HEART TO HEART CONVERSATION
The Living Corpse
Good night my friend. What do you mean, I woke you up? Ah, yes, I forgot to check my watch. I can't sleep tonight and so I decided to make a spontaneous visit to you. Sometimes I am a nuisance, you don't need to remind me. But now that I am here and you are already awake and much too angry with me to go back to sleep, so you can as well listen to me. It is a sometimes gruesome story and best told at night, don't you agree? Well, the cirucs...
Being eleven years old made me feel like an adult. I felt really grown-up, but of course, I was not. I had not even reached adolescence. But at that time I considered myself an adult. I had a certain routine, I knew how to ride a horse or drive a carriage, I could keep my household, and Karl's, that is, since I lived with him now and I was good in my job as violinist and as the magician's apprentice. Some gypsy girls not much older than me got married and were considered respectable women. So I considered myself a man now.
Ivan and I had a quarrel over a new show act. I had a new trick, he disliked it just because it was my idea and not his. The idea was that I would not come out of a casket but would seemingly materialize out of thin air. It was mainly a close-up magic trick I just enlarged to stage-size and instead of some small thing like a pen or an apple I would materialize. I was really angry because I would have loved my trick, but I knew for sure that I could not quarrel with him directly, he was much stronger than I and I was still too low in rank. I was at the very bottom of hierarchy. So I asked Angelica, who somehow was the matriarch of the circus people, what she thought about my idea over dinner. Ivan interrupted that I was just a stupid child and I retorted that I was old enough to get married, so I could at least make suggestions. I knew I would get my whipping for this, but it was an acceptable risk for me to take.
Angelica was at my side in this - she liked my idea and so the beginning of our show would be changed once I build my props. But now Angelica asked me to help her with the cooking. Men usually do not cook, except when no women are around to do the work. Since Angelica had helped me, she wanted my help now and I complied. That was a time when I was growing fast and was constantly hungry. So I was eager to help with the cooking, hoping for one or the other extra-bite. I was in no way prepared that she asked me to kill the five chicken she wanted to cook.
There was a wickerbasked with the five doomed chicken. I got one of them out and stood there a bit helpless. "Are you waiting for that chicken to die of old age?" Angelica snapped.
"I have never done this," I admitted.
"I'll show you. You can either snap the chicken's neck or cut it's throat, as you like," she said, then took the frightened chicken from my hands and snapped it's neck. She took a large knife and cut off it's head, then handed me the knife. "Now you!" she commanded.
I got another chicken out of the basket and found I could not do it.
"What are you waiting for?" Angelica asked again.
I looked down at the frightened chicken and admitted that I did not have the heart to kill it.
"Aren't you hungry?" she asked and I had to admit, that I was starving - as I always was at that time. "So - either you slaughter the chicken or there will be no dinner for anyone here," she threatened. I knew that they would take their revenge if I was responsible for all of them going to sleep supperless. It was the chicken or me - and that was not really a hard decision. It was not easy to cut off the chicken's head, it took me about half an hour until I found the courage to do it. But it got easier, the next three chicken were dead only ten minutes later. I had blood on my hands that was not my own for the first time in my life.
Depluming and taking out the innards was not so hard. Once the chicken were dead, they were just meat and feathers - nothing I had not touched before.
One might think that after having to kill the chicken myself I might have been disgusted or stopped eating meat, but I didn't. I did not even consider it, I liked meat too much. Did this make me a bad man? I do not think so, only very few berks are vegetarians and at that time I did not even know that vegetarians existed. I had to eat what they gave to me and of course meat was a special treat everyone loved. Usually we only got meat when we had something to celebrate or had earned much more than we had anticipated. Well, we got meat when we needed much strength for a really difficult travel like the one that lay before us - the alps. Meat gives you strength, that was what everyone knew.
Yes, that slaughtering animals for food became another skill I had to learn. I learned how to cut a goat's or a sheep's throat, how to stab a pig or a cow in the heart - you can't cut a pig's throat, it is far too thick and the easiest animal to kill was a bunny. Yes, that is strange. Everyone assumed since I still had problems to take an animal's life I would find it even more difficult with a bunny for bunnies are fluffy and cute. But when I stood there, a white bunny in my hands, and Angelica asked me if I had a problem, I almost enjoyed it. I still remember her exact words: "I understand that this is more difficult for you. Bunnies are cute so most people find it more difficult to do them in than other animals."
Something within me grew very cold at her words. As if something had more right to live just because it was cute and other creatures - especially the ugly ones - had less right to live. I snapped the bunnies neck without taking my eyes off Angelica, without showing any feeling, and I think I did not feel anything at that. "How many of them do you want for lunch?" I asked icily and Angelica stared at me in shock.
"You won't do another one in today," she decided, "I do not like the look in your eyes. Go and practice your new violin score!"
I guess this was the first time one of the circus people was scared of me - I only regretted that it was Angelica, whom I liked very much, and not Ivan or Frederik.
I never liked killing animals and I always made sure to kill them as quickly and painless as possible. But I did never consider this any sort of moral problem. You see, a carnivore kills to survive, even some graminivores eat meat from time to time, I've seen goats eating mice and pigs eating chicken, so there was no reason I should consider my survival less important than anything else's. I only killed an animal when we needed food and I always made sure nothing would ever be wasted. Angelica taught me that even animals like to live and if one kills, it would be a sin to kill and then trow any part of the animal away. Almost everything can be used and she taught me that I should always think of what I really need before I decide to do an animal in. I observe that rule to this day.
The trip to Austria was hard. It was spring and the mountain pass roads were open, but it was not an easy trip.
Suddenly a carriage capsized. It was the caravan driven by the "Gypsy Dancer" violinist and he was dead. Just like that. The carriage turned over and he was crushed. In operas you always have grand death scenes and wonderful arias. Death is nothing like that. It was just a carriage rolling down a hill, rolling over the man and he was dead.
His three daughters became hysteric, they had been in another carriage and were unharmed, but they threw themselves over his body, crying, screaming, sobbing. Everyone else was busy to keep the other horses from panicking or we would have had more casualties. Only when they were under control Istvan went to see what had happened to the carriage and the horse. The horse was alive but badly injured, he took out a gun and shot it. Angelica tried to get the hysterical girls away from their dead father. Ivan instructed the helpers to get everything they could from the damaged carriage and divide it so it could be stored in the caravans. We could not stay there, the road was not save, we needed to move on. So it was decided that Karl and I would stay to bury the dead body and skin the dead horse to take the skin and the meat with us - a dead horse meant meat for at least four days and we would not waste it.
"Skin the horse and bury the man - not the other way round!" Ivan instructed me, I assume he meant this as a macabre joke, but I could not laugh then. They left us two of Istvan's horses since these were the only horses that were not already carrying package or drawing a carriage. Istvan was angry, but Angelica's word overruled his. "If something happens to my horses, you'll be a dead corpse, understood?" he snarled at me.
Karl and I dug a small grave, put the body in, covered him with earth. An unmarked grave near a road. That was how all gypsies and diddicoys ended. "Do you know how a Hindu prays?" I asked Karl and he shook his head.
"There are so many religions in the world," Karl mused, "One can't know all of them. And then there are so many confessions within one religion... you see, you are Christian, Catholic to be precise. I am Christian too, but Protestant."
"What's the difference?" I asked as we started to skin and cut up the dead horse. I needed to talk about something to get my mind off the gruesome task we were just now performing.
"You believe in the Catholic Church, the hierarchy within the church with the Pope it's head. I do not. In our confession we have equality of all men," he lectured.
I was tempted to ask who and what the Pope was. I did not know at that time but I was too ashamed of my lack of knowledge to do so. I just accepted the fact. Equality of all men - maybe I was a true Frenchman after all, for equality sounded really good to my ears. It would mean that I had all rights every other man had, regardless of my looks or my low status.
Riding with two large bags of meat on each horse was not easy. The two stallions hated the smell of blood, the iron smell of the blood that covered our clothes was really disgusting but we had no choice - we had to reach the resting place before it became too dark. Once we saw the camp close to the road we got off the horses and took the bloody bags with the meat to the fire. Istvan took off to wash his horses in some little rivulet that was close by as Karl and I washed ourselves and our clothes.
That night he had two pugs in his bead and I had the two other pugs on my breast as we tried to sleep, but I guess, no one could do more than just rest a bit for every time one of us drifted off a bit we would see the carriage rolling down the hill again.
The circus people did not mourn for long, in fact, mourning was not allowed. Once someone was dead his possessions would be divided among the survivors and that was it. We didn't need a judge or a notary. Since I was the only other violinist I got his violin, which was better than mine by far, and mine would be used to teach children. The daughters of the deceased accepted their fathers fate rather stoic.
Ivan was far more shocked than he let on - and his solution was to get drunk the first time we came close to a village. He must have stolen money - not from the circus, even Ivan didn't dare to do that - but from someone in the village to buy cheap alcohol. I do not know what happened that night, we heard him coming home late and shortly after that heard the twins yell, but no one interfered. I didn't dare and obviously no one else wanted to endanger himself. In the morning the twins were gone.
And that was the new main problem. The "Dancing Gypsies" show act could go on with only me as violinist. I could do that. But I could never replace the twins - I had no twin, although I have to admit that I would have loved to have one. I would not be so lonely if I had a twin. But this is not what I wanted to tell you.
I wanted to tell you about how I had to grow up. Having to bury a dead body was something that made me mature strongly. You must not forget, I was about eleven and a half year old, not more.
So I suddenly faced the problem that I had to take over for Ivan again, but this time I did not have the twins. I could make the materialization though, I would take Ivan's place and one of Frederick's children took my place. It worked, but it was really a problem for the magic show relied heavily on the twins, with them gone, half of our tricks wouldn't work. It was a very short magic show and the dancers were really bad that day, it was the first performance without their father, so I guess everyone understood their distress.
Ivan came up with a solution for the "bilocation-trick". Instead of the twins I would have to do the bilocation. His idea was to dig up a skeleton, using salt dough to model my face and put clothes on it so it would look like me. I asked how he would find a skeleton my size and he just laughed. "The audience is not able to tell a difference of ten centimeters in size at my intended distance, don't worry, I know what I am doing."
Yes, he did. And he forced me to help him.
O yes, I forgot to tell you - we were somewhere in Bavaria that time. Don't ask for details, I would not know any.
We had left a village two days before and he suggested that we would ride back at night. It was no problem to do a week's journey in only one night when we would ride and not have to wait for the caravans and carriages and the packing.
We reached the graveyard he had chosen about one hour before midnight. Ivan had bags with him and two shovels. The graveyard was far outside the village so the risk being caught was low, but I was frightened, really frightened. I knew what we were doing was wrong, horribly wrong and I did not want to desecrate a grave. He picked the grave of an old lady who had died some month ago.
I tried to protest, arguing that this old lady deserved better than to be dug up and used for our show. He laughed. "How do you know she deserved better? Did you know her? She could be a greedy old witch, a wicked stepmother or an infanticide," he mocked me. I had to admit that I did not know her, but I assumed that even the most vile of mankind deserved to rest in peace in his grave and he himself would not like to be dug up. Again, he laughed and told me: "You can do with my body whatever you like once I am dead. I really do not care - eat it, feed the pigs with it, it does not matter for if I am dead I would never even know."
I accepted his logic but still did not like what we were doing. The grave was not deep - I do not know if Ivan had known this before or if we were just lucky. When my shovel hit the wood of the casket I jumped out of the grave and stood there, trembling, in the dim light of our lantern. Ivan could not get me back into the grave, I was too frightened, even as he threatened to kill me, I refused. So he just told me to watch out for any nightguards, but in my panic I saw men everywhere and he grumbled I was seeing ghosts and if I didn't shut up he would gag me.
He broke the wood of the casket and immediately a horrible stench hit me since I was standing next to the grave. The stench must have been unbearable where he stood. I couldn't help retching, it was too disgusting. To my absolute horror Ivan opened the casket and took the rotting corpse out, holding it out for me to take it. I couldn't. I backed away and was violently sick.
"Stop faking and help me!" Ivan demanded, but I could not bring myself to touch it. It was... horrible. It was not only the skeleton, it still had flesh, ugly, slimy flesh and rags that had once been clothes and were now soaked with that slime. I could not touch it, I writhed in disgust.
Ivan took a ring and a bracelet from the corpse and put it in his pocket. Then he started to put the corpse in the bag, he was angry for the legs had already come off and he had to climb back into the grave to get them. When he finished his gruesome task we covered the grave with earth again. Ivan carried the bag with the corpse to a pond while I took care of the horses and the tools. I was so sick, you can't imagine how sick I felt by then.
When I reached the pond I saw Ivan cleaning the slime from the bones like one would peel meat off a chickens leg, causing me to retch again. He wanted me to help him, but when he tried to push me towards the remains of that poor lady I fainted. I woke without any doing of his and had no idea how long I had slept. It must have been some time, for the skeleton was clean by then, only clean bones. He pushed the skull up to my face and laughed as I gasped in horror. Then he put the skull in my lap and left it to me to touch it with my bare hands and remove it from there.
I have to admit that human bones do not feel different from animal bones. Once I noticed that I could help him with the skeleton before we both walked away. We stopped at another pond and despite the cold of this spring night we both took a bath to get rid of the stench. It didn't help much. We would need another bath and another set of clothing once we reached the camp.
We reached the camp shortly after breakfast. They had not left anything for us, this was a common practice - who didn't show up for a meal would get nothing. Ivan was angry and I was glad, I would not have been able to eat anything. As far as I remember I spend the whole morning washing and cleaning my clothes. We had just some vegetables for lunch, which was good, so I could eat something. In the afternoon Ivan prepared the salt dough and then we started modelling my face onto the skull. I have to admit that Ivan was a formidable sculptor, when he finished his work, it really looked like me with my eyes closed.
We put the bones together with wire and he modeled the hands after mine. The skeleton was a taller than I was and the fingers were shorter but he told me the audience would never know the difference. Then my "double" was placed in a cage that would be lifted on a chain to make sure "I" wouldn't escape. The trick "he's in the cage - he's not in the cage" was absolutely simple. The cage had three sides covered in black curtains. The skeleton was sitting in the back of the cage. Before it was a very thin black veil. The front of the cage had another curtain, which could be moved with a yellow rope from below in the circus ring. Now, if a stagehand used a concave mirror to direct the light from the oil lamp to the skeleton, the veil would be translucent and in the dim light of the circus tent would be invisible. If the stagehand shifted the concave mirror only a bit the light would fall in front of the veil and the veil would look like it was the fabric of the curtain in the back of the cage. Of course the mirror had to be covered with a rag when it was moved, but this was no problem, "light on" and "light off" was used in many theatres and vaudeville shows, so no one would ever wonder why the light would be turned off to draw the attention back to the circus ring where I would magically "appear".
Why did they not notice that the skeleton never moved? Good question, I have no idea. No one ever noticed. Maybe another magician would notice for he would look where the audience's attention is not drawn, but I never saw or heard anyone ask about the skeleton, on the contrary, sometimes they talked about seeing it move. And when one saw it move, other's claimed to have seen it waive or something like that. The human brain never ceases to astonish me.
So we had the bilocation trick again.
But the price I had to pay for this trick was far too high. I could barely sleep in weeks and whenever I saw Ivan eating something my stomach turned, especially when he ate gigot, he would just take it in his hands and rip the flesh off with his teeth - and in my mind it turned to the leg he had just taken from the grave. In that time the other children left me in peace, I do not know why, everyone went out of my way as they did with Ivan. We were treated as if we were really wicked magicians who could curse someone. We were grave robbers, and in their superstition grave robbers would be haunted by ghosts, worst of all, we had not just robbed the grave, we used the skeleton in each of our shows now, adding desecration of a corpse to the list of our sins.
They thought we would be dead in the night from 30th of April to 1st of May, that was "Walpurgis Night". Yes, they DID believe that this night was something special and witches and ghosts would gather and the devil would collect some souls - and we would be on the top of his list. Ivan laughed it off, he was sure something like ghosts didn't exist, he did not even believe in any religion, claiming it was all made up by men to fool imbeciles.
I have to admit that I was terribly scared for I believed that I would be punished for that crime, even if I did not participate on my own free will. I asked Angelica for help and her idea was that I should go to a catholic church for a confession and ask the priest for a sanctified coin showing my patron saint - or, if they would not have the right one, Holy Mary. I should wear this coin all the time and the devil would not be able to touch me. Well, Angelica and I went to a church. I was disappointed for no one had ever heard of my patron saint, but the priest gave me a medal showing Holy Mary. The price we had to pay for this made me angry. I had no money and Angelica bought it for me, but my disappointment in church was really painful. I had thought church would help anyone, no matter if he was poor or rich, to find that they asked for money, which I didn't have, was really a hard blow to any faith I had before.
Karl's idea was that this was all stupid superstition so I needed to do nothing but repent, but he was sure my crime was not that bad since Ivan had forced me to do it.
Whatever it was, neither I nor Ivan had any problems, we didn't fall ill, we had no accident, we didn't even have a bad show. Everything was fine - except that I could not eat or sleep at the end of April.
The impact our survival had on the others was great - they seemed to fear us, now they did not only avoid Ivan but me too and I rather liked that. Karl and Angelica had no such problems, I liked them and they still wanted me to help them and do work for them, but somehow I gained some respect from the others, not only the children, the adults as well. But this had a horrible side-effect on my mental health. That time I didn't know, but today I think it was really terrible. I developed a morbid fascination for everything that was somehow connected to the physical process of death. I guess this is not a normal pastime for an eleven year old boy.
I did spend some nights on graveyards and crypts, actually hoping to see ghosts but none ever came, no matter how I tried to provoke them to force them to reveal themselves. Finally I was absolutely sure there was no such thing as ghosts. Ivan liked my progress, Karl and Angelica berated me for being so insensitive.
To cut the long story short, when I was twelve in autumn I was no longer afraid of graves and had my disgust over corpses under control. It was still ugly and disgusting, but I could rob a grave when I thought it needed to be done. You have no idea what people bury with their dead - rings, bracelets, necklaces, earrings - all things I liked for they could be sold. Of course I could not sell them myself, Ivan did and of course he did not share fairly. I did most of the work, he would get most of the money. But suddenly I had a little bit of money. Once I found large golden earrings and cleaned them in cheap booze. What Ivan used to drink, I only used as polish. It was a really good polish. I have to admit that I still use cheap alcohol as a polish in my household. Of course I would never even think of drinking that stuff!
Ivan pierced my ears so I could wear the golden earrings like some gypsy men did. The more reckless and, yes, I have to admit it, criminal I became, the more Ivan started to show some sort of weird pride. But getting along with Ivan more easy came at the price of Karl and Angelica turning from me. That time I was angry with them for letting me down, now I know they did it for my own good, they wanted to warn me to stay away from that path Ivan had chosen. Playing the role of the creepy magician is one thing, but identifying with that role in real-life is completely different, and it would never do any good. I just wish I had understood that sooner. Back then I liked my new image as the creepy bad guy, I embraced it and carefully nurtured it, I enjoyed shocking the others with my newfound irreverence and supercilliousness, my recklessness and absolute disregard for anyone's feelings.
O yes, I forgot to mention. We did make it to Hungary. Istvan was excited, telling me the puszta was the greatest landscape of all, but I was horribly disappointed. You see, the puszta is - nothing. Really. It is absolutely flat, the highest mountain is a molehill at the horizon. I have to admit I found nothing I could really appreciate and was happy that we left soon.
We did spend the winter in a large city in Germany. The city was so large, it had a circus building and they hired our best acts. That was Karl, Frederick and his family and Ivan and I. They did not hire the others for they found much better dancers and horseriders. I would never have thought they would find better horseriders than Istvan, but they had a group of them and what they did was absolutely astonishing. Karl was not the only clown they hired, but he was the only one with the "School" show. Ivan and I were not the only magicians, they actually had five magic shows and different programs. It was like... Like an opera house, but not for opera, it was for circus. They had two shows each day but Ivan and I would only be in one show every two days, but it didn't matter.
Our payment would be given immediately to Angelica, who used it to pay for the winter quarters for the circus. The only thing I got for my work was a new set of clothing, all in black, for black contrasted sharply to my extraordinary fair skin and made me look even more pale. Ivan taught me to use kohl to heighten my features, making me look even more skull-like. That winter I felt there might be a place for me in this world, a place where I could live, since I was not the only freak in the show. I was the only freak doing magic, but when we were hurrying to get on stage in time or to get our props no one cared for my appearance. As soon as the audience came in everyone forgot every disgust for my appearance and all worked together professionally.
The good news was, I was so busy I had not one second time to think of mischief. I could not play the bad boy - I had no time. And my troubled mind calmed down a bit. The less time I spend with Ivan, the better, and since he didn't like preparing the props this was my job and I spend most of the time preparing the props alone, sometimes Karl would sit with me and talk to me. He told me about a new idea he had with his pugs and asked for my opinion. Well, I guess he just tried to get my mind off from my morbid fascination with death and decay and to something more enjoyable.
Karl had one show a day and on weekends two a day. He was much better than me and therefor granted the privilege of being in more shows. But to be true - you can't really compare a clown to a magician, unless it is a clown-magician. And that is what he had in mind, he wanted a combined act, clown and magic. While I was working on the props or doing the housework Karl and his dogs would sit by my side and we would talk about a possible show act for the two of us. I would of course be the one to do the tricks, he would be the one to play the magician. It was more or less him the alchemist, me his clumsy assistant - you have to know that playing the clumsy one requires much more skill than playing the normal part - and the pugs would constantly take things away from us, seemingly ruining our experiment, but in the end out of the boiling pot a young woman would appear, proving the experiment to be successful, and many broken items would magically reappear unharmed. We had much fun planning that show.
But then I fell ill before our contract was over - I should have been working until end of January, but I had a terrible cough and my voice was almost gone. I could not work for the coughing became worse in the cold circus hall, I could not talk, I could not play the violin, I could not concentrate on my work and my coughing fits would ruin the show - suddenly Ivan noticed how much he was dependent on my cooperation, for he didn't even know how to prepare some of the props I had build so he could not simply go on with another assistant. I had become irreplaceable.
But that didn't help my acute bronchitis. I could not live in Karl's caravan then for fear he would get infected himself, I was isolated in a makeshift tent, well, tent is a bit too much to describe it - it was old wooden crates and a rain fly as a roof. I had a small fire pit made of scrap metal to keep me warm and prepare tea. It was cold, outside in the night the temperature would drop far beneath freezing point and in my small tent the temperature would be... well, close to the fireplace I would not find ice on the teacup if I forgot to drink it, but close to the makeshift walls the tea would be covered with ice in the morning. They provided me with herbs for my tea, I had to melt snow to get water, and I got food. I was not hungry, but my life was miserable. I wished I had coals, but all I got was dried dung and sometimes wood. I slept on a pile of dry leaves, straw was far too valuable, it would be needed for the horses. Since in the circus laziness was not tolerated, not even when ill, I had to do the only work I could then - which was unraveling old jackets, shawls and even socks to gain wool and knit knew things. I could make a new knit cap out of the wool of two ripped ones.
I would have been better off if I had managed to live in the sewers, but, you see, in large cities the slums were already overcrowded and the dry spots in the sewers, well, the good ones were already occupied. And I had some very valuable possessions then - I had a blanket made of sheep skin, it was five sheep skins stitched together. Some people would kill for a warm blanket like that. You have no idea how bitter poverty and extreme wealth lived in one city. The larger the city, the bigger the gap between its most wealthy and poorest inhabitants. I needed the protection of the camp or I would have been easy prey.
I survived somehow. And we faced the next problem. Ivan had taken his caravan, his horse and the props and left. The "Gypsy dancers" had left. We suddenly lacked two major acts - and I was suddenly alone. Without the props I could only do slight of hand magic and music. But I could not sing then, I still suffered from the nasty cough that was not over by then. I knew I would not overcome that before April or May when the weather would be warm again. The next problem was that Ivan had taken the money from the circus hall he had earned for himself - and only with Karl's ad Frederick's income the price for the winter quarters could not be paid in full. The farmer threatened to take our horses as pledge if we would not pay.
My previous experiences were that in such a situation I should better pack my belongings for I was for sell. But this did not happen. Since some people from other shows came to us our group was not as it had been before. This was common practice. The artist would travel with this circus, then with another one - just like that. So we got a new dancing group, this time a real gypsy family.
They were at large, all of them, for stealing children. I know that "gypsies are stealing children" is a cruel prejudice and in this case... it was not as easy as that. You see, there was a grandfather with his two sons and their wives and his thirteen grandchildren. Yes, right, thirteen grandchildren and two more were to be expected in a few months. The police had rounded them up as work-shy ragtag and taken the children into custody, giving them to foster-parents. These foster-parents had the duty of teaching the children to work to earn their livelihood in an honest way - in that case the foster parents had a waving mill and the children had to work twelve to sixteen hours a day there. Not that my workdays in the circus were shorter, I guess work itself was not the problem. The problem was that they wanted their children back and "stole" them from their new rightful foster-parents.
You see, gypsies did steal children - their own ones, which had been taken from them. The gypsies would not understand why the magistrate would take their children away, they did not understand why they were called work-shy ragtag. They refused to be factory workers or day-workers and work 16 to 18 hours a day for starvation wages and be completely submitted to the arbitrariness of their employers. They rather worked just as hard for a likely poor income and be free. I have to admit that I did never question this, neither way. Of course I understood a state's need for cheap slave-workers. Yes, if I had any chance, I would have loved to have slaves. But, being nothing more than a slave myself, I understood their wish for "freedom", as limited as it was.
Since Angelica knew how well I could copy nearly every paper I was the one to forge papers for them, giving them new names. That would be enough to fool the authorities and give them a "not known by the police" status. Some of the elder girls could dance very well, and one had a lovely singing voice. She was so agile, she would make a perfect "lovely assistant" to a magician - if I could make new props, that is.
We needed money and we needed it fast or the circus would fall apart. I fully expected to be sold now to another circus. But this did not happen. The gypsy and Angelica came up with another idea - in that town a medical professor had seen my appearance in the show and asked to examine me. At first Angelica had refused. We had an iron rule: See everything, touch nothing. No one was allowed to touch anyone or anything. Never. I think this was for our own protection. But this professor offered really much money. He was collecting "freaks" he could show in one of his lectures to sponsors of the University. In a way he was nothing more than a sideshow-manager on another level.
He wanted to present a gallery of living freaks and talk about his really necessary studies to help us poor freaks to become a useful member of society. It was more about our usefulness to society and not so much about our well-being. I refused outright. Showing my naked face and torso in a circus ring or a sideshow is one thing, but standing in an auditorium in university and having to hear a lecture about being an abomination and absolutely worthless for any decent human society was something different. It was... even more humiliating, I think, and it was frightening. It was not just the delighted horror of the audience, it was the delighted horror of the audience sanctified by science. Being called a freak, an abomination is one thing, but being attributed like that as by current state of scientific knowledge - you cannot imagine the terror I felt at that.
To give them credit, they did not beat me into submission or just sold me. They told me it was necessary for survival that I would do it and promised me a reward. The reward was - and I suspect they already had a bargain about that with the professor - that I would be allowed to visit an opera. Everyone knew how much I loved music and the prospect of seeing a real opera in a real opera house was a temptation I could not resist. I gave in, not sacrificing myself for the greater good but because I wanted to earn the ticket to the opera. The professor - he was a short man with a white beard - promised to allow me to sit in his box where I would be hidden from everyone else.
The show in the medical university was by far more humiliating than the sideshow or the circus. I had to stand there naked - stark naked - as he pointed out my deformations and took measures of my body. He told the audience that the age of a freak is often not easily guessed but could be seen at the genitals, which were in my case normally developed for a boy between ten and thirteen. I was twelve, so he was correct. But having him taking measures of my most private parts was not something I liked. The professor used French. You see, in Germany, Austria and even Russia the aristocrats wanted to separate themselves from ordinary people and they spoke French because they thought it was a more noble language than their own. So the professor spoke French with his aristocratic patrons. He did not know that I spoke French, in the circus I had not spoken much and the few sentences the audience would hear from me were of course in German.
"He's used as the magician's apprentice in the circus or he could be in the freakshow, but this poor boy has no other way to live. He has no talents of his own he could use serving society," the professor lectured and I could no longer keep my mouth shut.
"That is not true!" I objected angrily, "I am a very good violinist, the magic show was mostly my doing, some tricks I invented myself! I am a technical draftsman and a singer, a horse-rider and carriage driver and of course I have talents of my own! I'm not a dumb animal - I speak eight languages: French, German, Spanish, Italian, Russian, Romanese, Arabic and Farsi - does anyone of you speak so many languages?" I looked at the shocked face of the professor - he really had not known I was that clever - and the audience, which was somehow embarrassed by my little speech. "I do not like being stared at, I do not like being naked - would you? I am no animal, I am no thing, I am..." I could not go on, I was hysteric by then and broke down sobbing. Some assistant took my hand and lead me away to the next room where I could dress and he was kind enough to give me a glass of water and a handkerchief.
I had never had a handkerchief. I used my fingers if I needed to blow my nose like everyone else. Of course I did not know the luxury of using old newspapers to clean myself after relieving myself - we used leaves or stones we found where we just were. Yes, I know. I digress again.
Well, I saw other freaks there who were presented the same way I had been, men and women and a hermaphrodite, he had male and female genitals between his legs. He... well, I'm not sure if I should say "he" or "she" and I don't like to call him "it" - had to lie on his back and spread his legs so everyone would see. I guess I was better off than him, but I could not see that back then in the tiny room next to the auditorium. I was a sobbing mess and had no coherent speech left. One of the assistants of the professor called Angelica - she had told them I was her grandson or the authorities would have taken me away from the circus and put me in an asylum - and she took my hand and lead me back to the circus. She was accompanied by Karl, Istvan and our strongman to make sure no one stole the money from her.
"You are a good boy, Erik," she tried to comfort me, "Do not believe anything these stupid guy said. So called 'science' is nothing more than fortune telling and magic - but they have a better reputation and more money. That's all, a good name and being rich, that is the only difference between them and us."
I dried my tears and asked if he had given her a ticket for the opera as he had promised. All I could think of now was my fear he cheated and I had done it for nothing. She grinned and showed me a ticket - at least the professor was honest enough to keep his promise. I would have a box for me alone and I could take with me as many guests as there were seats in that box. It is astonishing how easily I was pacified as soon as I had my ticked in my hands. I can only guess but I was like a whore - as soon as the ordeal is over, you shrug it off and enjoy the payment and forget what you had to do. I was quite good in blocking out memories at daytime as long as I was busy. Only in the night, when I was asleep, nightmares would remind me and torment me.
That is how I came to see my first opera. I didn't go there alone, Karl accompanied me. My first impression was that in an opera the audience would wear the costumes for the women wore fancy dresses and so much jewelry I was tempted to steal and if Karl hadn't held my hands I would have made a small fortune - or been arrested then and there. Of course they turned up their noses on us - our clothing was cheap and patched, even our best clothes, and yes, our shoes were worn and I have to admit that even after cleaning our clothes we still smelled of circus, the smell I associate with circus is mostly sweat and animals. My mask made it much worse and I have to thank Karl's really good manners and persuasiveness that we were allowed to enter - even with our valid ticked.
But I will never forget the opera. It was "le Nozze di Figaro" and I fell in love with the opera almost the very moment the orchestra began the overture. So many instruments in almost perfect harmony - I could have stayed there forever, listening. It did not matter to me that two of the singers were not really good and the second violin was always a bit behind, I was a child and just enjoyed the opera. On our way home - back to the camp that is - I could not help singing all the arias I had memorized. I kept singing and when I finished Karl asked me to sing his favorite aria again.
"Voi che sapete che cosa e amor,
Donne, vedete, s'io l'ho nel cor,
Donne, vedete, s'io l'ho nel cor.
Quello ch'io provo, vi ridiro,
E per me nuovo capir nol so.
Sento un affetto pien di desir,
Ch'ora e diletto, ch'ora e martir.
Gelo e poi sento l'alma avvampar,
E in un momento torno a gelar.
Ricerco un bene fuori di me,
Non so chi il tiene, non so cos' e.
Sospiro e gemo senza voler,
Palpito e tremo senza saper,
Non trovo pace notte ne di,
Ma pur mi piace languir cosi.
Voi, che sapete che cosa e amor
Donne, vedete, s'io l'ho nel cor,
Donne, vedete, s'io l'ho nel cor,
Donne, vedete, s'io l'ho nel cor."
Right, that is the aria of Cherubino and it is a mezzosoprano aria. I had a mezzosoprano singing voice at the age of twelve. Karl was very quiet that evening while I was bubbling over in excitement.
When we settled down for the night - he in his bed, I as usual on the floor - he said: "It is such a shame you have to perform in a circus and not in an opera house or a concert hall."
"Why can't I?" I asked, confused. I had never even thought that I might perform there.
"They won't admit the likes of us," he said sadly, "I would have loved to be an actor, but my parents were poor and couldn't bribe the theater manager so I ended up as a clown in a travelling circus."
I was surprised. I had never questioned my life in the travelling circus and never thought about my possible future. I was a twelve year old boy and had already accepted my fate as a circus freak who would have a very hard and short live and lie in an unmarked grave with no one to mourn his death. It was a surprise to find that not everyone was as fatalistic and stoic as I was at that time. The mere concept that someone like myself could have any dreams other than surviving the day to fight for survival the next day was something new to me, but I rather liked it.
"Karl?"
"Hmmm?" He was not pleased that I didn't let him sleep.
"For my new magic show - can we include just one clown magic act? Please?" I begged. Hehe. Yes. I was a bit childish in my dreams for my future. But I made Karl laugh and he agreed.
With the money from the professor and some burglary and theft we got enough to pay the farmer and get our horses back so we could start travelling at the end of February. I had my magic show then, it was mixed with those circus elements I liked much more than Ivan's magic show. It started with Karl as the "Professor" doing alchemistic experiments and me as his "clumsy assistant" who did everything wrong. Instead of conjuring up a beautiful maiden, I made a pug. Instead of making gold I made straw. Instead of making him win in a game with oversized cards I made him lose against a pug. And Karl was wonderful as the annoyed master who was chasing me around and lashing out at me, of course without hurting me.
The others agreed that we could include that act in our show, just after "Frederick's flying family" and their tightrope show to give the audience a good laugh after the suspense.
But my main show was a bit more... dark. I combined music and dance with magic, one of the gypsy girls was now my assistant. God, I felt so grown-up and important as we did the first rehearsal of MY show. It began with the girl coming into the circus ring and stagehands bringing in the prop, a cage on an iron table and a ramp. I climbed up the ramp and was tied to the cage bars by the girl. She covered the sides of the cage with newspaper. Then the ramp was taken away and the henchman entered the stage on a horse. My idea had been a large black horse, but we didn't have a black one. I ended up with an old dun horse, a mare, her back galled by riding, she was so unsightly, not even the knacker would have bought her. Following Ivan's advise I made her look even worse. A good trickster cannot only make a bad horse look good or a good horse look even better - it works the other way round as well. The henchman would set the paper aflame and a burned skeleton would fall down from the table, making the audience scream. Then I would pull back the black hood and throw away the cape to let them know that I was the henchman and had outwitted death once more.
The skeleton? I have to admit that I simply dug one up at some random graveyard and painted it with black colour to make it look like it had been burned. It was not even a complete skeleton, but that was irrelevant. It was a short shock for the audience. Of course a fire in the cage only with paper would never completely burn a Body, but most people in the audience never even try to use their brains, if they happen to have some, what I highly doubted that time.
I was struck with the stage-name "living corpse" so why not milk it? I was the one who would outwit death himself, or herself, as I already told you.
After that trick I would use my violin to play and the girl - my assistant - would dance to my tune, faster and faster, until she would drop "dead". End of the show. I would have loved to cover her in the cape and make her disappear only to reappear somewhere else, but we didn't have trapdoors, so this wouldn't work.
It was not what I had envisioned, but it was good enough. And it was quite a successful show we had that time, travelling back to Austria because Angelica wanted to go to Italy again and we wanted to travel across the alps in summer.
We were already in Italy when Angelica stood up at the campfire after our dinner and pushed a worn leather briefcase in my hands. Then she announced she would go to the mountains. It was so silent, one could have heard a needle fall. Even the flames of the campfire seemed to be silent.
Karl looked away and Istvan was crying. I opened the briefcase and found papers, forged, but really good forgery. It was a passport to prove my identity. "Erik Ami Hein" was my name and I knew Ivan's cynical humor in that. "Freund Hein" is a German euphemism for personalized death, it means "friend Hein" and "ami" is the French word for friend. Erik Ami Hein. Born in Elsass, France, father German, mother French. My jaw dropped as I realized what this meant. I had a new identity, I was free - no one would sell me, it was my decision from now on if I wanted to stay or not.
I wanted to thank her and saw her walking away from the camp so I ran until I reached her.
"Thank you, Angelica," I said, breathless.
"You're welcome," she answered and nodded.
"Angelica - where are you going? It is night, we are far from any village, you should stay in the camp?" I asked and she gave me a long, sad look.
"I am going to the mountains," she said and continued to walk. An old woman going mountain climbing in the night? That was utterly mad!
A heavy hand fell on my shoulder, holding me back. It was Karl. "Let her go," he said, "Come back. It is our way of dying in dignity. She will go to the mountains to find her grave." He gave me a strange, sad glance and said: "I would do it myself, if it was not for my dogs. I can't leave them alone." I do not know if he said anything else, everything was black and the next time I could see anything it was daylight and we were travelling on, I was sitting on a coachmen's seat, tied to it with a rope so I would not fall. We were on the move again and Angelica's name would not be spoken again. There was no mourning and they believed speaking of the deceased would keep his soul from finding peaceful rest, as would mourning.
The circus was not the same after Angelica died. There was a sudden struggle between Istvan and the gypsy grandfather for control, Angelica had somehow been the matriarch and now everyone wanted her position. Everyone, except Karl. I think Karl would have been the best chief they could find, but he didn't want that job. The constant fighting affected our work. Of course we still worked together, but there was such a mistrust now, and I as the lowest in the hierarchy would be the one to suffer the most for everyone took out his frustration on me. Not everyone, no, Karl was even quieter than normally.
I do not know why but they suddenly started to tear the circus apart, fighting for the best pieces and regardless of Angelica's wish that it would be my own decision, I was more or less treated like one of the well-trained show animals. And I realized that I was just another coin to be used in the bargaining. I was devastated. While Angelica lived I had been under the impression that I was regarded as a human being, as the lowest ranking member of the tribe, yes, absolutely, but in a group one has to be the lowest ranking, isn't it? I could accept being the lowest one in hierarchy, but it really hurt me that time to be reduced to animal status again after Angelica had given me my papers, declaring me a free and grown up man.
After one dinner I just got up and left. I would go to the mountains as Angelica had, I would find a cliff and jump down. It would be a quick death, because I feared a slow and painful death. I would not starve - I knew I didn't have the willpower not to eat when I was really hungry - and I was afraid of the pain if I cut my veins or if I would hang myself. I know, this was a really childish idea about suicide, but I had never before thought about killing myself.
I do not know how long I wandered through the night when I heard Karl call my name. I saw him walking with a lantern, using his pugs to find me. Yes, pugs can be used as bloodhounds - if you are desperately searching for cheese. No, that's unfair. They found me and I had nothing to eat in my pocket. "Go away," I called out. He didn't and since he saw much more with his lamp than I without light, he could move faster - especially his dogs could. They ran and caught me and I had to stop and greet them. I could not run with four pugs bustling about my feet.
"Where are you going?" Karl demanded.
"To the mountains - take your pugs and go back!" I snapped angrily with tears in my eyes. To be true, I did not want to die. Not really. I wanted to live, I was so young.
"Come back to the camp," he said. Nothing more. I didn't need more to give up my childish suicide plan and return to the camp with him.
"I too considered suicide. I always do," Karl said after a while. I looked up at him in surprise. It somehow made sense - he was always so melancholic, so depressed, so sad. He smiled sadly as he went on: "I never had any chance in my life. I have no talent, for nothing, I'm always only a burden to everyone. And yet I live... not really understanding why. But I can't die now, what would become of them?" He gestured to his pugs. "But you have so many talents, you are such a clever boy, Erik. Why would you want to end your life without trying?"
"YOU have no right to complain!" I yelled at him, sobbing, as I ripped away my mask, "Look at me - just look at me once! I never had any chance, never will, no one will ever love me, no one will ever even like me. And I do not want to be less than a trained dog, even a dog is loved by its owner!"
"O Erik," he sighed, "You are so young."
"And I do not want to die - but I am scared! I am too scared to live!" I have no idea why I said that, that moment it just felt like the right thing to say. Karl took me in his arms and suddenly I wept like a baby. I was ashamed, but I could not stop my tears.
"I, too, considered taking my life," he answered and reached for his pocket to show me a henchmen's noose. Obviously he had planned to hang himself on some tree. I recoiled in horror as I saw just how skillful the knot was. It wasn't the first noose he produced.
He must have sensed my discomfort for he gave me a sad smile and told me he had come to another decision. "I leave the circus," he said.
I stared at him, my eyes wide.
"I leave the circus and go back to Germany. In the circus hall I met another circus, I prefer to travel with them from now on," he told me. I knew what this meant. He would leave and I had no home any more for I rather liked living with him in his caravan. I knew they would give me a place to live - maybe I would even have my own caravan - but I liked Karl.
"Can I go with you?" I asked, but he refused. He knew exactly that his travel to find the other circus would take months and would be very hard and he didn't want me to suffer these hardships he was going to face. I begged him but he refused again and told me I was better off if I started to make my own decisions than allowing others to determine my fate.
"Really? You think I could do that?" I asked. I had never even thought about really running away from the circus. I had always been told - and learned the hard way - that I could not survive alone. As long as I depended on another one's care of course it was his or her right to tell me what to do. I was too young and inexperienced to make any decisions of my own. Well, sometimes I did, and most of my decisions had turned out badly - like when I nearly had set the tent aflame. I had learned to trust others and not myself. I know, from what I am now it sounds really odd that I was easily lead by others that time. I had no plans or dreams for my future more elaborate than maybe a cup of hot chocolate. I didn't know what that was, but I had heard that it was something very good. My biggest dream was to try it. I did not dare to even dream of seeing another opera.
"You are a magician," he said, "You make the impossible possible and you are the one who cheats death every evening show - yes, I think you could make it. You can find your way to live in this world."
I chuckled as he said that. I loved the thought that even someone like myself had a place in this world. If there was a divine plan for this world and every man was just a piece of the puzzle then even I would eventually find a place where I would fit in perfectly and be accepted by my next pieces of the puzzle.
He gave me a smile and said: "Erik, let's make a pact. If you do not give up, I will not give up. Swear to me never to give up."
"Fine with me," I answered lightly, too lightly for his liking. Of course I was just a child and didn't understand the meaning of this pact. But he pointed it out to me. He would make both of us tattoos and whenever we saw them we would think of each other and our pact never to give up.
Karl stayed with the circus a few weeks more to make sure they would have a complete show before he left. Of course we did not find another clown, the "replacement" was a juggler. He was half-gypsy, half-Negro. His father was a gypsy sideshow-master and his mother the main exhibit, the descendant of the legendary warrior-queen Candace, a Nubian Queen who even defeated Alexander the Great, who conquered the whole Orient, and her name is even to be found in the holy bible. I highly doubt that this black woman was really a descendant of that queen, but she could have been Nubian. Well, obviously this sideshow-master had an unique talent to bind his most valuable exhibit permanently to him - he married her.
Karl was true to his word and used a special ink and a needle to stitch a crude tattoo in my skin, the left side of my left upper leg: "Never say die". He himself made the same tattoo on his right leg so when we stood side by side the tattoos would match. A tattoo is... well, it hurts. A lot. And you mustn't move or you have to live with a flawed tattoo for the rest of your life. Believe me - the "N" looks rather like an "U" in my tattoo, but it does not matter, I know what it means. No one sees it for I never show my naked legs if I have any choice in the matter, but whenever I take a bath I look at it, sometimes I touch it. Some people think I am touching my left pocket in my trousers like I was looking for my keys when I do that, but I use it when I am really tempted to give up, when I just want to lie down and die. It reminds me of my pact with Karl. Never say die.
Sometimes I wonder why I had my ears pierced through and a tattoo - as if my body wasn't deformed enough, I had to mutilate it further. But this tattoo I never regret. It reminds me of a really good friend and our pact never to give up, no matter how hopeless the situation seems to be. "NEVER SAY DIE".
The day after he made our tattoos Karl was gone and I was left alone. Well, not really alone, but among the others and the hubbub in the circus each day I felt more lonely than ever before. And the constant fighting began to annoy me, everyone was tensed up, everyone in a bad mood - how can one make a good show like that? And if something went wrong, someone surely would blame me. I have to admit, sometimes it was my fault, but most times I was really innocent. Yes, I was no saint who would suffer any abuse without considering revenge - of course I sometimes used my abilities as pickpocket to make something disappear and then reappear right before their noses. Ans sometimes I pretended to be stupid or not understand an order. Of course I did understand everything, I understood much more than I could say in the different languages, but I deliberately misunderstood, hoping they would leave me in peace in the future.
The situation became more and more unbearable, the constant fighting, the constant intrigues, it even came to open threats and violence. I constantly lived in fear for I didn't know who was my master now - that could change every minute - and if I was allowed to obey or not. Since I did not like anyone there I did not feel any loyalty towards anybody.
So shortly before my 13th birthday I snatched two saddlebags, saddle, brindle and a mule and left the circus. In the saddlebags I could not take with me the large props - the ones I could not use alone for I needed up to four helpers to operate them properly. I only took what I could handle alone. Plus a second set of clothing and my sheepskin-blanket and my violin. Nothing more. I thought I deserved the mule as payment for my services the previous years, so no, I didn't consider it theft, do you?
O no, I really forgot the time! The sun is already shining! We must not be seen together, I must hurry. Goodby, I'll visit again when I am ready!
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There were not only travelling circuses - there were circus halls in big cities in Germany where various shows would stay for some months and then go on.
The tricks I describe do work.
What I describe happening in the medical university did really happen - and can happen to anyone who has a rare decease even today. Medical professors love to present their interesting patients in an auditorium but they never think about how a patient might feel in such a situation.
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