Free Carn by Patrick McCabe

nines. Their London accents seemed to soar high above the rooftops and sit in the
clouds like magic. Their perfume filled the air. A farmer on his way home stopped dead in the middle of the The Diamond and stood staring with his mouth open as if he were hallucinating. They set
down their suitcases and lit cigarettes. “Oh girls—this is my pal Sadie.” They smiled broadly and shook hands. Then Sadie heard another voice, a male London voice. He had hair
like George Harrison, a moptop cut above the ears. He wore a brown corduroy waistcoat and a striped shirt. She followed his bright hipster trousers all the way down to his elasticated suede boots.
She was so overwhelmed she didn’t know what to say and was glad of the distraction when Una thrust a case into her hand.
    They set off down the road together, alive with chatter, and when Sadie Rooney set off for home, she felt as though she were cruising six inches above the road.

    Through the open door of the Golden Chip Bob Dylan shouted that he’d got no secrets to conceal, the girls from The Park draped across the shimmering chrome of the jukebox
as if they were trying to climb inside his very words.
    Sadie tensed as she saw them come in. He was with them. “There you are Sadie,” called Una. “Here Dave, you sit down there beside Sadie.”
    He smiled and sat beside her. She reddened. They ordered coffees and after that the conversation wandered to where she had hoped it would, to the beaches of Brighton where a phalanx of
motorcycles stood outside a hotel, leather-jacketed rockers fondling chains as they faced the oncoming mods in their knee-length parkas. “I love the Beatles,” he said. “I’ve
got all their albums.”
    Albums he calls them, thought Sadie. Not records. Or long players. Or elpees. Albums.
    “Those rockers, they would really do for you,” said Carol, tapping ash into the tray.
    “What’s this about you being in a group?” Una said cheekily to him. “Are you?”
    He nodded. “The Trygons. We play The Stones. And The Who. And our own songs.”
    “They’re fab,” said Carol.
    Afterwards they set off for the carnival dance, linking each other, smoking cigarettes and singing. Reared in the teeming surburbs of London, they had more to worry them than sour old men and
crotchetty women so for their benefit they wiggled their hips and sang even louder. Dave walked on ahead, trying to make sense of his new surroundings, the tiny shops and littered streets. Down at
the carnival, mock screams carried upward into the navy blue sky, sparks from the dodgems fantailed above the cacophony, Frank Sinatra crooned from a hanging loudspeaker, his intimacy wrapping its
arms around the town. The swingboats seemed to stop just short of the moon. They tossed pennies on to chequerboards, Dave picking out a bullseye on a target with one single shot.
    The dancers made their way in scattered knots to a marquee decked with coloured lights. “Dancing in a tent?” Dave cried incredulously.
    Inside, oil-slicked countrymen clustered together beside the mineral crates, hiding behind the smoke and stealing mouthfuls from hidden whiskey bottles. Girls fawned adoringly over the band. The
singer kicked his instep and winked, pasting back his accordeon-pleated hair. Dave and the girls stared in wonder as if they had come upon a secret commune of Martians. They stared at the six poles
supporting the canvas. They stared at the band’s blazers. They stared at the posters advertising treasure hunts and parish socials. They had tumbled back in time, lost in space at the Carn
annual grand carnival. The locals eyed them viciously as they danced, narrowed their eyes and stood with their arms folded. When Dave went down on this hunkers to do the Woolly Bully with Carol,
they muttered under their breath, “Woolly bully—Woolly Ricky!”
    Carried along on the tidal wave of their confidence, Sadie came into her own. She danced for all she was worth, the canvas became the