The Orphan's Tale

For a second, my heart lifts. Perhaps she has word of Peter. Then I catch myself. Can she bring back the dead? Turn back time? I pull away. “There is no good news anymore.”

  “Emmet said you can perform again,” she says, then pauses, watching my face for a reaction. Does she expect me to leap up with joy and change into my practice leotard? Once returning to the trapeze was all I wanted. But it does not matter anymore.

  “Let’s go practice,” Noa urges, still trying for all her best to make things better. It doesn’t help at all, but I love her for caring. “Astrid, I know how hard this is. But lying here isn’t going to change things. Why not fly again?”

  Because doing the normal things feels like accepting that Peter is gone, I think. A betrayal. “What’s the point?” I ask finally.

  Noa hesitates. “Astrid, you must get up again.”

  “Why?”

  She looks away, as if not wanting to tell me. “Remember Yeta?”

  “Of course.” Yeta had survived her fall and been sent to a hospital near Vichy to convalesce. I am suddenly uneasy. “What about her?”

  “I asked Emmet about her before we left Thiers and he said she was being sent back to Darmstadt to finish healing. But then I heard the workers whispering that she had been taken from the hospital and sent east on one of the trains.” Noa’s voice drops to a whisper.

  “Arrested?” I ask. Like Peter. Noa nods. “No one is arrested for a broken leg, Noa. That’s ridiculous. She didn’t do anything wrong.” But even as I say this, I doubt my own words. These days a person could be arrested for just about anything—or nothing at all.

  “They said if she couldn’t perform, then her working papers were no longer valid,” Noa continues. “You have to get better, Astrid, for all of our sakes.” I realize that this was why Noa was so quick to tell the Germans I was not sick. They can smell weakness and want nothing more than to exploit it. “Please come with me to the ring. If you don’t feel well enough to practice, at least watch and tell me what to fix.” Noa’s voice is pleading.

  “Performing with a gun to the head,” I say. “Where is the joy in that?” It is not about joy now, though, but survival. And Noa is right: lying here will not change things or bring Peter back. The circus, my act, they are the only things I have. “Fine,” I say, standing up. She takes Theo to the cabin where Elsie is staying as I find my practice leotard and hold it up to the light, remembering the last time I had worn it, feeling Peter’s touch against the fabric. My throat grows scratchy. Perhaps I cannot do this after all. But I put on the leotard. When Noa returns, I let her lead me from the cabin.

  We cross the fairgrounds. The workers have done their best to assemble everything, from the beer tent to the carousel, exactly as they had been in Thiers. But the grounds here are abysmal—a dirt field at the edge of an abandoned stone quarry, uneven and pockmarked from fighting that had passed this way earlier in the war.

  As we near the big top, I glimpse the trapeze through the open flap. Then I stop. How can I ever fly again, knowing that Peter will not be there to see me?

  Noa takes my hand. “Astrid, please.”

  “I can do it,” I say, shaking her off.

  Inside, I can see that nothing is right. The tent has been shoddily erected with the grounds not properly prepared and with less than half the workers, most local and inexperienced. What would Herr Neuhoff have thought of his grand circus, now in tatters? The will had stipulated that the circus go on, but there are a thousand little details it could not account for, about wages and living conditions and working hours and such. It would be easy to blame Emmet. The downfall of the circus had not begun with him, though; the cracks had been months or years in coming; only now, in this godforsaken village with no one to lead us, the weaknesses have been exposed, their full depth revealed.

  Enough. I steel myself. With the circus in such a state, Noa and the others need me more than ever. I start forward with new determination, pull back the flap of the big top, then lift my head to appraise the state of the trapeze apparatus. Above, a dark unfamiliar object catches my eye. For a second, I think it is one of the other aerialists rehearsing. I step back, not ready to face anyone else yet.

  The person in the air does not move with any force, though, but rather hangs limply. “What on earth?” I move closer for a better look.

  From the Spanish web, where I had once performed, hangs the lifeless body of Metz, the clockmaker.

  “Astrid, what is it?” Noa asks as I sink to the ground. It is almost impossible to hear her over the buzzing in my ears, growing louder. “Are you feeling okay?” she asks. Her gaze is focused downward on me, not seeing the horror of what I see above. “This was a mistake. Let me help you back to bed...”

  “Call for the workers,” I command, but even as I say this, I know it is too late. “Go now.” I want her to leave the tent to spare her from the sight. But her eyes follow my gaze upward and she lets out a bloodcurdling scream.

  I grab Noa by the shoulders and force her from the big top. “The laborers,” I order again, more firmly now. “Go!” Alone now, I stare up at Metz. I had seen Herr Neuhoff die just days earlier. But this is different. Metz died because he was a Jew—and because he thought all hope was gone. That could have been me. I stand silently, touching my coat where the star should have been, a moment of solidarity.

  “In the big top!” I hear Noa calling outside. “Please hurry.”

  Two workers rush into the tent. I stand alone, watching as the laborers climb the ladder, then try to reach out with the long pole we use to pull in the trapeze bar in order to retrieve Metz.

  I turn away, sickened and not wanting to see anymore. Noa hurries back in, Emmet close behind. “Damn it,” he swears.

  “Should we call the police?” Noa asks.

  “No, of course not,” Emmet snaps. “We can’t afford to attract attention from the police.”

  “But if someone killed him, we have to report it,” she protests with more force than I imagined she might show against Emmet. He does not answer, but storms from the tent.

  I put my hand on her shoulder. “Noa, no one killed him. He killed himself.”

  “What?” I watch her expression as she grapples with the idea.

  “Surely you’ve heard of suicide.”

  “Yes, of course. But how can you be sure?”

  “There are no signs of a struggle,” I explain. “I just wish I knew why.”

  Noa’s face crumples. “He must have found out.”

  “Found out what?” I demand.

  She hesitates, and I can tell she has been keeping something from me. “Emmet said he was letting the workers go.”

  “What?” I am stunned by the notion. Metz must have somehow learned of Emmet’s plan. With his family gone and no chance of sanctuary, he had given up, taken his life instead of letting it be taken. He had not seen another way out.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner,” Noa says quickly. “Emmet threatened me if I said anything. And I didn’t want to worry you...” Not listening to the rest of her explanation, I walk from the tent.

  Word has spread quickly through the fairgrounds and workers and performers have clustered outside the big top. I circle the gathering and find Emmet on the far side, standing uneasy and separate from the others. “How could you?” I demand. “We need these people.”

  His eyes widen. “You’ve been lying around for days, and now you want to tell me how to run the show?” he snarls. “You’ve got some nerve.”

  “It’s you who’s got the nerve, Emmet.” Noa’s voice comes from behind me. “If you had told them before we left Thiers, that man might have had a chance.”

  “This is none of your concern,” he counters.

  “Are you going to tell them or am I?” He is caught off guard by Noa’s defiance.

  The others d
raw closer now, having overheard. “Tell us what?” one of the acrobats demands.

  Emmet shifts uncomfortably, then turns to the crowd that has assembled. “I’m sorry to tell you that the circus is nearly out of money. We will be letting all of the workers go.”

  “Except for the foremen,” I interject quickly. I am overstepping my place, but I do not care. I continue quickly before Emmet can protest, “And those who have been with the circus for more than five years.” If everyone left at once there would be no one to run the show.

  “Goddammit!” one of the workers swears. “You can’t do this!”

  “There’s no other choice,” Emmet replies coldly.

  “You will each receive two weeks’ pay and a train ticket home,” I add. “Isn’t that right, Emmet?”

  Emmet glares at me. Clearly he had not been planning that. “Yes, yes, of course. If you go peacefully. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have business to attend to.” He slinks away, keeping his eyes on us as if afraid to turn his back. When he has gone, the workers begin to dissipate, still grumbling. The performers, spared for now, go more quietly to rehearse.

  At last only Noa and I remain outside the big top. Behind us, there is a clattering noise and I turn in time to see the two workers who had gotten Metz down carry his body from the big top. “Oh!” Noa says, covering her mouth with her hand. “Astrid, I still don’t understand it. Even if things were so bad, to just give up like that...”

  “Don’t judge,” I say, the rebuke in my voice sharper than I intended. “Sometimes the running just gets to be too much.”

  22

  Noa

  The next day, Emmet blocks my way as I start from the cook tent back to our cabin after breakfast. “Where’s Astrid?” he demands, arms crossed. “She isn’t back to practicing?” he presses.

  “Not yet,” I say. I shift the bowl of porridge I’ve taken for Astrid out of his view.

  “Now that we are out of Thiers, there’s no reason for her not to rejoin the show. So why hasn’t she?”

  “She doesn’t feel well,” I say, lying for Astrid instinctively, even though it could cost me my job if Emmet found out. In some sense it is true. “And we tried yesterday—you saw that. But then there was that business with the worker...”

  He waves his hand, as though the clockmaker was of no consequence. “She needs to be back in the show by tomorrow,” Emmet says. “Everyone has to pull his weight around here. No more lollygagging for that one,” he adds. The notion of Astrid being lazy is so ridiculous I almost laugh aloud. I want to argue again that it is too soon for her to swing again after all that she has been through, that she needs a few more days to get back on her feet. But I know he will not be swayed. Taking my silence as agreement, he continues on.

  I begin to walk again, pulling my coat over my head to avoid the thick spring drizzle that has begun to fall. I peer across the roadway where a thin strip of river separates us from the town of Colmar. I had crossed the bridge into town once since our arrival to see if there was anything to be had at market beyond our tiny rations. But my trip had been useless: the lone seller at what had once been a bustling town market had only some unidentifiable meat, which would have been too tough for Theo even without the foul smell. Indeed, the whole town seemed to be stripped bare by the years of war. The streets were nearly deserted at midday, except for a stray dog by the gutter and the SS, who seemed to watch from every corner. The shutters on the houses and shops were drawn. The faces of the few townsfolk I saw (all women, since the local men had been drafted against their will and sent in droves to fight in the east) were pinched by hunger and fear. We might as well have been back in Germany. I hurried from the town center, past the barbed wire and ditches that had been erected as a kind of haphazard fortification around the perimeter, and returned to the fairgrounds. I had not gone into town again since.

  I head toward the cabin, recalling Emmet’s angry red face as he insisted Astrid perform.

  Since we arrived in Alsace nearly a week ago, she has lain in bed, curled up like a wounded animal. Other than her one attempt to return to the big top that ended when we found the clockmaker, she hasn’t left the cabin. I’ve stayed close, doing what I can for her. It is not enough, though. Every last bit of her will seems gone. Save her, Peter’s eyes had seemed to say in those final minutes before he was taken. But how? Even if I feed her, make her drink, her spirit is gone. I can barely care for Theo and myself—under the weight of all three of us, I will break.

  What will Emmet do if Astrid refuses to return to the show? I shiver at the thought. I need to get her up and moving.

  As I pass the train parked and empty at the end of the line, my eyes travel wistfully to the underside of our sleeper car and the belly box where Luc and I had once left word for one another. I wonder if Luc might have followed the circus after we had left Thiers, but know that it is impossible. I walk to the box and pull it open, almost hoping that something might be there. Of course it is empty. I run my hand over the rough wood, imagining Luc doing the same.

  Inside the cabin, I am surprised to find Astrid sitting up on the bed in her dressing gown. “Peter...” Astrid says as I near.

  I freeze. Has she gone mad from all of her grief? “No, it’s me, Noa,” I say, stepping closer. She is not having delusions of Peter, but rather staring at a crumpled photograph. I approach Astrid carefully and get a better look at the picture. It is one I have never seen before of the two of them sitting in the backyard under a parasol on a sunny day in street clothes, not costume.

  “Where was that taken?” As she passes it to me, I notice that her once-perfect manicure is gone, the nails shredded where she has chewed on them.

  “A little town just outside Salzburg. It was in summer, the first season after I returned.” Before I had arrived, I think. It feels strange to imagine the circus when I was not here. “We weren’t together yet, you know, just getting to know each other.” She smiles, her eyes far away. “We would talk and play cards for hours. He was fierce at card games, gin rummy, poker. We would start with a drink in the afternoon and the next thing I knew the whole night had passed.”

  I study the photograph. Even then, Peter’s eyes were somber—as though he knew what was to come. “It would have been his birthday tomorrow,” she adds, and her expression saddens once more. She speaks as though he is already dead. I fight the urge to correct her, not wanting to offer false hope.

  From the other cot, Theo stirs. I pick him up, kissing the top of his head. Our one blessing. Through all of the hardship, Theo has thrived. His cheeks are still round and his hair has grown thick and curly, a dark meringue. Still holding Theo, I sit down beside Astrid gently. Everything has been taken from her—a chance at a child, the man she loves. She simply has nothing left—except us. I wrap my arms around her.

  But it is not my warmth she seeks. She reaches for Theo and I pass him to her, offering one of the few comforts that remain, pressing him into her arms. She clings to him like a buoy at sea, seeming to draw strength from his tiny body.

  I pick up the still-warm bowl of porridge and bring it closer to her, but she shakes her head. “Astrid, you have to eat.”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “Think of Peter.”

  “I am thinking of him.”

  “Every second, I know. But is this what he would want for you?” She reluctantly takes a mouthful and turns away once more.

  “Emmet was asking for you,” I say hesitantly.

  She raises an eyebrow. “Again?” I nod. He is the boss and even Astrid will push him only so far. But what can he do to her, really?

  “Please, Astrid. We need you. I need you.” Astrid is my only friend in the world and I am losing her.

  Astrid raises an eyebrow, as though the thought has never quite occurred to her. She sighs, then stands up. She takes off her dressing go
wn and I am surprised to find she is already wearing her leotard. Gratitude washes over me. She will not let me down. “Let’s rehearse,” she commands.

  We step outside. It is midmorning and the backyard is busy with trainers feeding the animals, performers on their way to practice. The few laborers who remain struggle to mend equipment and put things in place with a third of their usual number.

  At the door of the tent, she turns to me. “I don’t want to do this.”

  Is it Peter or the baby or Metz? I wonder. I squeeze her hand. “I understand. But you can do it. I know you can.”

  At least she is here, willing to try. I start for the ladder. Then looking up where the man had hung, my stomach turns. I stop, still holding on to the ladder and staring upward.

  I wonder if the memory of the clockmaker will stop Astrid. But she climbs the opposite ladder without hesitation. Then, halfway up, she stops and grows concerned. “Something is not right,” she says.

  Nothing is right. The fairgrounds had not been prepared when we arrived, the earth rough and strewn with debris. “I asked about leveling the ground,” I say. I’ve performed here with Gerda a handful of times, gotten used to the rickety apparatus and the way that the slope of the earth changes my fall. But Astrid has not been here since we’ve come to the town. To her it is jarring, a disgrace.

  “Is it the ladder?” I ask, tugging on it to show her that it is firmly secured.

  But she shakes her head sadly. “It is just everything.”

  I watch her intently, waiting for her to climb back down and insist on seeing the head of the grounds crew. She might refuse to perform. Then she shrugs and keeps climbing. Even this does not matter anymore. She reaches the top and grabs the bar, nearly losing her balance. It is too soon, I fret; forcing her back to the trapeze so quickly had been a mistake. But she rights herself.

  I start up the ladder, wondering if she will need my help. But she holds out her hand to ward me off. “I need to do this myself.” I step away from the ladder and back close to the entrance, standing in the shadow of the tent flap and giving her space to find the trapeze once more on her own. She leaps without hesitation, seeming to grow stronger and more assured as I watch.