Hell hath no fury like a magician’s assistant scorned… but how was Polly to get her own back?
BY JULIA DOUGLAS
Polly watched through a peephole in the velvet curtain as Mark sang Welcome To The Circus in his baggy red tartan suit.
The rest of the cast danced around him on the big top’s circular stage. Each took a turn displaying their party piece: juggling with hoops, breathing fire and, in Suzanah’s case, taking flight on a wire and spiralling like a fairy into the roof of the tent.
Show-off! thought Polly, her hackles raised, as they always were when the pink-haired acrobat was in her sight.
The number ended with an eruption of fireworks. Polly pushed a wardrobe on wheels onto the back of the stage and ducked back out of sight.
“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen,” called Mark as the rest of the performers trotted off stage. “I’m Mark, and this is…”
He gestured to the empty spot beside him and looked around in pretend consternation.
“Polly, where are you?”
“I can’t come out,” Polly called. “I’ve nothing to wear.”
“Will you stop messing about and help me start the show?” Mark shouted.
“If you insist.”
Polly stepped into the spotlight with a head full of curlers, wearing a very short fluffy pink dressing gown.
“See, I’ve nothing to wear.” Polly put her arm inside the wardrobe and slapped the sides to show its emptiness.
“Well, you didn’t look properly.” Mark closed the door and reopened it to show the wardrobe full of colourful dresses. They were swinging on their hangers, having dropped out of a trapdoor in the top that was released when he closed the door.
“Here, wear this.”
He handed her a green dress.
Acting huffily, Polly walked behind the wardrobe. Without breaking her stride, she emerged from the other side in the knee-length green dress – or, rather, an identical copy. Her curlers-free hair swished around her shoulders.
“Does green suit me?” she asked the amazed audience.
“It goes with your eyes,” Mark snapped at his blue-eyed wife.
The ad-lib stung her. It wasn’t long ago that their bickering-married-couple routine had been only an act. These days the roles came too easily to them both.
“I think I should wear red,” said Polly, “to go with your eyes.”
She circled back behind the wardrobe and the green dress was instantly transformed into a red ankle-length one.
It was a simple trick – fo
