But then, just as he was about to disappear into the crowd again, he seemed to sniff her, and with a chilling certainty he turned his head in her direction and peered down the darkened alleyway. There was no more shadow for Candy to shrink into. She could only hold her breath and wait.
Narrowing his eyes as though trying to pierce the shadows, the Criss-Cross Man began to push his way through the crowd toward the alleyway. The smallest of smiles had appeared on his face. He knew where she was.
Candy had no choice. Clearly he’d seen her. She had to retreat. And there was only one place to go: into the freak show.
She broke out of the shadows and started to run. She didn’t bother to look over her shoulder. She could hear how close Houlihan was now: the sound of his feet sticking and unsticking on the garbage-strewn ground, the raw rasp of his breath.
She parted the canvas curtains and flung herself through them into the backstage area of the freak show. The smell that met her was almost overpowering: the mingled stench of rotting hay and some sickly sweet perfume that had perhaps been splashed around to cover up the other smells. There were three large cages close by, the largest containing a thing that looked like a pony-sized slug. It let out a pitiful mewling at the sight of Candy, and it pushed its eyes between the bars of its cage on fleshy horns. They scrutinized Candy for a long moment. Then the thing spoke, its voice soft and well-educated.
“Please let me out of here,” it said.
The creature had no sooner uttered these words than they were echoed from the other two cages (one of which contained what looked like a four-hundred-pound porcupine-woman; the other, one of the creatures Candy had seen advertised on the billboards outside the show: a hybrid boy, with scaly flesh and a pointed tail). The same cry, or a rough variation of the same, escaped them both: “Let us out!”
It was now rising from other directions too. Some of the voices were high-pitched squeals, some low rumbling, some just scrawls of sound.
And then, just as she thought the cacophony could not get any louder, she heard Houlihan out in the alleyway, whistling for her like a man who’d lost his pooch in the crowd.
Quietly cursing him, she backed away. Any minute, she guessed, the Criss-Cross Man was going to step into view. The sooner she was out of here the better…
Meanwhile there was a roll of drums from the show itself, followed by an announcement delivered by a woman’s voice, which managed to be both coarse and pompous.
“Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to Scattamun’s Emporium of the Malformed. You are guests in the largest collection of freaks, grotesques, inverts, miscreations, mutants, monsters, tetragogs and fiends in the Abarat; plus, of course, the one and only Eye in a Box! Be prepared to be appalled at the horrors Creation has made in the name of Life; at the Horrors that Evolution in all its Cruelty has brought forth! They were made for our amusement! Feel free to mock them! Spit at them! Poke them a little if you dare! And be grateful you are not in their shoes!”
“Please—” the giant slug mewled. “Let me out.”
After hearing Mrs. Scattamun’s horrendous speech, Candy had no doubt of what she should do. She pulled open the bolts on the creature’s cage. The slug leaned its weight against the door, which swung open with an ill-oiled creak. Meanwhile Candy moved on to liberate the porcupine-woman, followed by the hybrid boy. None of them lingered. The very moment the bolts were drawn they were out, hollering and howling with joy at their liberation.
The freaks nearby heard this joyous din, of course, and started to raise a chorus of their own. Soon the whole wooden platform upon which the freak show stood was shaking with their demands of freedom. Candy might have gone to find them and set them free, but at that moment the curtains were pulled apart, and Otto Houlihan came through, gloating.
“There you are!” he said, advancing on Candy. “I knew you couldn’t escape me forever.”
Before he could catch hold of her, the porcupine-woman intervened, stumbling between them in her ambition to be free. In so doing she blocked the Criss-Cross Man’s path for a few vital seconds, preventing him from getting hold of Candy. She pulled aside a second rotting canvas and stepped into a much more brightly lit area. Here there were twenty cages and tableaux arranged for the viewing pleasure of the paying customers, of which there were several dozen. Everybody seemed to be having a fine time watching the Scattamuns’ poor captives as they shook their cages. The louder the freaks sobbed and complained, the more they laughed.
Candy was revolted by the whole spectacle and felt a spasm of guilt at the sight of Methis, who had been quickly elevated to the status of The Most Terrifying Freak in Captivity. He didn’t look particularly terrifying. He sat at the back of his cage with his head in his hands, his eyes downcast. A little boy with cotton candy all around his mouth was kicking the bars of Methis’ cage, trying to get a response from him. When he failed, he started to spit at the zethek.
“Did this one pay, Mrs. Scattamun?” said a tall bony man, pointing down at Candy.
Mrs. Scattamun swept on over, her gray dress raising a little cloud of dust. She had spiky painted eyelashes and cherubic lips. Her nose and cheeks bore the unmistakable bloom of a very heavy drinker.
“No, I didn’t sell a ticket to this one, Mr. Scattamun.”
“Did you not, Mrs. Scattamun?”
“I did not.”
The pair of them wore hats, which were morbid variations on the aquarium hats that were apparently such a rage in Babilonium. Instead of housing living fish, however, the Scattamuns’ hats were filled with dead, withered creatures.
“Did you come here to look at the freaks?” Mrs. Scattamun said.
“Yes…” Candy said.
“But you didn’t pay to look.”
“I came in here by mistake,” Candy said.
Mrs. Scattamun put out her empty palm. “Mistake or no mistake, everybody pays. That’ll be six zem.” She leaned forward and the withered thing on her head bobbed in its formaldehyde.
Before Candy could reply, there was a fresh eruption of noise from the back room, and Houlihan started shouting again.
“Out of my way!” he yelled. “All of you! Out of my way before I slit your throats.”
Hearing this outburst, the audience began to beat a hasty retreat, which did not please Mrs. Scattamun.
“Mr. Scattamun,” she said. “Kindly discover what’s going on back there. And stop it! Well? Don’t just look at me!” She gave her husband a very unloving shove. “Go!”
Reluctantly Mr. Scattamun crossed to the curtain and stepped through. Two seconds later he was thrown backward through the curtain at great speed. He was followed by the man who’d pushed him: Otto Houlihan.
Mrs. Scattamun let out a shrill shriek. “Get up and get that yellow monster out of here!” she demanded. “You heard me, Mr. Scattamun.”
Obediently Mr. Scattamun got to his feet, but Houlihan kicked him in the chest and down he went again, knocking over several small cages as he did so.
“Where’s the girl?” Houlihan demanded.
Candy had taken refuge behind a cage that contained a beast three times her size, which seemed to have completely rubber limbs. It bawled like a baby. Candy told it to hush, but it responded by bawling even more loudly.
Its din drew Mrs. Scattamun’s attention to Candy.
“The girl’s back there!” she said to Houlihan. “I can see her from here! She’s hiding behind the fetteree!”
“I see her,” Otto said.
“Don’t