The Book Man, Chapters 12-13 (Revised)

12 CONRAD’S TALE

Conrad’s father, Bartholomew Smithson, had grown up an ordinary man, son of a blacksmith, apprenticed to his own father when he was eleven, and wedded at seventeen to a young woman of slightly more wealth and standing than himself. The marriage did not last long; the wife died in childbirth, as did the baby.

“That’s terrible,” said Christian.

“It was common at the time,” Conrad said. “My father was tall and strong, and everyone was sure he’d find another wife in due time.”

Everyone, however, was mistaken. Bartholomew showed no inclination for finding another wife, though he was a talented blacksmith and had begun to amass a small fortune from his work and wise spending. Everyone said what a shame it was he would grow old alone and die without the comfort and security of an heir to his craft. He did not even take an apprentice.

Bartholomew was seventy-two when an evil arose in the site on which the park now sat, a creature named Goblin.

“I don’t know what he was exactly,” Conrad said, “nor what he looked like. I wasn’t there, after all, and no one ever saw him but Morrow, the Rover king.”

With Morrow at their head, the balloon-artist said, an army of Rovers, circus-folk, and townspeople came to victory against Goblin’s horde of wicked beasts. Goblin himself was trapped in a cave deep beneath the wood, with a spell Morrow performed with the help of the Good Magic.

“The Good Magic?” Christian said.

“Ah, I’m telling this all backwards,” said Conrad. “Storytelling is not a particular talent of mine.”

He didn’t know how to explain the Good Magic. It was, as he said, the Good Magic. A group of small and lovely beings from another world, fairies, you might call them, who had made their home in the wood and guided and protected travelers long before Goblin and his allies appeared. They were still around, but the war had weakened them. Now they dwelt in the rose gardens, where a caretaker had been assigned to watch over them.

After the war, Bartholomew was assigned as the Guardian of the park. Morrow gave him the role in recognition of his services during the war, though what services Conrad didn’t know.

“My father didn’t like to talk about it, the war,” he said. “Think he just lost too many friends. He’d tell me about the Good Magic, took me to the rose gardens to see, told me all about Morrow and what a great king he was, but the actual fighting—no.”

As Guardian, Bartholomew was to watch for signs of Goblin’s return, for Morrow knew the spell holding him could not imprison him forever. The evil creatures were driven out of the wood by the Rovers, the park was constructed to keep them from returning to the site, and the Rovers and circus-folk were granted the park as a home so they could settle down and live in prosperity rather than continuing their difficult nomadic lives.

“But where do they go in the daytime?” Christian asked. “Imelda wouldn’t tell me.”

“The Otherworld,” said Conrad. “The same place the Good Magic comes from.”

No sign of Goblin or his allies had been seen in the rest of Bartholomew’s time, but when he was one hundred and fourteen he did finally wed again, to Isadora Pratt, a horse-trainer for the Catcher Family Circus. When Conrad was born—

“Hang on,” Christian said. “Did you say he was one hundred and fourteen?”

“When he married my mother, yes. He was nearly two hundred and fifty when he died.”

“So—so how old are you, then?”

Conrad grinned. “Oh, I’m a young man in my prime. I’ll be—let’s see—one hundred and twelve next May.”

“One hundred and twelve,” Christian repeated. One hundred and twelve, and the balloon-artist barely looked the sixty-two he claimed. “You—you don’t look it.”

“Thank you,” Conrad said, and he continued with the story.

When Conrad was born, Bartholomew began preparing him to someday take over the role of Guardian. At last he had a new wife and an apprentice like everyone had always expected (though not in the way they’d expected). Conrad grew up in the ways of a Guardian, learning the kinds of creatures that had fought with Goblin before, the signs that would mean his return was imminent. Though he was not insensitive of the honor and importance of his inherited role, by his forties he longed for a normal life, an Outside life. He continued to return to the park at night to practice balloon-art, which he had fallen in love with the first time he saw it; but now he spent daytimes peddling balloon-animals in London, where balloon-art was yet a novelty to behold.

He was already in his seventies when he met and married Liza—

“Then,” Christian asked hesitantly, “then is Liza a hundred and twelve also?”

“Oh no. Liza’s only—but it’s not gentlemanly to tell a woman’s age. At any rate, she really is the age she claims to be. Now stop interrupting.”

“Sorry,” said Christian.

Conrad had stayed home at night in the first years of his married life, but in time he came to miss the wonder and merriment of the Fair and took to visiting whenever he could. Then his father’s health declined.

“I don’t know why,” Conrad said. His brow wrinkled at the thought. “The magic here keeps us all young and vital years after our time, but he started wasting away about two years ago, and it wasn’t long after that. Buried him last year. And then I really had to keep an eye, because I was the only Guardian left.”

He and Liza moved to the Town a week before he met Christian. The balloon-artist set up shop in front of the park and took to sneaking out of the house late each night, after his wife had fallen asleep, to visit his mother in the park and watch for the signs. At first he had seen nothing. Then he’d noticed hellhounds prowling the streets after dark, odd mists that came and went no matter the weather or time of day, small flocks of crows roosting in the park trees—

“Murder,” Christian said. “A flock of crows is called a murder. I read it—”

Conrad held up a hand to stop him.

“I know, lad,” he said. “But try to turn it off a moment longer, would you? I’m almost done.”

“Sorry,” Christian said again, blushing.

“At any rate,” Conrad said, “I noticed the signs, just like my father said they’d be. Well—couldn’t help it, could I? Not when that hellhound took a chunk out of me.”

He patted his leg. “That’s why I need you.”

13 A REQUEST

Christian stared at his friend, jolted out of the story by the pronouncement.

“Me?” he said at last. “Why on earth would you need me?”

“I’m laid low for a while,” Conrad said, patting his leg again gingerly. “Whether that’s because Goblin sent that hellhound after me to keep me from fulfilling my duties as Guardian, or because the beast decided it had a taste for balloon-artist, I don’t know. But I need someone to go to the rose garden and tell the Good Magic what’s happened, because if Goblin did send that hellhound it means the spell holding him is weakening. He shouldn’t even be able to communicate with such beasts.”

“The rose garden?” Christian said. He was not sure he wanted to get involved in—whatever was happening. Conrad’s story was a lot to take in. But if whatever his friend needed him to do involved spending time in the rose garden, where Minerva was…

The balloon-artist noticed the faint smile that had appeared on Christian’s face and said, “Yes, the rose garden. That’s where the Good Magic lives now. There are some benches and lamps and—it’s a perfect spot for reading. You could read until the fairies come out to open the portal to the Otherworld, just before dawn.”

“Reading,” Christian said, though he was thinking of Minerva. “Yes.”

“So you’ll do it, then?” Conrad said.

“Yes,” Christian said. “Yes, I’ll do it.”

“I owe you, lad, I really do. But there’s more, yet.” The balloon-artist looked rather sheepish.

“What is it?”

“Well, I hate to impose, and I know you’ve got work, but would you—just in the evenings, mind, and maybe on Saturdays—would you look after the balloon-cart for me?”

Christian stared at him.

“It’s just that—well, your balloon-art is coming along nicely, after all,” Conrad said. “And I do hate the thought of my cart just sitting there, all wrapped up and lonesome, and people walking past and none of the kiddies getting balloons. So I just thought, if you didn’t mind—”

“Well—alright,” Christian said. He was not at all as confident in his balloon-art as his friend was, but it wasn’t such a huge request. He could bring a book with him and read between customers, and so while away the hours until sunset each night, when he would close up, eat dinner, and return to the park to visit Conrad.

The balloon-artist settled into his pillows.

“One last thing, and that’s all, I promise. Liza. Now, not being an inanimate object, I think she’ll get a mite suspicious if she thinks you’re keeping an eye on her. But if you could tell her something to ease her mind, just for the time being—”

“I could tell her—” Christian stopped, unsure what he could possibly tell Conrad’s wife that would both be believable and keep her from getting angry with him when he had already told her he had not seen her husband. Well, he could figure something out when he saw Liza at work tomorrow.

“I don’t know what I could tell her,” he conceded, but Conrad said, “I’ll be fit as a fiddle before you know it, and then I’ll go home and tell her everything myself. But for now, if you don’t mind, I think I’ll get a bit of shut-eye.”

Imelda bustled in with a vial full of the green concoction she’d been stirring.

“A good idea if I ever heard one,” she said. “But show me your leg first. We need to get that swelling down. As for you, Mr. Abernathy, you might want to take a walk. I doubt it’ll do your appetite any good to see this.”

Christian thought she was right, so he said goodbye to Conrad and slipped out of the wagon before Imelda could undress the wound. He made his way north through the Fair, dodged the two enthusiastic ringmasters from last night as they strode toward him shouting about their circuses, and entered the dark silence of the gardens.