Women and girls were trickling out of the audience as fast as men and boys came from every direction to swell it, clustering thickly beneath the boardwalk. As solemnly as gladiators parading at the Circus Maximus, eight men filed onto the bridge and stood, bandaged hands on hips, legs apart, swaggering at the admiring oohs of the crowd. Meggie thought they were wearing underclothes, for they were clad in long black tights and vests with closely fitting grey trunks from waists to midthighs. On their chests, big white Roman capitals said JIMMY SHARMAN'S TROUPE. NO two were the same size, some big, some small, some in between, but they were all of particularly fine physique. Chatting and laughing to each other in an offhand manner that suggested this was an everyday occurrence, they flexed their muscles and tried to pretend they weren't enjoying strutting.
"Come on, chaps, who'll take a glove?" the spruiker was braying. "Who wants to have a go? Take a glove, win a fiver!" he kept yelling between the booms of a bass drum.
"I will!" Frank shouted. "I will, I will!"
He shook off Father Ralph's restraining hand as those around them in the throng who could see Frank's diminutive size began to laugh and good-naturedly push him to the front.
But the spruiker was very serious as one of the troupe extended a friendly hand and pulled Frank up the ladder to stand at one side of the eight already on the bridge. "Don't laugh, gents. He's not very big but he is the first to volunteer! It isn't the size of the dog in the fight, you know, it's the size of the fight in the dog! Come on now, here's this little bloke game to try- what about some of you big blokes, eh? Put on a glove and win a fiver, go the distance with one of Jimmy Sharman's troupe!"
Gradually the ranks of the volunteers increased, the young men self-consciously clutching their hats and eyeing the professionals who stood, a band of elite beings, alongside them. Dying to stay and see what happened, Father Ralph reluctantly decided it was more than time he removed Meggie from the vicinity, so he picked her up and turned on his heel to leave. Meggie began to scream, and the farther away he got, the louder she screamed; people were beginning to look at them, and he was so well known it was very embarrassing, not to mention undignified. "Now look, Meggie, I can't take you in there! Your father would flay me alive, and rightly!"
"I want to stay with Frank, I want to stay with Frank!" she howled at the top of her voice, kicking and trying to bite.
"Oh, shit!" said Father Ralph.
Yielding to the inevitable, he dug into his pocket for the required coins and approached the open flap of the marquee, one eye cocked for any of the Cleary boys; but they were nowhere to be seen, so he presumed they were safely trying their luck with the horseshoes or gorging themselves on meat pies and ice cream.
"You can't take her in there, Father!" the foreman said, shocked. Father Ralph lifted his eyes heavenward. "If you'll only tell me how we can get her away from here without the entire Gilly police force arresting us for molesting a child, I'll gladly go! But her brother volunteered and she's not about to leave her brother without a fight that will make your chaps look like amateurs!"
The foreman shrugged. "Well, Father, I can't argue with you, can I? In you go, but keep her out of the way, for-ah-pity's sake. No, no, Father, put your money back in your pocket; Jimmy wouldn't like it."
The tent seemed full of men and boys, milling around a central ring; Father Ralph found a place at the back of the crowd against the canvas wall, hanging on to Meggie for dear life. The air was foggy from tobacco smoke and redolent with sawdust they had thrown down to absorb the mud. Frank, gloves already on his hands, was the first challenger of the day.