“I just want to check on my rigging, though I doubt we’ll be putting on another performance tonight. Accidents happen in threes, we always say. I’m sure you will have many questions.”
As they entered the ill-lit, empty hangar, Dorj asked the muscular young man about the lion tamer.
“Cheslav was a roustabout, not a performer,” replied Fabayan, contempt evident in his tone. “He was an out-of-work stonemason. Zubov spotted him leaving after a show in Chelyabinsk. We needed some muscle to set things up, to help move cages, to haul up the rigging.” He indicated the complicated arrangement of ropes, nets and trapezes half hidden above them. “I couldn’t trust him with the knots or getting the nets in the right places, or any of that. Eventually Zubov gave him the lion-taming act.”
Nothing at the circus was what it seemed, thought Dorj. Its amazing and glittering wonders were nothing more than tawdry deceits. Yet what about a murderous corpse? What sort of deceit was that? Or was that real?
Dim light outlined the web of ropes high up in the cavernous hangar. Certainly the distance between Fabayan’s trapeze, up near the ceiling, and the hard concrete floor far below was real enough.
“It takes true skill to perform up there,” boasted Fabayan, following Dorj’s gaze. “Buturlin recognized talent. He was born to the circus. He was the one who engaged me. If he were still alive, it would be different.”
“Buturlin was the former owner?”
“Yes, and then Zubov and he became partners. Buturlin died a year or two ago. But Zubov, he was originally just the accountant; he knows nothing about talent or the circus.”
“Zubov did perform some magic,” Dorj pointed out.
“Anyone can buy a trick box. The only thing Zubov made disappear was our pay cheques. If he had headlined my aerial act rather than a fat, unemployed labourer and a drugged big cat, we would be the toast of Moscow by now.”
Fabayan’s voice echoed around the empty hangar as he walked about, testing several thick ropes dangling from above. Dorj followed a few steps behind.
“Why did Zubov imagine you would do better business in Mongolia?” he finally asked.
“Because we would have no competition, or so he said. But, more importantly, as it turned out, he did not realize that you Mongolians don’t have enough tugriks to keep the traffic lights working, let alone pay for art.”
Not put diplomatically, but true enough, reflected Dorj. It struck him that the deaths of both the owner and his favoured lion tamer had at once removed two impediments to Fabayan’s career. He wondered who else might have been angered by Zubov’s refusal to headline aerialists. “Do you perform alone?”
“At the moment, yes. However, I have been training Ivana. Naturally, the audience wants thrills and artistry such as I provide, but I also needed a vision of beauty on the wires, to complement my performance.”
The young man stared up into the shadows, a bird with its wings clipped.
“Isn’t it dangerous, trying to learn something like that at her age?” Dorj ventured delicately.
The other dismissed the suggestion. “Ivana is closer to my age than Cheslav’s,” he said, somewhat heatedly it seemed to Dorj. “Besides, she is an accomplished acrobat. She took over for Larisa when she could no longer continue her act. Her acrobatic act, at least. We no longer have a contortionist. Larisa was the only one of us with that talent.”
Larisa had mentioned only her acrobatic skill. For a moment Dorj said nothing. He was thinking about her remarkable blue eyes. It was hard to imagine those blue eyes belonged to a woman who was, or had been, a contortionist, as well as… Dorj forced his thoughts back to more important matters.
“Is it true that the women had reason to hate Zubov?” he asked, recalling Dima’s comment.
“You mean because he was constantly propositioning them? Actually, the way he was always looking at Ivana, I am surprised poor Cheslav waited until he was dead to kill the old lecher. If I had been her husband, I would have strangled him long ago!”
Dorj immediately recognized the possessive jealousy in Fabayan’s voice. How often had he encountered that fierce tone while investigating a crime? Perhaps that was why he so distrusted his own emotions. So often strong emotions led to disaster.
He might have felt compelled to ask whether the young man had been having an affair with Cheslav’s wife, but the aerialist grabbed one of the hanging ropes and hauled himself up into the shadows. A few seconds later, Dorj heard the creak of the swinging trapeze.
Dorj climbed into Zubov’s caravan. Having spoken to the last two or three members of the small troupe, he had discovered that, predictably, they all claimed that everyone else but themselves had good reason to hate the circus owner.
It was hard to remember he had driven out here hoping that for a few hours the circus’s dazzling lights, nimble performers and sideshows would free him from the dreariness of the vast grey desert and cramped grey offices of his official life. In Ulaanbaatar he had had the consolation of the State Theatre. Out here in Dalandzadgad culture was a traveling circus.
Dorj removed his wire-framed eyeglasses and carefully wiped their round lenses with his handkerchief. But when he put the spectacles back on, the scene remained unchanged and just as murky.
He examined the interior of the caravan. It held no revelations. Its few cupboards contained only household necessaries, and in any event they were too small for purposes of concealment. Nor had anyone been hiding in the lavatory cubicle, waiting to escape in the general excitement. He would surely have been noticed.
The blood smears on the floor and the imprint of a bloody hand on the lavatory door mutely reproached his lack of understanding.
Dorj positioned himself beneath the closed roof vent and reached up to touch it. When he had noticed it earlier, while examining the outside of the caravan, he’d guessed it was too small to serve as an entrance. Now he was certain. His shoulders were much wider than the opening and Dima, although short, was at least as broad. Not a proper midget, as Zubov had said. In addition, the vent gave no evidence of having been opened recently. Indeed, a ropy bit of cobweb hung down from it.
The cobweb made him think about Fabayan’s rigging. Didn’t aerialists fly through the air, in a manner of speaking? He would have had a motive, certainly, unless Dorj were mistaken about the aerialist’s relationship with Ivana. For that matter, Ivana was an acrobat. Dorj tried to imagine some way aerial or acrobatic skills might breach a locked caravan.
After a moment’s thought, Dorj replaced Zubov’s wooden chair to the spot he had seen it while assisting Dima to lay Hercules’ body on the bed. He sat down where Zubov had sat. Why had the circus owner locked the door until the ambulance came? As a precaution, no doubt. People who were hated had reason to lock their doors.
He glanced around again. By the disordered bed an empty vodka bottle had rolled into a corner.
So, he reasoned, perhaps Zubov had felt the need for a drink, sitting in his cold caravan with the corpse of his headline act. It was not surprising. Dorj tried to imagine how it would have been, sitting there with the dead man, drinking, perhaps eventually dozing.
And suddenly the dead man is rising from the bed. Impossible. It must be the vodka, or the tail end of a nightmare. Half awake, he is confused. He jumps to his feet. The chair topples over as the dead man advances. Convulsed with panic, the ringmaster backs away, but there is no escape. The corpse staggers against the lavatory door, steadies itself with a bloody hand. Then those huge hands fasten on Zubov’s throat. Trying to push the nightmare away, the ringmaster finds only a barrel chest gashed by a hideous wound.