Page 29

I was in trouble. For all of Holy Week, I slept on a bench next to Río’s tank, which, despite the minor discomfort of trading Saul’s quilt and pillow for a drop cloth and a burlap sack, meant opening my eyes each day to fanned eyelashes, parted lips, and waves of rust-red chestnut hair drifting across the slope of Río’s fins. As if I needed another reason to watch him sleep, the sun through the hopper window set his iridescent scales ablaze every morning, and Jesucristo , it was enough to make me give up on air altogether and try my luck breathing water instead.

None of this was exactly motivating where freeing him was concerned.

Given my updated sleeping arrangements, the extra trips between the Albemarle and the theater gave me time to wrestle with the obstacles to Río’s freedom—ones that didn’t involve my growing attachment to him. Between Luna Park and the ocean was Surf Avenue and that behemoth Dreamland, not to mention a public beach crawling with fishermen, vendors, and hustlers. I considered reattaching the tank wheels, but it would still take every set of arms in the Menagerie to push it through the theater’s barn doors where the mares could be hitched.

One obstacle that loomed even larger than Dreamland was asking the company to betray Luna Park, to which they were nearly as loyal as they were to each other.

Not that I wasn’t earning goodwill with my housemates. With leftover museum materials, I set aside time in the afternoons to install some retractable platforms in the kitchen that Madam Navya could use to access the countertops more easily. While I was at it, I got permission from Lulu to replace the back of her settee with something that wouldn’t require her to prop her aching back against a bunch of flimsy pillows. On Easter Sunday, we raised our glasses to the Resurrection at a table overflowing with Igor’s lamb roast, kulich , and pashka with a side of my escabeche .

But whenever riddling out Río’s freedom brought me to another dead end, and it always did, I’d consider what might happen if he just stayed in Luna Park—before guilt and shame dead-ended that thought too.

Guilt because I’d considered breaking my promise.

Shame because I didn’t want him to go.

On the afternoon of the first warm day since I’d arrived, the Albemarle’s door opened to Sonia and Morgan, returned from the city. The showman hollered for everyone to meet him in the parlor, where we found him completely refinished in a new suit even greener than the last, single-breasted with cuffed sleeves, white piping, and engraved buttons down the front. As we took our seats, he leaned against the mantle with an impatient eye on his pocket watch, visibly uncomfortable in a room he obviously never visited.

Looked like he’d taken Sonia shopping too. She practically had to duck when she entered the foyer, so generous was the plumage on her new hat.

Madam Navya looked the Fraülein up and down. “You look like a condor landed on your head.”

“I am ignoring you,” Sonia declared, directing a curtsey at Igor instead who clapped his enormous hands and bellowed, “ Krasivaya! ”

“Whaddaya think, Benny?” She lowered herself gracefully onto the settee beside me. “Ain’t I a proper lady now?”

“You were always a proper lady,” I answered, then regretted it the instant she blushed.

“Well, I’m a Manhattan one now! What fun to roam around Fifth and Broadway in a motorcar!” She touched my arm with her gloved hand and giggled. “I can finally say I’ve seen Central Park, and you wouldn’t believe how different it smells over there without all the horseshit in the—”

“Miss Kutzler,” said Morgan sternly.

I hated the way he scolded her. Sonia’s name in his mouth was sufficient to make all her cheerful energy retract like a parasol. It might be easy to confuse as fatherly if it wasn’t laced with the same cruelty he used whenever he spoke to Río.

“Well now!” Morgan exclaimed brightly once everyone had seated themselves. “Aren’t we a lively bunch!” A glance around the room revealed a row of drowsy stares, save for Timmy, who was under the end table taking apart the mantle clock with a stick.

“As you know, Miss Kutzler and I made good on my promise to promote, promote, promote the coming season. Within the next few weeks, you shall start seeing your faces in the Times , The Sun , and the World . Our investors have expressed quite a bit of eagerness for a summer season that will well outperform the one before. Which is why I’ve guaranteed them that this summer’s earnings will not only top last summer’s but outearn the sideshows of Dreamland and Steeplechase combined!”

A low din of groans filled the parlor before Lulu said what everyone was thinking: “Why’d you go and tell ’em that? The merman’s a wild thing. We got no idea how it’ll take to a crowd.”

“Picture this...” Morgan strode into the center of the room as if taking the stage. “A brand-new backdrop—painted by yours truly—of ocean waves on a moonlit night. Stars and a moon hang above a mystical atmosphere of danger and intrigue! As both our outside and inside talker,” continued Morgan with a flourish of his hat, “I simply regale them with the story of how the merman rescued Sonia from certain death, steering her safely back to shore before being fallen upon by ruffians!”

“Beggin’ your pardon, but ain’t we the ruffians?” asked Vera, gesturing around the room with her unlit cigarillo.

“Heavens, no. Let me finish.” He opened his arms to the room. “The curtain parts and, behold, here dwells the water-bound hero I saved from dismemberment! No one will even know we’ve passed a glorified tadpole for a prince.”

I stared at Morgan’s act with burning eyes and sharp twinges in my palms where my fingernails had dug into them.

Across from me, Matthias reclined in his armchair, large arms folded under an expression like extreme fatigue. “So, what happens to the rest of the show with this ball o’ yarn stuck in the middle of it?” he asked.

Morgan straightened his cuffs and smiled. “Not to worry, Matthias. You will all have your time to shine in a separate show of your own. Now, now,” he added when Emmett started growling, “no need to fret. Morgan’s Menagerie of Curiosities will remain our flagship production, and all of you, our leading players. But to whet the appetites of amusement-goers, we will prepare an exclusive two-for-one show that will open a day ahead of the season as a preview.”

“A day ahead?” Eli sat up. “Who made that call?”

“Why, Mr. Thompson and Mr. Dundy, of course. At my recommendation.”

Igor’s disapproving hum rumbled through the floorboards. “No one will come on workday,” he argued. “We play to empty house.”

“Oh, it won’t be empty.” Morgan reached into his pocket, withdrew a folded-up sheet of paper, and stepped across the rug to hand it to Igor. It was the same flyer I’d seen in Morgan’s tent less than a month ago, with a small change.

“‘Prince of Atlantis, Preview Exhibition’?” Igor read aloud.

“That advertisement is already on every wall in Manhattan, Staten Island, Brooklyn, Queens,” Morgan said. “New Yorkers can’t even piss in an alley without seeing our name.”

Eli snatched the flyer out of Igor’s hand for a look. “That’s a lot of alleys.”

“And a lot of piss,” mumbled Sonia.

“Consider what we are up against,” Morgan exclaimed. “Steeplechase is well in our shadow, but Dreamland? The only way to beat them is to get a head start. One day will be more than enough for the Prince of Atlantis to reach renown across the city without giving Dreamland the chance to catch up!”

“But what happens when the crowds only want to see the fish-man?” Emmett demanded. “When a million cash-paying chumps realize we’re a buncha gaffers compared to what’s in the tank?”

Morgan’s eyes narrowed. “I realize most of you began here under Jack Morgan’s proprietorship, God rest his soul, but as far as I have brought this establishment since taking the helm, I don’t think I need to remind you what alternatives await should your popularity... falter.”

Shock deadened the room at the threat Morgan had made between his genteel teeth. You didn’t have to live in Coney Island to know that prisons and asylums were full of curiosities without a show to perform in.

It was enough to revive Matthias, who leaned forward with a warning glare on his face. “Ain’t no one here in need of your reminders, Sam.”

“A little motivation hurts no one,” he said with a chilly smile. “I’m counting on all of you to plumb the depths of your imagination—so that all who see your enchanting faces in three weeks will be reminded why the Luna Park sideshow is here to stay! What say you all?”

Gray-faced, Madam Navya threw up her hands. “We are mired in catastrophe anyway. I shall meet you all again in the next life to undo this mess.”

“That’s the spirit!” Morgan popped his top hat back on his head. “I’ll confer with you all within the week to help you revise your performances. In the meantime, secrecy is paramount from now until opening night,” he said, his eyebrows knitted in warning. “You never know who might be watching. Understood?”

A round of muttering to the affirmative brought the pleasantry back to Morgan’s eyes. “Capital,” he said. “You can all get back to lazing about or whatever waggery you were up to before I got here.”

And with that, everyone got to their feet and scuffled anxiously out of the parlor, Igor ducking under the archway in front and me bringing up the rear.

“Benny,” Morgan said. “You stay.”

A quick glance over my shoulder treated me to Matthias’s concerned stare before he exited the room.

Morgan leaned in close enough for me to smell the smoke already hanging off his new clothes. “I am most eager to hear you explain,” he said, “what you’ve done to my tank.”

“Oh. I figured you’d want to dress it up a little—for the show,” I answered with as much indifference as I could fake. “It didn’t cost a penny.”

“And the merman let you do it?”

I nodded.

He sucked on his teeth. “Interesting,” he said. “Has it perchance... said anything?”

Río withheld his voice just like he withheld his name. I felt duty-bound to protect it.

“No, but he’s not looking at me like I’m a snack anymore,” I said.

“It looks at you,” he repeated. “As in, not glaring? Not sneering?”

I’d have to thread this needle just right. If Morgan thought Río actually liked me, he might feel justified taking back the responsibilities that had warmed the merman toward me in the first place. “He tolerates me, I guess. I know his routines now. Figured out what he likes to eat. I could keep taking care of him—if you think it’s a good idea, I mean.”

He took a step back and looked me up and down. “Paint me impressed,” he declared. “Good thinking, making the tank an aquaterrarium. As for the rest, steady on if you believe your efforts have made an improvement on its vile temper. I’ll expect you to show me just how tame it is in your presence soon enough.”

Miércoles . How the hell was I supposed to show him that? “Will do,” I said in a thin voice.

“You know, Benny, you remind me of myself at your age,” he mused, buttoning his overcoat to leave. “Focused. Hardworking. Unperturbed by a challenge. I daresay, with some grooming, you might be a decent showrunner yourself one day. Land of opportunity and all.”

Ave María , if I had a jitney for every condescending compliment a white man gave me whenever I did something too hard for them to do themselves. “That’s awful nice of you to say, Mr. Morgan.”

I watched him leave with my hands sweating in my pockets. Why did every solution have to spawn a new problem?

Janitor. Blacksmith. Hired hand. Of all the hats I’d collected since leaving my island, there was one I had yet to declare, and I bet it would wind up on my headstone.

Here lies Benny Caldera, Puerto Rican Fraud.

It was small consolation having dinner preparation to occupy me after Morgan’s announcement. The mood at the Albemarle had curdled with the announcement of an early opening and two separate shows, leaving the company pricklier than a pincushion over what it would mean for them. I was so distracted, I burned the canned onions like I was Vera.

What would Río say once he learned I’d set up Morgan to watch us? Río’s trust was a fragile thing more valuable to me than anything I owned. For all I knew, he’d retreat to his corner and never look at me again.

Igor said grace in Russian, which no one asked him to translate, and we dug in.

“I swear to Christ, Benny,” murmured Eli, his eyes rolling back. “How does someone do this to a can of beans without fairy dust?”

“Don’t like beans,” Timmy grumbled, flicking the habichuelas off the rice with his spoon until Lulu spanked his wrist.

I grinned. “Well, I’m glad you like it, Eli.”

“I love it,” Matthias remarked. “When I performed with Buffalo Bill, the cooks there didn’t have no education on making beans taste better than salty mud. That said...” He leaned back and wiped sauce from his mouth with his thumb. “Bill Cody ran a tighter ship than this cracked-up circus. Sam-the-Ham-Morgan telling us we gotta come up with new acts after six years keeping this damn park afloat”—he wedged a whole potato in his mouth—“all so he can play Shakespeare with his pet merman.”

“You’ll all be jake,” muttered Lulu. “What about me? There ain’t nothing special about a fat lady without a human skeleton standing next to her. Without Saul, I need a whole new gimmick. I’m gonna wind up begging Benny to teach me to play his guitar.”

I wasn’t sure why Lulu was so worried about her act if she and her nene enjoyed the financial security of the Albemarle Hotel. Then again, the way she mothered everyone in the company, maybe she felt responsible for more welfares than Timmy’s.

“Bet Sonia don’t need to come up with nothing,” said Vera with a sharpness that made Sonia’s cheeks redden. “Mighty fine dress you got there, princess.”

“Put a cork in it,” Sonia muttered. “I’ll have to spruce up my act, just like everybody else.”

“Ah, but you’re part of the bleedin’ Prince of Atlantis show,” singsonged Vera. “Reckon all you need to do to keep your job is touch your toes.”

“Like you weren’t already looking for an excuse to—to start swallowing swords or something!” Sonia dragged her napkin roughly across her mouth, smearing her lip rouge off. “I didn’t get a say in this business any more than you did. This was all about making his stupid patrons happy!”

“Now, now, settle down, you two,” Lulu commanded.

“I will say,” ventured Eli, “the way Morgan’s been dropping dough on the renovations and motorcars, you’d think he was getting cozy with the Carnegies.”

“Don’t kid yourself,” Matthias said. “They ain’t no Carnegies. Ain’t that right, Sonia?”

Her eyes were glued to her plate. “How would I know? I don’t say more than two words to them.”

“Why bother taking you, then?” I asked.

Sonia turned from her plate with a look to slaughter me where I sat.

“Yeah,” Vera pressed. “Why did you go?”

“Don’t ask me,” Sonia snapped. “Sam’s got this silly idea that I’m good for publicity or something.”

Madam Navya shook her head. “That man is a wolf. It’s a wonder he did not barter your life to those patrons if it meant an extra donation to the show.”

“ Can it!” Sonia was on her feet. “You think I don’t know what all this bellyaching’s really about? Reading me the riot act just ’cause I get to go downtown while you stay here twiddling your thumbs next to an empty promenade! You’re all jealous!”

“Sonia,” Lulu said gently, “we’re only saying that something about all this smells bad. No one would ever accuse you of throwin’ us under a trolley.”

Vera cleared her throat and reached for her glass. “Exceptin’ me. I’m definitely accusin’ her.”

“Oh, go jump off a bridge, Vera,” Sonia spat. “You want answers, take it up with Sam. I ain’t hungry no more.” She untangled her skirts from the table and stormed off.

Igor folded his hands, making his plate disappear underneath them. “Vera, you are too harsh with Sonia,” he boomed. “She is barely woman.”

“Nineteen’s old enough to stop being bloody naive about Sam Morgan,” she said. “You think that posh dress and hat has anything to do with publicity? That she’s the star of the Prince of Atlantis show because she’s Helen Gardner? I know bribery when I sees it!”

“She wouldn’t betray you,” I said, then quickly added, “I mean, us.”

“Rice and beans with a side of opinions nobody asked for,” Emmett sniped with an eye roll.

I ignored him. “You shoulda heard her talk when she first met me. She loves the company and the show more than anything.”

Matthias pushed up his glasses. “Brother’s right. She’s protecting us in her backward Sonia way.”

Navya tutted in concern rather than her standard disapproval. “Miss Sonia needs more protection than all of us.”

Vera forked the last bite of rice into her mouth and washed it down with the rest of her cider. “You lot can have your fun—how’d Sam put it?—‘plumbing the depths of your imagination’? Well, if anyone cares to join me, I’m gonna go plumb the depths of the rum bottle in the parlor.”

Eventually, everyone took Vera’s invitation, leaving me to tidy up. I didn’t have the heart to throw out Sonia’s half-eaten dinner after the way she left the table, accused of things she had so little say in. I knew that feeling too well.

I took the plate to her door and knocked. Sonia answered with her hair down around her shoulders, rougeless lips, and pink eyes. She looked... her age.

“Thought you might still be hungry,” I said.

She took the plate from me and sniffed. “I’m glad you don’t think I’m a scab.”

My finger threaded nervously around San Cristóbal . “You heard that, huh?”

“You should know... I ain’t a perfect person, but I’d never do anything to hurt the company. Sam always says”—she dropped her voice low and mimicked his high-class, no-accent accent—-“‘What’s good for the show is what’s good for us all.’ And, I dunno. I just think he’s right.”

I couldn’t tell whether she was trying to convince me or herself that this was true. “That’s one interpretation of ‘with it, for it, never against it,’ I guess.”

She smiled down at the plate in her hands.

“I was wondering,” she said softly. “Monday’s Light the Night, and I thought maybe you’d want to go with me.”

“What’s Light the Night?”

Her eyes livened a bit. “The maintenance crews come back to Luna Park on Monday. Light the Night is when they turn everything on for the first time since the last season ended—the lights, the music, the rides—and that way they get to see where stuff needs fixin’. It’s a helluva sight, and the only night of the year you get the whole park to yourself. I never miss it.”

“You mean, you get to ride the rides?”

She slid closer and winked at me. “Sounds fun, don’t it?”

It did, but her manner of persuading me was having the opposite effect. “Well, uh, I dunno. Won’t we get in the way?”

“Not a bit. They’ll be keen to see a couple o’ kiddos like us having fun on the roller coasters. C’monnn , Benny,” she whined. “It’s a Coney rite of passage!”

I looked into her large, tear-stained eyes and rocked uncertainly on my feet. The very thought of visiting Luna on a night when the park was lit up was so enticing, I could almost feel the electric arcs of all those lightbulbs along my neck. I’d heard that entering the park at night was such a jolt to the senses that first-timers think they’re hallucinating.

Going with Sonia didn’t have to mean anything. It wouldn’t mean anything. She and I would be just a couple o’ kiddos having a romp at America’s Playground. And anyway, by the injured way she lashed out at the table, I didn’t think she deserved another rejection.

“All right. If it’s a rite of passage.”

Sonia bounced on the balls of her feet like she hadn’t just been crying alone in her bedroom for an hour. “Oh, it’s gonna abso-tively make you scream, just you wait! We’ll walk over together after dinner tomorrow!”

Then, balancing her plate on one hand, she reached up on tiptoe to kiss my cheek, stepped back into her room, and shut the door, at which point one thing became abruptly clear.

I was abso-tively gonna regret this.

I wasn’t yet halfway down the aisle in the theater when Río shouted, “I have a new verse for your song!”

A grin pulled at my lips despite my nerves. “The pump’s louder than a Model T Torpedo. How do you always know when it’s me?”

Lamplight lit my steps onto the stage until Río’s face smirking over the glass came into view, his tail undulating in its usual hypnotic rhythm. “I can always tell,” he said. “Your legs have a... manner about them.”

“I thought I was being quiet.”

He let out a genuine Brooklyn pfft . “Quiet, yes. As a bob of seals.”

I stepped across the grill until I’d made it halfway, folded my legs under me, and sat. “I want to hear your verse, but first... I’ve got some news you’re not gonna like.”

Río listened stone-faced as I recounted the details of the announcement Morgan delivered in his bright new vestido—his plan to open the park ahead of schedule, the Prince of Atlantis exhibition, and how it had thrown everyone in the company into chaos as soon as they realized they’d have to compete with a second show starring none other than Río himself and the woman who’d helped snare him.

By the time I was done, he was carving a slow circle below me, scowling like I’d just polluted his water.

“The Shark has an obscene talent for aggravating me even when he is not here to do it himself,” he spat. “However did you manage to convince him to make you my permanent caretaker?”

Aquí vamos. “I might’ve told him you were warming up to me.”

He stopped pacing. “You what ?”

“But that was it,” I added quickly. “I didn’t let him think you’ve done anything more than just look at me so he wouldn’t think that... you know.”

“That you have heard my voice.” Río stared fretfully into the water. “We must be especially careful not to speak if he is near.”

My ears warmed at realizing I was the only human who’d ever earned Río’s conversation, but the thought of further limiting our talks was an injustice I couldn’t tolerate.

“Your mother talked right into my head,” I offered. “Is there a reason why you can’t?”

He resumed pacing. “I can only speak to your mind if we are touching.”

“There goes that idea,” I muttered. “Well, we won’t need to talk. Just, acknowledge my presence a little when he’s watching, and that way, he’ll keep me around and you won’t have el Tiburón circling your tank.”

Río had stopped listening. “‘Prince of Atlantis,’” he hissed, thrashing his tail to send water fanning out at the bars. “That merfolk would ever put a crown on their own heads for—for Neptune knows what purpose! And this Sonia. Am I to be terrorized by her as well?”

I shook my head. “At this point, she’s a bigger danger to me than you.”

“To you? Why?”

“Apparently”—I rubbed the back of my neck—“she’s sweet on me.”

Río wasn’t in the right temperament for interpreting yanqui slang. “What does this mean, ‘sweet on you’?”

I stammered trying to come up with a way to explain it that wasn’t just another colloquialism he couldn’t make sense of. “It means, she likes me. Romantically.”

He cut me an incredulous look. “Does she not know that you feel no passion toward women?”

“Río, no one knows that but you.”

At this, he raked an exasperated hand through his hair that nearly unraveled his braid. “Drag me on a reef, Benigno, how can you expect to get me out of here if you persist in keeping yourself a secret from anyone who might help?”

“I can’t just come out and say it! I know, it’s human tontería , but I swear I’m working up to it!”

He halted in the water, splashed some over his face, and rubbed it into his eyes as if it could put out his temper like a fire. “I am sorry,” he sighed, “for suggesting you endanger yourself more than you have already. I am going mad in here, Benigno.”

More absurd to me than the state of human preoccupations with love was the idea that Río had anything to be sorry for. I was about to tell him so when I remembered what I’d nicked from the pantry for just this occasion. Hopefully, Timmy wouldn’t be blamed for it.

“I brought you something to soften the news, but I probably waited too long.” I laid myself flat on my stomach over the lattice and held out my closed fist. “Not the moon, I’m sorry to say.” Then, I opened my palm to him.

He took the sugar cube between his wet fingers, turning it slowly to inspect it. “It is a white stone,” he said flatly.

“Just put it in your mouth. Quick. Before it melts into the water.”

Tentatively he placed the sugar in his mouth. As soon as his lips closed over it his eyes widened. “Oh,” he breathed. “Oh, it is wonderful . What is it?”

I rested my chin on my hands, pleased at having managed to bring Río something to eat from the world of men he didn’t find completely repellant. “ Azúcar. It’s cheaper to get here than it was in Puerto Rico, but I know what sweetness really costs even if these yanquis don’t.”

He surveyed me with tired eyes and managed to smile. “You always surprise me, Barnacle,” he said. “Thank you for the sweetness.”

“ De nada. And I’ll tell Sonia the truth about me tomorrow night,” I said. “They’re turning on the park and I promised I’d go with her. It’s this big thing.”

“I see...” Swallowing the last of the sugar, he laid back on the water below me, giving us the effect of standing face-to-face. “I hope for your sake that she will be accepting.”

“Me too.”

“With the Shark returned,” he went on, “you will go back to your bed at night?”

I’d purposely put off thinking about that. Thinking about it now felt like getting evicted all over again, if everything I cared about had stayed locked inside the apartment.

“Guess so,” I said without looking at him. “I still need to hear your verse, you know.”

“All right. Sing yours first. Then I shall add mine.”

I sat back up on the lattice and cleared the trace emotions from my throat.

Llévame, río, hasta el mar,

Sobre olas azules de agua cristal.

Porque soy un muchacho al que le gusta cantar.

Con tritones y sirenas, me gustaría bailar.

“Now you.”

“ ‘Acercate más, amante del mar,’ dijo las olas de agua cristal ,” he sang—in a voice so rich and resonant it stopped my breath. “ El ritmo que sientes, la tentación fluvial, el latido de mi corazón es tu cantal. ”

Río’s verse took on the perspective of the water, connecting the rhythm of the waves to a heartbeat that lured the human singer to the sea like a lover. Incredibly, my eyes were prickling. “Río,” I breathed. “You brought the waves to life.”

“They are alive. I thought they deserved a say. Do you not approve?”

I might have told him everything right then and there. That his words were more precious to me than I had words to express. That I’d never slept so easily as I did beside him and wanted to give him so much more than the bit of sweetness I could fit in my palm. Part of me—the part he’d woken from a decades-long sleep—was desperate to say he’d leveled the fortress around my heart the moment I first locked eyes with him in the East River.

But freedom and I were mutually exclusive. And Río could only want one.

“Es perfecto,” I whispered. “Absolutely perfect.”