Not a single child is run over. In fact, everyone is brilliant, and none more so than Rosie. She carries Marlena on her pink sequined head during the Spec, curling her trunk in a salute. There’s a clown in front of her, a lanky man who alternately does back flips and cartwheels. At one point, Rosie reaches forward and grabs hold of his pants. She yanks so hard his feet leave the ground. He turns, outraged, to face a smiling elephant. The crowd whistles and applauds, but after that the clown keeps his distance.
When it’s nearly time for Rosie’s act, I sneak into the big top and stand flattened against a section of seats. While the acrobats are receiving their applause, roustabouts run into the center ring, rolling two balls ahead of them: one small, the other large, and both decorated with red stars and blue stripes. Uncle Al raises his arms and glances at the back end. He looks right past me, making eye contact with August. He gives a slight nod and flicks one hand at the band leader, who slides into a Gounod waltz.
Rosie enters the big top, promenading beside August. She carries Marlena on her head, her trunk curled in a salute and her mouth open in a smile. When they enter the center ring, Rosie lifts Marlena from her head and places her on the ground.
Marlena skips theatrically around the border, a whirl of shimmering pink. She smiles, spinning, throwing her arms out and blowing kisses to the crowd. Rosie follows at a fast clip, her trunk curled high in the air. August moves beside her, hovering with the silver-tipped cane rather than the bull hook. I watch his mouth, lip-reading the Polish phrases he’s learned by rote.
Marlena dances around the ring’s perimeter one more time and comes to a stop beside the smaller ball. August brings Rosie to the center of the ring. Marlena watches and then turns to the audience. She puffs up her cheeks and wipes a hand across her forehead in an exaggerated gesture of exhaustion. Then she sits on the ball. She crosses her legs and sets her elbows upon them, resting her chin in her hands. She taps her foot, rolling her eyes toward the heavens. Rosie observes, smiling, her trunk held high. After a moment, she turns slowly and lowers her enormous gray rear onto the larger ball. Laughter ripples through the crowd.
Marlena does a double take and stands, her jaw dropped in mock outrage. She turns her back on Rosie. The elephant also stands and then shambles around to present Marlena with her tail. The crowd roars with delight.
Marlena looks back and scowls. With dramatic flair, she lifts one foot and plants it on her ball. Then she crosses her arms in front of her and nods once, deeply, as if to say, Take that, elephant.
Rosie curls her trunk, lifts her right front foot, and sets it gently on her ball. Marlena glares, furious. Then she thrusts both arms out to the side and lifts her other foot from the ground. She straightens her knee slowly, her other leg pointing to the side, toes extended like a ballerina’s. Once her leg is straight she lowers her second foot so that she’s standing on the ball. She smiles broadly, sure that she has finally outsmarted the elephant. The audience claps and whistles, also sure. Marlena shuffles around so her back is to Rosie and lifts her arms in victory.
Rosie waits a moment, and then sets her other front foot on the ball. The crowd explodes. Marlena does a double take over her shoulder. She shuffles back around so that she’s facing Rosie and once again places her hands on her hips. She frowns deeply, shaking her head in frustration. She lifts a finger and starts wagging it at Rosie, but after just a moment she freezes. Her face lights up. An idea! She raises her finger high in the air, turning so that the whole audience can absorb that she is about to outdo the elephant once and for all.
She concentrates for a moment, staring down at her satin slippers. And then, to a rising drum roll, she starts shuffling her feet, rolling the ball forward. She goes faster and faster, her feet a blur of motion, rolling the ball around the ring as the audience claps and whistles. Then there is a wild explosion of delighted cries—
Marlena stops and looks up. She has been so busy concentrating on her ball that she hasn’t noticed the ridiculous sight behind her. The pachyderm is perched on the larger ball, with all four feet crowded together and her back arched. The drum roll begins again. At first, nothing. Then, slowly, slowly, the ball begins to roll under Rosie’s feet.
The bandmaster signals the band into a fast number, and Rosie moves the ball a dozen feet. Marlena smiles in delight, clapping, extending her hands toward Rosie and inviting the crowd to adore her. Then she hops down from her ball and skips over to Rosie, who climbs rather more carefully down from hers. She drops her trunk and Marlena sits in its curve, hooks an arm around it, and points her toes daintily. Rosie raises her trunk, holding Marlena aloft. Then she deposits Marlena on her head and departs the big top to the cheers of an adoring crowd.
And then the shower of money starts—the sweet, sweet shower of money. Uncle Al is delirious, standing in the center of the hippodrome track with his arms and face raised, basking in the coins that rain down on him. He keeps his face raised even as coins bounce off his cheeks, nose, and forehead. I think he may actually be crying.
COURTESY OF TIMOTHY TEGGE, TEGGE CIRCUS ARCHIVES, BARABOO, WISCONSIN
Eighteen