Romancing the Clown
3
Everybody Loves a Clown
I LOOKED AT MY CANES. Lisa and I both had our boxes open in the bank vault as we prepared to step out. We’d been secreting knives around our bodies and I’d strapped on my sword. I was looking more like a warrior and less like an actor with every item I put on my body. I thought about my bow, but decided I could acquire a bow later if I needed one. I didn’t need to walk out of the bank with one. What I wanted to take was my cithara. I’d purchased one of the five-string lutes on my second trip to Chaos and it had come in very handy. I was definitely taking it.
“Leave the canes,” Lisa said. “Or let me use them. You won’t fool anyone. Better that you hide behind the guitar and look all musical.”
“We’ll need money. How are we fixed? Do I need to make a withdrawal?”
“We’re okay for the day at least. In fact, you should have plenty to get a wagon. We’ll need to get trappings for the horses, too. Gabe and Raphe probably have money they can give you as a draw against your percentage. If not, we can always make a trip back to the bank,” Lisa said. I agreed and we left the canes and our saddles in the boxes. I did take out my colorful hat and vest that readily identified me as a minstrel. Lisa had a recorder that she tested and nodded. We left the vault playing our instruments and walked out through the front of the bank.
The perfumed oil Seph had dabbed on our noses cut the smell of the central sewer. Some. Rock Canyon City was far advanced in terms of waste disposal compared to some of the towns we traversed. It at least had a central ditch that the effluent ran into rather than just being left to stink in the street. Unfortunately, the ditch didn’t drain anyplace. The city had employed its prisoners to dip the shit in the ditch at one end and haul the buckets out a mile into the country to be dumped in a field. The forced labor barely kept up with the generation of new waste.
“I smell shit,” I complained at once.
“Yes, but it is rose scented shit,” Lisa whispered. Officially, she was my mute, male assistant, Lees. Her voice could betray her masculine disguise. We walked down Main Street in order to reach the next bridge where we could cross the shit canal and go to the inn that I owned. We paused to wait for a wagon before stepping into the street. I felt a tug at my belt and a boy about ten took off at a run. He had my purse.
I started after the little brat but Lisa grabbed my arm and directed me down an alley. We crossed between the buildings to the next street over and peeked around the corner. The kid, glancing quickly behind him to see if we were chasing, turned and ran toward us. What better way of throwing your pursuer off than to circle around behind him? We ducked back as the kid pelted toward us. We could hear the slap slap slap of his bare feet in the mud of the street. He came barreling around the corner and smack into my arms.
“So, little thief, you think you’re a cutpurse,” I said as I clamped my hand over his mouth. I had no need for a kid to be screaming bloody murder at me in the streets of Rock Canyon City. Lees patted him down quickly and found my purse. And two others. “You seem to have a profitable business here. I am going to release my hand from your mouth so you can answer my questions. I want you to look carefully, however. My companion’s knife is an inch from your throat. If you cry out, you will be quickly and permanently silenced. Do you understand?” The kid nodded. I released his mouth. He took a deep breath and stopped short when he felt the point of Lees’s knife against his throat. “What is your name?”
“Saul, sir,” he whispered.
“Well, Saul Sir,” I said. “Do you work alone or do you give your earnings to someone else?”
“I have to take what I find to Uncle. He beats me if I bring less than ten quid a day. He gives me a pinch if I bring more.”
“Son, that isn’t a working wage. I think we need to set your foot on the straight and narrow. We are going to walk back to the main street and down to the Inn of the Brothers. You will hold my hand like your life depended upon it. Which it does. Lees will be right behind you, ready to stop you. He doesn’t speak, but he is very good with his knives. He might give you five steps just to make it sporting.”
“Yessir,” the boy quavered. He was shaking and I could smell urine where he’d peed himself, but, to his credit, he wasn’t crying. We made our way down Main Street with Saul’s hand in mine and Lees half a step behind us. I’m sure we made a bit of a spectacle as it is not that common to see a traveling minstrel and his entourage, even in the larger towns like Rock Canyon City. We made it to the inn.
“Minstrel Lincoln!” Gabe shouted from behind the bar as we entered. “Welcome back to your humble inn.” I walked to the bar and shook Gabe’s hand. “You are looking fit. Good to see you have healed from your injuries. Master Lees, greetings. What have we down here?” Gabe looked over the bar at the urchin and scowled. “You’ve not been gone long enough to produce this,” Gabe said.
“Ahrgh! You caught the foul little bastard!” Raphe said coming out of the kitchen. He zeroed in on Saul and had pulled a knife from his belt.
“I take it you have had dealings with the thief?”
“Three days ago, he cut my purse as I headed to the bank. I chased him, but I wasn’t fast enough. An entire day’s deposit gone. Put his hand on the bar so I can cut it off. We’ll see how many purses he picks with just one hand,” Raphe said.
“The whole hand? I was going to take a knuckle for every purse he stole,” I said dragging Saul up on a stool. He struggled, but Lees had a strong hand on the back of his neck. “Don’t wiggle around so much. I don’t want to miss,” I said. “Now you have three purses on you and one stolen from Raphe three days ago. That’s four knuckles. The question is whether we should take them off four different fingers or if we should choose a finger and work our way down. What do you think, Raphe?”
By this time Raphe and Gabe had figured out that I was not going to take any limbs if I could help it, so they joined in a lively discussion regarding the taking of knuckles, getting the maximum pain, deterring further crime. Saul finally broke and began to cry.
“Please don’t!” he begged. “Uncle makes us do it. He beats us if we don’t bring back enough. He’ll kill me for this. There will be no one to take care of my sisters.”
“Sisters?” I asked. “You mentioned an uncle before. I believe it is time for you to tell us everything.” The rascal looked miserable, but nodded his head. “Let’s start with the uncle. Where is he?”
“He camps a mile out of town and sends us in to do our work. One of his three men meets us at the edge of town in the evening and rides back with what we have collected so that we have nothing on us if someone should stop us. We have to walk to the camp making sure we’re not followed. It takes us a while because my sisters are little. If we have satisfied Uncle, he gives us food. If not, he sends us back to town to beg after he’s beaten us.”
“And you have younger sisters who are cutpurses?” Gabe demanded.
“No, sir. I mean. Yes, they are supposed to. I try to keep them hidden during the day and get enough so all three of us can deliver at the end of the day. I promised.”
“Whom did you promise?” Raphe asked.
“My older brother. He was killed a few weeks ago when he was caught and tried to fight his way free. Uncle said it served him right, and if he’d gotten free, then Uncle would have set the hounds on him. They guard the camp.”
“This uncle fellow sounds like a problem,” Gabe said. “If you do not return tonight, what will he do?”
“It depends. If my sisters go back and tell him I was taken, he will break camp and move in the night. We never stay near a town more than a week anyway. If my sisters stay hidden, he’ll come into town to find us or to kidnap a couple replacements before he leaves. That’s how he got us,” Saul said. I looked at the brothers and Lees. They all nodded. “Saul Sir,” I intoned, “you have a big decision to make right now. It is mid-afternoon. Your contact will be at the edge of town in two or three hours. In a few minutes you will walk out that door.” He looked at me with wide eyes. “Empty-handed. You will decide whether to attempt to fill your quota and chance that the next mark will be less kind or that your uncle will be merciful when you return empty-handed. Or you will go find your sisters and bring them here to the inn where you will eat a full meal and be protected to the best of our ability. I remind you of the duty your brother imposed upon you to protect your sisters. You must decide whether the known cruelty of this uncle is a better choice than the unknown treatment you will receive here. At least here, what lies ahead includes a bowl of hot stew and bread. Do you understand?”
Saul looked at me with a puzzled expression and looked down at his hand, still gripped in mine and held on the bar. I released his hand. He slipped down off the stool and backed away. He looked each of us in the eye.
“Yessir!” he snapped and ran for the door.
“Well, that’s the last we’ll see of him,” Raphe said.
“I fear that I have brought trouble to the Inn of the Two Brothers once again,” I said. “I would rather not spend a day scrubbing blood off the floor. Lees and I need to prepare to travel and it will take some doing. How is the new constabulary working out?”
“They operate in fear,” Gabe laughed.
“Fear? Of whom?”
“Fear of being the brunt of a minstrel’s song if they turn out to be—what did you call them?—Keystone Cops. Which means that they’re actually quite effective. The city has found that it can function just fine without a mayor. The constabulary reports directly to the people by way of our seven-person council. The council, by the way, is also highly motivated to not become what you called a US Congress. Mockery seems to be a very effective motivator in Rock Canyon,” Gabe laughed.
“When the children come back—and they will—we need to make sure that as many people as possible see them and know that they have been taken in here. That will be the easiest way to let ‘Uncle’ know where they are,” I said.
“We’ve seen gangs like this before,” Raphe said. “They keep a very low profile unless they’re pushed. Then they respond with force, usually with a knife in the back. If they come into the inn to reclaim the children, they’ll speak little, grab what they want, kill whomever is in their way, and run. They don’t stop to claim any spoils except to cut the purse strings and run. I heard of such an occurrence over at Twin Falls. They killed a wealthy man and didn’t claim any of his possessions but the purse. They’d probably have had to fight a few more people to claim the man’s house, but Twin Falls doesn’t have much of a guard and they could have taken what they wanted with ease. Instead, they took a very fat purse and ran.”
“That would suggest that if they come in here, they will use both the front and back doors,” I said. “Saul said there were four of them. Probably two at each entrance. I would guess the ones in back will be armed with crossbows to take out the most dangerous threats. Then they’ll have swords for close work if there is more resistance.” Lees scratched a quick floorplan on the bar with his knife. He put four dots on it and pointed to each of us. Lees to be seated by the front door. Raphe behind the back door. Gabe behind the bar, and me by the fireplace. Presumably, I’d be entertaining.
“What about the children?” Gabe asked. We debated that a bit and decided the best place would be in the kitchen so they weren’t in the direct line of fire. I didn’t think we’d need them to identify their so-called uncle.
And, speaking of the children, Saul came bursting through the door with two ragged little girls behind him. I guessed they were no more than six, but malnutrition and hard life could easily stunt a child’s growth. They looked identical, even to the dirty streak on the side of their noses. Twins!
“You said ‘stew,’ sir,” Saul announced by way of introduction. The girls peeked around his shoulders at us.
“Indeed, I did.”
“There is a bucket of dishwater just inside the kitchen door,” Raphe said. “Scrub your hands and your faces so you don’t leave smears on the bar while you eat. Your stew and bread will be on the bar when you finish.”
“Get them some well-watered wine, too,” I suggested to Gabe. “They don’t look like they’ve had a decent meal in months. And it will make them sleepy.” He nodded.
The three children ate like they had never seen food before. Lees tried to get them to slow down a little, but I was pretty sure they would all have stomach cramps in half an hour. We extracted more information about Uncle and his goons. We found the girls’ names were Melody and Harmony. I thought that was pretty appropriate for the minstrel’s entourage. After they had eaten, we set them to sweeping out the inn and the board walkway in front of it. People began to filter in late in the afternoon and we made a big deal about how the children had been adopted as part of the minstrel’s troupe. I was pretty sure word that I was here and had taken in children would spread quickly.
At nightfall, we brought the children in, fed them again, and Molly found a place in the kitchen where they could curl up out of the way and sleep. I looked in to find Saul protectively curled around his sisters blocking them from the rest of the kitchen.
I spent the evening entertaining in front of the fireplace, mostly singing well-known ballads and playing the cithara. Lees leaned his chair back against the wall next to the door with a shillelagh by his side. Raphe stayed out of sight, which worked well since the brothers usually split the shifts. Raphe normally worked morning and noon then went home early. Gabe would come in shortly after noon and work until they closed about ten. A helper and his wife slept in the room that had once been occupied by Ariel and Jules. They tended to any late-night needs of the guests in rooms. Lees and I had a room at the top of the stairs when we were in town.
It was a couple of hours after dark when the fun started. We heard a wagon pull up in front of the inn with the howling of hounds in cages in the wagon. It took a few minutes before the assault began so two could come in through the back as predicted. I saw movement to my right and the two were raising crossbows. Unmistakably, Uncle entered through the front door with his sword drawn. A goon was just at his left shoulder and raised a crossbow looking for a target.
“Where are my brats?” Uncle yelled. “I’ll flay the skin from their bones when I get them.”
“Would those be the children you kidnapped from High Tide a year ago?” I asked. “They have sanctuary here and have been adopted as part of the minstrel’s family.”
“Then they’ll be orphans in a moment,” Uncle yelled turning his sword toward me. Gabe brought his crossbow out from under the bar. As the rest of the people in the Inn froze, Uncle’s goon locked on Gabe. The bolt went into the ceiling as Lees leveled the goon with her club. Another bolt skittered across the floor as one of the guards from the back flew forward face first following it. The other backdoor guard sprouted a bolt from his chest before he could get a shot off. Uncle was alone and charged toward me.
He dropped his sword as the shuriken I threw hit his right eye. He grabbed the blade, which served only to bloody his hand as he dropped it on the floor. Right on cue, the constabulary flooded the room and hogtied the three who were still alive. The constables stood back as Lees, Raphe, and Gabe stripped the four of their money and weapons.
Uncle, the only one who was conscious, was howling in both rage and agony. The epithets he hurled and the threats he made were empty in the face of his helplessness. When they were stripped of their valuables, the constables dragged the three living to stools at the bar and pulled the dead one to the floor in front of them. A man at the table to my left pounded his stein on the table. The room fell silent.
“Those gathered in this room have witnessed an unprovoked attack by four ruffians on persons known and well-respected in this city,” the man said. “Does any man or woman here speak in defense of these men?” Everyone was silent. “The council having witnessed this act and having met with due deliberation, hereby sentence those remaining alive to be hanged by the neck until dead. The property on those subdued is forfeit to the minstrel, his aide, and the brothers of the inn. All other worldly possessions are forfeit to the city and will be auctioned in the square at noon tomorrow. The sentence is to be executed at once. Take them away.” He slammed his stein on the table again and the constables hauled the three away, now all screaming about what they would do to us.
Justice was swift. No one in the inn bothered to witness the hanging. Undertaker arrived shortly and hauled the dead goon out, then waited at the gallows for the last twitch before he carted the rest of the bodies to the burial pit outside of town.
The children didn’t even wake up.
There were a few problems in disposing of the gang’s belongings. Sadly, even the best animal handler in town could not subdue the four hounds and they were put down. It was messy. The children directed the constables to the camp outside of town, but even after a thorough search, there was little there. The goods that the city had to auction amounted to four horses, a large wagon, camping gear, and four dead dogs. The dogs were bought by a butcher and I scratched that shop off my list for getting supplies.
I looked over the wagon with its four-horse team and bid on it. It was a good-sized rig, poorly suited for either farm work or city transportation. It was the kind of wagon one could live out of. Lees nodded his agreement and by a quarter past noon, we owned our show cart. It was going to take some work to make it into what we needed, but we had a solid basis to begin. We paid Barnaby, the stableman, to haul our wagon and horses to the stable and provide a place for us to work on it.
Then we had to deal with the children.
“Do you wish us to steal money for you?” Saul asked as we trudged back to the inn after the auction. I laughed out loud.
“Do you think we saved you from a life of thievery to make thieves of you?” I asked. “Certainly, there must be a better use for you.” Saul took a deep breath and pushed his sisters behind him.
“Please, sir. I will let you use my body however you wish, but please do not harm my sisters. They’re too small.” I looked at Lees and his mouth dropped open. I’m sure mine did as well.
“See here, Saul. No one will be using your body nor those of your sisters as long as Lees or I am around. Whatever you believe about people, you must put aside. We are from a place where children are not worked to the bone and are not abused sexually or beaten. You are children. We are adults.”
“We don’t have to do anything?” he asked.
“I did not say that. Every child has tasks to be performed. We will make sure they are appropriate for your size and age. The foremost of your tasks is to learn. Gabe and Molly have children about your age. I think they will invite you to stay with them and learn the same as their children do,” I said. The three children were silent as we made our way back to the inn. I don’t think I’d heard either of the twins say anything yet. We strolled through the marketplace and purchased some fresh fruit. I gave each of the children a peach and they soon had juice running down their chins.
“Good morrow, mistress,” I said to the soaper. She had quite an array of soaps available, some of which were scented and some of which were harsh. I chose three bars and handed them to the children. “You will be using these daily while you live with us or the innkeepers,” I said sternly. Then I turned back to the soaper to pay her. “Mistress, when you make soap, there is a clear liquid or oil byproduct. By what name do you call that?”
“I see you are not from around here, Minstrel,” she laughed. “First, expecting children to use soap every day and then not knowing the names of its parts. The liquid oil you refer to is called glisten.”
“Of course. It has a similar name where I come from. We call it glycerin. I would like to acquire a jar of vegetable glisten. Do you render beans for soap as well?”
“Well, that is rare. I make some because Mad Aunt Hattie on the hill claims she cannot harm an animal and must only eat or use plant products. Imagine beef stew without the beef! How much of this vegetable glisten do you want?” I described the size of pottery jar I wanted filled with it. She agreed to render the amount if I would also buy the soap bars. After we had agreed upon a price, I moved on.
“Master Minstrel,” a twin spoke to me as we left. She was looking at the bar of soap in her hands. I spun around and knelt to look the girl in the eye. It was the first time she’d spoken to one of us.
“Yes, sweetheart,” I said. “What is your name?”
“I’m Melody,” she answered. Her voice was as sweet as I could imagine.
“I’m Harmony,” stated the twin. There would be no mistaking which was which if they spoke. Harmony’s voice, like her name, was a perfect third below her sister’s. It was beautiful.
“Miss Melody, what can I do for you?”
“If we wished to stay with you and Master Lees instead of remaining at the inn, could we do that?” she asked. I glanced at Lees. He was grinning and nodding his head.
“I believe that Master Lees would be pleased with that. Let us discuss it after you have bathed. I need to go to the stable to measure our new wagon. Why don’t the two of you return to the inn with Master Lees and he will order a bath brought to our room for you? Saul, why don’t you assist me at the stable and when we come back, you can get your bath as well?” Saul was hesitant. I knelt again so that I could look him in the eye. “Let me assure you, son. Master Lees will in no way harm your sisters, nor will he allow harm to come to them. They are as safe with him as anyplace on Chaos.”
“Yessir.” He turned to his sisters who already had hold of Lees’s hands. “We will talk,” he said to them. “Obey Master Lees.” The girls nodded and Lees took them to the inn.
“Saul, was your life always so hard?” I asked as we headed to the stables.
“No, sir,” he answered. “Our life was good until Uncle took us away. He killed our parents and my oldest brother. Nothing has been the same since then.”
I sighed. “It is a harsh world and you have been ripped from the safety of your home and family to find your own way.” We walked on and inspected the wagon. The first order was to remove the cages from the wagon and scrub the blood out of it. I noted there were eight cages, but there had been only four dogs. I asked Saul if there had been more dogs.
“We were locked in cages at night. If we had been outside, the dogs would have killed us. Each night when we walked to the camp, we had to be there an hour after sunset before the dogs were loosed to guard the camp.”
“Well, we shan’t need cages. Cut them apart. Save as much of the cord as you can. The wooden bars we will take to the inn to burn,” I said. I saw him take a rusty blade from his belt and begin sawing at the cords. “Let me see your knife,” I said. Saul handed it to me. It was in poor shape—sharp, but rusted with a broken tip. I threw it across the barn where it stuck in a post. I handed a good quality blade and sheath to Saul from my belt. “Take good care of that,” I said. He stared at the blade and then grinned at me. He made short work of the cages as I scrubbed the floor of the wagon. It was a box wagon, with high sides. My plan was to build side extensions and a roof that could fold out into a stage where we could perform. There would be a lot of painting to be done after the basic construction was finished. When it was done, we would have both a stage and a home.
As we ate an early dinner, we discussed the proposition of having the children join us on our journey. I was concerned that we were taking them into potentially dangerous situations and that when Lees and I had to leave, we would be abandoning them in parts unknown. I stressed that they must then be prepared to continue to move on and perform, therefore they would need to be apprentices in our minstrel craft. Ultimately, I was voted down by the simple expedient of Lees grinding his foot onto mine until I relented.
Well, traveling as a family of performers was certainly one way to face this. It would take us two weeks to get our wagon ready and to get colorful blankets for the horses made. There was no time like the present to get started with their training.
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