Free Circus by Claire Battershill

family. Mr. Hendricks worked for thirty-eight years in the local fish cannery. Jemima wrote that his beard smelled like the inside of a mussel shell and his hands were the colour of sockeye salmon. Mrs. Hendricks made her famous Bakewell tarts for every church bake sale and did some bookkeeping for the cannery when the usual girl was on holiday. Jemima was their only child. Mrs. Hendricks suffered four miscarriages before her daughter was born, and two more afterwards. We know all thisbecause she kept a diary. The forty-seven volumes are housed next door in the same building as the oldest, largest, and most wonderful cabinet of curiosities in British Columbia. I’m supposed to tell you that you should check that out after your visit with us. The diaries are still restricted-access files, because of their age and fragility, but I was lucky enough to receive permission to enter the archive last summer.
    I’m sad to say that reading Mrs. Hendricks’s diaries was not an altogether scintillating experience. In fact, I think I’d better stop calling them “diaries” so no one gets too excited about them. When I sat down at the desk in the archive and opened my first little navy leather book, I found that Mrs. Hendricks’s daily records were in fact ledgers, and contained point-form lists of what she cooked each day, who came calling from her church group, the entire family’s medical history, and a record of every penny she spent. No, sorry, I don’t know how the currency would convert based on inflation, so I can’t tell you what the numbers mean, but I don’t get the impression that she was a big spender. The cabinet of curiosities attracts more visitors, because of the preserved bull testicles and the camera obscura, but I know when I’m in there with those leather books that I am the beholder of historically significant, if outwardly tedious treasures. Anyway, it’s a good thing we have the notebooks, because they tell us, through the indisputable logic of cake recipes, that Jemima was a cherished daughter indeed.
    Both Mr. and Mrs. Hendricks were glad to see the back of Uncle Barnaby, whose unruly presence was like a tsunami rushing through this canning town that had only known agentle seaside breeze. His most catastrophic faux-pas was whisking Jemima away on an excursion to Dithers Landing: perhaps you’ve been there already? It’s the second-best attraction in town, so I’d highly recommend a wander over there this afternoon. Anyway, the trip to the Landing was the only thing Jemima had ever done without her parents’ permission. It was a crowded summer’s day when Barnaby and Jemima went for their walk along the pier. The tide was out as they strolled along past the fish stalls, where the boats moored in the low water. Fishermen pulled out buckets full of their day’s catch to sell on the docks before the rest was shipped to the cannery. This was before they gussied it up for the tourists, so it was a quieter place than the salmon-mad bustle you’ll see today on a Saturday.
    Barnaby laughed his uproarious, rosy laugh and patted his belly with satisfaction when Jemima asked questions about London. As he doddered along, Barnaby told Jemima about the omnibuses in the streets and the carriages in the park and the people as numerous as prawns are in Dithers. Jemima couldn’t help but imagine that everyone in London was as boisterous as her uncle, and she promised herself that she would go with him someday to swim in the Serpentine and sleep on the steps in front of the Prince Albert memorial, the way Barnaby said he often did. I went to London myself once. It was my first and only time out of the country, actually, and I wouldn’t recommend it. People ride the underground like they’re heading either to Heaven or Hell – all elbows and hurry for the next, better thing, or else they look shrivelled and drooped like kelp away from the sea. Give me a damp fishingtown over a world-class city any day. You guys