The Magnificent Lizzie Brown and the Devil's Hound Read Free

happily. “Come on!”
    Lizzie and the twins dashed out of the show tent, shielding their heads as best they could from the pouring rain. They ducked inside the animals’ tent for a quick breather. Immediately a snarl ripped through the air, making Lizzie jump. Leo the lion was pacing up and down, glaring and occasionally roaring. Camels fidgeted and spat.
    â€œGoodness,” Lizzie said. “What’s got into them?”
    â€œThey’re spooked,” said Nora. “Just like Victoria was.”
    â€œLook at the elephants!” said Erin. Mo, Myrtle, and Sashi, usually calm, were stamping their feet and tossing their heads. Akula trumpeted and reared up.
    Just then, Hari came in, his face grim. “Better leave them to me,” he said. “It’s easier to calm them down if there are fewer people around.”
    â€œWhat’s upsetting the animals?” Lizzie asked.
    Hari shook his head. “It’s been a long trip. They don’t like being cooped up for hours any more than we do. And the storm’s making a lot of noise.”
    That wasn’t the whole story, Lizzie could tell. She approached Akula with her hand held out. “Easy, Akula. It’s only me.”
    â€œI wouldn’t go near her,” Hari warned. “I know she’s your friend, but she’s scared right now.”
    â€œScared? Of what?” Lizzie asked.
    Hari looked down as if he’d said too much. “The same thing half of us are scared of, I expect. Some people are saying Fitzy’s made a mistake coming here to Kensal Green. They think we should move on.”
    â€œWe can’t!” Erin yelled. “We’d lose money — and Albert and Victoria aren’t paid for yet!” At the shrill sound of her voice, the lion roared.
    Hari quickly shooed them all out of the tent. “Come back later, when the storm’s blown over,” he suggested.
    Ma Sullivan, the twins’ mother, had rigged up her tea tent outside the family caravan. It was cozy inside with the entire Sullivan family gathered around a single table and some of the other circus folk visiting for a relaxing brew. Usually, the tea tent was a jolly place, full of laughter and gossip. Fitzy would often stop by and play a round of dominoes, puffing fragrant pipe smoke into the steamy air. Today, though, the girls walked into an atmosphere of gloom.
    Erik the acrobat was sitting with Bungo the muscle man. The two of them made an unlikely pair, one thin and wiry as a pole, the other stout as a walrus. Erik looked up at Lizzie with wet, pale eyes, as if he expected her to explain why this black mood was hovering over everyone.
    â€œGoodness,” Lizzie said with a nervous laugh. “Has someone died?”
    Ma Sullivan sucked air through her teeth. “You’d best not go making jokes about that sort of thing, Lizzie love. Not around here.”
    â€œThose rich folks said this was no place for a circus the moment they saw us,” Erik said.
    Erin helped herself to a huge mug of tea and one of her mother’s oat flapjacks. “The animals are all wound up. Hari’s trying to calm them down.”
    â€œWhat did I tell you?” Bungo said to Erik. “It’s always the animals that know when something’s up. They’ve got a sixth sense.”
    â€œVictoria didn’t like going past . . . that place,” Nora said. They all glanced in the direction of Kensal Green Cemetery.
    â€œIt’s not right. It’s just not.” Ma Sullivan, short and draped in a shawl, went to heat up a fresh kettle full of water on the wood burner. “The dearly departed should have a corner of some little churchyard to call their own. That’s as much as any of us need. Just a quiet little plot with a hazel tree, perhaps, and a headstone. But that place?” She shivered, making a brrr sound. “It’s the size of it that sets your teeth on edge, I don’t mind