Death of A Clown Read online

  Tony appears at the door, his face ashen and drawn. He nods to the two men and they step aside. Turning, Tony goes back inside without saying a word. I follow. With a fleeting look over to the three hospital beds, I half-expect to see Catalena lying in one of them, as if this is a big

  misunderstanding. Instead, a sheet-covered body lies on the ground just inside the doorway. Dangling from one of overhead tent poles is the pale blue belt of a robe, a ragged cut at the bottom.

  Constantin sits on one of the beds, holding his head in his hands, intermittently wailing or crying out words I can’t understand. Ioana is on the floor at his feet, tears streaming down her face.

  “Oh, God, Tony,” I whisper, looking down at the white sheeted form. “Is that…?

  Before he can answer, Sheriff Draeger emerges from a corner of the patient’s area carrying a notepad and pencil. He walks around the body, but stops when he sees me. Looking back at the grieving family, he gestures for us to move away to another part of the tent.

  “What’s she doing here?” he asks Tony, while looking at me.

  “I’d asked Miss Deane to help out with some things,” Tony answers vaguely, then turns to me. “Maybe you’d better leave, Jeri. I’ll talk to you later.”

  “This little lady seems to be in on everything, Mr. Phillips,” the sheriff says in an accusing tone of voice. I’m about to say something, fight for my right to be there when he focuses on Tony. “Well, it looks like you and your circus are in a packet of trouble.”

  “Maybe not,” Tony says. “Maybe this is the end of the trouble.”

  “What are you thinking, mister?” The sheriff’s eyes narrow on Boss Man.

  I stand speechless, watching this exchange.

  Tony pulls himself up to his full height, putting on what I have come to know as his mock-sincere, showman face. “Maybe the girl was fooling around with the clown, got pregnant and found out he was leaving. One thing led to another. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.”

  “What are you saying?” I ask, horrified.

  A look of comprehension crosses Sheriff Draeger’s face and he begins to nod his head. “I see what you’re getting at. She gets in the family way. This Connors decides to run out on her, leaving her holding the bag. She finds out, creeps up behind him and strangles him with the wire. Then she loses the baby, and in a fit of remorse, hangs herself. I already got that nurse’s testimony about finding her swinging.”

  “I’m not saying that’s the way it was,” Tony says smoothly. “I’m merely offering that as a possible --”

  “How could she strangle Eddie?” I interrupt, louder than I intend. Lowering my voice, I add, “That’s absurd.”

  “Now, now,” the sheriff says, looking at me. “We all know you gals aren’t the same as other women. You’re stronger, a lot like a man. I saw them muscles on you yesterday, Miss Deane. You could lick a lot of men I know. Not me, of course, but—“

  “I’m not saying that’s the way it was but…” Tony says again, letting his words drop off and looking at the shorter man. His expression is filled with expectation.

  “It fits, it fits.” The sheriff has a smug look on his face.

  “It doesn’t fit,” I retort.

  The sheriff glares at me. “Yes, it does and that’s what I’m putting in my report.” He looks at Tony. “That might mean you don’t have to close your circus, Mr. Phillips. We got our killer, a scorned woman.”

  “I can’t believe either of you --” I start.

  Tony’s voice overrides mine. “What happens now, sheriff?” he says, putting a hand on the pudgy sheriff’s arm and steering him away from me. I follow. Tony shoots me a warning look over his shoulder.

  Draeger closes his notebook and puts the pencil in his shirt pocket, chatting in a low voice, as he walks. “First thing, we’ll remove the body to the mortuary. Her family can take it

  from there. Then I’ll give my report to the city council. There’ll be an inquest but that’s a formality.”

  I ignore Tony and go around to the other side of the sheriff. “You can’t mean this--”

  “That’s enough, Jeri,” Tony interrupts. His voice is low and menacing. He turns to Sheriff Draeger with a smile. “The

  circus will cooperate in any way we can. Let me know if there’s anything we can do.”

  Yeah, I think, what are you going to do, Tony? Throw another thousand bucks his way?

  “I’ll get my men in here to take the body away. I’ll leave you to take care of your own people, Mr. Phillips,” the sheriff says, giving me a disgusted look.

  I watch Tony escort the sheriff to the tent exit. When he turns around, I open my mouth to speak but he grabs me roughly by the arm and pulls me back to the same corner as before.

  “Shut up, Jeri. It’s over.”

  I break free of his grasp. “It’s over? What’s over? Catalena didn’t kill that boy.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “I do know that. Even if she could strangle him with the wire, how the hell could she pull his dead weight into the lion’s cage? She hardly weighed a hundred pounds. And why would she drag him there? It doesn’t make any sense.” I glare at him. “Listen, you hired me to find out who murdered Eddie and that’s what I’m going to do.”

  He glares back. “Well, I’m un-hiring you.”

  “Tony, it wasn’t Catalena. She was running away with Eddie. She had a bus ticket to Salt Lake City. I found it in her diary.”

  He pulls at his mustache. “Listen to me, Jeri. I don’t know if the girl killed Eddie or not, but I’ve got a circus to think about. And did you see what happened just hours after I

  hired you to look into it? Someone put a hairbrush under your howdah, then cut the cinch for good measure. You were almost killed.”

  His words stop me cold. “Someone put a hairbrush under the cinch?”

  “Yes, it acted like a burr. No wonder Mabel went on a rampage.” I start to speak but he overrides me again. “Jeri, in two months time, we can get Brinks in here, real detectives.

  They can find out what happened, if we still want to know. Let the sheriff think what he’s going to think. We can stay open. Once the press gets wind of his version of this, there will be no more threats of cancellations.”

  I stare at Constantin and his daughter wrapped in a world of tragedy.

  “Meanwhile, the real killer is out there, Tony. And thanks to you and the stupidity of the sheriff, her poor family gets to believe that Catalena killed another human being, as well as taking her own life. That’s not right.”

  “I don’t care about right. I care about protecting you and keeping the Big Top open.”

  “I don’t want your protection.” I say through clenched teeth.

  “Then it’s about keeping the circus open.” His voice is low and hard. “It’s over, Jeri. I’ve made my decision. I’ll want the keys and the chart back before tonight’s show.” And with that, he turns on his heels and walks away, exiting the tent.

  I lean against one of the tent poles and study the Baboescu family’s grief from a distance. Constantin is inconsolable, surrounded by thick walls of desolation, not letting his younger daughter in. I observe the little girl reach out to her father, using a gentle hand or a soft word, and he will have none of it. The scene is all so familiar, it almost kills me.

  I suspect Ioana has always tried to comfort her father, gaining some solace herself by the very act. Maybe now he

  will stop shutting her out. Or maybe one day, something would die inside of her and she’ll stop trying.

  I’m torn between staying in the shadows and going to comfort Ioana, telling her everything will be all right, which is a downright lie. I stay in the shadows.

  Two deputies come in with a gurney and lift the sheeted body onto it. Constantin tries to stop them, yelling incoherently, but is restrained by a third deputy. It’s a terrible, terrible sight.

  I remain in my corner, trying to give the family as much privacy as possible, y
et unwilling to leave. The gurney is carried out, bearing its young burden. I forget to ask about the sirens.

  Doc’s whereabouts come into my mind. I haven’t seen him and know he has to be somewhere nearby. I creep back to his office. He’s sitting at his desk finding relief, once again, in a bottle of Johnnie Walker Red. I call out several times before he hears me.

  “Jeri, is that you?” he says, his back to me. He twists around, watery blue eyes small and swollen. I go over and put my hand on his shoulder.

  “You look like you could use some food, Doc. Let me go get you something.”

  He doesn’t answer. I notice the label has been virtually peeled off this bottle, too; curling, ragged pieces laying about the desk. I take the whiskey from his hand.

  “You’ve had enough, Doc.”

  He smiles. “Now you sound like a wife.” He loses the smile. “I had one once. She’s dead.” I can tell he’s caught up in the past, not a recent one but the past of many years, a past that sweeps him away more and more these days.

  “Doc,” I say, trying to bring him back.

  “Killed waiting at a bus stop. Hit-and-run.”

  I open my mouth to say something but think better of it. He probably won’t hear me, anyway. I sit in the chair on the other side of the desk.

  “I should have been there,” he says, ruffling his grey-white hair with slender fingers. “I should have driven her where she needed to go. Eight and a half months pregnant, standing on a street corner waiting for a bus, but I was too busy making a name for myself.” He looks at me from across the desk. It might as well be from across an ocean.

  “Death is everywhere, you know, just waiting. When you’re a doctor, you think you’re trained to expect it, wait for it, challenge it. But you’re not. I’m not.”

  “I’m sorry, Doc, for all the things that have happened in your life. But right now I need you to tell me about last night. It’s important.” He doesn’t answer, so I press him. “Time’s running out, Doc. Tell me. Please.”

  He looks down and brushes at the curled papers, then worries one of the flaws on his scratched desk. I wait. I can see him fighting something inside of him, maybe those personal demons that hound him so much these days. When he speaks, his voice takes on a monotone.

  “I was asleep. I’d left for my compartment around midnight. The nurse was spending the night with Catalena, as a precaution. We don’t like to leave a patient alone overnight. You know the portable toilets are outside, quite a ways down, near the gorillas. Around four a.m. Laverne had to go to the lavatory. Catalena was sleeping or that’s what the nurse thought. Laverne says she was gone maybe fifteen minutes, twenty at the most. When she came back, she saw Catalena hanging from one of the overhead poles, a chair kicked out

  from under her. Laverne climbed up and tried to free the knot, get her down. Then she found some shears and cut the belt. All the time she was screaming for help, for what she says

  seemed like hours, but there was nobody around to hear. I’d gone back to my compartment. I thought the danger was over. It’s my fault.”

  “It’s not your fault.”

  “I should have stayed with my patient.”

  “You had your nurse stay with the patient. That’s the same thing.”

  He looks me dead in the eye. “It wasn’t enough.” He turns away. “It’s never enough.”

  “Where’s the nurse now?”

  “Laverne’s lying on a cot back there.” He gestures to the supply room. “I gave her a sedative, a heavy dose. She should be out the rest of the day. She has to live with this, you know, for the rest of her life.”

  “I know about things you have to live with, Doc,” I say, my mind flashing back to my last day with Brinks. “Did she find a suicide note?”

  Doc shakes his head. “The sheriff looked but couldn’t find one, either.”

  “What that might mean, Doc, is that if Catalena didn’t take the time to write one, she was a pretty desperate, driven person. It was probably going to happen no matter what

  anybody did. Maybe Catalena had been awake for awhile, only pretending to sleep, waiting for the right time.”

  Doc lay his head down on the desk, pillowed by crossed arms. “I didn’t think about a suicide watch, Jeri, and I should have. The death of her lover, the loss of her baby; it was too much for her. She was only sixteen.” He swallows hard and is still.

  I want to say something of comfort but nothing comes to mind. I feel helpless and inept. The silence becomes stifling.

  “I should go, Doc,” I say, standing. “I can’t do anything here.”

  He nods without looking up. I come to the other side of the desk and lay a hesitant hand on his shoulder.

  “I want you to promise me you’ll get something to eat.”

  “Sure,” he says without moving.

  I know he won’t and I’m not completely sure why I said it. Doc is right. Sometimes, no matter what you do or say, it’s never enough.

  Chapter Fifteen

  8:30 a.m., Monday

  Outside in the bright morning, I lean against a small tractor used to carry feed and grain to the animals around the lot. Birds chirp, the sun shines, the world sparkles. It all feels wrong to me.

  I pluck at my dark green robe. I should go back to the sleeper and dress, I think, but I can’t move, cry or utter a sound. I sink down to the runner of the tractor and close my eyes, putting my head in my hands. The darkness feels good. I’m not sure I ever want to open my eyes again.

  I don’t know how long I sit there but I hear Tin Foot call my name, not once but several times. It sounds as if he’s standing directly above me. I shade my eyes from the sun and look up. The hulking, red-headed man holds two mugs of something hot, tendrils of steam rising, carried off by a soft breeze.

  “Hi, Jeri,” he says, when he knows he has my attention.

  “Hi.” My voice cracks on the word and I clear my throat.

  “I brought you some hot tea with milk. Just the way you like it.” He thrusts the mug in my direction, waving it under my nose.

  “Thanks, Tin,” I say, taking it. I hold it in my hand, watching the steam rise and disappear.

  “Best drink it while it’s hot.” He squats down beside me. I can smell the coffee in his mug.

  I take a sip of tea, but find I can’t swallow. It’s like my throat is too small. The liquid runs down the sides of my mouth and I wipe at it with the sleeve of my robe.

  “I can’t…” I begin to say then stop.

  “Just hold it then, Jeri. It’ll warm your hands. You look cold.”

  I nod and wrap my hands around the thick, white mug, looking at my friend.

  “You know about Catalena?” My voice sounds tight and constricted; the words too insignificant.

  “Yes. Everybody knows. It’s been going on for a couple of hours. I was glad you missed most of it. Nothing you could do. Nothing any of us could do.”

  “She was so young, Tin. She had her whole life before her. I can’t understand it.” My voice breaks.

  “I guess the last twenty-four hours were too much for her.”

  “We’ll never know,” I whisper. “She didn’t leave a suicide note.”

  “How are you doing today?” Tin Foot asks, changing the subject. “You don’t look too bad, considering what you went through last night.” His voice is soft, almost without inflection.

  I glance at my hands and arms. “No, I guess I don’t. I haven’t had a chance to think about it.”

  I take a tenuous sip of tea. This one goes down. It tastes grand. “The sheriff thinks that Catalena killed Eddie and in a fit of remorse, hanged herself.”

  I gulp at the tea and look over the top of my mug at him. While his face registers bafflement, he doesn’t say anything. He drinks more coffee, his expression dark and pensive.

  “He’s going to write that up in his report,” I go on. “That lets the circus off the hook. He says the town won’t close us down now.”

  He grunts.
“What did Boss Man say to all of that?”

  “He planted the seed in the sheriff’s mind, Tin. Tony says he wants me – us -- to stop the investigation.”

  “I’m not surprised.”

  “I’m not going to stop.”

  “I’m not surprised.”

  We sit in silence drinking from our mugs, thinking our own thoughts. Tin Foot turns to me.

  “Well, if we’re not stopping then I’ve got some news for you, Jeri. Actually, a couple of things. Maybe you don’t want to hear them.”

  I look at him and take another swig of tea. “I do. I don’t want to think about Catalena right now. Tell me.”

  “First of all, yesterday at the poker game, the guys were talking about how Eddie owed each of them money they’d never collect. They weren’t mad about it but you know how it is. They’ll never see that money now.”

  “I take it he was a better clown than he was a poker player.”

  “Seems like,” Tin agrees. “After I left, I wrote the names and amounts down on this piece of paper.” He reaches into a pocket and pulls out a folded sheet. “The most was twenty-five bucks to the Bard. He’s the one who dresses up sort of like Shakespeare. He didn’t play cards with us. Said he had a headache or something like that. The guys mentioned that the Bard took Eddie under his wing when the kid first showed up. Strange little man.”

  “That’s the clown who wears the ruff around his neck and drives the little car they all pile into?” Tin Foot nods. I take the sheet without looking at it. “Vince is still the largest amount that you know of?”

  “By a lot,” Tin says. “And here’s something the guys were shocked by. Not that Eddie was running away – he owed a lot of people -- but about the girl.”

  “No one knew about him and Catalena?”

  “They saw the two kids talking now and then but figured they were just pals. Eddie came from a pretty strict Mormon family a few months back.”

  “That doesn’t mean anything. Mormons know what goes where. So the guys didn’t know about the baby?”

  “Not until it got out this morning. I overheard them talking a while ago. They couldn’t believe that he…well… knew Catalena in a Biblical way. Although…” He breaks off.