I slunk around the tents, moving away from the big top and the noise, toward someplace where I could rest for a few minutes before putting things together.
I could hear people running toward me in the darkness, and I spotted a familiar tent. I plunged into it. It was dark and warm. I could feel the animals rustling in their cages.
“I think he went in there,” came a voice.
I ran behind the nearest cage, and the cat inside bellowed. In the entrance stood someone with a flashlight. The light beamed into corners, and I hovered behind the wheel of the wagon. The figure took a step into the tent and was stopped by the darkness and a loud animal snarl. The figure was small and looked to me like Nelson. The figure backed out.
“Not in there,” he said, and I knew it was Nelson.
There was time to catch my breath. I sat on the cool ground, telling myself that it had really happened, that Paul had really plunged through that hole. I knew I’d see him in my dreams.
Something rustled outside a cage in the darkness.
“Who is it?” I said, getting to my feet. No answer.
My eyes were getting used to the dark, and I could see the green-yellow eyes of animals following me as I crouched and moved toward the rustling sound.
“I’ve got a gun,” I lied. “Step out into the middle of the tent or I’ll shoot.”
No one stepped into the middle of the tent.
“Your gun is in the hands of the police,” came a voice from the dark.
I wasn’t sure where the voice came from, but I took a chance and leaped around the lion wagon, ready to throw a punch with my good remaining arm. There was no one there, but someone was suddenly behind me, someone who had moved quickly and hit me now with the weight of the world before my sore back would let me turn.
My skull is worn thin by nearly half a century of my using it to ward off attacks instead of as protection for my brain, which should have been thinking.
As the blue darkness with little stars skittered in my head like the beginning of life or time, a voice said, “For my brother.”
Koko, the clown of my dreams, reached out for me, and I tried to pull my hand away. I have a brother too, I wanted to say. But Koko wanted to play, and there was, as I now knew, no turning down a determined clown. I took his hand and went into the inkwell.
13
And that is how I came to be encaged with a snoring gorilla.
My choices were now clear. I could stand perfectly still when he woke up and pretend I wasn’t alive. I didn’t know how long I could keep that up or how much I could expect a gorilla to believe. I could also simply go about my business, pretend that I frequently found myself in cages with bad-tempered apes and act as if I were washing out my clown costume or cleaning my nails on my knee. A third choice was to start jumping up and down and making as much noise as I could in the hope that Gargantua would be too surprised to act. Even if it worked, which was as far from likely as Herbert Hoover making a comeback, I didn’t think I could keep it up.
Enter Henry. He came through the opening in the tent and looked directly at me. His finger went up and his mouth fell open. I tried to motion to the cage door, but Henry had other plans. He fell over on his face and lay there as if he had been laid out by Joe Louis.
He was either my killer’s victim number three, the object of a heart attack, or dead drunk. I was giving myself a lot of options for a lot of things. I guess that’s what you do when you lose control over a situation.
“Franklin D. Roosevelt,” came the words from Henry. He was drunk. The words were said without Henry bothering to move his head. Gargantua stirred and scratched his right leg with his long fingers.
“Franklin D. Roosevelt said tonight,” Henry went on, turning his head and starting to sit up, “that we were living in violin times. I don’t understand. Who understands? Maybe he meant violent times. No. That is no better. I had that map of the world out, just like Franklin D. said. Franklin D. coughed a lot tonight. If he’s getting sick, we are lost. ‘Flying high and striking high,’ he said. ‘American eagle isn’t going to imitate an ostrich or a turtle.’”
I considered whispering to Henry and even let out a controlled “Psssssst.”
But he wasn’t buying any. He was too busy analyzing the President’s latest fireside chat. His head swayed as he sat on the ground and tried to find Gargantua in the dark. “I think,” he said emphatically, “that Franklin D. is a man of the people. Yes, a man of the people, but what have violins or violets got for Chrissake to do with it?”
“Violence,” I whispered.
“Thank you,” said Henry sincerely. He got off the ground slowly, using a nearby cage for support. “Violence,” he mused. “Now that makes sense.”
The issue settled, he turned his back and took one tentative step toward the outside. I had to risk it.
“Henry,” I whispered. Nothing. “Henry,” I whispered louder. Gargantua definitely stirred. Henry stopped and looked back at the cage.
“I am drunk,” said Henry. “I ain’t very much in the way of smart, but I know when I am drunk, for I am a drinking man. Gor-yellas don’t talk. They can’t. Can’t even teach ’em.”
“It’s me,” I said, almost breaking the whisper, “Peters, Toby Peters. I’m locked in the cage.”
Uncertainty clouded Henry’s brow. I could see it in the half-light of the approaching dawn. He took a few steps toward the cage, and I expected him to fall on his face again.
“In the cage?” he asked.
“Get me out,” I said, glancing at Gargantua, whose eyelids were fluttering. “Fast.”
Henry walked to the cage a few feet from me and grabbed the bars to keep from falling over. “You are not supposed to be in there,” he said with all the authority he could get together. “You are supposed to be out here.”
In case I didn’t know where “out here” might be, he pointed at it. “Out here” proved to be a few inches above the ground in front of him.
“Get me out of here,” I whispered. Gargantua was definitely coming awake now. I tried not to move, but it was hard to watch both the gorilla and Henry without at least turning my head.
“I’m sure as hell getting you out of there,” said Henry resolutely, without moving. “Out of there and over here.”
Gargantua picked his nose dreamily and ran a finger down the side of the cage. He didn’t seem to notice me.
“If you don’t open the cage,” I sang, near hysteria, “I’m going to get torn apart.”
Henry considered this possibility for a moment by looking down at his feet. My impulse was reasonable and sane. I wanted to reach through the bars and kill Henry. Gargantua definitely looked in my direction.
“Henry,” I said softly, smiling at the gorilla, “if you don’t get me out of here now, please, I’ll beat the hell out of you.”
Henry laughed and shook his head. “Can’t beat the hell out of anything if GooGoo tears you up.”
He was right. Sometimes even drunken fools or private detectives are right.
“I’ll curse you,” I said as Gargantua stood and cocked his head to one side to be sure that what he thought he saw was actually in the cage with him.
“Curse?” asked Henry, lifting his head. I had his attention. “You mean like the evil eye?”
“Right,” said I, turning my back to him to face Gargantua, who cocked his head to the other side. “I have the evil eye. Got it from my aunt. I’ll give you a blast from it if you don’t get me out of here.”
Henry began to move. He pushed himself away from the bar and I lost sight of him, though I could hear him moving. I couldn’t take my eyes off Gargantua, who took two steps toward me.
“Hurry,” I said, not knowing whether Henry was opening the cage or running in drunken madness from my evil eye. A second or two later I knew he hadn’t gone. I heard his voice.
“Goes around throwing people through tents and does who knows what else and then says he’ll give me the evil eye,” he mumbled. “Me, Henry Yew, who has almost never done bad … except maybe the time with my cousin Parmale.”