The Palace of Laughter (14 page)

Now Ignatz, limping along beside him, was describing how the three creepers had been jumped by a small party of Stinkers as they crawled through a hole in a hedge, close to the border between the territories. He had been felled by a Stinker club, which he described as a sort of stocking with a ball of hard slime in the end of it, and knocked almost senseless. “It's the stench,” said Ignatz. “It's worse than the whack itself. That smell would knock you out on its own.” He had crawled free of the ensuing scramble, but they were outnumbered, and Henry and Little had been tied up in a matter of seconds. Ignatz (by his own account at least) had managed to land a few blows with his bone, and with his speed
and slipperiness he had escaped the Stinkers and run all the way back to the churchyard.

The mist had almost cleared as they reached the bullring, a dozen bone-wielding Halfheads slipping through the broken turnstiles. Miles looked about him as they entered the dilapidated arena. The Stinkers were waiting at the far side. He could just make out Little and Henry sitting on the crumbling stone terraces, guarded by a couple of the larger boys. He waved at her, but he was not sure if she could see him. Besides the Stinkers, a scattering of small long-haired boys sat around the terraces. Some nudged each other and pointed at the Halfheads as they entered. They were mostly barefoot.

Lob grunted. “Gnats is here already,” he said.

Three of the Stinkers were crossing the arena toward them, swinging their clubs in their hands. The top halves of their faces were painted black, as though they wore masks over their eyes. Two of them wore kilts, and the smell of rotten eggs preceded them like an invisible tide. Miles fought the impulse to hold his nose. Jook casually lit a cigar, and stepped forward to meet the chief Stinker.

“Got us one of your creeps,” said the Stinker in chief through a broken-toothed smile.

“You got two prisoners,” said Jook. “We want to
play for 'em both.” Miles looked at him in surprise, but Jook's eyes were fixed on his opposite number.

“We got one prisoner,” said the Stinker, “and a girl that was with 'em. You taking girls in now, Jook? Your boys not tough enough?”

“She's not Halfhead,” said Jook, blowing a cloud of thick smoke at the chief Stinker. “She belongs to one of my boys. You can throw her in with my creeper, and we'll say no more about it.”

“Finders keepers, even creepers,” said the other boy. “She's not Halfhead, like you said, and we don't have to give her back. Might make a good lookout, if her eyes are sharp. We play one game for the creeper. First to three scores. You lose, you got to play for him again next week.” He turned on his heel and began to walk away.

“Wait a minute, slime head,” said Miles.

The Stinker in chief whipped around and scowled at him through his painted mask. “I don't know your face, squirt,” he spat. “And you're not going to know it either, once this game is done.”

He turned to Jook. “I'd teach him to keep his mouth shut if I was you.”

“Well you're not me,” said Jook, “so you can keep your own mouth shut.”

“
I'll
play for both of them,” interrupted Miles.
“The girl and the creeper. Just me against your team.”

There was a moment's silence. Halfheads and Stinkers alike stared at Miles in disbelief, then Ignatz slapped his hand to his forehead and groaned, and the Stinkers burst out laughing.

“You've never played Pigball, have you, squirt?” said the Stinker in chief. He stepped forward and stuck out a filthy hand. “You're on. It'll be a short match, but it'll be fun to watch. Better get a wheelbarrow, Jook.”

The three Stinkers walked back across the bullring, still chuckling. Jook let out a long stream of smoke, and stubbed out his cigar butt. “I like you, pez,” he said, shaking his head. “That's why I stuck my neck out for you. But that's got to be the stupidest idea I've ever heard.”

“It's just a game, isn't it?” said Miles. “How bad can it be?”

“Ever been run over by a tram?” laughed Lob.

“It ain't funny,” growled Jook. “You'd better give a good account of yourself in the few seconds you're going to last, pez.”

“How many are on a team?” asked Miles.

“How many? The whole gang is a team. You'd have to get the ball across the bullring, up the terraces
and into their drum, playing against fourteen of 'em, plus the crowd of course.”

Miles felt his stomach sink. “The crowd can play as well?”

“They can't leave the terraces, and they can't score,” said Jook. “But they can foul whoever they like.”

Miles looked around at the scattering of long-haired boys on the terraces. “They all look very small,” he said hopefully.

“That's 'cause they're Gnats, pez. None of 'em's more than six or seven. Some of them's not much more than babies. Henry was Gnats, once. When he got too big we took him as a creeper.”

“They shouldn't be too much of a problem then,” said Miles.

Jook laughed. “Don't count on it, pez. Gnats sting.”

“I think you'd better teach me the rules so I can work out a strategy,” said Miles.

“No eye gougin',” said Ignatz, scuffing the dirt with the end of his bone.

Miles waited for a moment. “What about the rest of the rules?” he said.

“That's it,” said Ignatz. “No eye gougin'. That's the only rule there is.”

M
iles Wednesday, stomach-knotted and hopelessly outnumbered, looked around him at the crumbling arena with its scattering of tiny spectators. He could just make out the rusted oil drum, painted with black and yellow stripes, on the top terrace at the Stinkers' end of the arena. It seemed impossibly far away. The Halfheads had slapped him on the back and left him alone, forming a huddle to exchange bets. The Gnats fidgeted and squinted in the sunlight, and on the far side of the ring, the Stinkers gathered in a dark huddle, from which laughter broke out from time to time.

A Stinker was dispatched from across the bullring. “You the new face?” he said. Miles nodded. The Stinker produced a tightly bound ball of rags that looked like it was a veteran of many matches. “You understand the game?” he asked.

“I think so,” said Miles.

The boy turned and pointed to the arches that ringed the top of the terrace. “See the black an' yellow drum under the bigger arch?” he said. Miles nodded. “That's where you got to put the ball. Your drum is up there.” He pointed to another large arch above where the Halfheads were seated. “That's where we got to put it. Usually a game is first to three, but the chief says you only got to score once. An outsider's not worth three scores, and besides, you'll never make it out of your corner.” He spat on the ball and held it out for Miles to do the same.

“The rest of you Halfheads is out of this game, by agreement,” said the Stinker. “Otherwise all bets is off, and you don't get the outsider, nor your creeper neither.” He turned back to Miles. “It was nice knowin' you,” he said. “Game starts in three minutes.” Halfway across the arena he placed the ball carefully on the ground, and went to rejoin his team.

The sun was high now, and the heat was beginning
to rise from the packed dirt of the arena. Miles took off his jacket, but despite the warmth he felt a cold chill down his spine. He thought of the scoop of ice cream he had unwittingly collected while under the benches at the Circus Oscuro. He paused for a moment, then a smile crept across his face. He moved into the center of the knot of Halfheads and took off his shirt as well. He rolled it into a ball, knotting the sleeves around it as tightly as he could. He put his jacket back on, and stuffed the shirt into his pocket.

Jook was watching him closely from his seat on the terrace. He took half a cigar from his pocket and put it between his lips, unlit. “I'll bet two toe bones on the pez to score,” he said. “Any takers?”

“You're on,” said Lob, removing the necklace of bones he wore under his shirt. “I say he never gets to the terraces.”

“Get ready for the whistle, pez,” said Jook. “Your only chance is to get to the ball first.”

A moment later a shrill blast on a whistle echoed across the arena, and Miles took off as fast as he could. His seven escape attempts from Pinchbucket House had made a sprinter of him, and he covered the ground like a whippet. The entire Stinker team, with the exception of the two who were guarding
the prisoners, was charging toward him from the opposite side, yelling and whooping and whirling their stinking slime-filled stockings over their heads as they came. Miles carried the bone he had inherited from String, but he concentrated on running and left the whooping and whirling to his opponents. It looked like they would reach the ball at the same time, and Miles tried to block out all thoughts of the coming impact from his mind. He was only yards from the ball now—nine, eight, and the leading Stinkers were almost upon him, eyes staring from their blackened faces, seven, six, tongues hanging out as they ran, the smell of bad eggs turning the air before them. He took a last lungful of clean air at three yards and dived for the ball, still holding his bone in one hand, and a second later he was buried under a pile of smelly boys, scrabbling and grabbing for the ball, and flailing wildly with their slimy clubs.

Miles could feel the ball under his chest. He wormed his fingers in among the knotted rags to tighten his grip. He couldn't breathe for the weight on top of him, and with the weight being composed entirely of Stinkers he wasn't sure he wanted to. A knee dug into his back and a bang on the side of his head made his ear sing. The weight shifted, then
eased, as the pile of boys toppled over, and with a mighty wriggle he was out from under them and struggling to his feet. A hand gripped his jacket. He swiped with his bone and felt the grip loosen. He lowered his head and charged a couple of Stinkers who stood in his way, knocking one of them over, and he was free and running again.

He could just see the terraces through a film of sweat that was running into his eyes. He leaped onto the first terrace, hoping that he was heading for the right arch. The Stinkers were hot on his heels. One of their slime clubs wrapped itself around his ankle. He tripped and half fell, then recovered his feet and jumped another few terraces, landing among a crowd of Gnats. Too late he remembered that audience participation was a part of the game. He felt a stabbing pain in the back of his leg, then another, and he fell to the stone terrace with a crowd of small boys swarming over him like wasps on spilled jam.

Once again he was at the bottom of the pile, but this time they were mostly Gnats, although his nose told him that more Stinkers were joining the scrum by the second. His bone was snatched from him, and he could hear it clatter down the steps and out of reach. The real ball was wedged underneath him,
and with his free arm he rummaged in his pocket for his balled-up shirt. Instead his fingers found his pocketknife. He was nose to nose with a Gnat who could not have been more than four years old, grinning through his long stringy hair. “Fun, ain't it?” said the boy.

Miles produced his knife, and the boy's eyes widened. “You want this knife?” he gasped. The boy nodded. Miles put it back in his pocket with difficulty. He shoved the ball quickly under the other boy's chest. “Take this up to the Stinkers' drum and wait for me,” he said. “Then I'll swap the knife for it.”

The Pigball pile shifted and heaved. Elbows were jammed in ears, and feet between teeth, and minor fights and scuffles broke out until the heap of boys collapsed outward onto the terraces. Miles seized his chance. He pulled his filthy rolled-up shirt from his pocket and broke out from the scrum, holding the bogus ball tightly under one arm and leaping down the terraces. He took off at a sprint across the ring, straight toward the Halfhead side. He could hear the Stinkers laughing as they chased him. “Hey, Halfwit,” one of them called. “Keep going straight. You're going to score.”

Three of the fastest Stinkers were right on his
heels. A blow from a slime club stung his ear, and he felt his sleeve grabbed. He spun around as he fell. The three Stinkers were on top of him, shoving him into the dirt. “Here, we'll do that for you,” laughed one, then they were up and running toward the Halfheads' drum, one of them with Miles's rolled-up shirt clutched under his arm. Miles scrambled to his feet again. He caught a glimpse of the shocked faces of the Halfhead spectators, and flashed them a grin. He turned and ran as fast as he could toward the terraces. He did not make directly for the Stinkers' end, but reached the midpoint, where the terraces were empty, and leaped onto the first step. His lungs were burning, and his legs stung where they had been cut by the Gnats. The laughter of the Stinkers, and the watching Gnats, echoed across the bullring. “He's lost the ball,” someone shouted. There was more laughter.

“No he ain't,” came a shout from up beside the Stinkers' drum. The Gnat had reached his target unnoticed, but he could see that Miles was on the way with the fine knife he had promised him, and he could contain himself no longer.

“It's up here! I got it!” yelled the boy, holding the ball over his head and hopping with excitement. The Halfheads broke into a roar of delight. Miles
leaped the next terrace. The heat and the exertion were making him dizzy, and his legs felt like wet string. The chief Stinker was roaring now too, and not for the same reason. “Get after him, you boneheads! Where's your defense? Flatten the Halfbrain!”

Miles looked across at the Stinkers' end. A crowd of them had started up the terraces to cut him off before he could reach their drum. He was making his way around toward them with each step he climbed, but he was still only halfway up, and the top terrace seemed a lifetime away. The Gnat had stopped jumping up and down now. He had stuffed the ball behind him on the step and was looking worried. The Stinkers were whooping and swinging their clubs as they swarmed up the terraces, the black on their faces smeared with sweat. Miles pushed himself up step after step until he felt his lungs would burst. He reached the top terrace and ran on rubbery legs, following the wide curve beneath the colonnade of arches.

It was cooler up here, where the breeze could reach him and the sun could not. Everything seemed to slow down and fall into place. He could see the Stinkers, clambering up to cut him off, and he could see the Gnat with the ball, looking wide-eyed from
him to the approaching horde and back again. He could see Little down below, standing on the terrace between her guards, waving both arms in the air and shouting, and most of all he could hear the roar from the Halfheads, a wave of surprise and delight that seemed to carry him the last few yards to the Stinkers' drum without his feet touching the stone. He grabbed the ball from the Gnat's outstretched hands and paused for a moment at the mouth of the oil drum. The Stinkers were two steps below him, mouths wide as they gasped for air, defeat already in their eyes. He held the ball high, and dropped it into the drum.
Thunk!

His legs gave way from under him, and he collapsed onto the terrace beside his small accomplice.

“So this…is…Pigball,” he panted as he handed over his knife.

The small boy nodded. “Fun, ain't it?” he said.