Nightmare Carnival

Mirchland and I, cautiously passing written notes, planned our escape. We were fairly certain the fleas could not read. St. Joseph was to be the spot where we would take our leave of the caravan. The plan was to disappear with the crowd at the end of Hibbler’s act, to mingle in with them and, once to the road, try to hitch a ride or run for it. Not much of a plan, but we were desperate. The correspondence we had going was voluminous, most of it pondering the fact that the fleas obviously intended to drain all of us in the carnival before dispersing out into the general population. We never saw news of flea infestations from the towns we passed through and wondered why the minions didn’t spread out and share their horror with the rest of the world. Mirchland thought it was because they were building strength, increasing their numbers for an all-out assault on some unsuspecting hamlet in our path. I, on the other hand, thought it had to do with that part of their act where they transformed through accretion into the figure of a man. “Only together can they achieve their terrifying potential,” I wrote to the dwarf.

Just as we planned, when the evening show let out on our second night in St. Joseph, I met my friend behind the clowns’ trailer. He’d packed a small satchel he had attached to a stick and had a lantern in his hand, the wick brought down so as to only offer a mere glow. He was sitting on an overturned milk crate, his back against the trailer wheel, his feet off the ground. “Hurry,” I said to him. “Let’s go.” I was anxious to be on the move. As I stepped away from him, my other me noticed that he didn’t budge. Then I spotted his empty eye sockets, and spun around.

The fleas issued forth from the twin puckered holes where his eyes had been, two living streams of black. Single file, and if my ears did not deceive me, singing some kind of song in unison. I gagged, doubled up with fear, and fell on my knees. The fleas marched along the ground to within two feet of me, and then drew together to form the word sorry, in my very own script. Something bit my rear end, a warning that I’d not be going anywhere. To my surprise, they didn’t infest me. I supposed I was to be saved for a later meal. Returning to my trailer in a stupor, I spent the night scratching my ass, the itching from just that one bite an agony. The prospect of inevitably being overrun with them made me consider Ichbon’s method of scratching with a revolver no longer insane.

Granted, the fleas were shrewd, but the next day, after torching Mirchland’s remains, the caravan headed away from Missouri and back toward the heart of Kansas. Everyone who had been with the show for a couple of years knew this was wrong, but no one mentioned it. I surmised immediately what was going on. The Miserable Clowns, who drove the trucks that pulled the trailers, were taking us out into the plains, away from the towns and cities. To be honest, I was shocked that they’d have the foresight or concern. When the fleas got through with us, there was nothing stopping them from overrunning humanity. The plan, as I perceived it, was to strand us out in the heart of the Dust Bowl and let them eat each other after they’d devoured us. In the end, if the world was to be saved, it would be saved by miserable clowns.

For the next three days straight, the caravan rolled at top speed, at first on a road, passing small dilapidated farms and one-horse towns, and then on a packed dirt path that cut through the sandy remains of what had once been pasture. The sky was blue, but you’d hardly know it as the dust blew up around everything, choking the air and blocking the sun. Myself and I had to wear kerchiefs around our mouths and noses and something to protect the eyes from the blowing grit. I opted for goggles and my other me settled for an old wide-brimmed hat pulled low. The hours dragged tediously on as we passed through the desolation. Late on the third afternoon, when the caravan came to a halt somewhere in the far-flung dry heart of America, the clowns were informed by Hibbler that there would be no more driving. The fleas needed to perform.

The trailers were gathered into a half circle as the night came on and then lit by lanterns and torches. There was no paying public for a hundred miles in any direction. We performers were to be the audience. There wasn’t any choice. We gathered on folding chairs, forming a half circle around Hibbler and a small, makeshift stage for the fleas. The old man wore his graduation gown instead of his tuxedo and top hat. He stood before us, weaving to and fro, with an insipid smile on his face. When the crowd quieted down, he lifted the graduation robe over his head and dropped it on the ground. One more horror to add to the onslaught: a completely naked Hibbler stood before us.