The light and chatter from the delighted crowds were extinguished as the mouth of the tent was pulled shut. The darkness that enveloped the interior of the small tent felt charged with excitement as the members of the audience went still in anticipation.
A single spotlight beamed suddenly from above, illuminating a solitary cylinder of light in the centre of the round tent. Standing regally in the harsh light was a man clad in a white straight tunic with pantalooned trousers and a ruffled collar, which were accented by slim black dancing slippers on his feet. The skin of his hands was hidden by thin white gloves, while white paint covered his angular face. His facial features, which included high, prominent cheekbones and full lips with sharp, intelligent eyes, were highlighted with black makeup, creating a severe contrast with the rest of his attire. A white, traditional Pagliacci hat was perched jauntily on his head of dark curls - he wore no wig.
This man commanded the attention of the entire tent, though he hadn't even spoken yet; he stood in the spotlight as if he belonged there, completely at ease and taking no notice of the audience surrounding him. He simply stood - tall and elegant, with careless grace.
The audience clapped politely, out of respect, but still he still failed to acknowledge them.
Suddenly, another clown ran out from behind the bleachers, another spotlight turning on to follow his progress into the centre of the ring. This one was much shorter and scrawnier, his rat-like features noticeable even under the layers of bright red makeup and large fake nose. He was clad in various articles of baggy clothing of different plaids and polka dots, and a multicoloured wig sat atop his small head. He grinned and waved cheerfully at the audience, seemingly unaware of the coldness of the first clown, who shared none of his enthusiasm. Jaunty music was playing from some unseen corner of the tent now to match the second clown's excitable attitude.
The short clown had nearly reached the centre when he tripped exaggeratedly, limbs flailing in every direction, earning him a grand rouse of laughter from the audience. He feigned a look of shock before pushing himself back up to his feet, brushing himself off, and skipping to the middle of the tent.
The first clown ignored him, turning around and walking over to a bench that had a bucket of white paint and a paintbrush sitting next to it. The bright clown was completely oblivious, still grinning and waving to the audience and occasionally almost falling over, waving his arms in huge circles in order to regain his balance.
The white clown picked up the paintbrush and painted across the bench. When he was done, he set up a large sign next to the bench that said "CAUTION: WET PAINT" in large capital letters across the front, but when he set it up on the stand, the sign was upside down. He then walked away.
The short clown strolled across the stage towards the bench, kicking his feet and swinging his arms. By the time he reached the bench, he was demonstrating extreme exhaustion, dragging his feet and breathing heavily and pretending to wipe his brow. His face lit up in obvious delight when he spotted the bench in front of him, and he marched over and sat right down on the middle of it. The audience began to giggle, and a few children even yelled out "No!" or "The paint is wet, Mr. Clown! Read the sign!" The clown feigned confusion and acted as though he couldn't understand why the audience was reacting so.
The white clown strolled over, face impassive as ever, and stared at the other clown for a moment before reaching over and flipping over the upside-down "CAUTION: WET PAINT" sign. The short clown leaped off of the bench and turned around, exposing his paint-covered backside to the audience, who roared with laughter. His eyes were wide and his large hands covered his mouth, which was open in a huge "O" of shock. The first clown remained indifferent and graceful, always seeming to be five steps ahead of the audience while the second clown seemed about the same number of steps behind.
The rest of the act continued in much of the same fashion. The white clown strolled around the ring, witty and elegant, while the short clown stumbled around and got pies thrown at him and water squirted on his face, always seeming to be thoroughly enjoying himself and getting the audience excited.
By the end of the act, the audience applauded and cheered as the actors bowed. The short clown did so with many twirls and swoops of his arms and hands, but the white clown's bow was a simple inclination at the waist. The spotlights went off and the clowns disappeared into the dressing area before the main lights came on and the audience began to file out.
In the small adjoining tent that served as a dressing room, the white clown stormed directly up to a weary looking man with grey hair who was organising a mess of costumes on a rack.
"Lestrade, get Anderson out of here. I told you, I can't work with him!" he spat, rounding on the grey-haired man. The distaste on his sharp face was accentuated by the black and white makeup. "Why would you assign him for the afternoon act when you know he crushes any sort of artistic spirit I may have simply by being present in the room?"
"Hey!" the short clown protested, crossing his arms in front of the baggy green and yellow striped vest he wore, but both Lestrade and the white clown ignored him.
"We've been over this, Sherlock," Lestrade said, rubbing the back of his neck wearily. "The new workers don't start until May first, which is today, meaning that they won't even be close to ready to perform in any acts for another week, at the earliest. And since Victor left, it's been nearly impossible to find another stand-in."
"But why did it have to be him?" Sherlock asked, pointing a long, gloved finger at Anderson, who looked like a petulant child in a Halloween costume. "I simply cannot work with him! Couldn't you have found anybody else?"
"Nobody else would agree to work with you, Sherlock," replied Greg. "You've managed to get on the bad side of every Auguste clown we have here at Baker Carnival. Dimmock offered his fair share of profanities when I mentioned your name, and Anderson here was apparently the only one desperate enough to accept the offer. After we offered him double the usual pay, that is."
"Just make sure I never have to perform with him again," Sherlock snarled, waving his hand in Anderson's direction rather than having to look at him.
"Hey!" Anderson protested again. "That was my best performance yet! The audience loved me!"
"No, they didn't. They loved watching you make a fool of yourself," Sherlock corrected him. "And anyway, the audience are all imbeciles."
The white clown twirled on a black-slippered heel and made to stalk away, but Lestrade caught him by an elbow.
"Hey, you're not going anywhere," he said sternly, dragging him back into the cramped dressing room.
"And why not?" Sherlock asked indignantly, baffled.
"Because it's the first of May," Lestrade told him, "and that, as you know, is traditionally when training begins for our new workers."
"So?" Sherlock asked scathingly.
"So," Lestrade continued, "it's time for you to meet your new co-performer."
John Watson stood up from where he had been sitting on the uncomfortable wooden bleachers, stretching his arms over his head. The other members of the audience were all exiting the tent, chattering happily with their families or friends, but John Watson was there with nobody. He was used to being alone by then.
He had seen various clown shows when he was dragged to the circus with his family as a young child. He had always found them vaguely amusing and oddly set apart from real life inside those small tents, and this one wasn't very different. Except for the whiteface clown.
This performer had managed to intrigue John Watson. Most clowns were basically the same, all of them based off of the caricature of the role they were supposed to be playing in the act, but this whiteface seemed to have several more layers to his character under that white paint and elegant costume. He was tall and graceful, and carried himself with self-confident elegance that made him seem untouchable or otherworldly. Although he didn't speak a word throughout the whole show, he seemed to radiate intelligence and cleverness, along with his cool demeanour that separated him from the audience on yet another level.
Even while the Auguste clown was traipsing around in front of the audience with his loud clothing and exaggerated expressions, John was unable to pull his eyes from the less dynamic whiteface clown for the whole act. He was silent and stunning, his slim form accentuated by his flowing costume as his perfect facial structure was emphasized by the contrasting black and white makeup. John was absolutely entranced.
But the magic had ended when the spotlight turned off and the mysterious whiteface clown disappeared, and John found himself alone in a noisy world again. And now he was supposed to track down a man named Gregory Lestrade. John had received a letter from him about a month previously, in response to a job application John had submitted. Lestrade had said that he looked very promising, and that they would be delighted to have him join the troupe, even though he seemed a bit overqualified for the job of an Auguste clown. Lestrade said John might find the work a bit boring, but boring was fine with him. The exhilaration of constantly being on the move in a travelling circus would be plenty.
John scratched his head, gazing around the empty tent and wondering where the bloody hell he was supposed to go. He had had a hard enough time finding his way to this tent for the afternoon performance, even with the help of three maps and signposts and assistance from various staff members, and he dearly hoped he didn't have to stumble his way around this circus in the dark to find yet another tent that looked identical to the rest.
John's eyes fell on a tent flap across the stage from the main entrance, and vaguely recalled the two performers disappearing in that direction after the spotlight went off. Could that be where he was supposed to meet this Lestrade man?
John hopped down off of the wooden bleachers, wincing when he landed with more weight than he had intended on his bad leg. He normally carried a cane, but who had ever heard of a clown who needed a cane to walk? It was ridiculous. So John was resigned to limping around this carnival, pursuing a job he wasn't even sure he wanted in an area he knew virtually nothing about.
John staggered towards the tent flap and lifted the edge, peering inside. He was immediately confronted with a quite alarming amount of brightly coloured costumes of various shapes and materials and patterns, all strung up haphazardly on metal rolling carts. He tentatively stepped inside, pushing aside what seemed to be a luminous purple dress with several layers of skirts in every colour of the rainbow before he saw the other inhabitants of the tent.
The first two he recognised immediately. They were the two performers from that night's show; the short and mousy Auguste clown was frowning sulkily in the corner while the whiteface clown towered over a grey-haired man in dress trousers and an un-tucked white collared shirt. John had just opened his mouth to ask where he could find Mr. Lestrade, but he stopped as his eyes fell again on the whiteface clown. He was just as regal and breathtaking as he was under the spotlight onstage, possibly even more so up close.
Luckily, the grey-haired man took that moment to glance over at John, detaching himself from the performer to approach the newcomer.
"Ah, and you must be John Watson," the man said, reaching out his hand to shake John's. "Glad you managed to find the place; until you've been here for about seven years, everything begins to look the same."
"And you're Mr. Lestrade?" John asked, shaking his hand.
"Oh, please, call me Greg," Lestrade said amiably, turning to introduce John to the other two inhabitants of the tent. "And this is...well, Anderson's obviously scampered off somewhere, but you'll probably meet him soon enough - "
"Off to meet with a certain lion tamer, if I'm not very much mistaken," came a murmur from behind Greg. "Which I'm not."
Lestrade's face was a mixture of disapproval and amusement when he shifted to introduce the whiteface clown.
"And this," said Lestrade, "is - "
"Adler or Bartholomew's?" a low voice interrupted, and it was several moments before John realised that the clown was directing the question at him.
"Sorry?" John squeaked out. How could he know, how could he possibly -
"Which was it, Adler or Bartholomew's circus?" the performer repeated. Lestrade coughed lightly in embarrassment.
"Look, just ignore him, you don't have to - "
"Bartholomew's," John replied curiously, staring at the beautifully painted face of the tall man. "Sorry, how did you know...?"
But the man was already turning back to Lestrade.
"I'm afraid I have an important matter to attend to. Wish I could stick around to help introduce our first of May, but I'm sure you'll do a smashing job showing him the ropes - "
"Sherlock," Lestrade interrupted him. "John Watson here is going to be your new act partner."
John's mouth dropped open. Sherlock paused in front of the far tent flap.
"Is he?" Sherlock said in a much softer voice. "I...was not aware that you had found a replacement. And he agreed to this?"
"Obviously I found a replacement, Victor's been gone for three months now!" Greg cried. "And of course he agreed to it, what did you expect?"
"Nothing, just..." Sherlock took a deep breath. "What did you tell him about me?"
"I told him that we were in need of an Auguste clown to perform with an experienced whiteface for our late afternoon show, and that he would most likely be filling in where needed during the day," Greg replied.
"And that's all you told him?" inquired Sherlock.
"Yes!"
John was growing uneasy.
"Sorry, is there something that Greg should have told me...?"
Sherlock turned to him with a fake smile plastered on his face.
"Oh, nothing. Just, don't you think potential co-performers ought to know the worst about each other?"
Sherlock headed for the tent flap again.
"So, like I said, gotta dash, but I'll be back in an hour to start the training."
"Is that it?" John called after him, flummoxed.
"Is that what?" Sherlock asked, pausing again in the mouth of the tent.
"I've only just arrived, and we're about to begin training?"
"Problem?"
"I don't know a thing about this circus. I don't know where the bloody hell to go for clown training, and we don't know a thing about each other."
"I know you've recently been invalided home from Bartholomew's circus. You grew up in the circus life, then returned to it after medical school, after you found you couldn't settle down anywhere as a doctor. You were wounded in a traumatic circus accident and moved to London for a few months. You've thrown away your cane before you came here, and I know that your therapist thinks your limp's psychosomatic, quite correctly, I'm afraid. But you fired her; very good choice, she was quite wrong about your PTSD. That's enough to be going on with, don't you think?"
John simply gaped at him.
"The name is Sherlock Holmes, and we'll meet at the blue tent across the road in an hour. We'll get a late dinner before we start training. Afternoon!"
And with a wink and a twitch of that black-defined mouth, he was gone.
