Chapter 5
Debra's fears were justified. They weren't caught, but they were heard, then seen. Dan had been making a last round of the midway. He paused across from Meeks' flat joint to light a cigarette. It was then he heard a muffled sound from the tent. He tensed, listening. The sound came again and he recognized it as that of a woman in ecstasy. He debated lifting the tent fly and exposing whoever was inside, but it was none of his business if some carnie was banging a broad in there, unless it was some under-age townie girl and that could be trouble.
It was this that prompted him to melt back into the shadows of the caterpillar ride across the way and wait, the coal of his cigarette hidden by his cupped hand. He felt a faint shame at his spying, yet it was his job to know what was going on around the midway. And he was curious. Although he didn't think Gil Meeks was a swish, he'd never seen the man with a woman.
A few minutes later, he observed Cotty Starke and Debra emerge from the tent. Cotty had Debra's hand in his and he started up the midway with her. With a sudden jerk, Debra tore away from him. She said something in a voice too low for Dan to hear and started up the midway, half running. Cotty took two steps after her, then stopped with a contemptuous toss of his head. He turned back to lean against the counter and fire a cigarette as casually as he could.
Dan's first impulse was to confront Cotty, let him know exactly what he thought of him. He had to hold himself in check with an effort. It was none of his business, and carnies were well-known for their aversion to nosiness. It was bad enough to be known as the Patch; to become known around the carnie as the Meddler would be the last straw.
Besides, Debra was old enough to know the game, as well as the score. Whatever she had been doing with Cotty (and Dan's imagination could supply the details all too vividly), it obviously wasn't the first time. If she chose to play hanky-panky with Cotty Starke, let her! But Dan knew, as he watched Cotty drop his cigarette into the sawdust, grind it under his toe, and saunter up the midway, that his attempt to downgrade Debra to himself wasn't good enough. He liked her far too much. He didn't wish to see her hurt by Cotty, which Dan felt would eventually happen.
Sooner or later, he would have to have a word with Cotty about it, the very thing he had sworn he would never do again, get emotionally involved enough to be concerned with what happened to a fellow human being. Maybe if he just warned Cotty to go easy. ... The opportunity presented itself two nights later.
Dan stood in the crowd before the freak show as Cotty began his bally pitch. Juval was on the bally platform, banging on an iron wheel with a hammer, capering on his short legs. Cotty, sporty in dove-colored slacks and a bright shirt, marched up and down the platform with cat-like steps, chanting into the small microphone cupped in his hand. "Hi, lookee! Everybody down this way, folks! This is where the freaks are! The strange, the unusual, the weird, the unbelievable! Gather down in close for a free show!"
Cotty motioned and a parade of freaks filed up the short steps and lined up on the bally platform. Ikey, the tattooed man, a lean individual of forty, wearing only a loincloth, every inch of his exposed epidermis, excepting his face, covered with tattoos. Flowers, ships, miniature landscapes, panels of comic strip characters. He rippled a bicep and a naked woman, the pubic area blanked out, performed an obscene dance.
Next, the crucified man, who had small holes bored through his hands. With a hose he shot jets of water through the holes while the gathering crowd stretched, craning necks, and oohed and aahed. Next came Fumo, a tall man in a flaming-red Satan's suit complete with horns, carrying two blazing torches. He tilted his head far back, rammed a torch down his throat until it seemed to go out, then removed it and leaned toward the audience, breathing flame like a dragon of olden times. Then Steel strutted onto the platform, carrying a sword with a long, thin blade. He also tilted his head back and swallowed the sword until only the hilt was in evidence.
Now Cotty gestured grandly. "That's enough.
After all, we're here to make money. We can't show all our wonders for free, now can we?" He chuckled companionably. "What you see up here, ladies and gentlemen, is only a small sample of what goes on inside."
Dan, remembering Cotty when he first came on the carnie, had to marvel at the man's newly acquired assurance. Last year, working as a shill for Gil Meeks, Cotty had been friendless, secretive, distrustful. Now he strutted the bally like he owned the freak show instead of Greer. And in a way, Dan thought, he did. No carnie show made money unless it had a good front talker, one who could wheedle, charm, and cajole the majority of an audience into lining up at the ticket box after a spiel. A good talker needed the brass of a con man, the colorful vocabulary of an advertising man, and the swaggering assurance of a bull alone in a field of young heifers. And Cotty Starke possessed all three. Dan didn't like him as a man, yet he had to admit that he came on strong as a barker.
Now Cotty wheeled and pointed a dramatic finger at the big center banner stretched across the entrance to the tent. The banner depicted the buried casket with Basil Greer in it, his eyes closed, hands folded across his chest. Across the top of the banner were blazoned huge letters: BURIED ALIVE!
"That is our main attraction, ladies and gentlemen," Cotty said smoothly. "You have to see it to believe it! Basil Greer, buried alive in an airtight casket and padlocked in. Prominent citizens of your fair town have examined both Mr. Greer and the coffin and can testify there is nothing faked about the exhibit. This man was breathing, eating, living, even as you and I, only short hours ago. Now he is, for all practical purposes, dead. He is not breathing. His heart is not beating. Yet, about two hours from now, he will return once more to the land of the living! You have to see it with your own eyes to believe it! So step right up and buy our tickets! No waiting, no delay, the show never stops. It is going on inside right this very minute!"
With a flourish of his hand, Cotty sent the performers hurrying from the platform and into the tent. Juval gave the wheel a final clang and scampered away. Cotty talked for a few minutes more, pacing up and down the platform exhorting the crowd. Dan stood back, smoking a slow cigarette. He appraised the tip, the crowd Cotty had drawn. And he had turned over half of them, lined them up at the ticket box. Oh, he was good, he was damned good!
When the last ticket was sold, Cotty hung the mike on the ticket box and disappeared down the steps behind the bally. Dan put out his cigarette and went around behind the platform. Cotty had his head canted back and was spraying his throat with an atomizer.
Dan said, "Starke...."
Cotty's head came down and his face darkened with displeasure when he saw who it was. "Oh, it's you, Patch."
At that moment the strip of canvas reaching from the bally platform to the ground jiggled furiously, catching Dan's attention. A short figure emerged, rump first, from under the platform, then faced around, and Dan recognized Juval. And he recalled that Juval, unless it was raining, slept under the platform. The dwarf saw Dan, his gargoyle's face split in a grin, and he capered, the bottle in his hand sloshing pop on his chin. He licked at it with a long tongue, detoured around Cotty, and darted into the tent.
Cotty glared after him, scowling blackly, and muttered something too low for Dan to hear. His scowl still intact, he looked at Dan. "You want something, Patch?"
Many of the carnies called him Patch, some affectionately, some half sneeringly, but Cotty managed to bracket the word with a contempt that set Dan's teeth on edge. He said tautly, "About Debra...."
"What about Debra? Her old man gives me a hard enough time, now you. What business is it of yours?"
"Everything that affects the carnie is my business!" Dan retorted. He adopted a more conciliatory tone. "Debra's a nice girl. I don't want to see her hurt."
"A nice girl?" Cotty sneered. "How would you know she's a nice girl?"
Dan gritted his teeth and held his tongue in check.
"The way you put it, she's a nice girl and I'm a bastard, right? Is that the way you meant it."
"You said it, I didn't."
"Patch. ... If I get out of line on something to do with the carnie, maybe that's your business. At least you could go to Roberts about it. But my personal life is my personal life and you stay the hell out of it!"
"Starke, if you hurt Debra, I'll come down on you like a tree." It had been a long time since Dan had been so angry. His rage made him tremble, and he had to clench his fists at his sides to keep from smashing Cotty in the face.
Cotty returned his stare for a moment, then turned away with a contemptuous hitch of his shoulder. Dan stood and watched him saunter into the tent. Already he was wondering what had possessed him to say a thing like that. What had possessed him to start it in the first place? Starke was right; it wasn't any of his business. And if Debra ever found out he was meddling in her private life, she'd blow sky high! He knew her well enough by now to predict that reaction.
She found out. And she blew. She confronted him late that same night in the cook tent. She didn't see him when he came in. But when Dan had his coffee and pie and was seated at a table, she spotted him and came charging over, battle colors hoisted.
She stopped at his table, hands on her hips. "How dare you, Dan Fields!" she biazed. "How dare you speak to Cotty about me!"
"He didn't waste any time telling you, did he?" Dan said mildly.
"And why shouldn't he?"
"Knowing him, I guess I should have expected him to go running to you first thing."
"Knowing him! How about me, Dan? Do you know anything at all about me? I've never been so humiliated in my life!" Tears stood in her eyes. "You must think I'm still a child."
His own temper stirred. "Sometimes you act like one. Debbie."
"Oh! You make me so ... damned mad!" She stamped her foot, then leaned down to pound on the folding table with her fists. Dan's coffee sloshed over. "Who do you think you are, my father?"
"If I were, I'd turn you over my knee."
"Just try it. I dare you!" She thrust her face close to his and they glared at each other.
"Here! What's with you two?" a husky voice said.
Dan had forgotten where he was. He came to with a start and glanced around. Evan Frost, an apron wrapped around his ample waist, stood near, scowling at them in puzzlement and some concern.
Debra whirled to face him. "Evan! He's impossible! Dan's utterly impossible!"
Evan Frost said, 'I don't know about that, girl, but you'd better get back to your register."
A number of carnies were lined up at the register, waiting to pay their bills. Debra said, "Oh!" and hurried away.
Dan's gaze followed the saucy bounce of her behind. He noted the way her long, lovely legs twinkled as she ran.
Frost said, "Dan, what is it? Anything I should know about?"
Dan looked at him, his glance vague. Frost was close to sixty, with a shock of iron-gray hair and warm blue eyes. His round face was red from the range and still wore the unaccustomed scowl. Normally, he was the most genial of men; only where Debra was concerned did he ever show temper.
Dan forced a smile. "Nothing you should know about, Evan. It was all my fault. Debra had every right to be mad. I was sticking my nose in where it didn't belong."
Frost looked relieved, nodded cheerfully, and turned back toward the counter.
Dan switched his gaze back to the cash register and Debra. He knew now why he had stuck his nose in, why he was concerned about her. He was in love with her. It was incredible, it was hard for him to accept, yet there it was.
And that should be good for a laugh all right. He, Dan Fields, the man who didn't want to get emotionally involved with anyone, in love with a girl hung up on a man like Cotty Starke!