Case with 4 Clowns Read online

  “In a way, I suppose it is,” agreed Helen. “But I don’t ever think it out clearly like that.”

  “All right,” said Beef. “And then what happened?”

  “Well, then we went on changing and talking together as we always do. But then I happened to look round and Anita was with her back to me by the bed. Her back was bare, and the skin was just like I knew mine would look if I turned round to the mirror. I thought suddenly that if a fly settled on her it would probably make me itch as well as her. And then I picked up a knife.”

  “Where was it?” asked Beef. “Did you take it out of a drawer?”

  “No, it was on the dressing-table. One of the knives they sometimes use in the ring. Not a proper one, but made of steel, only blunted. It was always hanging about the place.”

  “And then what?”

  “Then I stabbed her, I suppose. I don’t really remember doing it. I just felt that I had to. It didn’t seem to me that Anita was a person at all—more like a cardboard figure. I wanted to cut at it with something. I didn’t hate her or anything like that. I just forgot she was a person at all. And then she fell across the bed with a sort of moan and I knew what I had done. Oh, it was horrible …”

  Helen suddenly stopped speaking and crouched down with her head in her hands crying softly to herself. “I must have been mad,” she said. “Whatever could have made me want to do a thing like that?”

  As she spoke we heard coming from the tent the sound of the band playing and of the clowns shouting. It seemed to seep through slowly, as if our attention had now become relaxed, and we were able to notice things outside of this wagon again. Anita too, must have been disturbed by the sound for she stirred for a moment on the bed, and then opened her eyes.

  “Well,” said Beef, “and how are you feeling, young lady? You gave us a bit of a fright, you did.”

  Anita smiled vaguely and tried to sit up. But the smile turned to a wry expression of pain as she felt the wound.

  “Best thing you can do is to lie still,” ordered Beef. “Do you think you could tell us what happened?”

  “I think so,” said Anita, “I feel all right really. My back hurts a little, that’s all.”

  The clear voice of Eric, the proprietor’s son, rang out clearly from the big top, speaking some traditional clown’s patter with the Yorkshire accent he was assuming for the benefit of the crowd.

  ’This morn I arose

  From my sweet repose.

  I goes

  Out among the trees that grows

  To shoot the crows,

  And meet one of my British foes.

  Anita’s story was substantially the same as her sister’s. She was a little embarrassed by my eye as she told of her suggestion to prolong the joke of mixed identity with me.

  “It was only a joke,” she explained to Beef, although she looked at me with her eyebrows slightly raised, as if to see how I was taking it. “But Helen wouldn’t do it. She seemed a little cross with the idea, so I didn’t say any more.”

  We have some words that quickly come to blows;

  He hits me on the nose,

  Down I goes,

  Into the gutter where all the muddy water flows.

  Eric’s voice seemed to be forcing its way through tears as he told of this fictitious tragedy. Then came the unvalorous sequel, the man who knows he is bested and does the commonsense thing about it.

  Up I arose,

  Straight home I goes,

  I takes off my wet clothes—

  “And then,” said Anita, “just as I was taking off my things I happened to glance up into the little mirror over the bed. I saw Helen’s arm, with a knife, coming down towards me. I tried to move, but it was too late. Then I suppose I must have fainted.”

  “That move you made,” commented Beef, “just about saved your life.”

  Helen gave a low soft moan at these words and looked across at her sister. Anita stretched out her hand, and Helen suddenly went across to the bed, kneeling against the side of it, and buried her face in Anita’s shoulder.

  —And into bed I goes.

  I turns up my toes,

  I tallows my nose,

  I has a sweet repose—

  And that’s all I knows.

  There was a light tapping sound on the door of the wagon and the head of Mrs. Jackson looked nervously in.

  “Can I came in, Mr. Beef?” she asked. “I brought some tea. I thought the two girls could do with a cup. I always say it steadies you when anything goes wrong.”

  Beef motioned her in.

  “There,” said Mrs. Jackson, giving the two girls a cup each, “drink it up. You’ll feel much better. Really,” she went on half-turning to Beef and me, “I don’t know what’s coming over the circus these days. What with one thing and another. First we have Mr. Beef here. I don’t know what Mr. Jackson is about. And then this talk of murder …”

  “Murder?” said Helen suddenly. “Who’s been talking about a murder?”

  “Oh, it’s nothing to do with you, dear, I’m sure. As if anyone would think about a thing like that. No, it’s something that silly boy Albert Stiles has been spreading about. As if anyone couldn’t see he was having his leg pulled.”

  Is that ALL you know? asked the level voice of Jackson from the big tent.

  No, said Eric,

  That’s not all I know

  I knows,

  And you knows,

  And everybody else knows,

  Mrs. Jackson stopped talking abruptly when she heard her husband’s voice, as if she were afraid of interrupting him. She was a small slight woman, on whom the circus life appeared to have had its effects. Nervous, so that her hands seemed to flutter continually from her lap to her hair without ever doing anything useful when they got there. She had the startled look of one of those who have grown used to bullying and sought now only to avoid it. Her white lumpy face was kind and showed concern easily.

  That a nice beef steak

  And a nice mutton chop

  Makes a hungry man’s mouth

  Go flipperty-flop—

  like a lamb’s tail.

  “Well,” said Mrs. Jackson. “I must go to put the supper on. If you’ve done with the cups, dears, I’ll take them with me.” The band in the tent had begun to play the music for the last turn, and Mrs. Jackson stood as if it had been a command and opened the door. “Well, good-by, dear,” she said. “These little trials do us good sometimes, I always say.” And forgetting to shut the door, she was gone, half-running, half-walking across to the proprietor’s wagon.

  “I often wonder,” said Beef ruminatively, “how it is some of these people get into a circus. Why they join up with you. Now people like your mother, I suppose, were born in the circus. But how do those like Mrs. Jackson ever come to be here at all?”

  “Your guess is quite wrong, Sergeant,” said Anita. “Actually mother wasn’t born in a circus at all. She used to be on the halls. That was a long time ago, of course. But she had an act with her brother.”

  “What did they do?” asked Beef.

  “Oh, some sort of a mind-reading act. It depended a lot on hypnotism, you know.”

  “Hypnotism?” said Beef. “Can your mother hypnotize people then?”

  “Depends on the person,” answered Anita. “She can’t hypnotize me, for instance. I’m the wrong sort of material. But she hypnotizes Helen sometimes.”

  “Has she done so lately?” I asked. “I mean within the last few weeks?”

  “Why, yes,” Helen said. “Actually, she hypnotized me this morning. Why do you ask?”

  I looked at Beef. “Well?” I asked, “what do you think about it?”

  “Townsend means,” explained Beef, “that there might be some possibility of your mother putting Helen under the influence, so to speak, so that she’d try and stab you.”

  But both the girls disagreed completely with the possibility of this half-formed theory. They said that their mother could not control them to that exte
nt—at least she had never done so in their experience. She was only able to put them into a sort of trance which, if anything, made one physically weaker. Beef seemed to be persuaded by them, and eventually led me out of the wagon. I was still unconvinced, but it was no use to argue with Beef. I saw that the only thing to do was to keep it in mind.

  “Well,” said Beef with a broad grin as we left the wagon, “do you still want to go home?”

  “Most certainly not,” I answered. “Things are just beginning to look exciting.”

  As I lay awake in bed that night I let my thoughts wander over what we had already witnessed in the circus, and its difference from the sort of life led by the rest of society. It was, I thought, exciting enough without the promise of a case. There seemed to me so much more vitality in the people. Already there had been an attempt at a murder, and I felt, as I lay there, that almost anything might happen in the future. That was the whole point about circus folk. They were not predictable, as most other people were. One felt that one had to be prepared for anything, when one was with them. It might be something quite small and ridiculous, or it might be something huge and terrifying. One could not foresee it anyway. But it was exciting. I decided that I would stay on with Beef.

  Since so many little things happened each day which were not in the usual logical order of our previous “cases,” I realized that it would be best to keep a continual account of them in the form of a rather full journal. Then, if anything did happen, I should have all the possible details of what led up to it already written down. It would certainly save time later. That was, of course, if a case ever came of the business. And even if it did not, I thought to myself, it would still be worth staying on.

  I turned to Beef to tell him about my decision, but he was already asleep, snoring gently with his face to the wall.

  CHAPTER VII

  April 27th.

  BEEF was already up and dressed when I awoke. He was sitting on the edge of his bunk examining a long yellow sheet which he held in his hands, and when I spoke to him he brought it over to me.

  “This is one of the circus bills,” he explained.

  “Have you found a clue or something on it?” I asked drowsily.

  “Clue?” said Beef. “No, I got an idea, that’s all. You know what we ought to do today? We ought to make a thorough round of everybody in the show; go along to everybody and see what they’re like, and that. Might come in handy afterwards.”

  “So that bill is a sort of checking list, is it?” I asked.

  “That’s right. Take a look at it.” And Beef handed me the bill. This is what I read:

  JACOBI’S CIRCUS.

  Twice

  4-30

  Daily.

  8-0

  Seats at 1/-, 1/3, 2/4, and 3/6.

  Children half-price at matinees.

  THE CONCINIS.

  THE GREATEST LADY TRICK RIDERS IN THE WORLD.

  Incredible equestrian feats—grace and color on a galloping horse.

  CORINNE JACOBI

  & her

  ARAB HORSES.

  Equine elegance and good manners under the eye of the graceful Corinne.

  The DARIENNE BROTHERS AND SUZANNE.

  GREATEST AERIAL ACT OF ALL TIME.

  Thrills! Thrills!! THRILLS!!!

  HERR KURT

  AND HIS MAN-EATING LIONS.

  The bravest man on earth.

  PETROV DAROGA.

  ECSTASY ON THE TIGHT WIRE.

  EUSTACE

  THE UNBELIEVABLE SEAL

  Shown by our own Corinne Jacobi.

  ARCHIE, SAM, and TINY

  the funniest clowns in existence.

  You scream, YOU ROAR, YOU YELL!!

  JACOBI’S FAMOUS ELEPHANTS

  SHOWN BY PETROV DAROGA

  Watch Hoodlums stand on his head!

  MANY OTHER LAUGHS, THRILLS, AND DISPLAYS.

  “Simple, isn’t it?” said Beef as soon as I had finished reading it. “We just go round to each of those in turn, and there you are.”

  “I suppose you know what you are doing,” I said, “but personally I can’t see the use of it. You can’t very well collect evidence at this stage, can you?”

  “Evidence? Of course not,” said Beef scornfully, “that’s all you seem to think about. My idea is to get to know some of the people. Make myself at home like. You never know what might come of it.”

  “True,” I said. And in a few minutes we had started on our tour.

  Beef made first for the proprietor’s wagon. Jackson was alone and let us in immediately Beef knocked.

  “Well,” he said, “I suppose you’ve got your murder now, Sergeant. Although you can hardly call it a murder when the girl was little more than scratched, can you?”

  “As a matter of fact,” said Beef slowly, “I don’t somehow think this is the murder I’ve been looking for. In the first place, it was too clumsy, wasn’t premeditated, as they say. More what they call in France a crime of passion, if you ask me. And then, of course, as you say, it wasn’t a murder at all. Now, I’ve spoken to both of the young ladies, and although I won’t bother you by going into the full story, it seems to me that it’s something to do with them being twins, if you see what I mean?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t,” replied Jackson.

  “Well, it’s rather difficult to explain,” said the Sergeant slowly. “Look at it like this. Here you have two girls, as like as two peas. Now, in an ordinary family living in a town say, that might cause a bit of fun sometimes, but nobody wouldn’t take it serious. But here things are a bit different. Those two girls weren’t leading more than one life between the two of them. Everything one could do the other might get the credit for, everybody one knew, the other knew as well. There was nothing private between them at all. Well, I think that’s what was the cause of this little business. Nothing very serious, mind you, but just enough to make one of them lash out.”

  “I’m sure your theory is very interesting, Mr. Beef,” said Jackson in a rather flat voice, “but I fail to see where it’s getting you.”

  “That’s what I was coming to,” said Beef eagerly. “Now, it may not mean anything in itself, so to speak, but it gives me just the opportunity I want to go round and talk to all the people here. I don’t want to question them like a policeman. Don’t think that, Mr. Jackson. I just want to have a friendly little talk with them all, so’s I can get to know them and get an idea of the circus as a whole. You see what I mean?”

  “Quite, but why come to me about it? You’re perfectly free to have these little ‘chats’ if you wish. It is no affair of mine, so long as you don’t interfere with the working hours of the circus, that is a question which only affects the people themselves.”

  “Still,” said Beef, uncrushed, “I just thought I’d like to get your approval. Well, that’s all right then.” And at that he rose, and we left the wagon.

  When we were outside he drew me aside, and with an expression of childish pleasure, opened his large hand and showed me what lay in the palm of it.

  “Found this on the floor in there,” he said.

  It was a small colored button with five or six letters printed across the center. It looked a very ordinary object to me. Perhaps a badge for some circus society, or one of those “clubs” which the makers of some proprietory articles actually persuade people to join in order to advertise their wares.

  “Well, what about it?” I asked.

  “I like little things like that,” Beef said. “Especially coming out of Jackson’s wagon. I’ve got my eye on him, you know.”

  “But what does it mean?”

  “How should I know?” protested Beef. “Give us a chance. I only just picked it up. I shall make an examination of it later,” he added grandly. “And now I think we’ll go and see the Dariennes.”

  “Oh yes, I know,” I said, “the greatest aerial act of all time.”

  “I don’t know about that,” admitted Beef, not recognizing my quotation from the circu
s bill, “but I’ve heard they’re very good trapeze artists. French, too. I like anything French.”

  “They have a partner, haven’t they?”

  “Um,” said Beef. “Suzanne. But she’s not French. More like Camden Town, I should say. But she’s All Right though.”

  When we entered the Dariennes’ wagon we found that Suzanne was with them, and it was she who invited us to that universal cup of tea which will always be associated in my mind with visits to circus people. It was hot, and sticky, and sweet; a rich dark brown in color, and made with tinned milk. Since Beef seemed completely occupied with the noisy consumption of this I felt that it was incumbent on me to open the conversation, which I conscientiously did, touching on such commonplace subjects as the weather, the dullness of the Yorkshire people, and the possibilities of a good house that evening. Meanwhile, I was closely examining the Darienne brothers.

  I had already heard strange rumors of these two, although I was determined to let Beef find out all that I knew for himself. Theirs was the most highly-paid act on the show, and topped the bill in the sense that they were given the largest type in all Jacobi’s posters. But what had struck Ginger, my informant on the subject, was the relationship between the two brothers. The Concinis were bound by their similarity, but between the Dariennes there was a more subtle bond. “Paul, that’s the oldest one,” Ginger had explained, “watches his brother like a cat with a mouse.” I appreciated this somewhat trite simile when I looked at Paul when he sat in the wagon. He had string-colored hair, which was cut so short that it stood straight up over his forehead in the old pre-war German fashion, and his face was large, heavy, and brooding. There was a sour and worried look on his solid features, and his big fleshy jowls were set uncompromisingly. Christophe was a very different type. He was slight, blond, and in the true sense of the word, gay. His clear-cut features were almost pretty, and his movements were swift and eager. He talked a great deal more than Paul, and had a little chiming laugh, the effect of which I found altogether charming. Both of them spoke English with a strong French accent, which gave to their conversation a special, if artificial, attraction, like the love-making speeches of Chevalier in the more obvious of his films.