The Nobody Show by Jonathan Dunne

Author:Jonathan Dunne [Dunne, Jonathan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2014-12-28T22:00:00+00:00

From the Mouths of Delinquents

Arthur Lawless left Jim-John talking to himself in the community hall and made a bee-line to The Hound to track down Moss ‘The Mayor’…but was stopped by a bunch of suspicious delinquents sitting on the wall outside the community-hall. They looked like the type of boys who hid widow-panes in their pockets.

‘Shouldn’t you lads be at school?’ Arthur thought he was being smart.

A faster answer came back from the leader with the vacant expression. ‘Shouldn’t you be at work?’

Arthur regretted saying anything but answered back readily, ‘I start tomorrow morning. But you lot won’t get a job if you don’t study…You’ll end up stacking shelves in…’ Arthur stopped short when he remembered his new-found employment. A flutter of nervous butterflies went off inside him as he realized, for the very first time, that he had everything riding on this possibly ludicrous circus idea. Career-wise, he had taken a step backwards by accepting working at the shop.

‘Ya won’t get anybody to go to your shitty circus if ya don’t have exotic animals…’

Arthur couldn’t go to the shop now, not now… Right now, this conversation had suddenly become more important. The word “exotic” seemed exotic coming from the vacant kid’s lips, a lot like Mr. Hayes in Rajasthan.

‘I’ve got some chickens,’ answered Arthur with a sense of pride.

The leader raised his eyebrow and scratched his pale skin-head. ‘Are they exotic?’

‘They dance exotically…’

‘Not the same, Lawless. Yer talkin’ ‘bout the common domestic farm-bird.’

Arthur didn’t like how they knew his name, but this was Old Castle after all.

‘No matter how much you dress up the common chicken, she will never be of exotic category,’ answered the delinquent in the middle.

Arthur didn’t like what he was hearing and he suddenly found a gaping hole in his plans – not that he wanted to admit that to himself, just yet. ‘Anyway, didn’t anybody ever tell you that it’s rude to listen in on other people’s conversations?’

‘Jim-John’s always having conversations with himself; we thought he was talking to himself.’

Arthur sized up the three boys. ‘Circus animals are old-school. Animals suffer and I won’t be part of that.’

‘Better than bein’ in a zoo…’ said the other one.

Arthur was beginning to be surprised at the level of intelligence and culture of the delinquents sitting on the wall like old crows. ‘How do you figure that?’

‘They get to travel ‘round the country whereas the other animals are in the same enclosure all day.’

The gang-leader interrupted, ‘Either way, they’re entertainers, and a tiger lost on some African savannah is anything but an entertainer… He’s just surviving, d’ya know what I mean? I mean, nobody gives a shit about that tiger but –’

‘Tigers live in Asia…’

‘Don’t be smart, Egg.’

Egg looked at the ground in shame…

‘Anyway, the tiger in the circus doesn’t have to bring down a gazelle cos his steak is given to him on a platter, rare, please – same for the tiger in the zoo. Fair ‘nuff, the animals in the zoo have more room to

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.