The Palace of Laughter (22 page)

“Good,” said Cortado. “Then let's not waste any more time.”

Miles allowed himself a small sigh of relief as he heard the door hinges creak again. His legs were cramped under him, and his neck ached from bending his head in the small space. He shifted his position slightly, kicking up another small cloud of ash, and that was when his sneeze chose to ambush him. It was a prize-winning sneeze, and when it came out it sounded like a donkey who had swallowed a large dog. It boomed around the metal furnace and echoed up the chimney and out into the evening sky, where it startled a passing tawny owl who had
just set out for his night's hunting. A slightly more muffled version echoed around the laboratory just as the door slammed shut.

Miles bit his lip. The door of the laboratory looked solid and heavy, and with the creaking hinges and the loud slam he was pretty sure they would not have heard his sneeze. He debated whether to try and hide himself in the chimney, or to risk a quick look through the yellowed glass of the furnace door to make sure the two men had gone. He wiped his nose on the back of his sleeve and listened. He could hear no sound from the laboratory. Finally he leaned forward to look out through the window in the furnace door, pressing his forehead against the grimy glass.

He could just see Little's foot beneath the table in the center of the floor. There was no other sign of life, so he was taken completely by surprise when the furnace door was jerked open. It seemed to have grown bigger, and he almost tumbled out onto the floor. A large hand grabbed his collar, and he caught the flash of bright yellow socks and the smell of stale cigar smoke. A moment later he was hoisted through the air and held, dangling like a kitten, in front of Genghis's disbelieving face.

“Hello, Chief Genghis,” he said.

G
enghis Big-belly, slack-jawed and dumbstruck, stared at the skinny boy dangling from his fist. The cigar stub detached itself slowly from his lower lip and dropped to the floor unnoticed.

“Can you put me down now please?” said Miles. Genghis let go of his collar, and Miles dropped to the floor. His legs, numb from being curled up in the dusty furnace, almost gave way under him, but he knew that if he fell he might draw attention to Little's hiding place, and he managed to remain standing. He returned the big man's bug-eyed stare steadily.

“It's him,” said Genghis in his broken-whistle wheeze. “It's that little weasel
again
. I swear there must be ten of him.”

“So I see,” said Cortado, who was standing quietly in the open doorway. His face was white behind his luxurious mustache, and he spoke carefully, as though holding his anger back with some effort. He closed the door softly behind him and walked around the laboratory table, pushing Genghis aside. He grasped Miles's chin and tilted his face up to look at him, although in truth he didn't need to tilt it far.

“Well, Selim,” he said, “your little vanishing trick did take me by surprise, I must confess. I was surprised that anyone would be so stupid”—he brought his face closer to Miles and measured out his words like ice cubes dropping into a glass—“as to…steal…my…property…from under…my…nose.”

“She's not your property. People aren't anyone's property,” said Miles. His legs were shaking now, more from fear of the Great Cortado's anger than from cramp, but he felt that somehow it would be worse for him if he let his fear show.

“Circus freaks,” said the Great Cortado, “are not people. You stole her. Now you will tell me where she is.”

“I don't know where she is,” said Miles. “She left when I cut the rope from her wrists, and I haven't seen her since.”

“He's lying, the little snake,” said Genghis. He gave Miles a sharp clout on the ear with his bandaged and bitten fist.

“Save it for later, Genghis,” said Cortado. “You won't rattle anything out of this boy's head like that.” He turned to Miles and dusted some ash from the shoulders of his filthy jacket. The normal color had returned to Cortado's face, but the smile that lurked beneath his mustache was not matched in his eyes.

“Time enough to return to the subject of the freak later,” he said. “As for you, Selim, your disappearing act seems to be surpassed only by your appearing act. Exactly what were you doing in my furnace, and how did you get in here in the first place?”

“I have a ticket,” said Miles, producing the silver ticket from his inside pocket. He glanced at the furnace. He could see now that the small hatch through which Little had wriggled was set into a larger door that comprised most of the front of the furnace. It was this door that Genghis had opened in order to haul him out.

“So you do,” said the Great Cortado. “But the ticket grants admisson to the auditorium, not to the furnace. And you are wasting my time, Selim.”

“I got in through the chimney,” said Miles. “I climbed on top of the hill because I didn't want to come in through the front door, and I found the chimney mouth up there. When I tried to climb down it, I fell, and got stuck in this dirty furnace. You should get Genghis to clean it out more often.”

“I'll clean
you
out, little snake,” wheezed Genghis. He raised his fist again, but stopped himself. “Can I hit him?” he said to the Great Cortado in a wheedling voice. “Just once?”

“I think not,” said the Great Cortado. “If you knock him out now he might miss the show, and that would be a shame. After all, he does indeed have a ticket this time, and I'm sure once he sees what a fabulous entertainment we have put together he'll be much more open with us. His story doesn't explain such things as runaway sandbags and tunnel-crawling expeditions, and I am very keen to hear a more accurate version when we've cured him of his stubbornness.”

“I could punch him in the kidneys,” said Genghis hopefully. “That wouldn't knock him out, as such.”

“After I'm finished with him you can do what
you like,” said Cortado. “From what he tells me, nobody will be sending out a search party. But first I want to find out what he's done with my circus freak, and I don't want him spitting blood onto my clean shirt while he's telling me.” He took Miles by the elbow and steered him toward the door. Genghis followed, carrying his doctor's bag and sulking.

The passage outside was short, and ended in a flight of steps that spiraled upward and out of sight. The Great Cortado was in a hurry, and he took the stairs two at a time, keeping his grip on Miles's elbow. Genghis puffed and panted several steps behind them. At the top of the stairs was a heavy iron door such as you might see in a bank vault, assuming of course that you were wealthy enough to have any business at all in the basement of a bank. Miles and the Great Cortado reached the door, and waited for Genghis to catch up.

The larger man was gasping for breath by the time he arrived. He rummaged in his pocket for the key and fumbled it into the lock, beads of sweat trickling down his forehead. He leaned his weight against the door, and it opened onto a curving corridor. Gas lamps hissed quietly in their ghostly globes between the many closed doors, and beside
each door was a small wire basket screwed to the wall. “I suppose,” panted Genghis, dropping a vial of antidote into each basket as he passed, “that you'd have something grander in mind than a small town like Larde. Maybe like Sevenbridge, or even Turmeric.”

The Great Cortado sighed deeply and shook his head. “Did I ever show you the scar that tiger left me before I killed it, Genghis?” he said. Miles pricked up his ears.

“Nasty business,” panted Genghis. “What of it?”

“What of it, he asks,” muttered Cortado, half to himself. They reached the elevator, which stood with its gates open at the far end, and squeezed in. Genghis pulled the rattling iron gate closed and punched the button, and the elevator creaked slowly into motion. He opened his doctor's bag and took out the two remaining vials.

“I'll tell you what of it, my boneheaded friend. I came within a whisker of losing my life to that tiger, and once you have stared into the mouth of death you will never look at life in the same way again. The tiger taught me a lesson that I would never forget, even if it were not indelibly written into my flesh. Do you know what that lesson is, Genghis?”

“Stay away from tigers?”

The Great Cortado laughed. He uncorked his vial and swallowed its contents. His laughter ceased at once and a frown took its place.

“I know,” said Genghis. “It's ‘Never tie your blunderbuss to the wall with wire.' If you'd just hung it on a couple of them big hooks, you'd have—”

“Shut up, Genghis,” said Cortado. “If you spent less time blabbering and more time listening, you might learn something.”

“But you asked—”

“It was a rhetorical question, Genghis. The lesson the tiger taught me was this. We arrive on this Earth as feeble, mewling bags of spit, and most of us remain little more than that until the day we die. The only thing that makes a real man is power. Without power over other people, and over the dumb beasts themselves, you are nothing.” He smoothed the ends of his mustache thoughtfully. “That tiger was left to me by a good friend of mine. He was a man with heart and energy and humor, but none of these qualities were worth a rat's whisker when it came down to it, because he didn't have the power to avert the cruel trick that fate had in store for him.”

“Blimey,” said Genghis. “That's a bit bleak, ain't it?” He swallowed his dose of antidote and replaced
the two empty vials in the bag, belching loudly as he snapped it shut.

“Bleak? It's reality. Before I looked death in the eye, my ambition was simply to own the biggest and most successful circus in the land. I wanted fame and money, but I knew nothing of the importance of power. Power is the only thing that counts, Genghis.”

The elevator continued to grind slowly upward through its stone shaft. The Great Cortado's face grew pensive. “I spent years researching the power of laughter, and devoted many more to devising the tools with which to control it. You don't think I spent all that effort just to become an unofficial civil servant in a godforsaken cluster of stone huts like Larde.”

“Er, no. Of course not,” said Genghis. He frowned for a moment, then said, “Why did you?”

“Because I have bigger fish to fry,” said the Great Cortado. Miles paid close attention. The two men seemed almost to have forgotten he was there, but he had listened with interest as the Great Cortado listed what was not included in his ambitions, and now he was curious to know what was.

“Tau-Tau's tonic is more addictive than any amount of beer and bear baiting to someone who's
been processed by our little show. More even than those steamed ginger puddings you stuff into your fat face as though there was no tomorrow.” There was no sign of a smile on the Great Cortado's face as he said this. Genghis licked his lips thoughtfully.

“Being the only people who know how to make the stuff puts us in a position of considerable power, and that power grows greater with every godforsaken village we put through the mangle. If we were to cut off the supply of Tau-Tau's for a week, we'd have the whole country out in riots. But this is just a start, Genghis. Once I have enough—”

Genghis cleared his throat loudly and jerked his head at Miles.

“What is it, Genghis?” sighed Cortado.

“The boy,” said Genghis from the corner of his mouth. “He'll hear you.”

The elevator ground to a halt, and the Great Cortado waited for Genghis to open the gates. “What of it?” he said. “By the time he has seen our fabulous show he'll be hard-pressed to remember his own name, and I'm sure this conversation will have slipped his mind altogether.” He smiled coldly at Miles. “Open the gates, Genghis,” he said.

“Once we have the peasantry hooked, it will be time to reel in the bigger fish,” he continued, as he
stepped out of the elevator. “We will have a season of gala spectaculars at the Palace of Laughter. They will be by invitation only, and we will round up every duke and marchioness and government minister, every bishop and rabbi and general, the prime minister and the chancellor and the entire royal family and God Almighty himself, if we can find his postal address, and we will lay on a show that outshines our most hilarious performances by a factor of three. We will entice everyone with power and influence in the land to spend an unforgettable night under our roof, and before the week is out they will be back in their town halls and palaces, and the power and influence will all be in my pocket.”

Genghis let out a whooshing sound that was meant to be a low whistle. “Well I'd have to say that your plan makes mine look like kid's stuff, and no mistake,” he said. “You've certainly got the breadth of vision there, that was lacking in my little scenario.”

“Elegantly put,” said the Great Cortado. “Now let's get our guest down to the auditorium before the show begins.” They walked along another curving corridor. There was only one door in this one. It was painted midnight blue, and the words “Master
of Ceremonies” were carefully stenciled onto it with silver paint. The Great Cortado stopped outside the door and turned to Miles. “This is where we part for now, Selim. We'll have another little chat after the show, and I have no doubt you will be more cooperative then. Genghis, make sure he has a ringside seat.” He closed the door after him, leaving Miles and Genghis alone.

They stepped into the gloom of the entrance hall, Genghis gripping Miles's elbow with his unpleasant pinch. Between the tall pillars Miles could dimly see the outline of Baumella the giantess seated, just as Silverpoint had said, with her back against the huge double doors. He could not tell if she was awake or sleeping. They marched toward the smaller doors that led into the theater itself, neither of them noticing the wiry, blackfaced figure of String, who watched from the shadows behind one of the pillars. His recaptured bone was tucked into the belt of his trousers, and there was a glint of malice in his eye.

“Now,” said Genghis, tightening his grip on Miles's elbow, “what was that you said about making me clean out the furnace?”

“That was just a little joke,” said Miles.

“I'm not laughing,” said Genghis.

It was on the tip of Miles's tongue to say “That'll be the antidote,” but for once he kept his mouth shut. In their hurry they almost bumped into a sour-looking man hobbling on a pair of wooden crutches, his leg plastered from toe to knee.

“What happened to you, Bobo?” wheezed Genghis. “Slipped on the soap, I suppose.”

The hobbling man gave off a smell that was every bit as sour as his face, a smell that Miles recognized from the night before, when he and Little had been brought down in the elevator to their temporary prison. It was the tramp clown, unpainted today, and certainly still unwashed.