For instance, how to walk out of a hotel in a dignified manner with two of your best dresses wrapped around you under the dress you had on. They had to do that once in Los Angeles and Molly got all of her clothes out. Only they nearly caught Dad and he had to talk fast. Dad was wonderful at talking fast and whenever he got in a tight place Molly would go all squirmy inside with thrill and fun because she knew her dad could always wiggle out just when the others thought he was cornered. Dad was wonderful.
Dad always knew nice people. The men were sometimes soused a little but the ladies that Dad knew were always beautiful and they usually had red hair. They were always wonderful to Molly and they taught her to put on lipstick when she was eleven. The first time she put it on by herself she got on too much and Dad burst out laughing loud and said she looked like something from a crib house-and jail bait at that.
The lady that Dad was friendly with at the time-her name was Alyse-shushed Dad and said, “Come over here, darling. Alyse’ll show you. Let’s take this off and start over. The idea is to keep people from knowing that you have any makeup on at all-especially at your age. Now watch.” She looked at Molly’s face carefully and said, “This is where you start. And don’t let anybody talk you into putting rouge on anywhere else. You have a square face and the idea is to soften it and make it look round.” She showed Molly just how to do it and then took it all off and made her do it herself.
Molly wanted Dad to help her but he said it wasn’t his business-getting it off was more in his line, especially on the collars of shirts. Molly felt awful, having to do it all by herself because she was afraid she wouldn’t do it right and finally she cried a little and then Dad took her on his lap and Alyse showed her again and after that it was all right and she always used makeup, only people didn’t know about it. “My, Mr. Cahill-what a lovely child! Isn’t she the picture of health! Such lovely rosy cheeks!” Then Dad would say, “Indeed, ma’am, lots of milk and early to bed.” Then he would wink at Molly because she didn’t like milk and Dad said beer was just as good for you and she didn’t like beer very much but it was always nice and cold and besides you got pretzels with it and everything. Also Dad said it was a shame to go to bed early and miss everything when you could sleep late the next day and catch up-unless you had to be at the track for an early workout, to hold the clock on a horse, and then it was better to stay up and go to bed later.
Only, when Dad had made a real killing at the track he always got lit and when he got lit he always tried to send her off to bed just when everything was going swell and because other people in the crowd were always trying to get her to take some, Molly never cared for liquor. Once, in a hotel where they were stopping, there was a girl got terribly drunk and began to take her clothes off and they had to put her to bed in the room next to Molly’s. There were a lot of men going in and coming out all night and the next day the cops came and arrested the girl, and Molly heard people talking about it and somebody said later that they let the girl go but she had to go to the hospital because she had been hurt inside someway. Molly couldn’t bear the thought of getting drunk after that because anything might happen to you and you shouldn’t let anything happen to you with a man unless you were in love with him. That was what everybody said and people who made love but weren’t really in love were called tramps. Molly knew several ladies who were tramps and she asked Dad one time why they were tramps and that’s what he said: that they’d let anybody hug and kiss them either for presents or money. You shouldn’t do that unless the guy was a swell guy and not likely to cross you up or take a powder on you if you were going to have a baby. Dad said you should never let anybody make love to you if you couldn’t use his toothbrush, too. He said that was a safe rule and if you followed that you couldn’t go wrong.
Molly could use Dad’s toothbrush and often did, because one of their brushes was always getting left behind in the hotel or sometimes Dad needed one to clean his white shoes with.
Molly used to wake up before Dad and sometimes she would run in and hop into his bed and then he would grunt and make funny snorey noises-only they sounded all funny and horrible-and then he would make believe he thought there was a woodchuck in the bed and he would blame the hotel people for letting woodchucks run around in their joint and then he would find out it was Molly and no woodchuck and he would kiss her and tell her to hurry up and get dressed and then go down and get him a racing form at the cigar stand.
One morning Molly ran in and there was a lady in bed with Dad. She was a very pretty lady and she had no nightie on and neither did Dad. Molly knew what had happened: Dad had been lit the night before and had forgotten to put on his pajamas and the girl had been lit and he had brought her up to their rooms to sleep on account of she was too tight to go home and he had intended to have her sleep with Molly but they had just fallen asleep first. Molly lifted the sheet up real, real careful and then she found out how she would look when she got big.
Then Molly got dressed and went down and got the racing form on the cuff and came back and they were still asleep, only the lady had snuggled in closer to Dad. Molly stood quiet in a corner a long time and kept still, hoping they would wake up and find her and she would run at them and go “Woo!” and scare them. Only the lady made a low noise like a moan and Daddy opened one eye and then put his arms around her. She opened her eyes and said, “Hello, sugar,” all slow and sleepy, and then Dad started kissing her and she woke up after a while and started to kiss back. Finally Dad got on top of the lady and began to bounce up and down in the bed and Molly thought that was so funny that she burst out laughing and the lady screamed and said, “Get that kid out of here.”
Dad was wonderful. He looked over his shoulder in one of his funny ways and said, “Molly, how would you like to sit in the lobby for about half an hour and pick me a couple of winners out of that racing form? I have to give Queenie here her exercise. You don’t want to startle her and make her sprain a tendon.” Dad kept still until Molly had gone but when she was outside the door she could hear the bed moving and she wondered if this lady could use Dad’s toothbrush and she hoped she wouldn’t because Molly wouldn’t want to use it afterwards. It would make her sick to use it.
When Molly was fifteen one of the exercise boys at the stable asked her to come up in the hay loft and she went and he grabbed her and started kissing her and she didn’t like him enough to kiss him and besides it was all of a sudden and she started wrestling with him and then she called, “Dad! Dad!” because the boy was touching her and Dad came bouncing up into the loft and he hit the boy so hard he fell down on the hay as if he was dead, only he wasn’t. Dad put his arm around Molly and said, “You all right, baby?” And Dad kissed her and held her close to him for a minute and then he said, “You got to watch yourself, kidlet. This world’s full of wolves. This punk won’t bother you no more. Only watch yourself.” And Molly smiled and said:
“I couldn’t have used his toothbrush anyhow.” Then Dad grinned and rapped her easy under the chin with his fist. Molly wasn’t scared any more only she never strayed very far from Dad or from other girls. It was awful that had to happen because she could never feel right around the stables any more, and couldn’t talk to the exercise boys and the jockeys any more in the old way and even when she did they were always looking at her breasts and that made her feel all weak and scarey inside somehow even when they were polite enough.
She was glad she was beginning to have breasts, though, and she got used to boys looking at them. She used to pull the neck of her nightie down and make like the ladies in evening dresses and once Dad bought her an evening dress. It was beautiful and one way you looked at it it was light rose and the other way it was gold and it came down off the shoulders and was cut low and it was wonderful. Only that was the year Centerboard ran out of the money and Dad had the bankroll on him to show and they had to sell everything they had to get a grubstake. That was when they went back to Louisville. That was the last year.
Dad got a job with an old friend who ran a gambling place down by the river, and Dad was his manager and wore a tuxedo all the time.
Things were going fine after a while and as soon as Dad squared up some of his tabs he registered Molly at a dancing school and she started to learn acrobatic and tap. She had a wonderful time, showing him the steps as she learned them. Dad could dance a lot of softshoe himself and he never had a lesson. He said he just had Irish feet. Also he wanted her to take music lessons and sing, only she never could sing-she took after Mother that way. When the school gave a recital Molly did a Hawaiian number with a real hula skirt somebody had sent Dad from Honolulu and her hair falling over her shoulders like a black cloud and flowers in her hair and dark makeup and everybody applauded and some of the boys whistled and that made Dad mad because he thought they were getting fresh but Molly loved it because Dad was out there and as long as he was there she didn’t care what happened.
She was sixteen and all grown up when things went to smash. Some fellows from Chicago had come down and there was trouble at the place where Dad worked. Molly never did find out what it was, only a couple of big men came to the house one night about two o’clock and Molly knew they were cops and she went all weak, thinking Dad had done something and they wanted him but he had always told her that the way to deal with cops was to smile at them, act dumb, and give them an Irish name.
One said, “You Denny Cahill’s daughter?” Molly said yes. He said, “I got some mighty tough news for you, kid. It’s about your dad.” That was when Molly felt her feet slip on glass, like the world had suddenly tilted and it was slippery glass and she was falling off it into the dark and would fall and fall forever because there was no end to the place where she was falling.
She just stood there and she said, “Tell me.”
The cop said, “Your dad’s been hurt, girlie. He’s hurt real bad.” He wasn’t like a shamus now; he was more like the sort of man who might have a daughter himself. She went up close to him because she was afraid of falling.
She said, “Is Dad dead?” and he nodded and put his arm around her and she didn’t remember anything more for a while, only she was in the hospital when she came to and somehow she was all groggy and sleepy and she thought she had been hurt and kept asking for Dad and a cross nurse said she had better keep quiet and then she remembered and Dad was dead and she started to scream and it was like laughing, only it felt horrible and she couldn’t stop and then they came and stuck her arm with a hype gun and she went out again and it was that way for a couple of times and finally she could stop crying and they told her she would have to get out because other people needed the bed.
Molly’s grandfather, “Judge” Kincaid, said she could live with him and her aunt if she would take a business course and get a job in a year and Molly tried but she couldn’t ever get it into her head somehow, although she could remember past performances of horses swell. The Judge had a funny way of looking at her and several times he seemed about to get friendly and then he would chill up. Molly tried being nice to him and calling him Granddad but he didn’t like that and once, just to see what would happen, she ran up to him when he came in and threw her arms around his neck. He got terribly mad that time and told her aunt to get her out of the house, he wouldn’t stand having her around.
It was terrible without Dad to tell her things and talk to and Molly wished she had died along with Dad. Finally she got a scholarship to the dancing school and she worked part time there with the young kids and Miss La Verne, who ran the school, let her stay with her. Miss La Verne was very nice at first and so was her boy friend, Charlie, who was a funny-looking man, kind of fat, who used to sit and look at Molly and he reminded her of a frog, the way he used to spread his fingers out on his knees, pointing in, and pop his eyes.
Then Miss La Verne got cross and said Molly better get a job, but Molly didn’t quite know how to begin and finally Miss La Verne said, “If I get you a job will you stick with it?” Molly promised.
It was a job with a carny. There was a Hawaiian dance show, what they called a kooch show-two other girls and Molly. The fellow who ran it and did the talking was called Doc Abernathy. Molly didn’t like him a bit and he was always trying to make the girls. Only Jeannette, one of the dancers, and Doc were steady and Jeannette was crazy-mad jealous of the other two. Doc used to devil her by horsing around with them.
Molly always liked Zeena, who ran the mental act in the Ten-in-One show across the midway. Zeena was awfully nice and she knew more about life and people than anybody Molly had ever met except Dad. Zeena had Molly bunk in with her, when she stayed in hotels, for company, because Zeena’s husband slept in the tent to watch the props, he said. Really it was because he was a souse and he couldn’t make love to Zeena any more. Zeena and Molly got to be real good friends and Molly didn’t wish she was dead any more.
Then Jeannette got nastier and nastier about Doc’s paying so much attention to Molly and she wouldn’t believe that Molly didn’t encourage him. The other girl told her, “With a chassis like that Cahill kid’s got you don’t have to do no encouraging.” But Jeannette thought Molly was a stinker. One day Doc whispered something to her about Molly and Jeannette started for her looking like a wild animal with her lips pulled back over her teeth. She smacked Molly in the face and before Molly knew what was going on she had pulled off her shoe and was swinging at her, beating her in the face with it. Doc came rushing over and he and Jeannette had a terrible battle. She was cursing and screaming and Doc told her to shut up or he would smash her in the tits. Molly ran out and went over to the Ten-in-One and the boss fired Doc out of the carny and the kooch show went back to New York.
“Fifteen thousand volts of electricity pass through her body without hurting a hair of the little lady’s head. Ladies and gentlemen, Mamzelle Electra, the girl who, like Ajax of Holy Writ, defies the lightning…”
Glory be to God, I hope nothing happens to that wiring. I want Dad. God, how I want him here. I’ve got to remember to smile…
“Stand over here, Teddy, and hold onto Ma’s hand. So’s you won’t git tromped on and kin see. That there’s a ’lectric chair, same’s they got in the penitentiary. No, they ain’t going to hurt the lady none, leastways I hope not. See? They strap her in that chair-only there’s something about her body that don’t take ’lectricity. Same’s rain rolls right off the old gander’s back. Don’t be scared, Teddy. Ain’t nothing going to happen to her. See how the ’lectricity makes her hair stand out stiff? Lightning’ll do the same thing I heard tell. There. See? She’s holding a ’lectric bulb in one hand and grabbing the wire with the other. See the bulb light? That means the ’lectricity is passing right through her ’thout hurting her none. I wisht your pa was that way with ’lectricity. He got a powerful bad burn last winter, time the wires blowed down and he was helping Jim Harness get his road cleared. Come along, Teddy. That’s all they’re going to do over here.”
Now I can get up. Sailor Martin’s looking at me again. I can’t keep saying no to him every time he asks me to go out with him. But he can always think faster than I can. Only I mustn’t let him, ever. I mustn’t be a tramp; I don’t want it this way, the first time. Dad…
Stanton Carlisle: The great Stanton stood up and smiled, running his glance over the field of upturned faces. He took a deep breath. “Well, folks, first of all I’m going to show you how to make money. Is there anybody in the crowd who’s willing to trust me with the loan of a dollar bill? You’ll get it back-if you can run fast. Thanks, bud. Now then-nothing in either hand, nothing up the sleeves.”
Showing his hands empty, save for the borrowed bill, Stan gave a hitch to his sleeves. In the folds of his left sleeve was a roll of bills which he acquired deftly. “Now then, one dollar- Wait a minute, bud. Are you sure you gave me only one? You’re sure. Maybe that’s all you got with you, eh? But here are two- one and two. Count ’em. It’s a good trick, especially along toward the end of the week.”
Which one will smile at the oldest gag? One out of every five. Remember that. One in five is a born chump.
He produced the bills one after another, until he had a green fan of them. He returned the bill to the lad. In doing so he turned his left side from the crowd, got a metal cup in his hand. It hung by an elastic from his left hip.
“Now then, out of nowhere they came. Let’s see what happens to them when we roll them up. One, two, three, four, five, six. All present and accounted for. Into a roll-” He placed the bills in his left hand, slipping them into the vanisher. “Blow on the hand-” The vanisher, released, thudded softly against his hip under his coat. “Lo and behold! Gone!”
There was a scattering of applause, as if they were a little ashamed of it. The chumps.
“Where did they go? You know, day after day I stand here- wondering just where they do go!” That’s Thurston’s gag. By God, I’m going to use it until I see one face-just one-in this bunch of rubes that gets the point. They never do. But that dollar bill production goes over. Poverty-struck bastards-they all wish they could do it. Make money out of the air. Only that’s not the way I make mine. But it’s better than real estate. My old man and his deals. Church vestryman on Sundays, con man the rest of the week. Frig him, the Bible-spouting bastard.
“Now then, if I can have your attention for a moment. I have here a bunch of steel rings. Each and every one of them a separate, solid hoop of steel. I have one, two, three-four, five, six-seveneight. Right? Now I take two. Tap ’em. Joined together! Would you take these, madam, and tell me if you can find any joints or signs of an opening? No? Thank you. All solid. And again, two separate rings. Go! Joined!”
Better speed it up, they’re getting restless. This is the life, though. Everyone looking at you. How does he do it? Gosh, that’s slick. Trying to figure it out. It’s magic to them, all right. This is the life. While they’re watching and listening you can tell ’em anything. They believe you. You’re a magician. Pass solid rings through each other. Pull dollars out of the air. Magic. You’re top man-while you keep talking.
“And now, folks, eight separate and distinct rings; yet by a magic word they fly together and are joined inextricably into a solid mass. There you are! I thank you for your kind attention. Now I have here a little booklet that’s worth its weight in gold. Here is a collection of magic tricks that you can do-an hour’s performance before your club, lodge, or church gathering or in your own parlor. An hour’s practice-a lifetime of fun, magic, and mystery. This book formerly sold for a dollar, but for today I’m going to let you have it for two bits-a quarter of a dollar. Let’s hurry it up, folks, because I know you all want to see and hear Madam Zeena, the seeress, and her act does not go on until everyone who wants one of these great books gets one. Thank you, sir. And you. Any more? Right.
“Now then, folks, don’t go ’way. The next complete show will not start for twenty minutes. I call your attention to the next platform. Madam Zeena-miracle woman of the ages. She sees, she knows, she tells you the innermost secrets of your past, your present, and your future. Madam Zeena!”
Stan jumped down lightly from his own small platform and pushed through the crowd to a miniature stage draped in maroon velvet. A woman had stepped out from between the curtains. The crowd flowed over and stood waiting, looking up at her, some of the faces absently chewing, hands cupping popcorn into mouths.
The woman was tall, dressed in flowing white with astrological symbols embroidered on the hem of her robe. A cascade of brassy blond hair fell down her back and a band of gilt leather studded with glass jewels was around her forehead. When she raised her arms the loose sleeves fell back. She had large bones, but her arms were white and capable-looking, with a spattering of freckles. Her eyes were blue, her face round, and her mouth a shade too small, so that she looked a trifle like an elaborate doll. Her voice was low-pitched with a hearty ring to it.
“Step right up, folks, and don’t be bashful. If there’s any of you that want to ask me a question Mr. Stanton is now passing among you with little cards and envelopes. Write your question on the card; be careful not to let anybody else see what you write, because that’s your business. I don’t want anybody asking me about somebody else’s business. Just let’s all mind our own and we’ll stay out of trouble. When you’ve written your question, sign your initials to the card or write your name as a token of good faith. Then give the sealed envelope to Mr. Stanton. You’ll see what I’m going to do next.
“Meantime, while we’re waiting for you to write your questions, I’m going to start right in. It isn’t necessary for you to write anything, but that helps you to fix it firmly in mind and keeps your mind from wandering off it, same as if you want to remember somebody’s name you just met it helps to jot it down. Isn’t that so?”
One out of every five heads nodded, entranced, and the rest looked on, some with dull eyes, but most of them with questions written on their faces.
Questions? They’ve all got questions, Stan thought, passing out cards and envelopes. Who hasn’t? Answer their questions and you can have them, body and soul. Or just about. “Yes, madam, you can ask her anything. The questions are held in strictest confidence. No one will know but yourself.”
“First of all,” Zeena began, “there’s a lady worried about her mother. She’s asking me mentally, ‘Is mother going to get better?’ Isn’t that so? Where is that lady?”
Timidly a hand went up. Zeena pounced on it. “Well, madam, I’d say your mother has had a lot of hard work in her life and she’s had a lot of trouble, mostly about money. But there’s something else in there that I don’t see quite clear yet.” Stan looked at the woman who had raised her hand. Farmer’s wife. Sunday best, ten years out of style. Zeena could go to town on this one- a natural.
“I’d say, ma’am, that what your mother needs is a good long rest. Mind, I’m not saying how she’s going to get it-what with taxes and sickness in the family and doctor’s bills piling up. I know how it is because I’ve had my share of troubles, same as all of us, until I learned how to govern my life by the stars. But I think if you and your brothers-no, you have a couple of sisters, though, haven’t you? One sister? Well, if you and your sister can work out some way to let her get a couple weeks’ rest I think her health ought to improve mighty quick. But you just keep following a doctor’s orders. That is, you better get her to a doctor. I don’t think them patent medicines will do her much good. You got to get her to a doctor. Maybe he’ll take a few bushels of potatoes or a shoat as part of the bill. Anyhow, I think she’ll be all right if you have plenty of faith. If you’ll see me right after the demonstration, maybe I can tell you more. And you want to watch the stars and make sure you don’t do anything at the wrong time of the month.
“I see now that Mr. Stanton has got a good handful of questions, so if he’ll bring them right up here on the stage we’ll continue with the readings.”
Stan pushed through the crowd to a curtained door on one side of the little proscenium. He passed through. Inside there was a flight of rough board steps leading to the stage. It was dark and smelled of cheap whisky. Under the steps there was a square window opening into the low, boxlike compartment beneath the stage. At the window a bleary, unshaven face blinked out over a spotlessly clean white shirt. One hand held out a bunch of envelopes. Without a word Stan handed the man the envelopes he had collected, received the dummy batch, and in a second was onstage with them. Zeena moved forward a little table containing a metal bowl and a dark bottle.
“We’ll ask the gentleman to drop all the questions into this bowl. Now then, people ask me if I have spirit aid in doing what I do. I always tell them that the only spirits I control are the ones in this bottle-spirits of alcohol. I’m going to pour a little on your questions and drop a match into the bowl. Now you can see them burning, and that’s the last of them. So anybody who was afraid someone would find out what he wrote or that I was going to handle his question can just forget it. I’ve never touched them. I don’t have to because I get an impression right away.”
Stan had backed to one corner of the stage and stood watching the audience quietly as they strained their necks upward, hanging on every word of the seeress. In the floor, which was a few inches above their eye level, was a square hole. Zeena stroked her forehead, covering her eyes with her hand. At the opening appeared a pad of paper, a grimy thumb holding it, on which was scrawled in crayon, “What to do with wagon? J. E. Giles.”
Zeena looked up, folding her arms with decision. “I get an impression- It’s a little cloudy still but it’s getting clearer. I get the initials J… E… G. I believe it’s a gentleman. Is that right? Will the person who has those initials raise his hand, please?”
An old farmer lifted a finger as gnarled as a grapevine. “Here, ma’am.”
“Ah, there you are. Thank you, Mr. Giles. The name is Giles, isn’t it?”
The crowd sucked in its breath. “I thought so. Now then, Mr. Giles, you have a problem, isn’t that right?” The old man’s head wagged solemnly. Stan noted the deep creases in his red neck. Old sodbuster. Sunday clothes. White shirt, black tie. What he wears at funerals. Tie already tied-he hooks it onto his collar button. Blue serge suit-Sears, Roebuck or a clothing store in town.
“Let me see,” Zeena went on, her hand straying to her forehead again. “I see- Wait. I see green trees and rolling land. It’s plowed land. Fenced in.”
The old man’s jaw hung open, his eyes frowning with concentration, trying not to miss a single word.
“Yes, green trees. Probably willow trees near a crick. And I see something under those trees. A- It’s a wagon.”
Watching, Stan saw him nod, rapt.
“An old, blue-bodied wagon under those trees.”
“By God, ma’am, it’s right there this minute.”
“I thought so. Now you have a problem on your mind. You are thinking of some decision you have to make connected with that wagon, isn’t that so? You are thinking about what to do with the wagon. Now, Mr. Giles, I would like to give you a piece of advice: don’t sell that old blue-bodied wagon.”
The old man shook his head sternly. “No, ma’am, I won’t. Don’t belong to me!”
There was a snicker in the crowd. One young fellow laughed out loud. Zeena drowned him out with a full-throated laugh of her own. She rallied, “Just what I wanted to find out, my friend. Folks, here we have an honest man and that’s the only sort I want to do any business with. Sure, he wouldn’t think of selling what wasn’t his, and I’m mighty glad to hear it. But let me ask you just one question, Mr. Giles. Is there anything the matter with that wagon?”
“Spring’s broke under the seat,” he muttered, frowning.
“Well, I get an impression that you are wondering whether to get that spring fixed before you return the wagon or whether to return it with the spring broken and say nothing about it. Is that it?”
“That’s it, ma’am!” The old farmer looked around him triumphantly. He was vindicated.
“Well, I’d say you had just better let your conscience be your guide in that matter. I would be inclined to talk it over with the man you borrowed it from and find out if the spring was weak when he loaned it to you. You ought to be able to work it out all right.”
Stan quietly left the stage and crept down the steps behind the draperies. He squeezed under the steps and came out beneath the stage. Dead grass and the light coming through chinks in the box walls, with the floor over his head. It was hot, and the reek of whisky made the air sweetly sick.
Pete sat at a card table under the stage trap. Before him were envelopes Stan had passed him on his way up to the seeress; he was snipping the ends off with scissors, his hands shaking. When he saw Stan he grinned shamefacedly.
Above them Zeena had wound up the “readings” and gone into her pitch: “Now then, folks, if you really want to know how the stars affect your life, you don’t have to pay a dollar, nor even a half; I have here a set of astrological readings, all worked out for each and every one of you. Let me know your date of birth and you get a forecast of future events complete with character reading, vocational guidance, lucky numbers, lucky days of the week, and the phases of the moon most conducive to your prosperity and success. I’ve only a limited amount of time, folks, so let’s not delay. They’re only a quarter, first come, first served and while they last, because I’m getting low.”
Stan slipped out of the sweatbox, quietly parted the curtains, stepped into the comparatively cooler air of the main tent, and sauntered over toward the soft drink stand.
Magic is all right, but if only I knew human nature like Zeena. She has the kind of magic that ought to take anybody right to the top. It’s a convincer-that act of hers. Yet nobody can do it, cold. It takes years to get that kind of smooth talk, and she’s never stumped. I’ll have to try and pump her and get wised up. She’s a smart dame, all right. Too bad she’s tied to a rumdum like Pete who can’t even get his rhubarb up any more; so everybody says. She isn’t a bad-looking dame, even if she is a little old.
Wait a minute, wait a minute. Maybe here’s where we start to climb…