Fizzlebert Stump and the Bearded Boy (15 page)

‘What!’ said the Ringmaster, pointing at the denuded lady’s chin. ‘But!’

He was in shock. The audience was enraptured. Fizz was exhilarated. And Fish was annoyed.

Now, if you or I got a bit of fur stuck between our teeth, it would be awkward, but not impossible, to pull it out with our fingers. But a sea lion can’t do this (having no fingers). Instead he can only shake like a wet dog, and shake is exactly what Fish did.

Wystan saw what was going to happen first. He pulled Fizz to the ground, shouting, ‘Duck!’

Over the tops of their heads began flying all the things she’d hidden in her beard.

A bunch of magician’s flowers.

An umbrella (which sprang open in the air and drifted down to the sawdust a few metres away).

A ladder. A violin. A teddy bear.

And then other things.

Three small red spheres, which Fizz instantly recognised as being clowns’ noses.

Two white plates, which landed on top of one another and smashed.

A clipboard, which went flying.

A massive pair of false teeth, which bounced off Bongo Bongoton’s head, knocking him out. (He was used to being hit by invisible things. A solid object was a new, unlikable and distinctly unfunny experience, he later mimed.)

(But they had bounced! Aha! Fizz knew who those belonged to.)

Another one of Percy Late’s plates, which landed on its edge and rolled into the darkness at the back of the ring.

Some long sticks of wood that were probably stilts.

‘I told you,’ Fizz said to the Ringmaster, as he stood up.

The Ringmaster looked at him with his mouth open, pointing with one hand at the pile of Barboozuls who were still getting up, and with the other at his underpants. (A splinter from one of Percy’s plates had flown up and cut his braces, dropping his trousers and getting a huge roar of laughter from the crowd.)

‘They . . . I . . . but,’ he stuttered.

Percy Late came running out of the darkness, holding his extra plate up, saying, ‘Oh, look what I found. It just came rolling past me.’ (‘Pottery in motion,’ added Unnecessary Sid.) And they were followed by others who had seen what was going on in the ring. There were a couple of riggers and the Vol-au-Vents, and Dr Surprise was there with a pair of just-walkers who had caught a brief glimpse of their stilts in flight.

But still the show wasn’t over.

Free of the beard between his teeth, Fish had begun balancing things.

No longer was he a sea lion with stage fright. He’d forgotten all about the spotlights and the sawdust. Now he was among friends and just showing off.

He was balancing the lion’s false teeth on his nose and was honking loudly in a way that said, ‘Look at me, aren’t I clever, don’t I deserve a treat?’

But Lord and Lady Barboozul had got up off the ground and she was protesting loudly.

‘How dare you let this monster get away with such an act of barbarism?’ she shouted at the Ringmaster.

‘Don’t you mean “barber-ism”?’ said Unnecessary Sid, loudly.

The Ringmaster was holding his trousers round his middle with one hand, while pointing at her with the other.

‘You . . . You . . .’ he said. ‘It was a false . . . a false . . .’ His face was as red as his coat, anger and embarrassment mingling in his high blood pressure. ‘I answered an advert . . . it said “bearded family”, not “beard-wigged family” . . . I believed you . . .’

Once again Lord Barboozul was stood behind his wife (who, strangely enough, looked rather plain without her beard (and with the dirty torn dress and the sawdust in her hair, which, to be fair, never makes anyone look their best)), and was talking quietly at her.

Fizz could make out some of what he said. ‘Actually dear, if you listen to the audience, I think the sea lion’s not half bad. He has potential. Maybe we should – ’

But she was having none of it.

‘This is the worst circus we’ve ever been involved with,’ she snapped.

‘You mean,’ said Wystan, standing up beside Fizz, ‘the worst circus you’ve tried to ruin.’

‘How dare you, you little toad!’ she blustered. ‘You turncoat! We make our judgements and weed out the weak. We eliminate the useless. We make circuses better! We do it for their own good!’

She spoke with such a loud voice, that everyone was looking at her. Even Fish. (He’d dropped the false teeth.) What Fish was now thinking was:
she
had the last bit of fish, maybe she knows where the next bit is.

And he followed her pointing finger.

And there, at the end of where it pointed, was Wystan, the bearded boy.

Fish lunged, sniffed and lifted Wystan up.

‘Argh! What are you doing, you silly sea lion?’ he yelped. ‘I get sea sick. Stop spinning me!’

Fish was balancing the boy on his nose and twirling him round.

Once again he had the audience in the palm of his flipper. They ‘oohed’ and then they ‘aahed’ and then they laughed and clapped as Wystan was spun round ever faster.

‘Fish,’ the Ringmaster said. ‘Put . . . put . . . put the boy down.’

Fish ignored him.

Lord Barboozul had pulled a clipboard from his beard and was making notes as he watched. Lady Barboozul was scowling and rubbing her bald, but slightly sticky, chin, and poking her husband with her free hand. It seemed she didn’t approve of his writing.

‘Oi mate,’ one of the riggers tried. ‘Drop the kid, would’ya?’

Fish ignored him too. He was having too much fun being the centre of attention.

‘Fish,’ said Fizz, fumbling in his coat pocket, ‘I’ve got something here . . .’

And he pulled out the empty tin of tuna. The one he’d used to attract Fish in the first place. He’d wrapped it up in a plastic bag and had meant to drop it in the bin, but when the sea lion had broken down the door, everything had got a bit tense and urgent and he’d forgot all about it.

Now he took it out of the bag and waved it in Fish’s face.

With a flick of his head, the sea lion tossed the bearded boy over his shoulder and made a snapping lunge for the tin can.

That wasn’t exactly what Fizz had hoped for. He didn’t want anyone to get hurt. And Wystan
had
helped him get Fish free.

He watched as Wystan flew through the air.

So did everyone else.

The entire audience watched him, following the arc of his flight with their heads.

Even the de-bearded Lady Barboozul had her eyes in the air.

So engrossed was she in the parabola Wystan’s flight followed that she forgot to move out of the way until he’d already landed on her.

She was knocked backwards, slipped on a clown’s red nose, and fell straight into Lord Barboozul.

(Laughter. Applause.)

Or rather, I should say, not actually into Lord Barboozul at all. Instead, the correct words are: ‘into Lord Barboozul’s beard’.

She slipped and tumbled inside, vanishing, her feet wiggling in last of all and sliding down out of sight as if she were falling a great way in there.

A last shout was heard: ‘I’ll get you, you rotten flea-bitten worm of a . . .’ and then there was silence.

Almost silence. Fish burped a waft of haddock-breath as he licked the very last bit of tuna out of the corner of Fizz’s tin and with a flick of his tongue threw it in the air, bounced it on his nose, flipped it to his tail and whacked it out of the way.

Fizz and the entire audience watched the spinning tin glinting in the spotlight and then falling down, down, down toward the ring, where it hit Eric Burnes, the fire-eater, right on the very top of his head.

Now we all know that fire-eaters are dangerous people to just leave lying around and when he went ‘Ow,’ (which is what anyone would say when hit by a flying tin, no matter how tough they were) he let out a small puff of red flame, the very end of which happened to catch the tip of Lord Barboozul’s beard.

Before anyone knew what was happening there was a ripping sound as he tore the beard off his face (it was stuck on with theatrical gum, which is strong stuff) and a whooshing sound as the whole beard vanished in a frazzling gust of fire. Wooof! And it was gone. (Hair burns very fast. Do not try to test this at home. Just trust me on it.)

‘Ah,’ he said quietly, looking at the pile of ashes where the beard containing his wife had been.

The audience went wild with their applause, assuming it to be a brilliant trick of some sort.

The Ringmaster had enough sense to signal to the band to play the closing music and to the stunned crew that they should lift the tent-flaps and let the crowd out.

Well, it only remains for me to tie up the loose ends and explain everything that’s happened. Easy enough. I’ll do it in the last chapter. (I probably should’ve done it in the first chapter, which would’ve made this a much shorter book, but I forgot. Sorry.)

Chapter Fourteen

In which we reach the end

Once the audience had been emptied out of the Big Top a circus meeting was called.

Fizz’s mum got her nose back.

Captain Fox-Dingle brought Charles in and they refitted his rubber teeth.

The stilt-walkers climbed back up and high-fived one another. (They’d spent a whole day low-fiving and hadn’t liked it one bit.)

While Fizz explained to everyone what he’d overheard (to a chorus of gasps and ‘Well I never’s), Lord Barboozul stood quietly by.

‘Why did you do it?’ asked the Ringmaster.

Lord Barboozul folded his arms and kept his mouth shut, but Wystan wasn’t so unwilling to explain.

‘Ringmaster, they’re your dreaded Circus Inspectors. That’s why they did it all.’

The Circus Inspectors?
They
were the Circus Inspectors? This news got a bigger gasp from the assembled circus crowd than even Fizz’s story had.

‘But why the sabotage then?’ Fizz asked. ‘Why all the stealing and breaking?’

‘That’s their way,’ Wystan explained. ‘I’ve listened to Lady Barboozul often enough. She always said, “It’s no good coming on a sunny day when everyone’s happy. You must see a circus put on a show in the most unpromising of conditions. It’s a trial by fire.”’ At the word ‘fire’ everyone looked at Eric Burnes who kept his mouth shut, just puffing a little smoke out of one nostril. ‘They smash the circus up to see if it still works, to see if you can make it work. If you can survive. I’ve seen it before, dozens of times.’

‘But why didn’t you say anything?’ asked Fizz. ‘Why didn’t you let me know?’

‘How could I? What I told you about my mum and dad, about them dying in a hot air balloon, that was true, Fizz. You’ve got to believe me. The Barboozuls really did take me in. So I had to do what they said. Otherwise, where would I go? What choice did I have? I’m sorry. I’m really sorry I did it, but . . .’

The Ringmaster turned to Lord Barboozul and said, ‘Is this true? Are you really the – ’

Lord Barboozul tapped at his clipboard and interrupted. ‘Ringmaster, you know how it is. A Circus Inspector is an anonymous figure. No one knows who they are. So, if I were one I couldn’t tell you, could I? I certainly wouldn’t admit it. And by telling you anything at all this little wretch has broken every code in the Circus Inspector’s rulebook. I expect. I wouldn’t know, though, because obviously I’m not a Circus Inspector. Am I?’