The Lakeside Tavern, which is less lakeside than lake-overlooking from the opposite side of the road, offers a reasonably priced pub menu and a nice selection of craft beer. Ruby orders the eggplant parm special and a local brew. She grabs an outside table, a little damp but mostly protected by the porch overhang, and ties the Hitchhiker’s leash to the leg. It had been raining so heavily this morning that the Farmers’ Market and Makers Faire had been canceled and Ruby had enjoyed what felt an awful lot like a snow day. She pulls her atlas out of her satchel and flattens it against the tabletop. “Okay, where to?”
The Hitchhiker rests her chin on Ruby’s knees. Sighs. Eyes up, worried eyebrows. Ruby places a hand on the dog’s head to listen.
“Here is now.”
“Nope. Time to go. The van is back and I’m ready to find new adventure.” Ruby looks around, thankful that there is no one within earshot of a woman having a one-sided discussion with a dog.
“Here is now.”
“That doesn’t even make sense.”
The worried eyebrows. Spaniel eyes.
“Why not?”
“No go.”
“Don’t worry, little one. Travel is fun. I won’t leave you behind.”
The dog sighs but does not look any less worried. “More work left.”
What Ruby “sees” in her mind’s eye is the scent of unhappy animals. “There are dogs everywhere that I can help.”
“Here is now.”
Frustrated, Ruby is glad when the server comes with her meal. The Hitchhiker’s thought processes remind her all too much of a truculent toddler’s. No go. Well, let’s remember who’s in charge here.
“Hey, Ruby, what brings you into Harmony Farms’ best kept secret?” It’s Bull Harrison with Boy.
“Bull, hi. Probably the same thing that brings you here.” Ruby gestures toward her mostly empty plate and the beer.
Boy and the Hitchhiker perform their greeting routine, tails wagging. Both flop down on the porch floor, noses directly in line with anything that might fall from the tabletop.
Without being invited, Bull sits down opposite Ruby, taps the atlas with a forefinger. “Going someplace?”
“Looking for the next stop.”
“I thought you’d be staying.”
“No. I’ve about tapped out the Faire. Besides, Cynthia is being a pain in the tuchus. Gets in my face every single week.”
“That’s just her. Full of herself. She’s got something against everybody.”
“That’s no surprise. That woman is attitude on a stick.”
Bull rubs his whiskery chin in a gesture Ruby recognizes as a tell. She has an urge to grab Bull’s meaty hands and turn them over. She doesn’t, but she can read his thoughts in his expression. Not unlike his dog’s, Bull’s rumpled face gives away a lot of emotion.
“How come she’s angry at you?”
Bull makes that noise that might be choking or laughing and then stops. “We have a rocky history.”
“Former girlfriend?”
He shakes his shaggy head and Ruby gets why he might be nicknamed Bull. “It’s a long story, but everything worked out in the end.”
“Now you have me intrigued. Give me a short version.”
Bull gets a moment to decide if he wants to tell the story as Ruby’s server has wandered back to clear the table and ask about Ruby’s desires vis-à-vis dessert. She asks, “You want something to eat, Bull?”
“Naw.” He looks at the server. “Just the usual, Deb.”
“Seltzer and lime. Got it.” She scoops up Ruby’s plate, glances at her glass. “Another beer?”
“No. Thanks.” Ruby stops her. “Yeah, maybe another.” She’s intrigued by the wavering aura that now floats around Bull. She wants to have an excuse to examine it. “Go on, Bull. What happened?”
“A couple of years ago her ex-husband, although he wasn’t ex then, was arrested for animal abuse.”
“Whoa. Let me guess, Boy was the dog.”
“Yes, ma’am, he was.” Bull takes a long moment. “Anyway, it was my son who arrested him.” A beat. “My younger son.”
She keeps getting flashes of sharp grief, panic, and profound cold. Something deeply personal and yet not quite connected to the story that Bull has told her. His apparent need to clarify which son performed the arrest.
“Anyway, her husband, Don, went to prison for a bit. She liked having his money, but apparently so did he, so she didn’t get a ton of it in the divorce.”
“Kids?”
“One. I forget his name, but he was already in college at that point.”
Ruby gets it. Cynthia is one of those people for whom loneliness becomes bitterness. She is aggrieved and will make life miserable for anyone in her path. She also senses a hole within Bull Harrison. More than one. Not aggrieved, grieving.
She would ask but Deb has arrived to place a tall glass of seltzer in front of Bull. He sets aside the straw and takes a long drink and bends the conversation away. “So, tell me about where you’re headed?”
It’s a fair question. “I’m thinking Newport maybe, or the Cape. Look for street fairs, that sort of thing.” Even as she says this, Ruby realizes that she’s not as hot to pack up and venture blindly off as she had been an hour ago. The Hitchhiker noses her foot. Boy sighs and flops over on his side. The air is cool here, the breeze off the pretty lake ruffles her paper napkin. The sun has disappeared behind a scrim of fair-weather clouds, and the fairy lights hanging from the porch roof have come on. What’s the hurry?
“Polly will miss having you around. She says you’ve been a help.”
“That’s kind of her to say.” The fact is, Polly has been a help to Ruby. Letting her read the dogs in her care to some success gave her confidence that this canine communication phenomena is sticking with her.
“If it’s staying in the Dew Drop, well, you’re welcome to stay with me. Free. No strings.”
Ruby has no words for this offer. She’s seen the outside of his house; she can’t imagine what the inside must look like. “Um, that’s kind of you, but it’s not that. It’s just time to go.”
Bull sucks down the rest of the liquid, spits an ice cube back into the glass. If he’s disappointed or relieved, she really can’t tell.
“Stay stay stay.” Ruby hears Boy’s plaintive request. Even in her mind’s ear, his voice is distinct from the Hitchhiker’s.
Ruby closes the atlas, motions to the server that she’s ready to pay up. Bull digs into a back pocket for his wallet.
“No, I’ve got it. You can buy me a drink some other time.”
“Deal.”
“Do you need a ride home?”
“Nah. Got my trusty Raleigh. It’s not far.”
“It’s dark.”
“Got a good light. Coop bought me one of them LCD things. Real bright.”
“I think you mean LED.”
There’s a little goofy in his grin, the gaps where his front teeth should be giving him an oddly innocent expression. “I always get that mixed up.”
Ruby watches Bull pedal off before she starts her van. He’s got an uphill ride. She wonders at the effort he has made to go get a drink of fizzy water.
I do not understand why Ruby thinks it’s a good idea to leave here. Doesn’t she know that this is our territory? That we have marked it? That no good comes of wandering?
“I am so sorry to say goodbye and I hope that, when you are back in the area, you will make the Dew Drop Inn your home.” Ravi gives her that heartbreakingly melty smile of his and takes both her hands in his. She is unaccustomed to having her hands held rather than being the holder of hands. She momentarily expects him to read her and is surprised at the slight warmth rising in her cheeks.
“I will. I promise.” With the Westfalia back on the road, the summer weather absolutely divine, there is no reason not to camp. So, why does she feel like she’s wrong-footed?
As Ruby loads the rest of her stuff into the van, the Hitchhiker sits with her back toward Ruby, her nose pointed down and the term abject comes to mind. “Hey, girlie, hop in.”
The dog doesn’t move.
“Hitch, get in.” Ruby points toward the interior of the van beyond the wide-open slider. “Up. Up.”
Nothing. A sigh. A yawn. Her cheerful little companion is pouting.
Ruby swoops down, encircles the dog with her arms and hefts her onto the bench seat. “I’m bigger than you are. Ha-ha.”
The Hitchhiker circles three times and curls up, tucks her nose beneath her hind leg. Closes her eyes.
Ravi waves from the office door as Ruby pulls out of the empty parking lot. The weekends have been busier, but the weekdays she’s had the place pretty much all to herself. The begonias and impatiens have fulfilled their promise of huge happy blooms in the time she’s spent residing in this humble motor lodge. Ruby bangs a left, which will take her through town and on toward the highway entrance. Except for Ravi, she’s told no one goodbye, as is her habit. She’s got Polly’s number; she’ll stay in touch. She’s enjoyed Bull’s unique company, and he knows she’s going. As with pretty much everywhere else she’s been in her life, Ruby leaves without leaving a wake.
A quarter of a mile before the highway access there is a large modern church, far enough away from town proper as to not be in architectural conflict with its more traditional peers of the Protestant persuasion. St. Sebastian’s RC Church boasts a bright pebble-dash façade interspersed with tall wide windows and a bell tower surmounted by a gold cross. It also boasts a massive black-topped parking lot, in the western corner of which is a fleet of flatbed trailers bearing the unmistakable burden of carnival rides. Ruby slows, pulls in to read the church’s signboard. St. Sebastian’s Days will open on Friday at five with the traditional feast of all things Italian. Bands! Contests! Traditional dancing! A Kids Parade on Saturday with fireworks Saturday night! And, most tempting for a psychic on her way out of town, the featured Benini Bros Carnival! Holy Exclamation Point!
Three more days in Harmony Farms but no need to deal with Cynthia Mann. For a cut of the take, she knows that old Angelo Benini will let her read cards out of her van unless he’s found himself a fortune-teller willing to travel under his banner. Ruby vastly prefers to be a subcontractor than an employee.
“What do you say?”
The Hitchhiker has jumped down from the backseat and is standing between the front seats, her tail wagging in triple time.
“I haven’t changed my mind, but this could be a good reason to put the travel on pause.” Ruby doesn’t put her hands on the dog because she isn’t interested in any comment from this furry peanut gallery.
Ruby finds Angelo Benini the younger coming out of his camper. She remembers him from when he was just a tyke, following his dad around the various empty lots where the carnival would set up. He and Sabine were sometime playmates and once even classmates when they both overwintered in North Carolina when Angelo, Jr.—called Joe by his peers—and Sabine were in third grade.
“Ruby Heartwood as I live and breathe!” Joe trots over and throws his arms around Ruby in a joyful embrace. “You look great, you haven’t aged a bit.”
“And you are a flatterer or need glasses. But thank you.”
“And Sabine, is she here with you?”
“Nope. Happily married and firmly rooted in Moose River Junction.”
“She always did talk about finding a place to call home.”
“Your dad? Is he around? I’d like to talk with him.”
“He’s in Florida, semiretired. He remarried after Mom passed and his new wife isn’t carny.”
That is, one of us. Itinerant. Transient. It was always a bad sign when a carnival worker married outside of the culture; either the marriage failed or they found other, less transient employment. Even though an outsider might flirt with the life, it is a rare thing for them to stick with it.
“But he’s happy.” Statement of fact, not a question. She can read Angelo the younger without too much effort and interprets that he’s pretty okay with being in charge. “You’re happy.”
“We both are. He joins us for part of the year, so he gets his fix.”
“Well, I expect you know what I wanted to talk to him about.”
“You are more than welcome to set up with us. Let me check the layout and find a good place for you.”
The carnival is more just an edited-down version of itself, consisting of games of chance and rides, not the full-bore midway that Benini’s was known for a decade or so back. Joe notices Ruby noticing. “This is the local amusement division. Our big stuff is waiting for the big fairs coming up at the end of the summer—Topsfield, Freyberg. I’d love to have you there.”
“I’d like that. It’s been awhile since I did a big fair. I’ve been mostly doing little places. I like it. I can pick up and go when I want.” Except that she can’t seem to get out of Harmony Farms.
Because it’s asphalt, Ruby can’t set up her tent. Joe grabs a stack of traffic cones and delineates a space for her van, writes “Madame Ruby” in chalk in the rectangle. “All set.”
Time to deal. “Sixty/forty?”
“We’re more into fifty/fifty these days, but, hey, you’re family. Sixty/forty is fine.”
It feels so good to be among folk who get her.
Maggie Dean found a gaudy robe in a thrift shop in Newington; Ruby filched a box of hair dye from Caldor along with a home perm kit. Her holey Keds were set aside for a Goodwill pair of boots Maggie spray painted gold, then glued sequins to. Every day they practiced Ruby’s schtick. Ruby studied the tarot cards, memorizing the suits and meanings until it felt like she was prepping for exams. And just as if she was prepping for a big test, Ruby began to balk. She had never gotten the psychic feeling from props, only by touch and proximity. It was all intuitive, although she didn’t have that word in her vocabulary. “I can’t do it, Maggie. I just don’t feel it. I don’t know what to say if I don’t have a connection.”
“You only have to act, to pretend that you know what the cards mean. When you get a real feeling, then go with it. Otherwise, just play like you’re seeing something in the distance.”
Ruby would sit in Maggie’s book-crowded squat and shuffle and deal; shuffle and deal over and over until she had softened the edges of the cards. Curled up under a Salvation Army sleeping bag, she dreamed of laying out cards, of the Wands dancing, of the Fool wagging his finger at her. She learned the language of “cups” and “swords” and “arcana” and “wands” and on and on. Storytelling based on an occult mythology. And each time Ruby shuffled and dealt and interpreted cards from their position, upside or reverse, she thought of her life in the convent school and the fear in the nuns’ eyes when she displayed her gift of second sight; the anger and humiliation of Monsignor LaPierre in the face of her knowing his past. How she was considered the Devil’s tool and here she now was, handling the mysteries of the occult. Sometimes her fingers burned.
And it got easier. Maggie Dean reminded Ruby that she didn’t have to make up more than a half dozen readings; no one would ever know that she was passing out the same tales of future glory or past pain over and over. It wasn’t accuracy, it was the skill with which she would weave the tale, inexact but believable. The details would be left to the client; her job was to guide them into revealing enough to suffice. Improvisation by any other name.
The caftan was hemmed, and the boots were properly glittery; Ruby’s strawberry blond hair was now curly and as dark red as the jewel of her name. Maggie, her black trench coat belted tightly around her waist, took Ruby’s arm and the odd pair walked the six blocks to where the Carerra Brothers Carnival had set up. As if she were Ruby’s grandmother, Maggie kept up a litany of do’s and don’ts, mostly don’ts . Don’t tell them your real age. Don’t give them your real name. Don’t let anyone touch you. And then, when they met the brother who hired acts for the sideshow, Maggie actually did introduce Ruby as her granddaughter. One with extraordinary abilities who would draw a crowd. The brother shrugged, having no illusions about their relationship or Ruby’s so-called abilities, and said no thank you.
Ruby felt Maggie Dean’s ragged fingernails dig into her forearm, reminding her of their plan. In a pathetically thin voice, she offered: “Let me read you.” A free sample in the face of refusal.
Ernest Carerra laughed, shook his head, and waved them away from his trailer office. “Just beat it. Fake psychics are a dime a dozen. This isn’t that kind of show.”
“We both know that’s not true.” Maggie laughed. “It’s all fake.”
Ernest Carerra slammed the door of his trailer. End of discussion.
“Never mind.” Maggie renewed her grip on Ruby’s arm. “It’s a second-rate carny anyway. I’ll get you in with a better one.”
Ruby felt stupid dressed in the flowing robe and the glittery shoes, and the permanent wave curls in her dyed hair were beginning to frizz. Building within her was the urge to move on. She’d been too long in one place. Enough with Maggie Dean’s vision of her future. The next afternoon when Maggie was out panhandling, Ruby shoved the props of her untested profession into her schoolbag and slipped away.
Her unplanned route out of the city took her past the carnival. She skirted around the gate and marched up to Ernest Carerra’s trailer. Knocked. Dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, her Keds on bare feet, her hair scraped back into a ponytail, he didn’t recognize her at first.
“I need a job, Mr. Carerra. I can sell tickets or popcorn or sweep up. Whatever you need.”
“You’re that psychic kid. Maggie’s protégée.”
“No. I’m Ruby Heartwood and I need a job.” She watched his hands, the way they flexed as he thought about hiring someone who clearly didn’t fit the legal parameters of an adult. Someone who he would take on the road, farther away from whomever or whatever she had run from. Ernest Carerra had been a long time in the business and knew trouble when he saw it. But Ruby could see in his weary-looking blue eyes that he had a soft spot for trouble.
By the time the carnival had moved across the state, Ruby was plying her trade, paying Ernest six of every ten dollars she took in.