WITH THE GYPSIES
I start a show of my own--Gypsy Brown plays me a dirty trick--
The hunchback in the box--Bank Holiday at Cheriton Fair--I
plan to circumvent Gypsy Brown--And succeed only too well--
The crowd wrecks Brown’s booth--Pandemonium in the fair ground
--The gypsies attack my show--The fate of a peace-maker--My
fight with Gypsy Brown--£10 to £1 on my opponent and no takers--
A knock-out blow--Gypsy Brown vows revenge--My life in danger
--How I outwitted the gypsies--The last of my experiences as a
fair-ground showman.
Meanwhile all this time Brown was steadily robbing me. Again I confided
in my friend Mr. Wayman, telling him that I had by this time saved
enough money to buy a tent (but not a proper showman’s booth) and
asking his advice as to starting on my own. He thought it would be a
good idea, but again took occasion to warn me against incurring the
enmity of Brown, and his many friends and relations.
At this time we were performing at Sheerness on an open space in front
of the beach, and having made up my mind to act on Mr. Wayman’s advice
and chance it, I went to Messrs. Gasson & Sons of Rye, the big military
tent-makers, and bought from them a fairly large second-hand army
marquee, that I considered would about answer my purpose, at all events
for the time being. Then, after our last show at Sheerness, having
quite decided to sever all connection with Brown for the future, I made
shift to get my box away from his keeping; but unfortunately he was
able to retain possession of my banner, and my other “outside props.”
Our next destination after Sheerness was Cheriton, outside Folkestone,
where there was a big volunteer camp. We arrived here on an August Bank
Holiday, which, I should explain, is the showman’s day of days. All
was bustle and animation. I could not, I reflected, have chosen a more
auspicious occasion for my first venture as an independent showman.
Helped by the bluers, and a few others, I soon ran up my marquee, and
Mr. Wayman very kindly lent me a lorry for an outside platform. I had
previously engaged a big ex-army man named Sam Cliff as doorman, and to
take the money, etc. He was a fine-built chap, weighing over fourteen
stone, and by his own account a bit of a bruiser. I had also provided
myself with another banner, a duplicate of the first one I had made,
and which was now in Brown’s possession.
“Let him keep it,” I kept saying to myself. “Much good may it do him!
He’ll never dare to use it.”
But to my disgust and disappointment this is precisely what he did do.
Our two shows, situated almost directly opposite one another, each
flaunted an almost identical banner proclaiming to all and sundry that
Carlton Philps would give a performance of the famous box trick that
won £500 in the House of Lords.
This was, of course, intolerable, and I promptly went over to Mr.
Wayman and lodged a complaint. Whilst I was talking to him a little
hunchback chap came over to where we were, and asked:
“Are you Mr. Carlton Philps?”
“Yes,” I said, “that’s me. What do you want?”
“Well, sir,” he answered, “I hope you won’t be offended, but Mr. Brown
has engaged me to do a box trick. He fetched me down from London to do
it, and now I find that he is using your banner for my trick.”
“Oh,” I said, affecting an indifference I was far from feeling, “that’s
all right. Of course there are box tricks and box tricks. Now what sort
of a one is yours, may I ask?”
The hunchback gave me a description of it, from which I gathered that
his was a very ordinary show indeed, and far inferior to mine; his box
being about four times as big as mine was, and minus the canvas cover.
Also his trick was worked by means of a trap-door, whereas mine was
independent of any such adjunct. So, after turning the matter over in
my mind for a little while, I told him it was all right, and he was to
get on with his trick.
Well, by the time the fair ground opened, there were I should think
between fifteen and twenty thousand people present. The weather was
lovely, the crowd was in excellent spirits, and it looked as if we had
a record day in front of us.
Brown was ready before me, and he gave a first show under my banner.
“This will never do,” I thought. “I’ve got to queer him right here now,
or else he’ll queer me.”
So, after thinking hard for a second or two, I called to Cliff, and
told him to come up outside on the lorry with me, and to bring my box,
together with the canvas cover and the rope.
“Now,” I said, addressing the crowd, “I want some of you gentlemen to
step up here on the platform, put me inside this box after you have
examined it, lock it and keep the key, and then put on the canvas cover
and cord it up as tightly and securely as you can. Then, when you have
done all this, I want you to carry the box, with me in it, inside the
tent, and I will escape from it inside of ten seconds. Finally I will
guarantee that, as regards this my first performance here, everybody
shall get their money back which they have paid for admittance.”
“Hurrah!” cried the crowd, and before you could say “Jack Robinson”
half a dozen sailors had scrambled up on the lorry, and proceeded to
carry out my instructions as to locking me in the box, and roping it
up. Afterwards they carried me inside, followed by the rest of the
crowd, and I escaped from it, as I had said I would, within the time
stipulated.
Then I made them another speech, explaining to them that I was the one
and only original Carlton Philps, and showing them my photograph and
papers to prove it. “Now,” I concluded, “I promised that you should
all have your money back, and so you shall--but on one condition. I
want each one of you to take the penny my doorkeeper will give you,
and go over to the opposition show and see fair play. I ask you to
rope the other man up in the same way as you roped me, using the same
precautions. Then see whether he will be able to get out as I have
done.”
“Hurrah!” shouted the crowd once more. And off they went, sailors and
all, their pennies clutched tight in their hands, making a bee-line
for Brown’s booth. Then I began to get frightened. Cliff, too,
looked serious. But, as I pointed out to him, it was no good worrying
ourselves. What had to be, must be. Our business now was with our own
show.
By this time the fair was in full swing. The roundabouts were going
merrily, the steam organs were at full blast, and I had just begun to
gather another crowd round me when I suddenly noticed the central pole
of Brown’s booth began to wobble to and fro in a most alarming manner.
I could plainly hear, too, angry shouts, and cries of derision, coming
from the interior, and almost immediately the entire canvas edifice
collapsed with a crash.
“Good Lord! That’s done it!” cried Cliff. “Now we’re in for it. The
gypsies will never forget or forgive us for this day’s work.”
I began to think the same, for I quite realised what had happened. The
sailors had roped the hunchback in the box, and he had been unable to
get out. In revenge the crowd, led by the sailors, had wrecked the show.
However, I reflected, this was primarily Brown’s concern, not mine,
and I went on with my preparations for my own show. My marquee was
about half full of people, and more swarming in every minute, when
the expected happened. Brown, his huge face crimson with anger, and
bellowing like a bull, came charging across from the ruins of his
booth, followed by a score or so members of his tribe, all of them
obviously bent on mischief.
Nor did they come unarmed. Some carried iron tent pegs, others long
cudgels, and one big, brawny ruffian swung aloft a heavy iron-shod
oak capstan bar, used in the roundabout business. I also noticed, and
this caused me most misgiving, that several had round wooden balls
taken from the cocoanut-shy boxes. These are very dangerous missiles
indeed in the hand of the gypsies, for they can throw them, owing to
long practice, as straight as a rifle-shot. Many a time had I seen
men stretched senseless by a well-directed shot from one of them, as
narrated in the previous chapter, and I had no wish to repeat the
experiment in my own person.
However, there was neither time nor opportunity to do much thinking.
Calling to Cliff to follow me, I scrambled on the lorry, and with a
loaded revolver in one hand, which was ordinarily used in my show
business, and a heavy stake hammer in the other, I awaited the onset
of the gypsies. These surged round my lorry, a veritable sea of savage
humanity, shouting curses and execrations, and swearing that they would
have my life.
Sticking my revolver in my belt, I swung the heavy hammer aloft, and
threatened to dash out the brains of the first man who tried to climb
up on the lorry. This made them pause. Not that they were not plucky.
There was, I doubt not, many a brave lad amongst them. But none was so
brave or so foolhardy as to wish to court certain death.
By this time pandemonium reigned in the fair ground. All the shows
emptied, the roundabouts stopped, the cocoanut shies were deserted, and
everybody, showmen and public alike, came surging round my tent. At
this moment Sam Cliff, first throwing away a wooden stake he had armed
himself with, very pluckily leapt down amongst the gypsies, and tried
to parley with their leader. But hardly had he uttered two words, when
Brown, mad with rage, rushed at him and knocked him senseless with a
terrific blow in the face.
Poor Cliff was not expecting this. In fact he was purposely holding
his hands down by his sides at the time to show that his intentions
were peaceful. But Brown seemed to think he had done a very clever and
plucky thing in “outing” him for the time being, and elated by his
success, he came straight for my lorry, and made as if to climb up on
it. I raised my hammer aloft, and in my temper I should most certainly
have used it. But the crowd, fearing a tragedy, pulled him back.
Meanwhile Messrs. Hastings and Wayman, the managers, were talking to
the other gypsies, and trying to pacify them, pointing out to them
that they were wasting the best hours of the best day of the year;
that while they were quarrelling, money was being turned away, and
that people were even now commencing to leave the fair ground, fearing
a riot. “Yes, and as for the others,” put in Mr. Hastings, addressing
Brown and me, “they’re mostly climbing on the roundabouts and tents,
and damaging my property. Let’s to business, before it is too late.”
By this time I began to see that there was only one way out of it.
“I’ll fight Brown now,” I cried, “if the crowd will make a ring, and
see to it that I get fair play.”
“We’ll see to that, never fear,” yelled the crowd; and in a few
seconds a big ring was formed, and Brown, taking his place in the
centre of it, stripped himself to the waist. His huge hairy chest
heaved with excitement, and I noted, not without inward misgiving, his
powerful biceps, his brawny bull-like neck, and the closely cropped,
bullet-like head of the fighter by instinct and profession.
When I came to strip in my turn, a great roar of laughter went up from
the multitude, and no wonder. I was lean and lanky, and my skin, by
contrast with his, appeared soft as velvet, and in colour and sheen
not unlike to old ivory. “The lad’s beat before he begins,” said one
man in the forefront of the crowd, and who looked like a professional
pugilist; “I’ll lay £10 to £1 on the big ’un,” and he looked round
inquiringly. But alas! in all that crowd there were no takers. I don’t
blame them.
Directly I stepped into the ring Brown made a rush at me, his great
arms whirling aloft like the sails of a windmill. I stopped him with a
straight left on the nose, and down he went. He scrambled to his feet,
and came for me again, bellowing with rage. This time I caught him in
the eye with my right, more by luck than by judgment, and he tripped
and fell over a tuft of grass.
Now in a rough-and-tumble fight such as this was the strict rules of
the prize ring are, it is well understood, not exactly enforced. You
may not kick of course, and you may not hit a man when he is completely
down, and that is about all. Everything else almost is considered fair,
or at all events legitimate. So when Brown, having partially recovered
himself, raised himself on one knee, I considered that my turn had
come, and making a dive at him, and stooping down myself, I upper-cut
him under the chin, and down he went again flat on his back.
Moreover, greatly to my relief, this time he elected to stay down. He
wasn’t knocked out by any means, but he had had enough. The other
gypsies picked him up, and took him away. The crowd dispersed. The
roundabouts were restarted, the shows reopened, and all the fun of the
fair was soon in full swing once more. Only Brown’s one-time beautiful
booth remained lying where it had fallen, a tangled heap of rent canvas
and broken cordage. Brown himself spent the rest of the day presiding
at a cocoanut-shy, and nursing a bad black eye.
Every now and again he would turn and shoot a malevolent look in my
direction, nor did it need this to tell me that my trouble with him was
only now beginning. All day long, too, the other gypsies kept coming
up to my show in order to tell me of what was in store for me later.
“Brown,” they said, “swears he’ll kill you to-night, and he’s a man of
his word.” “Tell Brown,” I retorted, showing them my revolver loaded in
all six chambers with ball cartridge, “that I’ll certainly shoot dead
any man I catch prowling round my marquee after the fair closes down.”
This, I may add, was a bit of sheer bluff, designed to throw them off
the scent. I used to sleep in my marquee, there was nowhere else to
sleep in fact, and I knew full well that I could not keep awake all
the night long, and that once asleep it would be easy for one of them
to creep under the canvas and brain me with a stake hammer. True,
Cliff and I might have taken it in turns to keep awake and on guard,
one watching while the other slept; but even this, I reflected, would
only be postponing the evil day, or rather night. I knew too well the
fierce, vindictive nature of the gypsies, to imagine for one moment
that Brown and his tribe were going to forgo their revenge altogether.
No! I had another plan worked out in my mind, and soon after it was
dark I proceeded to put it into execution, with the help of Mr. Wayman
in whom I had confided.
He had slipped off to the station at my request, and had ascertained
that a fast train left for London at 10.20 p.m. The fair ground closed
at 11 p.m. Shortly before ten o’clock struck a man with a barrow, whom
I had engaged beforehand, took his position, silently and without being
observed, in a lane at the back of my tent.
Then I started the usual patter on the lorry outside in order to
collect an audience. I could see that the gypsies were watching me.
Possibly they had some suspicion of my intentions. But anyhow I
outwitted them.
We got the crowd inside all right, but these people did not get their
money back, nor did they see the show; for, instead of giving it, Cliff
and I made some excuse to the audience for a brief delay, as we put
it, and quietly slipped away out under the tent at the back, bearing
with us my box, which I had already packed with our joint personal
belongings. To hoist it on to the barrow was the work of a moment. Then
we trundled it off to the station. We had, of course, to leave the
marquee behind us, but as Mr. Wayman had promised me to look after it,
and sell it for me as soon as he got a fair offer for it, this did not
trouble me much.
As luck would have it, the train was on time. And as it steamed out of
the station, bearing our two selves with it, I was just in time to wave
my hand derisively at Brown and a lot of the other gypsies, who, having
found out too late the trick I had served them, came charging pell-mell
up the lane, cursing and shouting, with the object of trying to cut
off our retreat.
So ended my first, last, and only experience as a fair-ground showman.
I never went back to the business again; nor, if the truth be told, had
I ever the least desire to do so.