AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“No, ma’am, that’s the sideshow and the carnival that travels with the circus.”
“I see,” she said. She watched the balloon rise higher in the sky, the spotlight hitting on its silvery skin like hundreds of mirrors.
The policeman wore a short club and handcuffs on his belt and had a brush mustache and a merry smile. “Would you like to go there?” he asked.
“I was looking for my son. He loved to go to fairs and the circus when he was a little boy. I took him as often as I could.”
“Your son lives in San Antonio?”
“You could say he’s visiting. He was wounded on the Marne. His name is Ishmael Holland. Is there a jitney or a carriage that could take me to the carnival?”
“Yes, on the next block. You said your son’s name is Holland?”
“You know him?”
“Is he related to a former Texas Ranger?”
“Yes, his father is Hackberry Holland.”
The policeman’s eyes met hers, this time in a different way.
“You know Mr. Holland?” she said.
“Not personally.”
“My son shouldn’t be walking about. His wounds are probably bleeding.”
“That’s a peculiar situation you describe, ma’am. I’m having a bit of trouble understanding what’s going on here.”
“My son fought in a war to help make the crown princes of Europe and Britain richer. The oil reserves in the Arabian deserts weren’t a minor issue, either. Now he’s impaired.”
“Words such as those aren’t much welcomed around here.”
“That’s too bad.” She looked again at his eyes. “Was there something you were going to say about Mr. Holland?”
“He shot and killed a man in a colored house of ill repute. The man he shot was a syndicalist. At least that’s what they’re called hereabouts. Are you feeling all right, ma’am?”
“Yes,” she answered, an army of needles marching down her neck and spine.
“You’re a socialist?” he said.
“Yes, I am. I’m also a friend of Elizabeth Flynn and Emma Goldman.”
“I don’t know who those people are. Do you still want to go to the carnival?”
“I don’t know if I have enough money for a jitney. Is there public transportation?” she said, the sound of her words unfamiliar, uttered by someone else, like soap bubbles rising one at a time in her throat, her mind unable to shut down the image of Hack Holland killing a union organizer in a brothel.
The policeman reached out and placed his hand lightly on her upper arm. “Steady there.”
“I’m quite all right. I spent a long time on the train. I’m a bit tired, that’s all. Why did Mr. Holland shoot the union man?”
“I don’t know the details. The victim had been in prison for syndicalism. The radicals are upset because he was a war hero and that sort of thing.” He waited for her to speak, but she didn’t. “My fellow police officer parked down the street owes me a favor,” he said. “I’ll ask him to drive you to the carnival. Ma’am, did you hear me? Would you like my friend to drive you?”
“Yes. Please. That’s very gracious of you.”
“This isn’t a city to have trouble in.” The policeman gazed across the street, where two other policemen were dragging a man in a slug cap and disheveled suit out of an alleyway, through the garbage cans, throwing him onto the sidewalk. “I keep my own counsel about various things. You might do the same.”
FOR HACKBERRY, THE end of the day had become a harbinger of death, not simply a gathering of the light on the horizon but a shrinking of it, a compression whereby darkness prevailed over goodness and drew the vestiges of the sun over the earth’s edge, obviating the prospect of another sunrise, another spring, one of bluebonnets and buttercups and Indian paintbrush, another chance at undoing the past and reassembling the broken elements of his life.
