Carnies Read online

  While waiting for the kettle to boil, he went to the pantry and opened the door. There wasn’t much to choose from, but there were still some rice bubbles left in a box. He took it, without looking at the use-by date. He figured he was probably past that date himself, so what right did he have to pass judgment on cereal? He fished a bowl out of another cupboard, poured the rice bubbles into it, then sprinkled sugar on them. Next stop, the fridge. There was a carton of milk in the door shelf, which he opened and sniffed. It was well and truly off, and had that sour smell that reminded women of newborn babies and men of vomit. Well, the same thing really - newborn baby vomit. He poured it down the sink, trying not to spill it on the pile of dirty dishes there. It went down with a fight, and thick lumps caught in the drain. Paul tried not to breathe in through his nose, and he turned on the hot tap until it was all gone.

  The kettle clicked off with perfect timing. He poured the steaming water into the mug. He stirred the coffee for a few moments, and then put the spoon in the bowl of rice bubbles. For a second he considered pouring the coffee into the bowl to kill two birds with one stone, but common sense prevailed.

  Taking the bowl and mug, he limped into the living room. It was carpeted the same as the hallway, and the sharp fibres made his bare feet itch a little. He sat on his couch. It had once been white, but was now more of an uneven grey. He flicked on the television. Credits from the end of a movie played, including those of a few hackneyed actors, which let Paul know that he’d just missed the made-for-TV midday movie. He knew then that it was mid-afternoon, around two. Who needs a clock when you have TV? He watched the names roll as he ate his dry, stale rice bubbles. A taste sensation - not so much snap, crackle and pop as squish, shudder and retch. The credits gave way to advertisements, and then the next program started, a tacky talk show with an overenthusiastic studio audience. Paul finished his cereal and washed it down with the last of his coffee, savouring the caffeine buzz. Then he took his dishes and put them in the sink, and went to his kitchen table where he turned on the old computer sitting there.

  It was an obsolete machine that he’d bought from a second-hand store a few years ago, just good enough to read email and browse simple websites. He only had a cheap dialup Internet connection, nothing fancy, but it did the job. The modem made its melodic beeping noises, issued a sound like a cat coughing up a hairball, then the computer chimed to indicate that the connection had been successful. He opened up his email program, hoping for an email from Belinda, but instead there were eighteen messages offering a variety of services, from pharmaceuticals to Russian brides to a larger penis and fuller breasts. He deleted them without reading any. Three months without a word from Belinda, not even ‘Having a wonderful time with the new boyfriend, glad you’re not here’. It wasn’t for his lack of trying. He’d sent her dozens of emails, hoping to hear back. It was a compulsion. But not today, he told himself.

  Of course, he said that every day. Five minutes later he wrote and sent yet another email into the void, then closed down the mail program. Now it was time to go through the rest of the routine of the morning... well, the beginning of his day, anyway. He opened a web browser, and visited each of his half-dozen favourite online comics. Each one took a while to download. The modem was slow and the PC even slower, so it was a bit like watching the artist draw the cartoons from scratch, but Paul was quite used to it. Anyway, it wasn’t like he was in any hurry. He’d been unemployed for months now, since he’d lost his job at the cinema. He’d worked as a projectionist for a while, but more and more of the work had become automated, so they didn’t need as many staff. He supposed he’d become expendable. He didn’t mind, though, it gave him more time to do the things he cared about.

  This thought made him glance around the dining area. There were photographs stuck to any space on the walls available, mostly cityscape works of late night. He loved the city then, when it was almost dead quiet, just the mechanical breathing of a few thousand air conditioning systems. The harsh street lights separated everything into light and dark, with no shades of grey. The only people around were those who were paid to be there, or those who had nowhere else to go. He took his best photos on the streets at night.

  He had taken his best photos then, that was, until he’d sold his camera. In hindsight, he sometimes wondered why he decided his old Olympus SLR was less essential than, say, his crappy computer. He’d bought it a few years earlier, when he got his compensation payout after the accident, trying to make lemonade out of the lemons he’d been given. He’d always wanted to be a photographer, ever since he’d got his first cheap plastic camera as a kid, a Kodak Brownie. But real cameras and real photography weren’t cheap, and when he’d tried to go professional he’d found it cost more in materials than he ever made from the rare jobs he’d picked up. Then his rent had been due, his electricity and telephone bills had arrived hand-in-hand like skipping children, and he’d had to make a difficult decision. Belinda had begged him to keep it, but it was the lesser of two evils. And he figured he’d buy it back once he was back in the black.

  Right! Like that was going to happen. A month later she’d left him, and he no longer regretted choosing to keep his computer. After all, there was something his Internet connection could offer him that his camera couldn’t. Or, at least, rarely could.

  The page he was visiting brought up half a dozen popup windows, which he closed before they’d even started to load on his slow connection. Then he right clicked the latest link, and chose Save to Desktop. The file was called ‘aquasex.mpg’ and, he had to admit, he was intrigued. Some photographers claimed that taking the perfect shot was better than sex, but in Paul’s opinion that was bollocks. And with Belinda gone, Internet porn was the best he could get.

  The download said it would take over an hour over his slow connection. Paul stood up, stretched again and considered putting on some clothes, perhaps even going outside to check his mailbox. He was weighing up the pros and cons of this, paying some attention to the aching protests of his ankle, when his computer made an ominous beep.

  ‘Shit!’ he said, without much real animosity. He knew what had happened, and what would follow. Sure enough, a second later, the phone rang. He’d forgotten to turn off call waiting again, and the incoming call had disconnected him from the Internet. He went to the wall-mounted phone in the kitchen and answered it. Deep down he hoped it was Belinda, though he knew damn well it wouldn’t be.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hi Paul, it’s David.’

  ‘Hey, David,’ Paul said, his heart sinking a little. His older brother didn’t call very often, and it usually wasn’t good news when he did. There was a big age difference between them - David had turned forty-five a month or so back, which was when they’d last spoken, and he was married. He worked at the Daily News, a good steady job, something their father would have been proud of. Paul, on the other hand...

  ‘How are you doing?’ David asked. ‘Found work?’

  Paul sighed. ‘I’m doing fine. No job yet, but looking hard.’ He’d grown used to lying to his brother. It was second nature now.

  ‘Good, that’s good,’ David mumbled. There was an awkward silence. Paul was about to break it when David spoke up again. ‘Paul, are you doing anything over the next few days?’

  That was different. Paul was taken a little aback, unsure what to say. He decided to resort to sarcasm.

  ‘Gee, bro, I’m not sure. I’d have to check my busy social calendar.’

  ‘Very funny,’ his brother said, sounding anything but amused. ‘I’m planning to go down south tomorrow, to a small town called Tillbrook. Apparently there’s a little carnival down there that no one’s ever heard of. I thought it’d make a good story for the paper. I was wondering if you’d like to come along, take some photographs. I’ll pay you,’ he added, as if that was the most important thing.

  Paul was dubious. He and David hadn’t spent more than an hour or two together at a time for the last ten years or so. But the offe
r was still very attractive. ‘Yeah, why not. But I don’t have a camera any more, you know.’

  ‘That’s okay,’ David assured him. ‘I’ll provide the equipment. I could use someone to share the driving there and back. It’s a long haul.’

  Paul laughed. ‘That and the fact that you’ve never taken a decent photo in your life, hey?’

  David ignored this. ‘I’ll be over in the morning to pick you up, all right?’

  ‘Actually, could we make it around midday?’ Paul asked. ‘It takes me a while to get my shit together in the mornings.’ On those rare times I make it out of bed in the mornings, that is, he thought to himself.

  He could imagine his brother’s silent frustration.

  ‘Fine,’ David said in the end, ‘midday it is. See you then.’

  ‘Bye, David,’ Paul said, but the line was already dead. He hung up the phone, already beginning to regret his decision. Hours trapped in a car together, no escape... they might kill each other before they even left the metro area. But still, it would be good to get away, take some photos again, even if they weren’t very artistic ones. A change is as good as a holiday, and this could be both, plus the money would help. Maybe he could even buy his camera back. Maybe everything would be okay if he did. Maybe he could find regular work as a photographer...

  He brought himself back to reality. But most likely he and David would kill each other on the trip, out of pure frustration. Still, it beat sitting around the flat.

  -2-

  David Hampden sat at his desk, looking at the phone he’d just hung up with a mixture of excitement and anger. He couldn’t believe his brother’s attitude! Here he was, offering him some paid work, and Paul had hesitated over it, as if he had something better to do. How could he be so blasé? Still, at least he’d agreed to come. Whatever else one might say about Paul, he was a damn fine photographer, even David had to admit to that. He just wished his brother had taken it up as a profession, instead of taking the artistic route. David sometimes suspected Paul did these things just to spite him, or perhaps their late father, bless his soul. Whatever he was told he should do, he always did the exact opposite. But it didn’t matter now. David put the familiar thoughts away in that little box in his mind, what he liked to think of as his Worry About It Later, or WAIL, box. He had more important things on his mind.

  He stood up, pushed his chair away from his desk and walked to his editor’s office. He passed other desks in other cubicles along the way, where journalists were working hard on their computers, all with their hot stories. He suppressed a surge of jealousy and concentrated on the task at hand.

  David knocked on the door of Bill Holt’s office, the editor for his section. Bill had only been his editor for a year or so. Before then it had been Harry Christophersen, the best editor David had ever known. He was still at the paper, of course, still editing the major stories every day, still juggling his crack team of top-notch reporters. It wasn’t Harry who’d moved. It was David.

  ‘Bill?’ David asked, putting his head around the edge of the open door.

  Holt was sitting at his desk, typing slowly on his keyboard. He looked up. ‘Hampden,’ he said without a trace of welcome. ‘What is it?’

  ‘I have to go down south for a few days. There’s a story down there that I-’

  ‘Fine, fine,’ Holt said, interrupting him. ‘I’ll expect receipts and justifications for any expenses. You’ll be reimbursed afterwards.’

  David remembered having a company credit card. Those were the days. ‘I’ll be back Wednesday around noon, I’d say,’ he said. ‘Afternoon at the latest.’

  ‘You’d better be,’ Holt said, looking back to his monitor. ‘Deadline’s Thursday afternoon.’ He started typing again.

  The signal was clear: David was dismissed. He left Holt’s office and headed back towards his desk, happy despite his editor’s antipathy. Sure, this wasn’t a huge story, but at least it was a story, something he’d been having more and more trouble rustling up lately. A simple piece for the colour weekend magazine was better than nothing.

  He sat down at his desk and looked at the piece of mail that had started it all. It had arrived today, addressed to him in person, which in itself made it unusual. When he’d opened it, he’d found two pieces of paper, which were now lying on his desk. He looked at the first, a flyer for a carnival.

  DERVISH CARNIVAL EST 1899

  TILLBROOK FOOTBALL FIELD OPEN TUESDAY TO THURSDAY

  7PM TO MIDNIGHT GAMES ANIMALS CLOWNS

  AND MUCH MORE

  It really didn’t sound spectacular. But three things made it interesting. One, it seemed to be hand printed, without any telephone numbers or contact details. So this wasn’t a very professional operation. Yet it had been running for over a century, if you believed the blurb. Second, a note had arrived with the flyer in the mail, hand written and unsigned, a scrawl, just a single sentence:

  Please come and see.

  Third, and most telling in this day and age, David had gone onto the Internet and done a thorough search for this carnival, both in the newspaper archives and on a variety of search engines. There was not a single mention of it, not one.

  So here was a carnival that had been running for a hundred years in a small country town in the middle of nowhere, never becoming commercialised or popular, staying true to its original carnival traditions. His angle would be that it was a time capsule of an earlier age, showing how many things had changed while it had stayed exactly the same. And, more important, it appeared to be virgin territory, journalistically speaking. David couldn’t let the opportunity slip away. Not these days, anyway.

  A shadow appeared over David’s shoulder. He glanced around and saw Peter, a tall journalist he used to work with, who was looking at his desk. Instinctively, David’s hands went for the pieces of paper, and covered them up. But Peter wasn’t looking at them.

  ‘Red ten on black jack,’ he said with a small smile. David went blank for a moment, then realised what the man was talking about. He had a game of solitaire on his computer screen from earlier, before the mail had arrived. He laughed, a little too loud, and dragged the card over. ‘You know, if the computers here ever went down, one of the backup systems should be a deck of cards.’

  Peter smiled. ‘I heard that all US Navy pilots have to carry a deck of cards in their survival kit, along with their thermal blankets, Swiss Army knives and ration packs. When they ask what it’s for, they’re told that if they’re ever shot down in the middle of nowhere, with not another human around for a thousand miles, they should relax and play some solitaire.’

  ‘Really?’ David asked.

  ‘Yep. Because within five minutes, some bastard will be standing behind them, telling them to put the black seven on the red eight.’

  David groaned. ‘That’s awful.’

  ‘Had you going, though,’ Peter grinned, and walked back to his own desk. David figured he was working on his own stories, probably excellent ones, plus he’d have other stories on the back burners, waiting for them to boil. He’d had stories like that once. He’d had sources, snitches, friends in high places. But then things had changed. He didn’t know exactly when or how, but one by one his sources moved on, his friends retired, and he was left behind, like driftwood on the beach. It hadn’t taken long for him to get moved to working on the weekend colour magazine, a journalist’s limbo, and even that was proving to be harder every day. Sometimes he wished he could just write a best-selling book and live off that, the way so many of his contemporaries seemed to be doing, but it just didn’t seem to be in him. So he kept plugging away at a job that was looking less like a career path and more like a cul-de-sac, finding it more and more difficult to find the stories that would keep him employed. He hated to imagine what would happen if he lost his job. For a start, his wife...

  That reminded him. He picked up the phone and called her work number. Christine wasn’t coming home until late that night. She had a business dinner with clients, so he might
not get a chance to speak with her until the next morning.

  ‘Hello?’

  It was her secretary. ‘Christine Hampden, please?’

  ‘Who should I say is calling?’

  ‘Her husband.’ David was amazed that the girl had never managed to recognise his voice. She’d worked there for over five years now. He suspected she did it on purpose, just to spite him.

  ‘Just a moment, please.’

  The voice was replaced by soft classical music, soothing in small amounts, soporific in large. Luckily the wait was short.

  ‘David?’ She sounded annoyed. He’d probably interrupted something that she’d felt was more important than their marriage. Sometimes he suspected that could be just about anything.

  ‘Hello, Christine.’ He was using his best professional voice, because there were people around. ‘I just wanted to let you know I’ll be going away for a day or two, leaving tomorrow morning.’

  ‘Oh. All right.’ Christine didn’t sound very concerned. She didn’t even ask where he was going, or with whom. This never failed to get under David’s skin. If she’d been going away, he’d have demanded to know every little detail. It almost offended him that she didn’t think he was having an affair, or if she did think it, she didn’t care.

  ‘I’m going down to some country town for a story. I’m taking Paul,’ he added.

  ‘Oh, that’s good. How is Paul?’ she asked. David thought she’d always felt a little maternal towards his younger brother, especially as they’d had no children of their own.

  ‘He’s Paul,’ he answered, explanation enough. ‘I have to get back to work, honey.’

  ‘Goodbye, David,’ Christine said. ‘If I don’t see you in the morning, have a good trip.’

  ‘I will. Goodbye.’ He hung up. There was a bad taste in his mouth, acidic, coming from the back of his throat, and there was a dull ache deep in his gut, as if he was hungry. It was a familiar feeling. His ulcer had decided to say hello, as it often did when he was dealing with his wife. Or his work, for that matter. He concentrated on moving the sensations into the WAIL box. It must be getting very crowded in there.