Post by Meleta/Isoldaa on Nov 11, 2010 23:55:28 GMT -5
(( Any comments anyone would care to share at all, would be appreciated! (Part 1 of 2)
eta: >< Forgot to mention, my novel goes back and forth between modern times, mid-nineteenth century America and medieval Europe. This is set in the mid-nineteenth century portion, pre-Civil War. ))
The squalor of the tents dimmed, fading in the flickering glow of torchlight and the yellowy blush of strategically placed kerosene lamps. The great hand-painted wooden signs - strapped to the caravan wagons during the day, boldly touting their living wares over hillock and vale - seemed to take on a garish life of their own in the half-dark of dusk. Their larger-than-life depictions leaning now on great wooden stands, the likes of the scantily clad “Eloise the Snake Charmer” and the ursine “Maeve the Bearded Lady” beckoned to the crowd just beginning to assemble, titillating them to come closer - and then closer still.
“Come,” their painted smiles and lurid charms seemed to whisper, “Come see what is waiting just behind this canvas flap. There is a new world here - brighter than your dreary, mundane one and ablaze with wonders unimaginable… “
And all it would take was just a few pennies, a pittance really, to fill their lives with a new kind of light, eye-opening delights and horrors…
But for the golden-haired girl in the gilded cage, the cusp of day and night – that hazy border where the crickets and fireflies began, and the songbirds slept - had never seemed so dark and suffocating. The impatient stamping of horses’ hooves thudding into the hard-packed earth just outside, their snorts and snuffling around hard, uncomfortable bits of metal, only reminded her that she was not the only captive.
And all the people… None were yet inside the tent, but Mary’s sensitive ears could hear them easily outside. Whispers and mirthful chuckles, overloud conversation and outright guffaws seemed to crowd the space all about her, making the raised cage itself – just large enough for her to stand in, to walk a few paces right or left – seem all the smaller.
Not, of course, that the little girl moved at all, curled as she was in the farthest corner of her enclosure from the closed tent flap. Soft, tiny hands were wrapped tightly around the slippery smooth skirts. Knees to her chest and booted feet tucked beneath her, only those great forest green eyes peered fearfully above the temporary finery, golden curls brushed to a shine falling down her back from beneath the pale pink bow atop her head.
“Stand up,” came Talbot’s coarse, gravelly voice from the far side of the tent. The only other person in the tent besides the caged child, the grizzled man was turned out in his rough version of “Sunday best” for this, their very first show. The moon would rise in mere minutes – he could hear Sigurd’s outside, baiting the hook this very moment.
But Mary simply cringed, uncomprehending, as she peered up at him.
“Up,” he growled as he paced across the ground toward her, hands pumping furiously toward the canvas roof, “UP, goddamn it!” When she curled up even tighter at his approach, only making herself all the smaller, Talbot stopped mid-stride, closing his eyes as he tried to breathe through his fury. Hitting this idiot child, leaving a bruise or a bright red welt growing on her cheek (however well-deserved), would only mar her in the eyes of a paying public and - even worse - risk ripping that expensive silk and lace dress before its time…
His hard, strong hands reached through the bars, taking Mary up by her shoulders, lifting her to her feet and dropping her down in place, as if to emphasize what he wished of her. “Stand. STAY.”
The soft rose petal of her lower lip quivered slightly, eyes filling with unshed tears as the girl did what came instinctually, utter stillness in the face of danger. But somewhere in her heart, a small spark of courage lit brightly, hopefully.
“Mmi… kah,” Mary whispered softly to his retreating back, tongue and lips carefully trying to form the syllables over a palette still so unused to forming such ephemeral constructs.
“Mi… kahl…” she finally said, still shaking as Talbot turned around, one thick, gray eyebrow raised in surprise.
“Mikahl…?”
The man blinked in amazement, a small grin spreading across his bearded face despite himself. Michael was teaching her to speak, then? Hell, she was actually capable of speech? Damn – that kid might still have more uses than errand boy and nanny yet…
“Michael?” Talbot asked, his tone almost gentle as he approached the cage once more. “Michael, yes. We’ll go see Michael when we’re all done here, hmm?” The quizzical look on her upturned face told the man she hadn’t much understood even a half of what he’d said – but it sure the hell beat the tears she’d only been seconds from shedding. With something approaching gaiety – or at least, as close as that taciturn ever got – Talbot patted her head through the bars, ignoring her reaction as she cringed yet again.
And only just in time! The canvas flap of a door peeled back and away, Sigurd tying it off as the first of their “customers” entered. A few walked in slowly, trepidation marking their every step – and were quickly pushed aside by the young rowdies, eager for the biggest of all the “freaks” advertised, appetites whetted by the geeks and pickled punks and “human marvels” they’d already seen.
Mary somehow managed to stay on her feet, instinct telling her she should be ready to run at any moment despite the bars that surrounded her. Heart racing, her face aghast in the presence of more people in one place than she’d ever seen in all her short life; the little girl’s hands wrapped around the bars behind her, clasping them desperately in the absence of any other choice.
Sigurd carefully plucked the ticket stub from each outstretched hand as the men – and a few women – passed inside, filling the tent to capacity before he made his way carefully toward the front, to the ramshackle stage encased in black velvet, and the little girl tucked away safely behind bars of shiny brass.
“Ladies and gentleman,” the dashing man began in his silky smooth showman’s voice, “Let me welcome you to the last, and greatest, of the wonders the Legerdemain has to offer you this evening! What you see before you, this pretty, precious little girl, might seem the very picture of a cherub. But what you should be asking yourselves- Yes! Every. Last. One of you!” One perfectly manicured finger pointed over the heads of the crowd. “What you should be asking yourselves now, is what lies within… ?”
Behind the bars, Mary could barely bring herself to glance upward toward the myriad eyes that seemed to bore into her body, assaulting her with their bold, unabashed stares. But beneath Sigurd’s pitch, and only just above the nearly silent murmurs of expectation, her ears picked up the soft, high-pitched sound of a woman’s irritated whisper.
“She’s just… She’s just a little girl… No, it’s terrible – this is… It isn’t right… “
“Oh c’mon, Gwen, don’t be such a fraidy ca-“
“I am not. But just look at her! She’s scared to death!”
The little girl peered up from beneath her long lashes, searching for the source of that voice. And when she did, Mary gasped softly, her heart pounding – though this time, not with fear - as she dared to step forward. Hands releasing the bars behind her, one silk-covered arm snaked out of the bars slowly, outstretched toward the lady with the strange feathered object pinned to her head – velvet and plumes that covered piles of yellow curls crowning her head. Her eyes – no, they weren’t the color of the noon sky. Mary could see that right off, but that really didn’t matter to a broken heart.
Close enough. She was close enough to her mother, the beautiful dam she’d never see again. Mary simply couldn’t resist trying to reach, to touch her…
eta: >< Forgot to mention, my novel goes back and forth between modern times, mid-nineteenth century America and medieval Europe. This is set in the mid-nineteenth century portion, pre-Civil War. ))
The squalor of the tents dimmed, fading in the flickering glow of torchlight and the yellowy blush of strategically placed kerosene lamps. The great hand-painted wooden signs - strapped to the caravan wagons during the day, boldly touting their living wares over hillock and vale - seemed to take on a garish life of their own in the half-dark of dusk. Their larger-than-life depictions leaning now on great wooden stands, the likes of the scantily clad “Eloise the Snake Charmer” and the ursine “Maeve the Bearded Lady” beckoned to the crowd just beginning to assemble, titillating them to come closer - and then closer still.
“Come,” their painted smiles and lurid charms seemed to whisper, “Come see what is waiting just behind this canvas flap. There is a new world here - brighter than your dreary, mundane one and ablaze with wonders unimaginable… “
And all it would take was just a few pennies, a pittance really, to fill their lives with a new kind of light, eye-opening delights and horrors…
But for the golden-haired girl in the gilded cage, the cusp of day and night – that hazy border where the crickets and fireflies began, and the songbirds slept - had never seemed so dark and suffocating. The impatient stamping of horses’ hooves thudding into the hard-packed earth just outside, their snorts and snuffling around hard, uncomfortable bits of metal, only reminded her that she was not the only captive.
And all the people… None were yet inside the tent, but Mary’s sensitive ears could hear them easily outside. Whispers and mirthful chuckles, overloud conversation and outright guffaws seemed to crowd the space all about her, making the raised cage itself – just large enough for her to stand in, to walk a few paces right or left – seem all the smaller.
Not, of course, that the little girl moved at all, curled as she was in the farthest corner of her enclosure from the closed tent flap. Soft, tiny hands were wrapped tightly around the slippery smooth skirts. Knees to her chest and booted feet tucked beneath her, only those great forest green eyes peered fearfully above the temporary finery, golden curls brushed to a shine falling down her back from beneath the pale pink bow atop her head.
“Stand up,” came Talbot’s coarse, gravelly voice from the far side of the tent. The only other person in the tent besides the caged child, the grizzled man was turned out in his rough version of “Sunday best” for this, their very first show. The moon would rise in mere minutes – he could hear Sigurd’s outside, baiting the hook this very moment.
But Mary simply cringed, uncomprehending, as she peered up at him.
“Up,” he growled as he paced across the ground toward her, hands pumping furiously toward the canvas roof, “UP, goddamn it!” When she curled up even tighter at his approach, only making herself all the smaller, Talbot stopped mid-stride, closing his eyes as he tried to breathe through his fury. Hitting this idiot child, leaving a bruise or a bright red welt growing on her cheek (however well-deserved), would only mar her in the eyes of a paying public and - even worse - risk ripping that expensive silk and lace dress before its time…
His hard, strong hands reached through the bars, taking Mary up by her shoulders, lifting her to her feet and dropping her down in place, as if to emphasize what he wished of her. “Stand. STAY.”
The soft rose petal of her lower lip quivered slightly, eyes filling with unshed tears as the girl did what came instinctually, utter stillness in the face of danger. But somewhere in her heart, a small spark of courage lit brightly, hopefully.
“Mmi… kah,” Mary whispered softly to his retreating back, tongue and lips carefully trying to form the syllables over a palette still so unused to forming such ephemeral constructs.
“Mi… kahl…” she finally said, still shaking as Talbot turned around, one thick, gray eyebrow raised in surprise.
“Mikahl…?”
The man blinked in amazement, a small grin spreading across his bearded face despite himself. Michael was teaching her to speak, then? Hell, she was actually capable of speech? Damn – that kid might still have more uses than errand boy and nanny yet…
“Michael?” Talbot asked, his tone almost gentle as he approached the cage once more. “Michael, yes. We’ll go see Michael when we’re all done here, hmm?” The quizzical look on her upturned face told the man she hadn’t much understood even a half of what he’d said – but it sure the hell beat the tears she’d only been seconds from shedding. With something approaching gaiety – or at least, as close as that taciturn ever got – Talbot patted her head through the bars, ignoring her reaction as she cringed yet again.
And only just in time! The canvas flap of a door peeled back and away, Sigurd tying it off as the first of their “customers” entered. A few walked in slowly, trepidation marking their every step – and were quickly pushed aside by the young rowdies, eager for the biggest of all the “freaks” advertised, appetites whetted by the geeks and pickled punks and “human marvels” they’d already seen.
Mary somehow managed to stay on her feet, instinct telling her she should be ready to run at any moment despite the bars that surrounded her. Heart racing, her face aghast in the presence of more people in one place than she’d ever seen in all her short life; the little girl’s hands wrapped around the bars behind her, clasping them desperately in the absence of any other choice.
Sigurd carefully plucked the ticket stub from each outstretched hand as the men – and a few women – passed inside, filling the tent to capacity before he made his way carefully toward the front, to the ramshackle stage encased in black velvet, and the little girl tucked away safely behind bars of shiny brass.
“Ladies and gentleman,” the dashing man began in his silky smooth showman’s voice, “Let me welcome you to the last, and greatest, of the wonders the Legerdemain has to offer you this evening! What you see before you, this pretty, precious little girl, might seem the very picture of a cherub. But what you should be asking yourselves- Yes! Every. Last. One of you!” One perfectly manicured finger pointed over the heads of the crowd. “What you should be asking yourselves now, is what lies within… ?”
Behind the bars, Mary could barely bring herself to glance upward toward the myriad eyes that seemed to bore into her body, assaulting her with their bold, unabashed stares. But beneath Sigurd’s pitch, and only just above the nearly silent murmurs of expectation, her ears picked up the soft, high-pitched sound of a woman’s irritated whisper.
“She’s just… She’s just a little girl… No, it’s terrible – this is… It isn’t right… “
“Oh c’mon, Gwen, don’t be such a fraidy ca-“
“I am not. But just look at her! She’s scared to death!”
The little girl peered up from beneath her long lashes, searching for the source of that voice. And when she did, Mary gasped softly, her heart pounding – though this time, not with fear - as she dared to step forward. Hands releasing the bars behind her, one silk-covered arm snaked out of the bars slowly, outstretched toward the lady with the strange feathered object pinned to her head – velvet and plumes that covered piles of yellow curls crowning her head. Her eyes – no, they weren’t the color of the noon sky. Mary could see that right off, but that really didn’t matter to a broken heart.
Close enough. She was close enough to her mother, the beautiful dam she’d never see again. Mary simply couldn’t resist trying to reach, to touch her…
) ))