“That’s us,” an elderly male voice said, and Jem looked up into shadow to see Mally standing with a tall lean man in an off-white three-piece suit, one that looked bleached and quaint as if made of canvas or sailcloth. It had eccentric pleats and odd little tucks and ruffles like compressed fans, even a rolled cravat of the stuff at his throat.
Mally gestured grandly. “Jem Renton. It’s my great pleasure to introduce our Ringmaster and Master of Ceremonies, Mr Heinrich Fleymann, originally of Gutenberg. Mr F. as we call him.”
“Good to meet you, Jem Renton,” Mr F. said. “It’s been a while.”
Twinkling dry was the right term for him, Jem decided as they shook hands. Dry skin, dry voice, all with a sheen spilling from the eyes, which in themselves looked dry. An old painting of a man, complete with an explosion of white Mark Twain hair and wearing a raw canvas suit waiting for colours, highlights, flourishes.
Obligato courtesy came easy. “I’d say thanks for the invite, Mr F., but I had no choice in that.”
Mr Fleymann spread his hands. “Sorry to say. But we’ll set things right.” His words held only the slightest trace of his German ancestry.
Jem found it easy to play along. “I thought weird carnivals came in on trains.”
“Well, we’re Down Under, see, so it’s all ass-about. We join you. You come to us on the train.” Dry voice, dry smile stretching back, bushy white hair catching the light.
“So why am I here? Mally said I have a hidden power you mean to use.”
“Straight to it, good. You check out the attractions on offer. We have nine tonight. You get to pick three.”
“Pick as in try those tents?”
“Pick as in they’re your three. You try them all. Think of it as partly a fortune-telling thing.”
“That’s what my gift’s for? Lets you read the future?”
“Most surely does. Lets us determine the future, if we’re lucky. It all depends on what choices you make. Life’s about choosing. No point otherwise.”
Jem remembered what Mally had said about words and wondered what Mr Fleymann wasn’t saying. That was the game here. “You picked me. Joined me. How does that work?”
“Checked you out. Laid the old Sly spell, part of it in Perth with your gran and sister, part when you reached Cook. Other folk drop by, see the tents, decide to check us out. That’s the gravy. We chose you. Makes all the difference.”
“But you’re still not saying why.”
“Hey, no, sir! We’ve waited years for your visit. It’s our reward for all the effort.”
“You’ve chosen others? Visited others?”
“We have. We did. We do. Constantly. Got people out scouting right now.”
“Finding new blood.”
“Not our choice of words. Some duds, some misses, but all considered it averages out. It’s how we do what we do.”
“Come on, Mr Fleymann? You’ve got me here. Just what do you do. I don’t see any trade dropping by.”
“Not today, Jem! Not tonight. Tonight you’re here! It’s your turn. You’re the main attraction! We perform for you. Not just anyone can make us cross half a continent scouting.”
“I just visit the tents?”
“Pay each of the nine a visit, yes. Meditate. Reflect. Choose your three. They’ll be the ones we use.”
“For a fortune telling.”
“At the very least. For whatever comes.”
“Mally says there are thirteen in the troupe. Will I get to meet the others?”
“They wouldn’t miss this for the world. Though, like I say, we got some off scouting. Half-Bottle Johnny and Swallowed Girl can’t be here, and one of our two Kabuki Crows sends his apologies.”
“Finding my replacement if I don’t cut it.”
“Your successor whether you do or don’t. It never stops. They find someone, we shut up shop and go check them out like we did you.”
“And if I refuse?”
Mr Fleymann’s face locked. The smile gleamed above the fan of his cravat, hinted, promised.
“Then we lose out this time. You lose out.”
“You have that spell thing going. You could force me.”
“Not how we like it to be. Keep that as one of our Get Out of Jail Free cards. We all get them. Even you get one.”
“You’re serious?”
“Old rules. You could guess our secret name, our special name of power. Every Heirloom Carnival has one. Some visitors get lucky. Most don’t. That lets you cut and run.”
“Can’t be too obvious.”
“Has to be in plain sight.”
“So I’ve seen it already?”
“Most likely. But best you choose your three. Spend time with them, then come tell us. Have a bit of a debriefing on what you’ve understood. Answer a few questions.”
“Then I can go?”
“How it works. Jeremy Scott Renton goes scot-free. He’s off our books.”
“But with no memory of having been here.”
Mr F. snatched dazzle from the spotlight, grinned like a brand-new scimitar. “Still deciding about that. But, hey, Jem, you’re looking tired. Why don’t you go have a nap till later?”
“Thanks, Mr F., but I’m not—”
The third part of the obligato kicked in then. Jem collapsed where he stood, and Mally was there to catch him, every bit as strong as she looked.
When he woke it was evening and he was lying on an old car seat alongside one of the SUVs. To his left the western horizon was a band of gold over a vast blackness, sweeping up to become crimson passing through aqua into richest indigo overhead, already filling with early stars.
To his right the tents were so many jewel boxes, Chinese lanterns, shifting cabinets of light, sides stirring in the breeze off the desert. Daytime drab had become evening miracle, the easy magic of carnivals and circuses everywhere. The heat was going out of the land, but seeing the softly glowing shapes stopped Jem minding too much.
They had deliberately planned it this way, of course, provided the comfortable shift, the right segue from one mode to another. All the tents were illuminated internally, Jem noticed; all had lanterns atop poles by their entrances, a few left dark, most lit to show their signboards. There were people about too, not Mally or Mr F. as far as he could tell, but others, the rest of the troupe, doing last-minute errands, taking their places. There was music playing as welclass="underline" pipes, Gipsy violins, some light percussion, probably a recording rather than live musicians but muted, far off, entirely appropriate.
In spite of the circumstances, Jem felt genuine excitement, obligato effect or otherwise, though again with a stab of something else behind it, also muted and far off, which, in another time, another place, might have been panic. But he felt excited was the thing.
And here was Mally, wearing finery of her own: the cheekiest, flimsiest, most unlikely ingénue shift that clung to her full body way too well.
“Aren’t you cold?” was all he could manage.
“Surely will be. But, hey, I’ve been in jeans all day. This is playtime! And time to start your tour.”
“What, I just go wandering?”
“Take your time. Any order you like. It’s all about you now.”
“You’re not coming?”
“I’m part of the performance, ninny. Off you go.”
Jem had thought there’d be more to it, more fanfare, more of a fuss. But he stood and stretched, then started for the nearest attraction, half intending to do a clockwise circuit.