A Curious Beginning

“At last, Stoker—enter!”


Mr. Stoker lifted the flap and gestured for me to follow. What I stepped into was a scene straight out of a dream. The tent itself was hung with garish silks and more of the Chinese lanterns, its floor fashioned from a layer of thin Turkey carpets. But it was not the odd decor that caught my attention. The tent was full of people, and not one of them was like anyone I had encountered before. There was a woman so enormously fat that her chair was the size of three armchairs fitted together. She held a plate of cream cakes and was working her way through the lot, munching with diligent delicacy. Beside her stood a man with the face of a lion, his features obscured by a full growth of hair some four inches long, and wearing a full-dress military uniform with an astonishing array of medals and decorations. He rested his hand on the back of a rocking chair in which a very elderly lady seemed to be sleeping. Next to them stood the largest man I had ever seen, for if Mr. Stoker was a good six feet in height, this fellow was seven, with the sort of bulging muscles one seldom saw outside of caricature. Next to him sat two chairs almost back to back. There were no arms between the chairs, and I soon realized why. The pair of gentlemen seated in them was conjoined at the ribs and sat, rather like bookends, the back of one man’s shoulder touching the back of his brother’s. One of them held an accordion, the source of the strange music, while the other held only a slender cigarette in a holder a foot long. This he waved as we entered.

“Make way, make way, the bridegroom cometh!” he cried, waving his cigarette holder in a purely theatrical gesture.

Mr. Stoker moved to stand in front of him, pushing me along in front.

“Good evening, Professor,” he said. “It has been a while.”

“Two years almost to the day since you left us,” the professor said silkily.

A muscle twitched in Mr. Stoker’s jaw, and I understood then that he was wary of the reception he might find here. “I realize my leave-taking was a trifle sudden,” he began, but the professor waved him to silence.

“And yet the prodigal always returns; is that not what the Bible teaches us? And meting out the just deserts. I seem to recall something about every man receiving just what he is owed,” he remarked with a thin smile that did not reach his eyes. He shifted his gaze to me, giving me a curiously appraising look.

Mr. Stoker spoke. “May I present my bride, Veronica Stoker? Veronica, this is Professor Pygopagus.”

To his credit, he did not stumble over either my name or the word “bride.” He was watching me closely, and I had the strangest feeling that however I handled myself in the next few minutes would prove crucial to our future cordiality with one another.

I stepped forward and extended my hand. “How do you do, Professor?”

The professor clasped my hand and gave a little crow of delight. “Look, children—Stoker has brought us a bride! My dear, you are most welcome to our little family of curiosities,” he said, but there was no real warmth in his voice. He held my hand in his, and I felt the skin slide over fleshless bones as he continued to speak. “Now, there are far more members in our traveling show than are gathered here, but you will appreciate that it is very late, and the others have retired. They require more beauty sleep than the rest of us,” he added with a twist of his lips. “Permit me to introduce you.”

He gestured to each of the others theatrically. “First, my dear Madame du Lait. Madame? Madame!” He clapped his hands together sharply. The elderly woman in the rocking chair started and lifted a brass ear trumpet as she cocked her head.

“What? Why do you disturb me?” she demanded irritably. She was swathed in half a dozen shawls and traveling rugs, and she peered out at the company with colorless eyes filmy with age.

“My dear Madame, I wish to present our newest arrival, Mrs. Stoker. Stoker has returned and brought his bride.”

It took three more attempts to make her understand, but when she did, the withered old face pulled a frown. “Stoker!” she exclaimed. “I never liked him. Moody little devil.”

“Ah, but I am certain you will find his wife charming,” the professor instructed, his mouth twitching with a smile. I moved to shake her hand, but she had already fallen asleep again. The professor made a gesture of dismissal. “One must make allowances, my dear. She is one hundred and fifty-three years old. She was Napoleon’s wet nurse.”

From behind me, I heard Stoker murmur dryly, “And for an extra halfpenny, she’ll show you the teat where she gave him suck.”