III
One day the menagerie did not open. It had finished an engagement, and Jimmy Fascota had gone off to another town to arrange the new pitch. The show folk made holiday about the camp, or flocked into the town for marketing or carousals. Mrs. Fascota was alone in her caravan, clothed in her jauntiest attire. She was preparing to go into the town when Pedersen suddenly came silently in and sat down.
“Marie,” he said, after a few moments, “I give up that tiger. To me he has given a spell. It is like a mesmerize.” He dropped his hands upon his knees in complete humiliation. Marie did not speak, so he asked: “What you think?”
She shrugged her shoulders, and put her brown arms akimbo. She was a grand figure so, in a cloak of black satin and a huge hat trimmed with crimson feathers.
“If you can’t trust him,” she said, “who can?”
“It is myself I am not to trust. Shameful! But that tiger will do me, yes, so I will not conquer him. It’s bad, very, very bad, is it not so? Shameful, but I will not do it!” he declared excitedly.
“What’s Barnabe say?”
“I do not care, Mr. Woolf can think what he can think! Damn Woolf! But for what I do think of my own self.... Ah!” He paused for a moment, dejected beyond speech. “Yes, miserable it is, in my own heart very shameful, Marie. And what you think of me, yes, that too!”
There was a note in his voice that almost confounded her—why, the man was going to cry! In a moment she was all melting compassion and bravado.
“You leave the devil to me, Yak. What’s come over you, man? God love us, I’ll tiger him!”
But the Dane had gone as far as he could go. He could admit his defeat, but he could not welcome her all too ready amplification of it.
“Na, na, you are good for him, Marie, but you beware. He is not a tiger; he is beyond everything, foul—he has got a foul heart and a thousand demons in it. I would not bear to see you touch him; no, no, I would not bear it!”
“Wait till I come back this afternoon—you wait!” cried Marie, lifting her clenched fist. “So help me, I’ll tiger him, you’ll see!”
Pedersen suddenly awoke to her amazing attraction. He seized her in his arms. “Na, na, Marie! God above! I will not have it.”
“Aw, shut up!” she commanded, impatiently, and pushing him from her she sprang down the steps and proceeded to the town alone.
She did not return in the afternoon; she did not return in the evening; she was not there when the camp closed up for the night. Sophy, alone, was quite unconcerned. Pompoon sat outside the caravan, while the flame of the last lamp was perishing weakly above his head. He now wore a coat of shag-coloured velvet. He was old and looked very wise, often shaking his head, not wearily, but as if in doubt. The flute lay glittering upon his knees and he was wiping his lips with a green silk handkerchief when barefoot Sophy in her red petticoat crept behind him, unhooked the lamp, and left him in darkness. Then he departed to an old tent the Fascotas had found for him.
When the mother returned the camp was asleep in its darkness and she was very drunk. Yak Pedersen had got her. He carried her into the arena, and bolted and barred the door.