Fish Boy and I were next up. Clowning and the animals were my priorities, but after hooking up with Fish Boy I helped him with his act and did some stints as The Tattooed Woman. I’d flex my muscles and tell stories of pirates and sea monsters. I’d tell the story of a Goblin-child hunting for her long-lost brother only to find he was enchanted, turned into a merman, the memory of his previous life lost.
Fish Boy played his part in my story, becoming my merman brother. We made his fish tail together, matching the blues and greens of his tattoos. He’d swim in a tank of water, sometimes hovering at the glass, his webbed hands pressed up against it for the kids to see. When our story was finished he’d flick his tail, splashing the kids who would run off screaming, straight to the Lizard King who was waiting to tell them the story of how he cried tears of acid.
I watched the kids watching him as he told the story we’d told in the Underground during the war. The kids were spellbound; he was a real hit. On their way out after the show Morgana would be waiting, selling rubber lizards with glued-on crowns. France, Spain, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, West Germany, 1961 – 1964
Dad took the circus further afield, travelling through Europe. As we travelled, we picked up people along the way. Over fifteen years since the war had ended and people were still trying to escape; memories, loss, poverty. They were the displaced, the dispossessed, those with no family, uprooted by the war and unable to settle back into their old lives. We’d picked up many people who’d been persecuted by the Nazis, but no one talked about it. The Eichmann trial was on everyone’s lips everywhere we went, but we hardly mentioned it. We were in Belgium the day he was hanged. A small group gathered together and sat in a circle, each with a glass of whisky. I watched them. No one spoke. They drank their whisky and the group dissolved.
Our clown troupe had been myself, Marv, Ali and Paul for years, but Horatiu joined us in 1963. We picked him up in a small town in France on our way back home. He’d been working as a mime in theatre and in the streets. He was from Romania but had fled when the post-war Communist Party arrested and tried his father as a collaborator, threatened the rest of the family, and killed his friend. This was what mum had told me, but Horatiu wouldn’t talk about his time in Romania when Ali quizzed him, and I let him be; there was a quiet understanding between us both. The past should stay in the past. He freely spoke about his time in France; he was queer and didn’t hide it, regaling us with tales of his affairs. I thought the clown troupe, especially Marv, would bristle at his sexual exploits, but they enjoyed his stories.
‘Why so easy on Horatiu, Marv?’
‘What’s that, G?’
‘You had a problem with me and Angelina, but not Horatiu.’
He continued applying his make-up then said, ‘That’s different.’
‘How so?’
‘Horatiu is honest.’
I didn’t respond and stared at myself in the mirror, Goblin disappearing, becoming clown. I smeared on the lipstick, going over my fake smile again and again until it was a deep obscene red.
‘I told you – I don’t play for any side,’ I said, looking into my eyes.
He grunted. I closed one eye and drew in a vertical line, a black scar.
I’d sometimes spend the night in Fish Boy’s caravan. When I returned, Groo would be waiting for me, complaining. The morning she wasn’t there, I called for her and heard her faint voice. I got down on my knees. She was lying under the bed, lifting her head to meow at me.
‘Hey, Groo. C’mon out, whatcha doin’ under there?’
She half-stood, half-fell her way out from under, her back legs not working properly. She collapsed in front of me, on her side, breathing heavily.
‘What’s wrong, old thing? You’ve gone all lopsided like Monsta.’
A tumour, Colin said. She won’t have long to live, Colin said. Best to let her go.
‘I can’t let her go, she can’t go. She’s all I have left.’
‘You have me,’ said Fish Boy, ‘you have us.’
‘I should have looked after her more. I should have stayed here every night with her. I neglected her and now she’s dying.’
‘G, there’s nothing you could have done. She’s old. She had a good life. You loved her.’
‘It wasn’t enough.’
Fish Boy and I holed up in my caravan and lay on the bed with Groo. We stroked her and spoke to her and tried to get her to drink and eat, but she only lay there, her breathing more laboured. Fish Boy went for Colin and I put Groo on my lap, my arms around her as Colin inserted the needle. I kissed Groo’s head. I smelled behind her ear like I always did, but she didn’t smell of anything anymore. I watched her slip away. She peed on me, the warmth seeping through to my skin, and she was gone. I said I was sorry over and over, so so sorry. I kissed her head again and held her paw. My tears and snot darkened her fur.
Before we buried Groo, I let Rusty see her and smell her. I don’t know if it was the right thing to do but I thought maybe he would understand and I wouldn’t have to deal with him plaintively following me around, wondering where she’d gone.
He sniffed her, licked her, growled, circled her and barked at me before running off. He turned up at my caravan a couple of times, sleeping at the bottom of the bed, then I didn’t see him again apart from the performances and I was glad.
After Groo died I stayed in bed for a week. Mum and dad, Fish Boy and Angelina all came to see me, but I couldn’t get up. I had nightmares again, about Quatermass and Martians, about Devil and old-ma. I stayed in bed until one afternoon I woke up and felt like a weight had fallen from me as I slept. I had all the energy in the world and the first thing I did was print posters of David. I’d let it slide, so wrapped up in work and Angelina and Fish Boy that I’d only put up a few here and there. But now I had hundreds and I’d put them up in every town and city we stopped in.
We didn’t usually get much time to sight-see as we travelled, but when we were in Prague I walked down Charles Bridge and touched St. John of Nepomuk’s five stars, hoping the silent saint would grant my wish. When we were in Paris mum and dad gave us all a couple of days off and several of us went up the Eiffel Tower. Two of the acrobats were arrested for doing dangerous stunts on the top level and mum and dad had a hell of a time getting them out of jail, which gave us all a few extra days in Paris. I visited Père Lachaise Cemetery with Fish Boy, mainly to see Oscar Wilde’s grave, but I loved it there and we stayed until late afternoon. It reminded me of the days I’d spent in Kensal Green, but it was a soft, melancholy feeling, only a tinge of sadness as I remembered Devil leaping after bumble bees.
In the evening after we’d returned from the cemetery I sat on the steps of my caravan with Fish Boy, basking in the glow of the fading sun. I thought of the times I was entertaining in the Underground and I thought of meeting dad, how lucky I was. I was where I belonged. End the story here. The past be damned.
London, 25 November 2011
I try to cancel the exhumation.
‘It’s not there,’ I say. ‘I’ve forgotten. Mac doesn’t know, don’t trust him. It’s all forgotten.’
But it goes ahead and I go along. The old worksite is a worksite again; it was all set for new development when the bankers failed us.