Pegasus: A Novel (18 page)

They rehearsed diligently every day, and by the time they left for New York at the
beginning of April, Christianna looked like an angel on Athena’s back. She was nervous
at first, but she had exceptionally good balance, for obvious reasons, and she managed
to stand on the Lipizzaner’s back for part of the routine that Nick had designed,
and was comfortable in the saddle the rest of the time, riding beside Nick on Pegasus,
the two horses moving in split-second precision around the ring. Nick was thrilled
with how far they’d gotten with the new routine, and Christianna learned quickly.
And she had gotten better
every day. They still made mistakes, but very, very few, and none the crowd would
see. And he loved doing it with her. John North had been right—it added a measure
of elegance and excitement to Nick’s act. He could hardly wait to try it out in front
of an audience. They were both excited about it when he walked her back to her trailer,
the night before they left Sarasota. And they ran into her father and brothers and
younger sister when they finished their rehearsal. Nick greeted them politely, chatted
with her brothers for a few minutes, and then left to get back to his boys. Like everyone
else, he still had a lot to do before they left the next morning.

The day they left Sarasota to begin touring, later than usual this year, everyone
was excited to leave, and Lucas thought it was the most exciting day of his life.
The big cats were loaded onto the train, along with the elephants and other animals.
Nick loaded all his horses in a trailer early that morning after feeding and watering
them. There were roustabouts and handlers on the train to feed the animals and tend
to their needs. Many of the performers were taking the train, but some were driving
their trailers, as Christianna’s family was planning to do, and Nick with his boys,
following the train. The big equipment was being transported by rail and a fleet of
trucks. It looked like the whole town was leaving, which was nearly true, and it would
be eight or nine months before they returned, after touring the country, stopping
in small towns along the way, and occasional big ones, usually for only one night,
and rarely for more than two days, except when they opened in New York, where they
always spent four weeks at the beginning of their tour. And everyone loved performing
at “the Garden” because the conditions there were so good.

Nick had been told the tour would be grueling, but his boys didn’t care. And they
were looking forward to being in New York for almost
a month. Toby had asked to ride with Katja’s family, and Rosie was going to travel
the first day with Lucas and Nick. It seemed a fair trade.

Nick stopped briefly to see Christianna before they left. It would be many hours,
or even the next day, before he could see her again. She was wearing a white cotton
sundress and dance shoes that were too worn for the high wire. He gave her a quick
kiss before they took off. Her brothers and sister were already waiting for her in
their trailer, and her father and aunt were taking the train.

“My brothers are getting suspicious,” she whispered as he kissed her again. They had
been talking lately about saying something to them, but they were both sure there
would be a reaction. His presence in her life, and his concern for her well-being
was a huge threat to them. And they weren’t pleased that John Ringling North wanted
her to perform with him. They thought it diluted the impact of her own act later in
the show. According to them, high-wire artists didn’t perform on horses like acrobats.
But North was the president of the circus, and as Christianna pointed out to her brothers,
his word was law, and they had to agree. And Nick and Christianna were delighted at
the legitimate excuse to work together and no one could object. And the act that Nick
had designed for them was beautiful and artistic.

“See you later,” he whispered after a last kiss and hurried off, and she was smiling
as she got into the trailer and they started on the long journey to New York.

They had been driving for several hours when her oldest brother, Peter, asked her
about Nick.

“What’s going on with you two?” he inquired as he took a bite of an apple. Their little
sister, Mina, was asleep next to him on the couch. And their three other brothers
were taking turns driving.
Their wives had gone on the train to take care of their aunt and father-in-law.

“Nothing. Why?” She had never lied to him before, but she didn’t want to share what
was happening with Nick. She wasn’t ready to yet. What they had belonged to them,
and she felt loyal to Nick, and wanted to protect him, and herself. “We’ve been working
on the act Mr. North wants us to do.”

“And what else?” Her brother was smiling at her. “You can tell me,” he pried with
a knowing look. He always treated her like a child, no different than her thirteen-year-old
sister.

“There’s nothing to tell. He’s a nice man. We’re friends. I like his boys.”

“They’re more your age than he is. He’s old enough to be your father, Christianna.
I hope you realize that.”

“There’s nothing going on,” she repeated with a cold look. She didn’t like being pushed,
and she got on less well with her older brother than the others. He was too much like
their father and had old-fashioned ideas about their act. And he was jealous, and
always had been, that she was the star of the high wire. He had always wanted to take
their father’s place, but he was heavy-set, and the audience liked watching Christianna
better. She was a lot prettier to look at, and steadier on the wire. Peter had fallen
off the low wire many times. And none of her sisters-in-law had ever performed with
them. They were just part of the entourage, and several of them were jealous of her,
too, especially Peter’s wife. Christianna was wary of them both.

“Well, don’t get any ideas about him, just because he looks good on a horse. He’ll
throw you away in five minutes, and he won’t be here long. I know his type. Some fancy
aristocrat with a title, down on his luck, so he joins the circus with his horses
to bail himself out. As soon as he does, he’ll be gone. And don’t let him make you
believe
anything else.” Christianna didn’t think he’d be there long either, but for different
reasons. He deserved a better life than this, and wasn’t suited to it, even if he
was a good sport about it. He had long since told her why he had left Germany and
what he was doing there, but she couldn’t imagine him staying either, once Germany
returned to normal, which they all felt sure it would one day. The current insanity,
under Hitler, couldn’t last forever.

And if he didn’t go back to Germany, Nick talked about breeding horses one day, Lipizzaners,
maybe on a ranch. He didn’t have the money for it now, but maybe he would in time,
while Pegasus was still young enough to breed. There was plenty of time for that,
the stallion would live for another twenty-five years. But it was his dream. And in
twenty-five years, Nick would be the right age to retire. She would have to leave
the high wire long before that, no matter how good she was now. She could do it for
another ten or twelve years, if she was lucky. And then Mina would have to take over,
or someone else. But at least she and Nick could dream. For now, it was all she had.

“Has he said anything to you?” Peter asked persistently, as he finished the apple
and tossed the core out the window of the trailer, while looking intently at her.

“Why should he? All we do is work together, and I have a lot to learn.” Peter nodded,
satisfied for the moment. He wasn’t sure if he believed her. He had seen how Nick
looked at her, especially when she was on the wire. Everything he felt for her was
in his eyes. Peter was glad Christianna hadn’t noticed. It would only be trouble if
she did, but he knew she was an innocent girl and never looked at men. Her brothers
and father wouldn’t have been happy if she did. There were plenty of loose women in
the circus, and he wouldn’t tolerate his sister being one of them, although he had
been known to be enticed by them himself, unbeknownst to his wife. Christianna knew
that her brothers all misbehaved with the circus women, but she was a girl, and they
had different rules for her. She never let on to her brothers about what she saw or
knew, or that she’d heard talk about them with other women. It was one of the reasons
she was never interested in circus men. A lot of them played around and cheated on
their wives.

“I’d say he has a lot more to learn than you do,” Peter said disparagingly about Nick.
“He has no idea what the circus is all about.”

“He’s a decent man,” she said coldly to her brother. “And a good father. And I’m sure
he was kind to his wife.” All of which was more than she could say for her brother,
who slapped his wife around whenever he drank too much. It was common in the circus,
both drink and bad treatment of their women, who got even with them by sleeping with
other men. Christianna didn’t like their morality or values, or some of the games
people played. She just did her work on the high wire, and took care of her father,
aunt, and little sister. It was enough for her, or it had been until Nick arrived.
Now she wanted more, with him. And he was so infinitely better than her brothers,
such a gentleman, and so good to her. She couldn’t imagine ever being lucky enough
to have a life with a man like him. In that, she knew her brother was right, and believed
it herself. Despite his promises, she was sure that when Nick got back on his feet
and had enough money saved, or when Germany got sane, he would leave the circus, and
he wouldn’t be taking her. She could never fit into his real life. She was just a
girl in the circus, but she was grateful to be in his life now. She was living their
love from day to day.

“Just see that you don’t get any fancy ideas,” her brother warned her, and then went
up front to ride with the others, while Christianna lay on the couch with her sister
and thought about Nick. And after a while, she fell asleep, dreaming of him.

Nick was having fun with Rosie and Lucas, playing guessing games with them along the
way. The convoy of trailers and circus trucks seemed endless, as they wended their
way north. Most of them drove late into the night, the riders taking turns driving.
But Toby was too young to drive, so Nick usually did it all himself. He went to check
on the horses when they made a stop, and they were doing fine. He made sure that they
had enough water and feed, cleaned their trailer, and got back in the truck. Nick
was thinking of Christianna and wished they could have traveled together. And he wanted
to go and visit her when they stopped for the night. She had asked him not to before
they left Sarasota, and he agreed. He was thinking about her when she suddenly appeared
next to his trailer late that night.

“What are you doing here?” He looked happy to see her, and surprised. The boys were
already asleep, and he’d been outside, smoking a last cigarette before he went to
bed. The air was cool, and he was relaxing, thinking of her. “Did you escape?” he
asked, and she nodded with a mischievous smile, and looked like a naughty child. He
laughed with pleasure and pulled her into his arms to kiss her and hold her for a
few minutes.

“Everyone’s asleep,” she giggled, “my brothers drank too much when we stopped.” It
was a bad habit they had. And it had been a long boring day for them all.

“I wish we could just run away somewhere,” he said longingly, as they sat next to
each other on the trailer’s front step. There were a million stars in the sky, and
they could hear murmurs and soft laughter in the distance, but for the most part,
the trailers were quiet, and most of them were dark. It was late.

“Where would you run away to?” she asked with tender eyes. There was a sliver of moon
overhead. “Back to Germany?”

He hesitated for a long moment. “I don’t know. It’s not a good
place to be anymore. Back to the way it used to be, yes. Now, I don’t know where I’d
go.” He no longer had a country or a home. All he had now was a woman he loved, which
suddenly seemed like a lot, and much more than he’d had before. He pulled her closer
to him, and then smiled into her eyes that turned a deep ocean blue in the night.
She was the most beautiful woman he’d ever known.

“Where would you go if you ran away?” he asked her, and she looked up at him so innocently
that it tore at his heart.

“To you,” she said simply. The answer seemed easy for her. He held her tight and closed
his eyes, wishing that the world were different and he could give her what he’d once
had. He had nothing to give her now, except his love.

They sat for a long time in silence and then she stirred. “I’d better go back, in
case one of them wakes up.” He wished for an instant that she could stay there with
him, but there was no way that was possible, and his boys were with him.

He kissed her again, and she scampered off as silently as she had come. She was like
a vision that he conjured up whenever he thought of her or needed her, and suddenly
there she was, and then gone again, like a dream in the night.

And when she got back to her trailer, she could hear her brothers snoring, sprawled
out in the living room and on the floor. She quietly slipped into her bedroom, put
on her nightgown, and went to bed next to her sister, thinking of Nick.

The next morning they set off again at dawn, to travel the rest of the way to New
York. They made it at nearly midnight, and from then on, the roustabouts worked hard,
unloading equipment and setting things up. It was an enormous undertaking, which required
nearly
all the heavy manpower they had. The performers had nothing to do with it, but the
roustabouts and handlers had a big job.

The cages had to be rolled into place for the first acts and the tunnel cages that
led to them. The high wire, the trapezes, the poles, and the ropes all had to be put
in place. They worked all night and into the next day, and some of the clowns helped.
And they had to rehearse after traveling for two days. The acrobats and gymnasts always
complained of being stiff. The wardrobe mistresses had to organize costumes. There
were a thousand things to do. And Nick and Toby had to exercise the horses before
they rehearsed. Pegasus was prancing the moment Nick got on his back, the young stallion
was tired of being confined and excited to see Nick.