nodded.)
My soul, your temper is quite moderate.
The lips are coral. The waist is thin…
Oh, what a real fool you are, old harlequin!
Before you not a simple virgin,
in your booth came the Queen!”
Charles knocked his forehead with his palm. He got up and bowed. Looking at Simone from the bottom up, he said:
“I kindly ask you, Your Grace,
forgive me this disorder.
I am willing to beggar the wealth of ours,
So you stayed in the booth for an hour,
and if I am lucky,
For one or two days…
I see you are laughing at my phrase.
I am ready to serve the Queen.
Ready for centuries to be her harlequin…”
Charles put on a red wig on his head and began to trill with laughter. Simone shook her head and said in a sad voice: “It is not funny for me to look at your antics. It hurts, hurts, hurts… Have you, Charles, the greatest, the wisest man, the talented actor, decided to spend your life in this squeaky box with a beautiful name circus show-booth? Not small but a huge buffoonery.”
Charles grinned: “You are the first to use the superlative degree in describing my humble abode. I am filled with pride. I will just burst of self-worth and self-importance,” he puffed out his cheeks. “I will burst, and you, Simone, will mourn a great actor, an unsurpassed red-haired clown, a brilliant…”
“Jester, who is wasting his life,” Simone finished his tirade.
“Charles, you are on!” the manager of the circus cried out.
“That’s my turn,” having adjusted the wig, Charles said. “Allow me to leave you for a while. I can only ask you not to disappear. I hope you will be able to forgive me for all these stupid antics. Please, stay at the window, like a statue. And I will come back and will create a portrait: a window, sunflowers, skylight, and a lady…”
“Charles, hurry up, the program is coming to the end,” the manager tapped at the door.
“I am fly-y-ying,” Charles exclaimed, stepped out the door, and stopped. “Do not disappear, Simone. Wait. I will be right back… I will be back in a trice…” his voice reached from afar. It was not his voice, but the voice of the red-haired clown, who was amusing the audience.
Simone took a white sheet, sat down in front of the mirror, and wrote:
Dear, dear, Charles! I am sorry. I have to leave. Yes, yes, yes… I have to leave, despite everything you have done for me. Due to everything you have done for me. For you, for me, for US, Charles. I understand that the show-booth is your life, your work, giving you the opportunity to live… not to live, but to exist. Acting, buffoonery soaked so much into your skin, got in the bloodstream, in mind that… (please, think this out yourself, you are better at this). I know, you will upbraid me, saying that your tricks used to entertain me, your clownish laughter used to amuse me. Yes, you are right. I used to have fun because I was a little girl. I grew up, Charles. Now I am a mature, intelligent, well-mannered girl, who does not want to spend her life, her youth to check entrance tickets… I am sorry that I am telling you this, and not vice versa. Charles, you are a wise man, who has been teaching me not to be afraid of difficulties, but you yourself succumb to them. Why? Then, when we meet next time, you will answer me this question. You can answer yourself right this minute… So. I am leaving for you, Charles. My, at first glance, thoughtless act is really thought out to the last detail (I had an excellent teacher!). I am leaving you, Charles, knowing that you will not let such insolence remain unpunished.
P.S. Oh, forgive me… I do not want to hurt your feelings (in my opinion, you still have such feelings, such emotions that are not typical of clowns) … So, not to make your heart explode out of despair, I whisper you four words that you have wanted to hear from me for a long time. I know that it is true, that it has not been the work of my imagination, that you have not been playing at that moment, otherwise… otherwise… I will die out of sorrow and despair, because, because… I LOVE YOU, CHARLES! I am leaving for us, for… (think out the finale of my letter on your own, please…)
“Success, success, success! There has never been such a storm of applause in our circus. Simone, can you hear? It is the season of the red-haired clown!” Charles cried, opening the door of the show-booth. Flowers, which he was holding in his hands, slowly flew to the floor. A wig and a big red clownish nose followed them.
“Simone, where are you?” Charles said distractedly, realizing that something irreparable had happened. “Did you leave, Simone?”
His gaze rested on a sheet of paper, written in a steady hand.
“Black letters on a white sheet of paper this is the beginning of the finale,” Charles said, having stopped in the doorway. “Black letters instead of you – so little, so little… I have missed the tale, the dream… When will I find peace? I have to follow you again to meet the dream…”
Charles sat down on the steps, folded his arms, and, through the squinty eyes, began to observe the usual bustle of the circus actors. His thoughts were far away in the past, in that day. When he first saw Simone…
The girl with huge cherry bows was sitting in the second row. Why did he notice her and invite into the arena instead of the clumsy daughter of the Director of the circus Matilda? Probably, it was just fate.
“Do you want me to help you?” the girl from the second row exclaimed.
“Yes, yes, yes, my child,” Charles exclaimed in a clown’s voice. “Please, please. Help me become a person. Help me defeat the obnoxious white-haired clown”.
“I will try,” having reached out her little hand, she said. For some reason, Charles picked her up and carried into the arena. The white girl’s dress with cherry satin ribbons, threaded through the lacy collar and cuffs of the short sleeves, resembled a turned over liqueur-glass. Charles was admiring her.
“What should I do?” the girl asked in a businesslike tone.
“You should win,” he said, having remembered that they were at the arena, that the hundred-eyed audience was watching them, so…
“Don’t do anything silly,” he whispered to the girl.
“Of course,” she said, having done unquestioningly everything that was required.
The white-haired clown was defeated. The grateful red-haired clown Charles wanted to accompany his savior to her seat. She pushed his hand away and said: “I can take it from here.”
“Bravo!” Charles began to shout and to clap his hands loudly. The audience supported him. The girl walked to her seat under the storm of applause. She sat down, straightened her back, turned her head, and said something to a man, who was sitting next to her. He hoisted his eyeglasses on his nose and leaned forward. But new actors ran into the arena: Madame Juju with the pets dwarf dogs…
The performance came to an end. Charles ran to his show-booth to change his clothes. Somebody loudly knocked on the door.
“Open,” Charles cried. Somebody knocked on the door again. Then he got up, opened the door, and whistled, having seen a gentleman in eyeglasses, behind whom the cherry bows were hiding.
“May I talk to you, Mr. Clown?” he asked.
“Sure,”