‘Not tonight,’ she replied.
‘I saw you dance once before.’
She smiled politely.
‘I wish you would have danced,’ he said stubbornly, his eyes steady.
‘Shall I dance for you now?’ She smiled, picked up her skirts and did a couple of swirls, backwards and forwards, side to side, stamping her feet and finishing with arms akimbo. A cheer went up from those close by who saw. The older man applauded.
‘You have talent,’ he said with a slight bow of the head. A Yank, by his accent.
‘Thank you, Señor.’
‘Didn’t I tell you?’ The boy spoke with an air of great seriousness. ‘She’s remarkable. She speaks English, Uncle. And you ought to see her dance. The way she points the toe.’
‘Indeed.’ The man held her gaze. ‘Miss Pastrana,’ he said in English, ‘you really ought to go on the stage.’
Julia smiled, looked down.
‘She exceeded all expectations,’ Don Pedro said jovially, appearing at her side and putting one arm about her shoulders. ‘I taught her to read myself. She can make a good fist of French as well if it’s called for. Can’t you, Julia?’
‘Mais bien sûr, Monsieur,’ said Julia, raising a laugh.
‘Miss Pastrana,’ the man said, as the band struck up once more and Don Pedro was dragged away to the dance floor by one of his daughters-in-law, ‘have you ever been in New Orleans?’
‘I have never been anywhere, Señor.’
In English he replied, ‘Should you decide to make your fortune, Señorita, come and see me in New Orleans. My card, Señorita.’ Which he presented with another small bow.
‘My uncle is in the entertainment business in New Orleans,’ said the boy importantly.
The name on the card was Matthew Rates.
‘New Orleans,’ he said, ‘New York.’
The outer door opened, Charlotte coming in with the chocolate.
‘Charlotte,’ she called, ‘I’ve taken my veil off. You can bring the chocolate in here if you like, or leave it on the table and I’ll get it when you’ve gone.’
Julia set about unpacking her grip, putting things in the small cupboard next to the window. A moment later a voice said, ‘Miss Julia, there’s some pecans too’, and when she turned Charlotte was standing by the curtain with a bowl of hot chocolate and a dish of pecans on a tray. For a long moment she held Julia’s eyes, devoid of expression, then she set down the tray. ‘Mr Rates say he’ll come by for you when you’re rested,’ she said.
‘Thank you, Charlotte.’
Then she was gone. To tell. She was used to freaks of course, but still. The chocolate was dark and wonderfully rich, and Julia drank it by the window, eating pecans and looking out at the twining plant on the back wall of the yard, thinking about Cato. He doesn’t know he’s a pinhead, she thought. He lives in that face like I do, but it’s different because he doesn’t think about it.
I do.
And there were more to meet. She’d be a difference among differences. It was a peculiar feeling.
Later Mr Rates came across with Madame Soulie. ‘At last!’ she said, walking straight over to Julia and peering down eagerly into her face, ‘I can see you! Oh my, oh my, you really are the strangest person I have ever seen.’ Her eyes bugged out. ‘And believe me, I’ve seen a few.’ She reached down and touched the hair on Julia’s cheek with one finger. ‘You are quite unique.’
‘So I’m told,’ Julia said. There were no freaks among freaks, but it was dawning that she really did surpass the lot.
‘You didn’t exaggerate, Matt,’ Madame Soulie said.
‘What did you expect?’ Rates looked smug. ‘When have I ever exaggerated? She’ll slay them in New York.’
‘Ooh, it’s lovely and soft!’
Madame Soulie’s hand was light and cautious. She stepped back. ‘You are so like an ape it’s scarcely credible,’ she said. ‘You just don’t look human. And yet you do. And you speak so nicely.’
‘I can’t be an ape because they don’t talk,’ Julia said in French, smiling, ‘but I know how I look.’
‘Absolutely!’ Madame Soulie laughed. ‘An ape doesn’t talk!’
‘I talk,’ said Julia. ‘I speak French and English and Spanish. An ape doesn’t speak French and English and Spanish.’
Madame Soulie goggled with delight.
‘Mr Rates,’ said Julia, ‘Who am I sharing with?’
‘Myrtle and Delia,’ Madame Soulie said. ‘You’ll get along fine.’
‘Of course you will,’ said Rates. ‘Come and meet them.’
They were in the next-door shack, which had big shutters opening out onto the yard and served as a communal parlour. The room smelled heavily of citrus and was crowded with fraying armchairs. Rates led her in by the hand through the open door. They’d been told about her and knew what to expect. There was a White Negro, a Rubber-Skinned Man, a Girl With No Arms and a Girl With No Legs. Michael sat scratching his pockmarked face on a piano stool. Seeing her for the first time, he smiled slowly.
‘Jonsy,’ Mr Rates said, gesturing at the yellow-haired paint-white Negro, whose cochineal-coloured suit matched his pink eyes. He stared at her, aghast. ‘And this—’ indicating a dark, heavy-jawed girl in a calico dress, who ended at the waist and appeared to be growing out of the florid roses on the rug ‘—this is Delia.’ Delia twitched a corner of her mouth and one eyebrow. ‘And Myrtle.’ A plump blonde woman in an orange kimono and red shawl half reclined in an uncomfortable-looking, over-stuffed green armchair, drinking from a tin cup.
‘Pleased to meet you,’ she said.
‘And this is Ted.’ Ted sat beside a small card table knitting a black stocking very nimbly. The Rubber-Skinned Man, she assumed, but he just looked ordinary.
‘And here,’ said Rates, grandly, ‘is Julia.’
She smiled. She was terrified.
‘Sit here, Julia, next to me,’ said Myrtle. ‘Want a drink?’ She flourished an opened bottle of brandy.
The chair was scratchy, the smell of perfume overpowering. Myrtle handed her a tin cup with brandy in the bottom. It warmed her and went straight to her head. So this is how it’s to be, she thought. No return.
After that, though she remembered talking to Myrtle about the journey, and realising that the hand raising the cup to Myrtle’s reddened lips was actually a very supple, long-toed foot rising gracefully from layers of skirt, she was so tired it all became dreamlike, and she said she really must go to bed or she’d fall asleep where she was.
*
In bed with a swimmy head from the brandy, she thought of old Solana back home. Her voice calling, high and thready. Lying there bedridden now, peevish thing worn out from nursing them all, the young men and boys, Marta, Julia too when they brought her in from the orphanage. Julia was the one in and out all day dealing with the dribble and phlegm, the smell of piss, the feeding and washing and wiping of mess. The night of the wedding she’d shown Solana the man’s card. ‘Look.’ In the process of emptying the old woman’s bedpan. ‘This man thinks I could make a lot of money on the stage.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ Solana had just finished a coughing fit. Her eyes streamed and