‘...joints stiffened,’ said Milly. ‘And so now we’re here...’
‘...selling tickets and welcoming...’
‘...the world to meet our...’
‘...wonderful family.’
I was very much warming to these two old charmers and was keen to find out more about them and their lives in he circus, but another charmer had appeared.
‘Emily! Emily,’ said Colonel Dawlish. ‘You came.’
‘But of course,’ she replied.
‘And you brought... but wait, who’s this with you? Surely that’s not Florence Armstrong, lady’s maid and all-England Mazurka champion? In rational costume?’
I bowed.
‘Why the devil,’ he asked, laughing, ‘are you dressed like that?’
‘You distinctly said, “riding togs”,’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘Didn’t he, Flo?’
‘He did, it’s true,’ I said.
‘I suppose I did at that,’ he said with a grin. ‘Well done, you. But where did you get...?’
‘I shall tell you the full story one day, dear heart, but it shall suffice for you to know for now that I had need of a disguise at Kidderminster in 1904.’
‘I’d like to meet the man who would be fooled by the sight of that behind in those jodhpurs and give him the address of my optician,’ he said. ‘But in truth you look fantastic, the pair of you. Just right for the circus. Come on, I’ll show you round.’
We offered our thanks to Milly and Molly for their hospitality and took our leave.
The walkway led from the box office, forming a short avenue that led to the entrance to the magnificent Big Top. About halfway there, it branched to left and right at a small crossroads, with an oversized road sign at its centre pointing to “Big Top”, “Mysteries” and “Wonders”. We took the left turn to the mysteries.
The meandering path took us past a series of small tents, each with a sign above. There was “The Great Sandino – Magician” and “Pierre Marron – Mind Reader”.
‘How wonderfully exotic,’ I said, longing to go inside and see a show.
‘Leonard Sanderson from Ipswich and Peter Brown from Salford,’ said Dawlish. ‘Lovely chaps, great showmen.’
There were smaller tents for clairvoyants, palmists, and mediums and then as the path rounded the corner, yet more containing, so said the signs, a fat lady, a tattooed lady and “Wilfred Carney – England’s Seventh Smallest Man”.
‘Seventh smallest?’ said Lady Hardcastle.
‘So we boldly claim,’ said Dawlish. ‘To be honest, I doubt if he’s in the top twenty, but, you know, “seven dwarves” and all that? Brothers Grimm?’
‘Aha,’ she said. ‘Of course.’
There were more tents farther on, but we’d already turned back.
‘You look quite giddy there, Flo,’ said Lady Hardcastle.
Against all my instincts, I really was rather enchanted by the place. ‘It’s like the most wonderful little fantasy village,’ I said,
‘Very much like one,’ said Dawlish. ‘A greedy, hungry, messy, chaotic village with all the squabbles, rivalries, friendships and romance of the real thing. And when we’ve sucked a place entirely dry of all its spare cash we can pack it all up and move out in less than twelve hours to go and find somebody else to fleece.’
‘You can’t fool me with your sham cynicism, George Dawlish,’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘I see through you. You love it.’
‘The truth is, I really rather think I do. It’s the camaraderie of the army without the shouting and shooting. Don’t get me wrong, I do love to shout and shoot – there’s not a man this side of the Shanghai docks who loves the army more than I – but there’s something really rather splendid about this ragtag troop of misfits and outsiders. And although they’ll happily relieve a chap of his last farthing, they offer him a belly laugh or a few moments’ goggle-eyed amazement in return.’
By now we’d passed the crossroads and were heading towards “Wonders”. Here we found larger tents for the acrobats and jugglers, the contortionist, the strongman and the prize fighter. We carried on through to a canvas wall and Colonel Dawlish lifted a flap and ushered us behind the scenes.
Part of me was disappointed by how prosaic the camp was beyond the public areas. The magic of the bright colours and cleverly-laid pathways that slowly revealed new delights to the wandering visitor gave way to an orderly array of tents and wagons very much like – as one might expect from something organized by Colonel Dawlish – an army camp. Sleeping quarters, a mess tent, an open area for meetings and rehearsals and, off to one side, rows of wagons for the wild animals and “stables” for the many, many horses. The circus was rare in that it didn’t seem to have a menagerie, but I could see a lion cage as well as an enormous travelling cage for the elephant.
‘I hope you’re both hungry,’ said Colonel Dawlish and led the way to the mess tent.
The tent was already filling up with high-spirited circus folk, many already sitting and eating, chattering noisily, and some still queuing for their bowl of stew. There was bread and fruit on the tables, and jugs of ale and water.
We waited in line behind Colonel Dawlish who introduced us to the cook, a mountain of a man with a prodigious beard and a ready laugh who seemed to be called Babble. He dolloped generous helpings of a delicious-looking vegetable stew into tin bowls and we carried them towards a table near the corner of the tent where there appeared to be a little space remaining.
‘Did you say that man’s name was Babble, Colonel?’ I asked as we sat down.
‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘Babbling Brook: cook. It got shortened to Babble. His real name’s Bert Smith but I don’t remember the last time anyone called him that.’
We seemed to be joining a group of friends at the table and they shuffled along the benches a little to make room for us.
‘Lady Hardcastle,’ said Colonel Dawlish with formality, ‘please allow me to introduce my dear friends and colleagues.’
He indicated the first, a fair-haired woman of average height, lightly built but with the appearance of a subtle strength. Even sitting down she appeared graceful. ‘This is Miss Prudence Hallows, our trapeze artist.’
Next to her was a large, dark-haired man with an impressively luxuriant beard and an avuncular twinkle in his eyes. His shoulders seemed about to burst from his shirt and the forearms which emerged from his rolled-up sleeves looked to be thicker than my own legs. ‘This is Mr Abraham Bernbaum,’ said Colonel Dawlish, ‘our strongman.’
‘Next, we have Mr Jonas Grafton, our chief clown.’ He was clean shaven and plain and might easily have been a chief clerk rather than a chief clown. Or even a clergyman.
‘Mr Augustus Noakes, our lion tamer,’ said Colonel Dawlish, indicating a red-headed man with an extravagantly curled moustache.