[because chan is sharing!]
It was fading twilight when the circus arrived.
The inhabitant's of the city were by and large done for the day; the only people to stop and stare at the wagons as they made their way through town with their bright paint now peeling and faded, and the procession of trick ponies, usually light and skittish but drooping now after a long walk and the weight of their sequins, were a ragged cluster of boys, who gave up their post hassling the passerbys outside the drugstore for change and followed the circus for several blocks, staring.
Jasper stared back. He'd heard much about the city, the size of its crowd, the discernment of its audience. Most of all, he'd heard of the pickings to be had. But Ignatius Carrot, the scowling Head Clown had decided long ago that they would not play the city and the circus had worked the small towns and country fairs instead, building a reputation as the biggest fish in a very small pond.
And now the city.
Jasper lay on his stomach on the roof of the caravan he shared with Jules and Judy, the jerking movement of the caravan as natural to him as travelling in a car or train might be to folks without a circus. All around them, the stone cold front of the city's buildings loomed; dark, grey stone buildings with high arches and morose gargoyles. To Jasper's front, the shadows the building's left lengthened seeming to swallow up each caravan as they entered. Jasper shivered as the shadows fell on him.
He crawled over to the side of the caravan and knocked at the window.
Jules opened it. "Had enough?" he asked, stepping aside so that Jasper could squeeze through the narrow gap.
Jasper took a moment to size up the way the rocking of the caravan made his trapeze swing before diving for it; not a real trapeze, of course, there was not the room in the caravan. This one hung just low enough from the ceiling that Jasper had somewhere to sit when he was not tucked up snugly in the caravan's top bunk.
"There's no people," he said, swinging himself upright. "No one watching for us."
"It's been many years since there was a circus here," Jules said. "Maybe the novelty will be a p-point in our f-favour."
Jules sounded rather as though he hoped the opposite. Jasper glanced at the Strongman. He was wearing his show clothes, a broad, loud jacket that rumour had it had once belonged to the circus's gorilla when they'd had one, and looked about as comfortable in it as he always did; not at all. Jules only really looked comfortable when he and Judy sat around the table in the evenings with Jasper perched on his trapeze and the three of them playing cards or talking over the day's events.
"Jules," Jasper started. "Do you --"
"Better put your own suit on. I've got the legs ready."
Jasper was being put off. He frowned, opening his mouth to try again, but the caravan came to an abrupt halt that made even the bulky Jules stumble, and Jasper's trapeze bucked wildly.
"We're here!" Judy called a moment too late.
"We're here," Jules repeated. "Good. Good. Very good. Your legs."
Anyone listening might wonder at Jules concern for Jasper's legs. They were as skinny and slight as the rest of him, but in perfect working order nonetheless. Jasper swung backwards from the trapeze by his knees which put him in the reach of one of the caravan's low cupboards. He pulled out a blue jacket only a few shades less garish than Jules, a sequined bow-tie already attached. Shrugging it on still upside down, he used a rope attached to the roof of the cabin to pull himself and the trapeze up until Jasper could get a hold on the top of the window frame. Then, quick and nimble as an eel, he slid back up onto the roof of the caravan.
The circus had come to rest in an empty lot hemmed in on three sides by more of the dark grey buildings of the city. A wire fence surrounded it, and its gravel was punctuated by small growing weeds and broken glass. There was a burnt smell hanging over it though no sign of fire.
"Here we are!" barked a sharp voice Jasper was only too familiar with. Ignatius Carrot strolled through the caravans, rubbing his hands, evidently in one of his rare good moods. "Round the sides boys, round the sides --we'll have the big top here. Someone get rid of the glass."
As Judy scuttled to fetch the broom from the caravan, Ignatius noticed Jasper, and came over to the caravan to look up at him. "Jasper, my lad. What do you think of the city?"
"It's very big," said Jasper because it seemed to be expected. "And also very grey."
Ignatius snorted. He was a large round man, who didn't look fat; more as though he was a ball with head and limbs that had been inflated to full capacity. He was wearing as he always did the multi-coloured clown wig, topped by a overly small hat at a rakish angle, that couldn't disguise the deep lines of his face; they weren't smile lines even under the gallons of facepaint Ignatius wore in performance. "You don't know the city, Jasper," he said. "Fine place. Marvellous. Wait till you see the main pull, the glittering theatres, the shows, the gardens. That's where we should be. Not shunted off in some back lot." He scowled, good mood suddenly fading. "I want posters up. As many and as obvious as you can get 'em. You hear? I want the people to know we're here."
"Yessir," Jasper said crouching low against the caravan's roof.
Fortunately it was then that Jules returned, two long stilts already enclosed in the legs of an over long pair of trousers swung over his shoulder. He lent the stilts against the side of the caravan and Jasper quickly swung his feet into them, sliding the braces attached to the trousers over his shoulders so that when he stood he appeared to be, not a small slight boy with dark hair and a build that could only be charitably described as 'weedy' but as more like a reflection in an elongated mirror.
"You're all set then," Ignatius approved as Jules passed Jasper the roll of posters. "Get to work then. I want this town papered with our show. You hear me? Papered."
Jules and Jasper got more stares as they made their way through the streets. They certainly made an odd pair. Jules was half as broad as he was tall, but he hunched over slightly if people called out to them and it was Jasper, tall and thin and tiny at the top of his long stilts who had the task of asking the shopkeepers if they could post their notices on the sides of the shops.
Despite their grim exteriors, the people of the city proved to be interested in an abrupt sort of way; the proprietor of a soda fountain even gave them a bottle each of raspberry fizz, and they lingered outside the store to finish it.
"Busy, that's what their problem is," Jules said. "B-busy all the time. They don't have the time to stop and enjoy life. M-money. That's what it is. All the time money."
Jasper leant against the wall, tracing the peeling and dried up posters of days gone by. Like old wallpaper it was. He teased out a corner. "Well, some money would be nice. We could paint the caravans."
"More m-money means m-ore crowds," Jules said and lapsed into silence.
Jasper frowned, meaning to remind him that the crowd always applauded Jules' act but familiar title caught his eye. "Jules! Look at this!"
"What have you got there -- Jasper, don't ruin anything."
"I'm not," Jasper said. "All this is old and we'll be papering over it in a minute. But look!" He peeled away layer after layer of old posters, until there, in front of them, was a faded poster the design of which they knew like the back of their hands. "I didn't know we'd ever played here before."
"IGNATIUS CARROT," proclaimed the tired font. "PROUDLY PRESENTS HIS CIRCUS: THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH."
The individual acts were too faint to make out, but Jules placed his hand where his own name had once been. "Ah," he said. "I'd almost f-forgotten. That was a good r-run." He smiled. "The crowd loved us. But things ... things were different then."
Jasper looked from the poster to Jules, his eyes wide. "The greatest show on earth?" he asked.
"Things were d-different," Jules repeated. "Come on. Let's get this poster up so we can head back. Not many more now left to d-do."
It was not more than a few minutes later that the pair set back off down the road on their task, leaving behind them two empty soda bottles and a new poster, pristine and bright, announcing in large loud lettering: IGNATIUS CARROT and THE GREATEST FREAKSHOW ON EARTH.
2.
They were just finishing raising the Big Top by the artificial circus lights when Jasper and Jules returned, long past twilight and into night. Ignatius was at the centre supervising; the circus folk could not get the tent raised quickly enough for his liking. Jules was immediately put to work with the others hammering the tent's stays into the ground; Jasper climbed the main pole of the tent to catch and tie the ropes thrown him.
Already the Big Top looked like a circus from the outside. The brightly striped yellow and purple tent had the proper shape even if the folk inside looked oddly amiss without their costumes. Boards were laid down over the gravel, and the ring was set out, the skeleton framework of the seating going up too.
As soon as the trapeze wires were tightened and checked, Jasper jumped onto his trapeze. As always the feeling of almost flying swept him up so that for a few minutes the long day and the oppressive air of the city was behind him.
However, even the peace that being this high brought him wasn't enough to fully dispel all the questions he had. Jasper spotted Judy below, her neat figure distinct among the burlier shapes of the other circus folks and he swung down the safety rope till he was near level with her head.
"Judy!"
Judy was too used to Jasper to start. "There you are," she greeted him with a smile that creased her eyes up and made her ginger beard bob merrily. "I wonder how you're finding the Big City?"
"You didn't tell me we'd been here before. No one did." Jasper cut straight to the point.
"Now how did you find out about that? Well, there's no use denying it." Judy didn't pause to talk but kept bustling by with her broom. Jasper had to abandon his rope and make a leap for the tightrope, wobbling as he hurried to keep up. "It's been a long time since we've played here."
"Why?"
"The usual story. Trouble with the police, people looking askance. We overstayed our welcome." Judy hurried on resolutely. "Ignatius swore we'd never come back."
"So why are we back now?"
"A very good question," she said. "And one only Ignatius can answer. Do you want to ask him?"
Jasper looked to where Ignatius stood, directing the placement of the circus cannon, and swallowed. "No."
He climbed back to his trapeze.
The rest of the circus folk didn't give him a second look. Jasper was more often on the trapeze than anywhere else. Where other children dreamed of flying Jasper knew it as a someday possibility. It seemed he was only a whisper away from it at times, a hair's width from grasping the rope that led all the way to the stars. The only child of the circus's two acrobats, his cradle had been hung from the trapeze and he'd learnt to walk on the safety net. In thirteen years of life, Jasper had not once set foot on solid ground.
And so, where others took standing with two feet planted solidly down as natural and right, and did not doubt that their legs would carry them wherever they chose to be taken, Jasper feared being anchored. He leapt and jumped not just from delight in flying but also out of desperation; he would not be caught.
Caught was an apt word to use to describe the circus run by Ignatius Carrot, head clown. For a start, no one would have run away to join it. For another, no one there was quite free. Oh, they could have left any time and none would have said they were forced to stay there.
But they all had something.
Jules, it was his habitual stammer. Built like a solid concrete housing estate, he was nonetheless so shy that it when it came to talking to strangers he had sometimes been known to burst into tears. Judy was kind and sweet and pretty, but her fear of knives meant she would never be more to the general public than the freakish bearded lady. Ignatius had found them at their most miserable, offered them work, and now they could no more consider leaving the circus than they could taking a Caribbean cruise, or taking up professional ballet.
And Ignatius made sure they never forgot.
"Right!" Ignatius boomed. "That's it for the night!"
Tools were put down with relief and the circus folk relaxed into more everyday postures. Before the murmur of their conversation could reach up to where Jasper hung on the silver cords of the trapeze like a little spider, he swung down, flitting from trapeze to rope like a sparrow to land on Jules' broad shoulders.
Jules laughed, reaching up to catch Jasper in his broad hands. "Things will be different now, Jasper," he said, ruffling his hair. "You'll see."
Different? Jasper could hardly see how. The circus had been his entire life.
He was turning the thought over still long after Jules and Judy had fallen asleep in the bunks below his. Watching the shadows from outside play across the roof of the cabin, Jasper pulled the covers up to his chin and thought about this seriously.
Different?
It was what they wanted, wasn't it? Jules and Judy. If the show was a great success and brought in enough money they might go away and then whose shoulders would Jasper ride when there was not enough rope to swing from place to place? There was no one, and Jasper's stomach twisted into a cold knot. He hurriedly turned over. Just because they were in the city did not mean, he told himself. Nothing was really changing.
But the thought persisted and when Jasper dreamt it followed him, a tinge of worry that clouded his sleep and left him blinking dazed and confused when Judy came to wake him for breakfast.
3.
When Jasper was uneasy he always had the same dream. Not a nightmare, though to him it had the weight of one. Without being frightening the same way his nightmares of falling were, the dream nonetheless left him feeling shaken and unnerved in a way that no amount of Judy's soothing or a hot glass of cocoa, prepared over the comforting glow of the caravan's single gas ring, could quite dispel.
The dream was unnerving because Jasper had no explanation for it.
It was always the same. He felt a momentary flash of alarm and then he was hanging from a mantelpiece, orange coals still glowing in the fireplace below. Drawing himself up hurriedly, Jasper cradled his arm, glancing in confusion at the room, its stiff high-backed chairs and gilt edged paintings a far cry from anything he'd seen at the circus. The wallpaper was all of one kind too, though it was too dark to get a closer look at it. Then as Jasper gaped at the bookshelves and the strange, backless sofa, and the suit of armour in the corner, something shifted immediately behind him.
With a sort of sick fear, Jasper saw the thing, crouched and shadowy at his back. Without hesitating he made a leap for the brass arms of the chandelier, swinging off that and landing on the thick velvet curtains on the far wall. With the strange doubleness of dream logic, he was still surprised to find the window beneath exactly as he knew it should be. Jasper scrabbled frantically with the latch, not looking back; there was no noise, no sound or anything from the thing behind him.
Finally the window opened, and Jasper crouched on the windowsill ready to leap. He looked behind for his pursuer and with a sickening feeling that had his stomach still lurching when Jasper woke seconds later, heart thudding urgently, he saw that there was no one in the room but himself.
"All right, Jasper?" Judy said, setting his bowl down in front of him. "You look pale."
"Wan," suggested Jules. "Or peaky might be the better word. You're not feeling ill?" He placed his large broad hand on Jasper's forehead.
Jasper shook his head quickly. "I'm fine," he insisted. "Didn't sleep so well is all."
"An unsettled rest never a good day makes," intoned Madam la Rose, the wizened old fortune teller. The purple-sequined frames of her outsized glasses glittered as she gave Jasper a sharp look. "As care from the careworn something takes." She spooned an extra large helping of porridge into Jasper's bowl.
"I really am all right," Jasper repeated.
"First night in a new town," Judy said brightly. "It's enough to make anyone nervous. Buck up, Jasper. You'll be fine -- you know you've never missed a cue."
"Even the ones who've been in this business y-y-years get s-stagef-f-f."
Jasper huffed, pulling himself upright to balance standing on the bar of his trapeze. "Does this," he asked, somersaulting backwards to land in a one-handed handstand on Jules' broad shoulders, stealing Jule's toast with his free hand. "Look like someone who has stagefright?"
Judy applauded and Jules laughed a big hearty laugh that made Jasper wobble dangerously.
"Bravo, bravo!"
"The pair of you should really have been clowns," Judy said. "Oh dear, have I got porridge in my beard? Jasper, you wretch, this is your fault."
Unrepentant Jasper flipped himself right way up and took a bow. "Thank you, thank you," he said. "And for my next trick, I shall eat my porridge upside down."
There was still a lot of work to be done setting the circus up. Jasper climbed and swung from pole to pole, helping Carlyle, the dour second-clown who doubled as electrician, get the spotlights properly arraigned. Jules's strength was invaluable in setting up the seating for the audience, and Judy spread the sawdust in the ring. Ignatius was there too, and one look at his grim expression had the circus folk redoubling their efforts.
Mid-morning, the reason for the head clown's hurry became apparent. A collection of men in dark grey suits, all carrying notebooks or clutching gleaming cameras were ushered into the Big Top.
"Them'll be reporters," Carlyle said. "You mind you never say more than yes or no to 'em. Theys'll twist the words out of your mouth till they've got you saying something you never thought on in your life." He grimaced. "Light set six-oh needs adjusting for glare. Bring it lower, Jasper?"
They were testing the main spotlight when Ignatius waved Jasper down.
"Gentlemen," he said, as Jasper slid down the main stay to join them. "This is our aerialist and acrobat. Young Jasper will be making his debut as a solo performance in the city. He is, if I might say so, one of the highlights of our little show, a true prodigy in his art."
Jasper had heard Ignatius say much the same thing every time he introduced his act. Too used to it to be embarrassed, he wrapped his leg around the rope for hold and bowed. "How do you do."
"I understand that Jasper is your only acrobat?" one of the reporters, a tall, skinny man, who hunched over his notebook like a hawk.
"Our only aerialist," Ignatius corrected. "We've a few acrobats."
"Nonetheless," the hawk persisted, and the huddle of reporters around him looked to be taking note. "Isn't the trapeze normally a double act? Surely one child -- talented as I'm sure this Jasper is --" he smiled, a tight ironic smile that said he doubted it very much, "cannot hold an entire act."
Jasper bristled. "You've never even seen me --"
"A very good point," Ignatius interrupted. "And perhaps in that light, we will offer you a sneak preview. Jasper, you still remember the routine from last year?"
"Piece of cake."
"Ah, are you sure that's all right?" A round reporter, with mole-like, faintly bewildered eyes, blinked behind his glasses. "The safety net does not seem to be in place yet --"
"I don't need one," Jasper said, leaping quickly from his rope to the main tent pole and making his way up to the trapeze.
"As you can see," Ignatius said smoothly. "He has the artistic temperament in force. His parents -- such a sad loss, you may remember their performances -- wanted to raise their son to be completely fearless. They hung his cradle from the trapeze, taught him to crawl, then walk, then jump on the safety net. Jasper's continued their training as homage -- he's never once sent foot on solid ground."
There was a suitably awed murmur from the crowd of reporters and the flash of a few cameras. Jasper swung idly on the trapeze, waiting for Ignatius's signal.
The head clown caught his eye and nodded, a thin smile on his face. "Gentlemen, I give you the youngest aerialist to ever take the spotlight."
Carlyle was ready; the full bright light hit Jasper on cue. With a grin of his own, Jasper begun.
It would not have occurred to him to be frightened. The trapeze was as natural to him as breathing, perhaps more. He swung, ducked, somersaulted and vaulted between the two trapezes suspended at the top of the Big Top as if gravity only applied to other people. Perhaps it did. Certainly, this high up, other people did not come much into account. It was seldom anyone made it that high up the tent poles so Jasper might believe he had the tent to himself. The excited babble of the reporters below did not break this illusion; all that way below, their noise was hushed by distance. All that existed was the down-up motion of the swinging trapezes, the momentum that carried Jasper across the gap between them and the pleasure as he caught the bar. Flying could not be more perfect than this.
This particular routine ended in a triple somersault that took Jasper back to the starting platform. The reporters below broke into scattered applause, and even Ignatius clapped, putting his hands together slowly with a satisfied expression. Jasper had done well.
"And that is the routine he practiced last year," Ignatius said. "His new routine will take your breath away -- when you write your articles, gentlemen, make sure to mention that the circus cannot be held responsible for any asthmatics who have difficulties during the performance."
The reporters duly laughed and Ignatius ushered them towards the animal cages. Jasper caught a fly rope and swung over to where Carlyle was still working. "What's next?"
4.
When the reporters left, Jasper was outside getting his daily juggling lesson from Judy. The bearded lady usually did her juggling from horseback; for lessons she stood on two chairs stacked on top of each other and threw bowling pins to Jasper who balanced on the long stilts that he'd worn while helping Jules to put up the posters. He wasn't bad at juggling, but he had a tendency to forget the pins weren't as aerodynamically inclined as himself, and was sometimes surprised when they came down sooner than he expected.
"As you can see, we're all working hard for the performances. We'll put on a show the likes of which this city hasn't seen since the last time the Circus was in town."
"The last time -- your brother was in charge then, wasn't he?" The long, thin, newspaperman said.
Jasper started, a pin flying out of his grip. Ignatius had a brother? He barely managed to keep the rest of the batons from falling as the conversation continued.
"Ah, Marmaduke," Ignatius said with a smile that was all grimace. "I've not thought about him in years."
"So, it's not true that the reason your circus has avoided the city all these years is the disagreement --"
The rounder, ruddiest faced of the reporters stepped aside from the bunch to pick up the fallen pin. He offered it to Jasper, looking up at him with a crinkled smile. "Juggling as well? That's a bit of a tall order. No, I've got a better one -- Child gymnast balances acrobatics with bowling."
"Technically," Jasper said catching the pins that were in the air before ducking down to take the proffered pin. "I'm not a gymnast. Nor am I bowling. Thank you."
"Artistic licence," the reporter said. "I'm Roger Jolly, of the Daily Daily."
"The Daily Daily?" Jasper repeated.
"Today's news -- today. The motto's my idea," Roger said. "Self-starter starts own business. Budding reporter designs paper from the ground up. That sort of thing." He nodded to Judy. "And you're teaching him? Does that make you the juggler."
"I multi-task," Judy said pleased. It was seldom anyone looked beyond the beard. "Juggling, acrobatics, riding, you name it."
Roger whistled. "I have to say, I'm looking forward to the show. All the fun of the fair -- will there be peanuts? And candy floss?"
"More than you can shake a stick at," Judy said.
The reporter laughed, relaxing. "I've always loved the circus," he said. "Since I was a boy --" he put out his arm, absently, leaning against the nearest surface. Unfortunately, this surface was Jasper's stilts.
He was a heavy man, and the stilts were long and ponderous. Jasper toppled. He scrambled wildly to keep his balance, dropping the pins with a clatter that made Ignatius and the reporters look their way, but it was no good. One of the stilts fell with a loud clatter and Jasper swayed precariously at the top of the other.
"I say, I'm so sorry --"
Jasper barely registered the words. The ground seemed to jump up at him, as the stilt swayed first this way and then the other, jerking wildly out of his control.
"He's going to fall --"
There was nowhere to jump to, nothing --
The stilt toppled at last and Jasper leapt desperately for the only things between himself and the ground. He landed on the shoulders of the nearest reporter, flipped onto the next and used the tallest, the thin sour reporter, as leverage to reach the roof of the caravan beyond where he crouched, his hands and knees shaking like those of an overworked university student on their sixth cup of coffee.
The stilt clattered to the ground with a bang, the ruffled reporters almost as noisy in their protests.
"I'm awfully sorry, most awfully sorry," Roger said. "I wasn't thinking --"
"I did warn you all that Jasper never sets foot on the ground," Ignatius said wearing a pleasant smile with all the vehemence of a scowl. "Artists --"
"Trained to be fearless?" The mocking tones of the tall thin reporter cut throw the fuss coolly as a knife through lukewarm butter. "That child is terrified."
Jasper winced as everyone suddenly stared up at him, ducking his head away quickly. It wasn't fair, he'd been surprised --
"Gentlemen," Ignatius said, drawing from his waistcoat pocket the long chain watch he habitually carried. "What you mistake for fear is merely a sensitive nature responding to the shock of being this close to betraying the legacy of his dead parents. It is not something to be discussed lightly. Why, we all remember them," he said, his voice turning persuasive and dreamy. "Just look at this watch."
Jasper turned curiously. Jules had told him the watch was Ignatius's gift from his long-dead father. All he saw however was the back of Ignatius's tail-coat and the watch swinging back and forth in his hand. The reporters all stared at the watch, pens poised hungrily for the story.
"This watch," Ignatius repeated. "This very watch -- gentlemen, you must be feeling tired. Why not let yourselves relax, let those pens rest a moment. Yes. Now this watch was presented to me by my father, and inside its cover is engraved the names of every member of this circus -- are you relaxed? Let yourselves rest, let go a minute. Your minds are drifting, drifting, you are sleeping --"
He snapped the watch shut.
The reporters stared dumbly at him, no questions for once.
Jasper, still watching from the caravan roof, swallowed, not daring to move.
"When you awake," Ignatius said crisply. "You will remember nothing of Jasper's fall. You will remember only a pleasant morning at the circus, shared with my hospitable staff. When you write about this morning for your papers, you will tell everyone of the quality of the circus, of your great expectations for opening night. And you will buy tickets." He smiled grimly. "Now, we've just finished discussing how sorrowful I am that my brother will not be joining us for this performance. It's time for you to go. Wake up."
The reporters blinked, looking as dazed as if they'd just emerged from a dark room into the sun. A few of them blinked; Roger yawned.
"Gentlemen," Ignatius smiled tucking the watch away. "It's been a pleasure. Are you sure you can't stay ...?"
"Editors, deadlines -- I'm sure you understand," a brown, mousey man shook Ignatius's hand and smiled. "Thanks for the hospitality. We've had a most wonderful time! And you've given us much to write about."
The other reporter's chimed in and Ignatius grinned and shook their hands. "My pleasure, my pleasure -- see you opening night!" Even the tall thin one got a handshake.
As the reporters drifted towards the gate, Ignatius waved them off. "Jasper," he said, without taking his eyes off their backs. "Be more careful in future. I won't always be around and if word got out, you wouldn't be a genius aerialist. All you'll be is a kid with a phobia."
Jasper crouched down. "Yessir."
"You've done a good morning's work. Judy, when Jules is done, the three of you go take this boy for an ice-cream. My treat."
"Thank you, Ignatius." Judy nodded as the head clown left. She set first one stilt then the other against the side of the caravan, and looked up at Jasper with a warm smile. "Let's wait for Jules in the Big Top," she said. "You can show me the routine that made such a good impression on the reporters."
It was hard being afraid when she was so kind. Jasper returned her a wobbly smile. "You've already seen it," he said.
"I'd like to see it again."
"If you insist." The stilts barely wobbled at all now that Jasper was back in control. The ground was far enough beneath them that he didn't feel the urgent need to avoid it. And Judy didn't mind walking the long way around so that they were never far from something Jasper could land on.
5.
To Jasper's great surprise, Jules went first a deep red and then a blanched white at the news. "G-go for ice-cream?" he gasped. "Y-y-y-you and m-m-"
"And Jasper too," Judy said quickly. Her cheeks had gone an unusually deep ruby. "It's his treat."
"And J-jasper too," Jules said with a weak smile. "Just the three of us. A proper t-t-t --"
"You boys get cleaned up," Judy said. "I need to do my hair."
Jasper looked at her, but her hair looked just as it always did. "But Judy --"
"Mind you wash your hands, Jasper." Judy bustled away.
"t-t-t --"
"What's wrong with my hands?" Jasper demanded. "Jules?"
The burly strongman was still stuck on 'treat.'
Jasper leapt off his stilts to thump him on the back. "Jules! Better?"
"T-thanks, Jasper," Jules said with a watery smile.
The boy frowned, hooking his arm around a nearby rope, and hanging upside down to look more closely at his friend. "You're acting oddly," he said. "Even for you. What's going on?"
Jules turned bright pink, even to the tips of his ears. "We're in the city now, Jasper! It's different," he said quickly. "You have to be on your b-best behaviour."
"Best behaviour?" Jasper echoed, dismayed. "I thought this was a treat."
"Oh, it is," Jules promised. "You haven't seen the city, Jasper. There are ice-cream parlours here with one hundred flavours, all of them d-d-d-different."
"One hundred flavours?" Jasper tried to imagine all the flavours he knew. "You're making that up."
"No, I tell you it's the truth." The Strongman held out a hand and Jasper let go of the rope to drop into it. Jules set him on his shoulder, heading towards their caravan. "They have weird flavours like seaweed and peanut butter and mustard."
"Seaweed!" Jasper said awed. That was worth washing up for.
Judy met them at the gates. She'd changed into her nice dress, and Jasper saw with considerable astonishment that she had done something with her hair. Her gingery-blonde locks were pulled back from her face with a pink headband, and her beard was neatly divided and gathered into two tufts, each tied with a small pink ribbon.
Jasper had been very sceptical of Jules decision to add a sequined bow-tie to his shirt, but he had to admit the two of them made a matching pair.
"I didn't realise ice-cream was so important."
"Dressing up is half the fun," Judy said, straightening Jasper's shirt and glancing sideways at Jules. "You both look very nice."
Jules ducked his head awkwardly and even though it was Judy was a grown woman and more than capable of crossing roads by herself, held out his hand. Judy went pink as she took it.
"Where are we going?"
"I want to see the ice-cream place with the one hundred flavours," Jasper said, as they set off down the street, people pausing to look twice as they passed. "Jules said they have seaweed."
"I think I know the place. Jasper, you're not going to try all 100 flavours, are you? You'll be too sick to swing from anything."
"What's the point of having one hundred flavours if you can't try them all --"
Jules laughed. "We can come b-back, you know," he said looking sideways at Judy. "Maybe next time it will be m-my t-t-t--"
He never finished his sentence, but Judy simply smiled.
The ice-cream parlour had one hundred and one flavours as it happened. Jasper hung off Jules' shoulders and stared at the display until the strongman complained that he was getting tired.
"Hungry t-too," he said, whispering and blushing. Jules hated talking when there were strangers around and the other customers of the ice-cream parlour were definitely looking their way. "Let's o-order and s-sit d-down."
When Jules and Judy's order arrived, Jasper began to be suspicious.
"One peanut-butter-chocolate-chip, raspberry-fudge, cream-cheese, cucumber and ketchup waffle cone with rainbow sprinkles," the waitress said, placing Jasper's ice cream in front of him in a tall glass. "And for the ... couple," she placed a long tray of ice-cream topped with whipped cream, bananas, cherries and a bright pink heart drawn in strawberry flavoured syrup in front of Jules and Judy, "a sweetheart's sundae, to share."
Jules and Judy looked everywhere but at the waitress or each other or Jasper.
Jasper said nothing. Or at least not immediately. "Peanut butter's good," he said. "The ketchup flavour not so much. What's that you've got there?"
"Banana," Judy said. "And Rum, panna cotta and carrot. Want to try a bit?"
Jasper wasn't sure about her choice of flavours but he agreed. Somehow, he felt a bit better about Jules and Judy sharing an ice-cream if they still would share with him.
The treat passed pleasantly. Judy and Jasper played a game of trying to guess what ice-cream flavour the rest of their friends at the circus would be, and Jules forgot to be self-conscious enough to laugh occasionally.
"Not p-porridge flavoured icecream," he whispered. "They don't even have that."
"They have oatmeal cookie," Jasper suggested. "That's close enough for Madam Rose."
"What about Gideon?" Judy said, recalling the circus's morose daredevil. "Do they have anything gloomy?"
"Gooseberry fool? Trifle? All these are too happy," Jasper said, looking over the menu and licking the last of the cucumber off his spoon. "And he doesn't fudge his landings ..."
"Do they have g-g-gunpowder?"
"There's a thought," Jasper turned the menu over. "No gunpowder, but they do have liquorice and black pepper. Also chilli."
"Liquorice! That's what Gideon is," Jules slapped Jasper on the back.
"But then who's the chilli -- oh, of course!" Judy said. "It's got to be --"
"Ignatius," the three of them chorused, and laughed.
The three of them lapsed into silence, suddenly noticing that their ice-cream had begun to melt and getting busily to work with spoon and fork. Jasper thought he'd never had such a pleasant afternoon.
"Mommy, why does that lady have a beard?"
In the comparative silence of their table the question seemed very loud. Jasper turned to stare at the speaker. A small girl, her mouth smeared with ice-cream stared back.
"Well, I'm not sure about the panna cotta, but the rum --" Judy started, just as Jules said quickly and nervously, "I don't know about you two, b-but I'm about ready to head b-back --"
They paused embarrassedly, and Judy said quickly, "What was that, Jules?"
He shook his head. "No-- no," he squeaked. "You go ahead."
"Well, I'd finished anyway ..."
"And Mommy! That man has a funny voice --"
Jules gulped and hid his face behind the ice-cream menu.
Jasper looked around and glared.
"Amelia, honey, its not polite to stare --" The little girl's mother said, adjusting her lipstick in a hand mirror without looking up.
"He's staring at me," the girl persisted. "And he's not sitting properly. He has his feet on the chair."
Jasper looked down. He did, in fact, have his feet up on his chair, his shins pressed against the table, but that was how he always sat --"
"Doesn't he know it's bad manners?" the little girl persisted. "Why doesn't his mommy tell him not to?"
Judy put her hand on Jasper's arm and leaned in close. "She's just a little girl," she said, her voice kind. "She doesn't understand. Jules and I don't care how you sit -- you're our friend. All right, Jasper?"
His stomach still felt strange, but Jasper nodded. "All --"
"Mommy, mommy! That man is wearing a dress!"
"Amelia, dear. Lower your voice," her mother said.
"Mommy! You said he wasn't a lady," Amelia hissed in a whisper loud enough to be heard by the entire store.
"Sometimes, sweetness and light, when two men love each other very much --"
Jasper had never seen someone's face crumple like Judy's did then. The edges of her mouth turned down then her expression sagged like a soggy napkin. With a sob she stood up, and ran out of the ice-cream parlour.
"Judy --" Jules flushed as he realised he'd just called aloud. Ears burning as red as a fire-engine, he rushed out the door, whether fleeing from the crowd or following Judy, Jasper couldn't tell.
He looked at the last scoops of ice-cream melting into each other and dropped the sodden cone onto the remains of the Sweetheart Sundae. The ice-cream was ruined.
Even the whipped cream had had time to melt, and there was no sign of Jules or Judy. Jasper brooded over the menu, not actually reading it, but it meant he did not have to look at the parlour's other patrons. They were staring, he knew it.
Finally the waitress returned. "I'm awfully sorry," she said. "I need to clear this table. Perhaps you'd like to wait outside for your friends?"
That got to Jasper. He drew himself up proudly. "Of course," he said and leaped from his chair. He cartwheeled across one table, somersaulted over the next and landed on the window sill with a flourish.
"We're from Ignatius' Carrot's famous Circus!" he announced. "Opening in one night's time! Come and see us perform!"
There was a sprinkling of applause from the other customers but Jasper didn't wait to hear it. He swung himself up the drain-pipe and was on the roof without a second thought.
He was quick, but not quick enough. He'd heard a customer say with evident relief, "Well, of course. The other two must have been the clowns --"
6.
Jasper leaped from sloped stone roof with gothic decorations to flat brick with boxed petunias and hesitated. Still no sign of Jules or Judy or even the circus. All he could see surrounding him was a grey patchwork quilt of roofs. He didn't know any of the streets whose names he read from the signs and he pulled back from talking to anyone on the street below.
Best thing to do would be to go back to the ice-cream parlour, Jasper decided glumly. Jules and Judy were bound to remember him eventually.
But he wasn't even sure which way he came.
All of the rooftops he'd passed looked the same with only minor variations. Was it that chimney he'd swung off? Or had he vaulted from the drainpipe instead?
"Bother Jules," Jasper said grumpily. "Bother Judy. But most of all, bother this city!"
He felt a little better after that. Not much, but enough that he had an idea. If he could find a building tall enough, he might be able to get a better view of things, and then he could find his way.
A few tall sticks of buildings towered in this distance, but they were far away and Jasper wasn't sure that even he could climb those. Much nearer was a tall pointed house that seemed to have been built right at the top of a hill.
Jasper made his way toward it. Now he had a direction he moved quickly; the roofs were less travelled so he didn't have to worry about avoiding other pedestrians or dodging traffic. As he neared the house however, he was forced to abandon the rooftops; the houses were more spread out, and Jasper hung from tree branches, swung from lampposts and vaulted over post-boxes instead.
As he cartwheeled lightly over the fence of the house opposite the big house, Jasper caught sight of the gate and paused upside down, both hands on the fence.
The gates to the Big House were broad, heavy iron, with a crest, a flowing cursive 'M' with a 'V' sitting on top of it so that it almost looked like a sideways 'X'.
Jasper had never seen the gates before.
And yet --
He paused, balancing on one hand as he shook his elbow free from his shirt sleeves and took a look at it.
On the outside of his arm, just above where his elbow dimpled was a raised red scar. He didn't know where it had come from. Madam Rose had noticed it one day. Jasper had been so young then, that he'd been able to take his bath in the cauldron Madam Rose used in her fortune telling act.
"What is this, what is this?" She'd cried, pouncing on the mark with the soap.
"It's not coming off," Jasper told her. He'd poked at it curiously. "Was it always there?"
"Birthmarks are from birth," The old gypsy had scolded him. "From birth ... " She'd picked up the soap again grimly. "As my grandmother once told me, birthmarks are a sign of destiny," she said. "That mark of yours is very queer. Destiny doesn't just appear ... "
"Does it wash off?" Jasper had quipped and got a dunking for his cheek.
He wasn't inclined to be cheeky now. Although the scar had healed and faded until it was little more than a bump now, Jasper could picture clearly in his mind the crooked 'X' pattern of its first appearance.
It was the exact same pattern as the gate.
Madam Rose would know how to explain it. She'd give him a warm cup of her elderflower cordial and let him perch on her windowsill with the Raven, Humbug, and she'd tell him it was good luck or a change in the weather or maybe he was going to grow up to live in a big house on a hill. But Madam Rose wasn't there.
Jasper looked back over his shoulder the way he'd came, but all the houses were laid out flat with scarcely a wrinkle in them. The only way to find the circus again was to keep going. He lowered himself onto the fence and then bounced into the nearest tree.
He kept to the trees all the way up to the house. He had to -- set back from the road as it was there was no other way to get close enough. Fortunately the trees grew close to the house, and Jasper had no difficulty leaping from the branches of a oak onto the tiled roof.
What he did have difficulty with was landing: the tiles were worn smooth and slippery by seasons of rain and sleet. Jasper's feet slipped and his arms whirled frantically as he fought a brief, doomed battle with balance.
Jasper was not an aerialist for nothing, however! He managed to snag his foot in the guttering of the roof so that instead of falling straight, he banged into the wall below. Even before the impact jolted his foot free of its hold, his hands were searching for a purchase of some sort on the wall. He found a ledge, twisted his body round, and before you could see 'death-defying', was sitting on the ledge of a second storey window, his heart going at a speed that would get you pulled over in a residential zone.
"I'd like to see what that old crow of a reporter would make of that!" Jasper told himself. This close escape didn't leave him feeling sick and wobbly like this morning's had. Instead he felt pleased with his quick thinking. "Some show that would be --"
The dim light of a fire within the room caught his eye and Jasper glanced through the window. He stared, the heavy pounding of his heart suddenly squeezed tight in his chest. Jasper had never been to the city, let alone this house before. And yet --
He knew the thick velvet curtains, the pin-striped wall paper, the chandelier with its bronze arms and buds of frosted white. There was the mantelpiece, the sofa with no back, the upright chairs.
The room through the window was the room of his dream.
While Jasper stared, the window glass was suddenly pushed up. He barely managed to keep his balance on the sill; a second later, a pale, nightmarish face followed, with strange dark shadows about the eyes.
"Hello," it said.
Jasper panicked.
He leaped off the sill and ran up the drainpipe. In a matter of seconds he was back in the trees, swinging through them as he'd never swung before.
"Wait --"
But Jasper didn't wait. He didn't even look behind him, not to well after he'd left the house and its eerie inhabitant and unsettling rooms well behind and was back in the maze of rooftops and houses.
Only then did he remember why he'd sought out the house in the first place.
Jasper slumped down behind a chimney. Not only was he lost and alone, but it was now dark. He had no chance of finding his way after this, not one. What on earth was he supposed to do? No one in the circus owned a telephone --
A bright corner of colour caught Jasper's eye on the wall opposite, and he slid down the side of the roof to take a closer look. Was it -- it was! The familiar red and blue letters, the freshness of the poster -- he and Jules had only pasted it up yesterday!
Could it mean ... ?
Jasper jumped to the roof of the building with the poster and slid down its far side and onto the next house. Yes, there was another poster, and he could see one more a few houses down. And there was the soda fountain.
With a whoop of joy, Jasper did a double somersault and catapulted onto the next house. He could follow the posters back to the circus! At last, he was found!