A Hard Witching by Jacqueline Baker Page A

human, I guess—part, anyway—but they kept it in this cage, and they warned everybody, ‘Keep your hands away from the bars!’ Didn’t have to tell me twice. Bit the heads off live chickens.”
    “No shit,” Jack said.
    “No,” Ray answered, settling back against the seat. “No shit.”
    Lavinia looked at him quickly. Something about his voice had made her think, with a start, He’s faking. He’s not drunk at all. And she wondered, Is he so lonely, then? Is he that desperate?
    Jack suddenly pulled the truck to the side of the road. “Gotta see a man about a horse,” he said.
    When they were alone, Lavinia, on impulse, turned to Ray. “What’s her name, anyway, your wife?”
    “Linda,” he said, his voice sounding startled in the dark of the cab.
    “You must miss her,” she said.
    But before he could answer, Jack swung the door open and slid in beside her, singing, “My Bucket’s Got a Hole in It.”
    When neither she nor Ray joined in, he whistled the song to himself, tapping his fingers against the steering wheel. The three of them shoulder to shoulder, Jack hurtling them through the darkness, toward the lights of town.
    The carnival wasn’t as big as Lavinia expected. They’d set up in the empty lot by the railroad tracks across from the bar. Cars lined both sides of the street for blocks—farmers and people who’d come from other places where the carnival wasn’t stopping—but most of the town people just walked down. They strolled every street, ghostly and bristling with excitement.
    Jack took one last swig of rye and led them to where two torches marked the entrance. Lavinia and Ray trailed slightly behind. She glanced over at him once, at the heavy set of his shoulders, and thought he wanted her to say something to him. Something, maybe, about his wife. But Jack turned to wait for them, so she hitched her purse strap up and kept walking.
    “What’s the matter?” Jack said, thumping Ray on the shoulder. “Somebody can’t hold their liquor?”
    Ray laughed a little and nodded. “I’ll get it,” he said, as they reached the gate. He paid for all three tickets and handed them their stubs. Then they stood there a moment, looking around.
    “Hey,” Jack said to Ray, “there’s your girlfriend.” He pointed at a garishly painted sign depicting a bearded lady. “Let’s see if she still remembers you.”
    Ray nodded and jingled some change loosely in his pocket. “I need to take a leak,” he said abruptly.
    “Suit yourself,” Jack said as Ray disappeared into the crowd. “Guess you’re not interested,” he said to Lavinia.
    She shook her head, but he had already wandered off across the field, bumping into people as he went. Lavinia looked past the booths to where a lighted Ferris wheel turned slowly against the sky. She walked toward it through the bright alley made by the food vendors, realizing for the first time that she hadn’t eaten yet that day. She positioned herself in line at the first vendor and ordered a Coke and two hotdogs, eating the first immediately in three huge bites while standing at the booth, then downing half the Coke. It was possible, she realized, that she hadn’t eaten in days. Maybe that was the problem. Maybe she wasn’t sick at all. She took the second hotdog and her Coke and strolled back toward the Ferris wheel. It was darker there, away from the food. And cooler. She felt better than she had in weeks.
    “Ma’am,” someone said, close to her. Lavinia started, almost dropped the half-eaten hotdog she held. She realized she’dbeen expecting Ray, but the man at her elbow was young, a teenager probably. A boy. His hair combed back slick from his scarred face.
    “Ma’am,” he said, smiling, “you have not seen nothing till you have seen the eighth wonder of the world, and we have it right here.” He waved toward a small trailer at his back, lit by a single yellow bulb. “Right on up those stairs, ma’am, is a sight to behold straight from the