Circus of the Damned   ::   Гамильтон Лорел

The big doors were locked. I knocked. The door opened a moment later. Irving stood there. He wasn't smiling. He looked like a chubby cherub with soft, curling hair in a fringe over his ears, and a big bald spot in the middle. Round, wire-framed glasses perched on a round little nose. His eyes widened a little as we stepped inside. The blood looked like what it was in the light.

"What have you been doing tonight?" he asked.

"Raising the dead," I said.

"This the new animator?"

"Larry Kirkland, Irving Griswold. He's a reporter, so everything you say can be used against you."

"Hey, Blake, I've never quoted you when you said not to. Give me that."

I nodded. "Given."

"He's waiting for you downstairs," Irving said.

"Downstairs?" I said.

"It is almost dawn. He needs to be underground."

Ah. "Sure," I said, but my stomach clenched tight. The last time I'd gone downstairs at the Circus, it had been to kill Nikolaos. There had been a lot of killing that morning. A lot of blood. Some of it mine.

Irving led the way through the silent midway. Someone had hit the switch, and the lights were dull. The fronts of the games had been shut and locked down, covers thrown over the stuffed animals. The scent of corn dogs and cotton candy hung on the air like aromatic ghosts, but the smells were dim and tired.

We passed the haunted house with its life-size witch on top, standing silent and staring with bulging eyes. She was green and had a wart on her nose. I'd never met a witch that looked anything but normal. They certainly weren't green, and warts could always be surgically removed.

The glass house was next. The darkened Ferris wheel towered over everything. "I feel like one, / Who treads alone / Some banquet hall deserted, / Whose lights are fled, / Whose garlands dead, / And all but he departed," I said.

Irving glanced back to me. "Thomas Moore, Oft in the Stilly Night ."

I smiled. "I couldn't remember the title to save myself. I'll just have to agree with you."

"Double major, journalism and English literature."

"I bet that last comes in handy as a reporter," I said.

"Hey, I slip a little culture in when I can." He sounded offended, but I knew he was pretending. It made me feel better to have Irving joking with me. It was nice and normal. I needed all the nice I could get tonight.

It was an hour until dawn. What harm could Jean-Claude do in an hour? Better not to ask.