Monsieur Pamplemousse Aloft (10 page)

It was signed Yasmin.

His mind in a whirl, Monsieur Pamplemousse slipped the note back into its envelope. If only he’d taken the bull by the horns and gone to the circus the night before … But he hadn’t, so there was no point in wishing he had. All the same, he couldn’t rid his mind of Madame Caoutchouc’s parting words – the one word the girl had repeated over and over again as she was taken away.

He suddenly realised the owner was talking to him.
‘Par
don.’

‘
Monsieur
will be wanting
dîner
tonight?’

‘
Non.
’ He folded the letter and slipped it into an inside pocket. ‘
Non, merci.

‘Pommes Frites and I are going to the circus. I doubt if we shall be back until late.’

Madame Caoutchouc had been wrong in prophesying that no one would be going to the circus. Monsieur Pamplemousse found himself at the tail end of a long queue and spent the next fifteen minutes shuffling along at a snail’s pace while he reflected on the strange make-up of human beings. Tragedy acted like a magnet. In the past he’d known people drive for miles in order to visit the scene of a particularly gruesome murder, often bringing the entire family with them so that they could make a day of it. Listening to some of the conversations going on around him it was obvious many of those present were enjoying a vicarious pleasure in discussing the gory details. Everyone had their theories. Overnight, people who had probably never done anything more adventurous than stand on the seat of a garden swing had become experts on the trapeze. He chose not to listen. Half of them wouldn’t have been there normally. One couple had travelled all the way from Rennes, nearly one hundred and fifty kilometres away. He wondered what Yasmin herself would have thought had she known.

The noise was deafening. The side shows in the Fair were doing a roaring trade. Overall there was a strange acrid-sweet smell, a mixture of candy-floss, greasy frankfurters, and smoke from a
crêperie.
He was glad they had stopped for a
bite to eat in St. Nazaire on the way back, otherwise he would have felt ravenous and he might have been tempted. His liver would have suffered. As it was, once he’d got his ticket he gladly made his escape from the crowd and joined Pommes Frites in the car while he waited for nine o’clock.

A clown on stilts passed by on the other side of the road, drumming up custom; hardly necessary in the circumstances, but it was probably part of a set routine. A small group of children followed on behind, shouting words of encouragement. One, braver than the rest, tried to push him over and received a clip around the back-side from a walking-stick for his pains. A cheer went up. Loud speakers outside the Big Top blared forth unintelligible announcements at intervals. He heard the sound of a lion roaring, but in the general hubbub it was hard to tell whether it was the real thing or simply a recording. If he could judge by what he had seen that morning, he strongly suspected the latter.

He glanced round. Oblivious to it all, Pommes Frites was fast asleep on the back seat next to his bag of ballast. Opening the glove compartment, Monsieur Pamplemousse took out a pocket torch and shone it on his watch. It showed five minutes to nine. There was still time enough to stroll round the outside of the circus before taking his seat. If past experience with travelling circuses was anything to go by it was unlikely to start on time. Probably most of those running the sideshows were involved in one way or another and would need to make a quick change.

He was right. By the time he reached the Fair half the stalls already had their shutters up and the rest were following suit. Nearly all the crowd had disappeared. The only noise came from a giant electric generator parked near the
carrousel.
There was an air of suppressed excitement overall. Madame Caoutchouc, looking darkly voluptuous, came out of her caravan wearing a patterned dressing-gown over her costume. As she reached the tent belonging to the smallest man in the world, she paused and called out. A moment later she was joined by a midget dressed as a clown, and together they
made their way towards the Big Top.

Monsieur Pamplemousse wondered whether to follow on behind, then he decided to explore the waste area near the back of the circus one more time. He had no idea what he was looking for, let alone where to start, but the sight of the girl’s car still parked in the same place reminded him of the need to do something, however trivial-seeming.

He glanced around. There was an element missing, but he couldn’t for the moment think what it could be. The BMW was in exactly the same place, alongside the generator lorry, but the blue van had been moved further away. He shone his torch on the tail-board. There were patches of mud which he hadn’t registered earlier in the day. They looked fresh. The thin splashes had dried hard, but thick areas were still damp, and dark in colour. The rear wheels were covered with mud as well and there were bits of grass sticking to the walls of the tyres. He knelt down and felt the ground. There were marks which looked as though something heavy had been dragged along the surface.

Monsieur Pamplemousse was about to check the front of the van when he felt rather than saw a light go out in a nearby caravan. Switching off the torch, he backed into the shadows and waited. There was the whine of an electric motor, followed by the sound of a door being opened and shut. It was followed by the metallic click of a key being turned in a lock. The whole process was repeated. Then footsteps muffled by the grass passed him heading for the back of the tent. Whoever it was seemed to be in a hurry.

Taking a chance, Monsieur Pamplemousse peered round the side of the van and had a clear back view of a man in a dark cloak silhouetted against the light from the circus. A hood was pulled up over his head.

At that moment the muffled strains of martial music filled the air; ‘The Grand March’ from
Aida
played on drums and fifes, with a solitary trumpet in support by the sound of it. What it lacked in grandeur was more than made up for by sheer vigour, and any imperfections were drowned beneath
the cheers from the audience.

He allowed a few seconds to pass and then made his way towards the entrance, subconsciously matching his pace to the time of the music. With luck he would catch the end of the Grand Parade and a front view of the man he’d just seen. If anyone had asked why it seemed important, he couldn’t have answered.

In the event he was fortunate to get a seat. All the rows near the front were jam-packed, and he only just managed to squeeze onto the end of a bench near the back.

He recognised the man instantly even without his cloak. He had an air about him, as though he was at one and the same time both part of and yet separate from the whole. It was clear from the way he walked and the slightly arrogant look on his face as he led the parade out of the ring that he considered himself the star of the show. Perhaps he had usurped Yasmin’s place. The last time Monsieur Pamplemousse had seen him he’d been behind the wheel of the van which had followed the girl into town.

Once again, Monsieur Pamplemousse had the feeling of having seen him somewhere before, some echo from the dim and distant past. Either that or a picture of him. He wasn’t often wrong about such things. It was annoying because conundrums of this sort were liable to keep him awake at night, and he had lost enough sleep already.

He also recognised the man he’d spoken to outside the ticket office earlier in the day – now resplendent in the red frock-coat of a ring-master. He was introducing ‘Madame Caoutchouc’ in a ‘death-defying act’ – wrestling with a crocodile.

While the man did his build-up, Monsieur Pamplemousse took stock of his surroundings. It was a long time since he had been to a circus. Once upon a time, when he was a boy, it had been nearly all animal acts – lions, tigers, elephants, performing dogs and bears; now acrobats and jugglers were back in fashion.

Unusually for a small travelling circus, the king-poles were
made of steel. Perhaps that was another sign of the changing times. It was logical. As well as being safer in a strong wind, steel poles would have allowed the height of the roof to be raised and with it the height of the trapeze. All the same the girl must have fallen many times before. Perhaps it was a case of one time too many. It happened; people injured themselves every day falling off step ladders or doing something equally mundane like tripping over a broken paving stone.

He applauded mechanically as the band reached a crescendo and the lights dimmed, only to be replaced by the flickering of a stroboscopic spot lamp as Madame Caoutchouc dashed into the ring clutching a fully-grown crocodile in her arms. She landed in the sawdust with the beast on top of her and for a moment or two it was hard to tell which way the struggle was going as they rolled around – a mass of threshing arms and legs. At first the flickering light seemed an unnecessary embellishment, but gradually it had a mesmerising effect. It was like watching a rapidly changing series of old-fashioned still pictures. First the crocodile was on top, then Madame Caoutchouc, then the crocodile again. Their positions changed almost faster than the eye or the brain could cope with. Finally, as the music reached a climax, Madame Caoutchouc managed to kneel astride the animal. Clasping it around the middle she gradually lifted it off the ground, centimetre by centimetre, until they were both upright. The tent went quiet as the crocodile thrashed to and fro, finally giving her a blow with its tail which would have floored most of those watching.

Monsieur Pamplemousse joined in the applause as Madame Caoutchouc at long last managed to extricate herself from the crocodile’s grip, then forced its jaws open and placed her head inside its open mouth. Sooner her than him. The things some people did for a living; twice daily at that!

As she staggered from the ring, breathing heavily, the lights came up and the audience relaxed. A midget and another clown – an
Auguste
, the one with the red nose who always gets the custard pie – ran on and went through the age-old
routine of balancing a bucket of water on the end of a pole. The shrieks as it fell off, threatening to soak those in the front row before they realised it was empty, were equalled only by the gales of laughter when a full bucket of water landed on the second clown. The rickety tiers supporting the audience swayed in sympathy. There was no gag like an old gag.

Half of him wondered if he should take the girl’s note to the local police, but that would only involve a lot of tedious explanations. More than likely someone there would recognise him. They would want to know why he was in Port St. Augustin in the first place – by himself at that. It would all take up a lot more time than he could afford. The Director would not be pleased. The temptation to do a bit of ground work first was hard to resist. Afterwards he could decide on what action to take.

The clowns dashed off and were replaced by a girl doing handstands on the legs of an upturned table. The same girl repeated the trick to greater effect shortly afterwards on the back of one of the Arab ponies. Was she, he wondered, being groomed as a second Yasmin? She looked like a younger sister. Moments after her act was finished she joined the small band above the entrance to the ring, adding fife-playing to her other talents.

Madame Caoutchouc reappeared as the ‘Indiarubber Lady’, distracting attention while a cage was erected by tying herself up in knots to the tune of ‘Over the Waves’, whilst at the same time making a cup of coffee.

She could have saved herself the trouble. The act which followed was something of an anti-climax. Neither the lion nor its temporary keeper made any pretence at going near each other. Perhaps they both suffered from bad breath.

Monsieur Pamplemousse found his attention wandering. Clearly it was a case of ‘the show must go on’, but it was a struggle. The barrel was being well and truly scraped and there was a feeling of sadness about it all.

He kept his seat during the interval, feeling that if he once got up he might not return. He wondered what on earth he
was doing here anyway. Was it just the romantic notion of it all? Had he temporarily seen himself as d’Artagnan rescuing a damsel in distress? The combination of a pretty girl and the age-old lure of the circus. He corrected himself. The combination of a pretty girl, the lure of the circus and a desperate note. It was a case of locking the stable door after the horse had bolted, but he had to start somewhere.

There was something else that bothered him about the note. He took it out and read it again, even though he knew it by heart. It wasn’t simply a plea for help, there was an underlying message in it for him as well. ‘Take
great care
.’ The last two words were even more heavily underlined than the earlier ones.

‘I
must see you.
Please
do not come to me. I
will come to
you
, later tonight after the show. Take
great care
!’

It was almost as though she had wanted to tell him something, the knowledge of which would put him in some kind of danger too.

But there had been no ‘after the show’. In fact, the more he thought about it the more convinced he became that Yasmin’s fall had been no accident. It was too much of a coincidence. Perhaps she had been wrought up over something, perhaps it
had
been a momentary lack of concentration on her part. But even that didn’t ring true. In his experience, when it came to the crunch, people working in jobs requiring total concentration were capable of switching off to everything else, including personal problems.

He wondered about the man he’d seen driving the van. He seemed to be the odd one out. ‘The Great Christoph’ was how he’d been billed when he’d done a brief ‘strong-man’ act halfway though the first half. Apart from that one appearance he’d neither played in the band nor shown his face since the opening parade.

The answer came towards the end of the second half of the programme and left him with a strange mixture of feelings. The newspaper report had made no mention of Yasmin having a partner and from the artist’s impression on the
poster he had assumed she was a solo act; it had really been a case of the eye reading what the brain expected it to see. It hadn’t crossed his mind that the man had also been part of her act.

A hush fell over the audience as the lights over the ring were dimmed and Christoph entered the ring and began climbing a rope hanging against one of the king-poles. It was the moment most of them had been waiting for.

No wonder the man had been keeping a low profile. It was hard to picture how he must be feeling at this moment, particularly if the accident had been the result of a row. There was no doubt in Monsieur Pamplemousse’s mind that for whatever reason the girl had been avoiding her partner. Avoiding him, or … avoiding him seeing her with anyone else.