Pussycat's Circus Adventure

© 2013 David Jasmin-Green

“Eugene, wake up!” Owl said as she switched on the bedside lamp and shook her husband out of his tranquil slumber.

“Wassamatter?” Pussycat replied, lifting one corner of his crumpled Hello Kitty sleeping mask and blinking at his agitated missus myopically. “You've ruined my dream about Keira Knightley, you wicked old harridan, I'd just got to the interesting bit where she was stepping out of her lacy skidders and aggressively demanding intercourse. What time is it? It's still dark, you know I don't like being woken before daylight in case the Bogeyman is hiding under the bed.”

“There is no Bogeyman you pestiferous twannock, how many times do I have to tell you? But there is something here that bloody well shouldn't be.”

“What sort of something, Owl?” Pussycat mumbled as he pulled off his sleeping mask and rubbed his eyes. “A beautiful pea green boat laden with a record haul of Giant Golden Prawns? A fully functional Terry Wogan robot? I sincerely hope not, I can't stand the man. A set of propellers from a Lohner L seaplane? I hope so, because they could be worth a few quid. Be more specific, woman, what sort of something are you talking about?”

“There's a tiny circus ringmaster standing at the foot of our bed, and he appears to be an overweight British bulldog. He's standing there staring at us like a lemon right now, but before I woke you he said 'Roll up, citizens of Dullsville, roll up and prepare to have your gasts flabbered by the greatest show on Earth!'”

“Have you been smoking that psychotropic fungus again, woman, that Dead Man's Foot or whatever it's called? You have, haven't you, I can smell it's sickly sweet aroma on your breath. You know I don't like you smoking in bed. Anyway, how do you know that your hallucinatory visitor is a ringmaster?”

“It's Dead Man's Fist, not Foot, you utter nincompoop, and I haven't been smoking it, not since last night just after you nodded off, anyway. I might have sneaked a teensy-weensy bit into your cocoa, and a strong infusion of it might accidentally have found its way into the bottle of bitter lemon you keep on your bedside table for when you've been snoring and your mouth dries out. Oh come on, it's only fair, I can't trip on my lonesome, I'd get all panicky and wet the bed.....

I know he's a ringmaster because he's wearing a ringmaster's uniform – you know, a shirt so frilly your grandma wouldn't wear it in bed, a heavily sequinned jacket and red silk waistcoat and a ginormous top hat, and of course he has a huge waxed ringmaster's moustache, large bushy sideburns and a ridiculous little goaty beard. I'm not stoned, Pussycat, take a look if you don't believe me.”

“Oh, you're quite right, Susan. Hello there little fellow, what are you doing in our bedroom in the middle of the sodding night?”

“It's not the middle of the night, you feline tart!” the ringmaster snapped, fiddling with his moustache, “it's bright and early in the morning, and it's about time you got your lazy arse out of bed. You know what they say, Mr. Pussycat, the early bird catches the first worm. I have a proposal to make, sir, it's the chance of a lifetime, and I think you'll find the financial rewards on offer too tempting to ignore. Roll up! Roll up! Prepare to have your gasts flabbered by the undisputed greatest show on Earth!”

“I suppose I'd better get up and put the kettle on then,” Pussycat grumbled.

*************************

“What are you offering us then, short-arse?” a bleary eyed Pussycat said ten minutes later to the pint sized bulldog ringmaster sitting in an armchair that almost buried him, sipping coffee from a mug several sizes too big for his tiny hands and munching chocolate biscuits.

“Don't be rude, you grumpy old git!” Owl said. “This gentleman has come here out of the kindness of his heart offering you, well, offering something so far undisclosed, and it won't hurt you to be nice.”

“My name is Valentine Bulldog, and I'm going to make you an offer you can't refuse,” the ringmaster said, “unless you're a complete tit, that is. I come from a faraway country called Pollywoggle where multicoloured birds of paradise and gigantic blood red sea lions play tennis with spineless hedgehogs instead of balls, paraplegic rats dress up in skimpy pantomime Princess Margaret costumes and belly dance in great, wriggling, sweaty spastic heaps, the sound of their leg irons clanking together making your scalp crawl as they perform before huge crowds of dribbling scaly hyena monitor lizard hybrids, where lemmings fart clouds of neat sulphuric acid blinding wretched passers by unfortunate enough to cross their paths and obese guinea pigs sometimes explode. We had a nuclear disaster some time ago, you see, and there are a lot of mutant lifeforms swanning around..... 'Tis in Pollywoggle that the Valentine Bulldog Circus Of Mind-boggling Wonders largely operates, though we do foreign tours on occasion.

Oberon Lion, the most talented lion I've ever employed – he used to be a Shakespearean actor and his performances received unprecedented critical acclaim - suffered a massive cardiac arrest last Tuesday while he was weeding his prize chrysanthemums in the heat of the midday sun, and sadly he died on the way to hospital. He wasn't a real lion of course, he was a llama donkey hybrid, I believe, but he was a master of disguise and the star of my show. I'm struggling to find a suitable replacement, the only real lions on offer are too wild and aggressive for my liking, and I can't find anyone able to pose as a lion anywhere near convincingly. I've purchased a couple of lion cubs from Longleat safari park, but it's going to be some time before they're ready for the show.....

As you may appreciate from my size, the denizens of Pollywoggle are mostly Lilliputian compared to the creatures of your realm. The felines in Pollywoggle are all, well, regular domestic pussycat size, they're nowhere near as big as you, you great lump. What I'd like you to do, Mr. Pussycat, is come and star in my show for a few months until our cubs are trained up. A Mr. Norman Giraffe, who is currently on my payroll, gave me your name and address, he said you might be interested in the Lion role. You're quite a bit bigger than the biggest lion ever exhibited in Pollywoggle, and you should prove quite a spectacle. You'll have to wear a custom made lion costume, of course, and if you can't ride a unicycle and juggle you're no good to me.”

“I don't know what to say,” Pussycat said. “I can juggle proficiently and I can also ride a unicycle, swallow swords, perform a range of magical tricks and fly through the air with the greatest of ease on the flying bloody trapeze - I ran away and joined the circus for a few years when I was a youngster, you see. I'm also a pretty good actor, I'm a member of the Hog's Bottom Amateur Dramatics Society and we often perform before audiences of ooh, a couple or three dozen. But I can't see how I can accept your offer, Mr. Bulldog. Who's going to run my thingummy and whatyacallit business while I'm away?”

“I'll sell your trombones and other musical instruments while you're away, Eugene,” Owl said. “I'm sure you trust me to look after your customers.”

“I'm still a trifle wary. What sort of financial incentive is there?”

“The financial rewards are unmatched in the world of show business,” Bulldog said through a mouthful of chocolate digestive crumbs, “because my circus is a huge money spinner. Catch!” he said, producing a heavy little cloth bag with a shiny dollar sign stamped on the side from his jacket pocket and lopping it gently into Pussycat's lap. “Open it, Mr. Pussycat, that's just a little bonus, it's all yours if you decide to accept my offer, but your weekly wage will be five times that amount with an added five percent cut of the circus's takings.”

“Fifty gold pieces? That's a bloody fortune!”

“I take it that's a yes, then,” Bulldog said.

“Yes, I believe you've twisted my arm,” Pussycat replied.

“Splendid! Consider yourself hired, Eugene – or the Great Eugene, should I say.”

*************************

“Roll up, roll up, people of Sow's Nipple, Pollywoggle, prepare to have your gasts flabbered by the greatest show on Earth!” the ringmaster said to the crowd in the packed big top. “I present for your pleasure Wilf the harmonica playing zebra, Archos and Ethel, the Patagonian midget warthog acrobats, and Mr. Norman Giraffe and his magnificent troop of trombone and ukulele playing baboons! Meet Pompom the clown and chums, who will shortly be entering the ring in their legendary disintegrating Skoda, Eunice the singing gibbon, whose angelic voice has charmed crowds across the entire world, and Olive and Gretel, the incredible piano juggling emus! I give you Ying-tang, Piddleye and Ebeneezer, the Chinese yodelling camels, Omar and Bryn, the bombastic Siamese sloth twins and their spectacular conjuring act, and last but by no means least please give a big round of applause to the Great Eugene or, as we prefer to call him, Complete Twat Lion!”

“What?” Pussycat said as the wardrobe assistant pulled up the zip up at the back of his heavily patched, rather moth-eaten lion costume. “What did he just call me?”

“I didn't hear nuffink, luvvy,” Alfie, the camp and decidedly odorous water buffalo wardrobe assistant replied.

“Call Owl in here, would you? She's in the VIP box with the kids just through that curtain – maybe she heard what the abominable Mr. Bulldog said.”

“I shouldn't worry about it, duckie. Don't take it personal, like, it's just showbiz. Go on and do your turn, kind of, and then wander back to your dressing room, like, and smoke Dead Man's Fist like a bastard until your next performance, just like all the other performers.”

“But I've forgotten what my act is!” Pussycat grumbled. “I was dropped on my head by my mother when I was a kitten-”

“And consequently you suffer from occasional memory lapses, I've heard. Don't let it get to you, sparrer. The acts in this sad joint are all shit, they're a bunch of crass amateurs, so however shoddily you perform you won't have any complaints from Mr. Vincent high and mighty bleeding Bulldog. Have you seen how many people are out there? The old devil will be laughing all the way to the bank in the morning, and you'll be completely off your face until the next performance, no worries – we've got a good fifty kilos of dried fungus in the stores. You're only on with the clowns, anyway, duck, so let them make a fool of you and then come back here, light up and chill right out.”

“So that's the way it is, is it?” Pussycat grumbled. “This coffee tastes rather bitter, and it's got a familiar sickly sweet aroma. You haven't plied it with Dead Man's Fist by any chance, have you, Alfie? Why have you all of a sudden turned into a giant, wobbling yellow blancmange covered in fresh cream and sprinkled with hundreds and thousands? Why have I got a curious tingling in my three piece suite, why has your face turned into a Keira Knightley's, and what are you doing with that fifty gallon tub of Vaseline?”

“Never you mind, sweet stuff,” Alfie crooned, deftly dropping the bum flap in Pussycat's lion costume. “I only gave you a little bit of my magic potion, puffy cat, just enough to make you feel nice and relaxed.”

“Ooh, er,” Pussycat replied.

*************************

Pussycat scampered into the ring on all fours, reared up and growled at a timid looking woman in the front row and then did a triple backwards somersault without even thinking about it, but when he landed he tripped over his dangling tail and landed flat on his face, much to the delight of the crowd. A half-eaten toffee apple bounced off his head as he was getting up, and a small boy stood up and waved his arms in triumph. “I hit Complete Twat Lion on the head!” he yelled, but a surprisingly loud roar from Pussycat soon had him sitting on his mother's lap, burying his face in her ample, inadequately covered bosoms and crying his eyes out.

“I am the one and only Great Eugene, so you shut uppa your face, liddle boy!” Pussycat said in a completely involuntary accent that seemed to be a mixture of Spanish and Italian. “I don't-a-know where dis silly accent came from, folks of Sow's Nipple, Pollywoggle, but on reflection I kinda like it.” There was a series of almighty bangs as a battered, constantly backfiring blue and yellow Skoda entered the ring through a golden curtain, did half a dozen chaotic circuits and chugged to a halt beside Pussycat, at which point it literally fell to pieces - the headlights tumbled out of their sockets, the bumpers and bonnet fell off and the doors came off off in the hands of Pompom and his motley crew as they stepped out onto the sawdust. The clowns were so drunk that Pussycat could smell an assortment of strong spirits on their breath from where he was standing. “Pompom der frigging clown and his rat-arsed chums, I presume,” the Great Eugene said as a soggy ice cream cornet splattered on his bottom, the crowd excitedly cheering the anonymous assailant. “Pleased to meet you, I'm sure. Not.....”

“Yes, I am Pompom the frigging clown,” Pompom the frigging clown said, glaring at Pussycat with red rimmed eyes set deep in an elongated pasty white face, his huge red nose twitching ominously. “And according to the audience you is Complete Twat Lion. Lemme forecast your immediate future, Lion. You're going down.....” Pompom poked Pussycat hard in the chest, the thumb of his free hand pointing at the sawdust like a Roman emperor heralding the death of a gladiator.

“What breed are you, Rudolph?” Pussycat growled. “No, let-a-me guess. I'd say your father was a useless, pathetic drunken bum of mixed moose and caribou extraction and your mother was a decidedly ugly flatfish prostitute. Lemme tell you somethin', clown, I'z gonna send you back down to the seabed with your whore mammy where you belongs.”

“Lemme tell you somethin', you syphilitic, flea-bitten old moggy,” Pompom said, picking up the twisted front bumper that had fallen off the Skoda without taking his eyes off Pussycat, and the other three clowns picked up similar debris. “You're pretty much spot on concernin' my unfortunate genetic lineage, my perceptive feline friend - my daddy was a drunken, no-good anorexic moose hybrid of no fixed abode, and my mummy was a diseased Halibut harlot from bleeding Hull - but that don't change the fact that me and my good buddies are gonna kick you all round this ring, an' we ain't gonna stop kickin' until you dies or begs for mercy, whichever happens first.

Actually we're all brothers, and we stick together through thick and thin, come rain or shine, hell or high water. Meet Pahpah, Poohpooh and Frederick. I warn you, they're extremely violent and completely merciless. Ha! The crowd is gonna love your final 'umiliation, Lion.” Pussycat wished he had a lighter on him, because all he would have to do to claim victory was ignite the clowns' breath, which was a hundred percent alcohol, and they would explode in a puff of smoke, their twitching carcasses burning like dry pine logs in the sawdust.

“Well see about that,” the Great Eugene said, picking up the nearest car door. “Four drunks to one almost stone cold sober Lion – that seems like excellent odds to me.”

*************************

The battle was over in less than five minutes. Pussycat knocked seven kinds of shit out of the drunken clowns and the crowd loved every magnificent blow, they were cheering and clapping and stamping their feet for a good ten minutes after the bleeding, broken drunks were dragged away. Pussycat bowed and waved and blew kisses, signed autographs and eventually sauntered back to his dressing room and lit a huge Dead Man's Fist joint. “Daddy, you were brilliant!” his kids said as they rushed in.

“Oh Eugene, I'm so glad you're not hurt,” Owl said, throwing her arms around her beloved husband and squeezing him as hard as she could.

“That was a fine show you put on, Mr. Pussycat,” Vincent Bulldog said after he had announced the next act. “I'll pay you twice what we agreed from now on, but of course I'm going to have to find some more clowns.”

“No way, Hosea,” Pussycat replied. “Your new clowns, no doubt, will be less of a pushover than this sorry lot. Pay me for tonight, and that's it, I'm through. This is far too hazardous way of earning a living for my liking, and for some reason my bottie really hurts, so I'm going home on the next magic bus with my family where I bloody well belong."