Skimming Stones

The Bishops came from a long line of circus performers, and like so many families before them, had lost several relatives to tragedy many times.  A trapeze calamity here, a fire-eating accident there; uncles, cousins and aunts had died during their last performances, but none was remembered as fondly or talked about as often as Vincent Bishop, the tightrope walker.

Vincent Bishop, handsome, fearless and strong, was very popular in Asia, in particular by the Janbaz Circus people of Pakistan and the Tirana group of Albania.  In his publicity photographs he looked more like a 1950s movie star than a man who lived in a tent, and girls, and women and young men adored him.

His brother, David Bishop, was a tall man, so genetics cheated him out of the family business of tightrope walking, yet, saved him from the pre-mature and violent death of his twin brother, Vincent.  Vincent was always the more spectacular of the twins, and even in death people preferred him.  They constantly talked about the day when Vincent set-out on his final walk in Uzbekistan.  No one ever really knew what happened on that fateful day, that clear blue sky morning, and no one ever would.

“Simply wasn’t his day” was all his sister Edith said afterwards.  And she knew a thing or two about it not being your day.

Edith Bishop was one of those unfortunate women who were almost too beautiful in their youth to invest time or energy into cultivating a replacement for the day that that beauty would leave her.  Her entire act, as the woman men threw knives at, was based on her innocence, slight frame and peculiar exquisiteness.  When these attributes abandoned her, like a surprise breeze in July, she was older than she should have been, potentially homeless and unemployed.

But her father, Mr Bishop, never let old performers sit-out in the rain, and so he kept her on to sew costumes, make tea, sell tickets for the show and keep her surviving brother company.  The others referred to her as “old Edith” when she was just 37.

After the evening shows, Edith and David spent their time re-visiting Vincent’s short life through their shoe box of carefully cut paper clippings, publicity shots and postcards.

“Here’s one of him in Moscow” said Edith as if it were the first time she had ever seen it.  “So fearless, so brave” and she petted the side of the photograph as you would a small cat.  “Ah look at him in Pakistan” David echoed.  “So unique, so handsome, so concentrated.”

David Bishop still had the physique and awkwardness of a pre-adolescent boy even in his 50s, and he also had a slight stammer, which kept him away from strangers and new friends.  He tried several circus skills in his career, such as juggling, clowning and uni-cycling but he wasn’t funny, courageous or sad in the ring, so his father put him backstage early in life.  In her youth, Edith ignored this brother, but time and traveling and remembering Vincent brought them closer, and she loved him very dearly now.

One night after a particularly slow show when both the performers and audience seemed equally neglectful, Edith and David opened the shoe box carefully and began their ritual of photo gazing.

“Ah, look at Vincent here when he was so young” cooed Edith in an almost maternal voice.  “That was the winter we went to Michigan, Vincent loved going ice-fishing, do you remember that David?  Do you?”

David smiled and nodded, as he did every time she asked and he dutifully began the story.

“Yes, Edith of course I do.  That was the winter of ’63 when we spent some time near Lake Saint Claire” he said.  “We were resting after a summer of record sales and Vincent was practising his balance on the ice.  He loved it”.  David took a short break to roll a cigarette and to pour some tea.  Edith’s silence suggested he should continue and so he did.

“Vincent was so young that winter” said David.  “He loved having the evenings to play with instead of waiting for the curtain to come-up and his favourite game of all was to throw rocks over the ice, to see how far they would fly.  He loved the twilight and would play for hours until someone would go and find him, to bring him home for tea and to get him into bed.  He talked of nothing else for months and months other than the sound of skimming stones on the ice on Lake Saint Claire, and how wonderful he felt there”.

Edith smiled, David put out the fire, and the two went to bed and to sleep.