Silhouette Read Online Free Page A

the glow of the lamp at the back of the tent.
    ‘I am Silhouette,’ she said.

Chapter
3
    ‘I still don’t think it’s possible,’ the Doctor said as they made their way back through the fair.
    ‘Just because you don’t understand it,’ Clara told him. ‘Tell you what, why don’t we agree that it’s magic? That covers it.’
    He fixed her with a stare that was somewhere between sympathetic and condescending. ‘Magic is just a term people use for things they’re too primitive to understand properly.’
    Clara nodded. ‘I think that’s what I just said, actually.’
    They paused to watch a man in a short cape and impressive moustache doing card tricks. He fanned out the pack and waved it at the Doctor.
    ‘Pick a card. Any card. Don’t tell me what it is, but show it to the young lady there, and then to everyone else.’
    The Doctor showed everyone his card – the three of diamonds.
    ‘Good, now replace it in the pack, anywhere you like. That’s it.’
    The conjuror shuffled the pack. Then he cut it. Then he shuffled it again. Finally, he threw the pack up into the air. One card separated from the others, and he caught it in one hand. The rest of the pack, he caught in the other.
    ‘And tell me, sir,’ he announced confidently, ‘if this is your card?’
    The crowd was silent. The Doctor peered at the card. The seven of clubs. ‘No, it’s not.’
    The conjuror’s smile became rather more fixed as he quickly looked through the rest of the cards. ‘All part of the trick,’ he said rather unconvincingly. ‘Ah! Queen of spades.’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Nine of hearts?’
    ‘Still no.’
    The conjuror sniffed and frowned. ‘So what was it?’
    ‘Left pocket,’ the Doctor told him.
    The conjuror’s frown deepened as he pulled an unexpected card from his trouser pocket. ‘Three of diamonds?’
    ‘That’s the one. Sorry, I cheated.’
    They headed back through the Carnival towards the main Frost Fair. The snow was getting heavier, settling on top of the compacted snow already lying on the ground.
    ‘So what’s the plan now?’ Clara asked.
    ‘Jenny,’ the Doctor told her.
    ‘Clara,’ she corrected him. ‘Remember?’
    ‘Jenny Flint, Vastra’s maid, is over there,’ he told her. ‘Coincidence, do you think?’
    As they approached they saw that Jenny was talking to Michael the Strong Man. ‘Elderly gent, with white hair and mutton-chop whiskers,’ she was saying.
    Michael shook his head. ‘Sorry. Don’t remember him. But we get so many people through here in a day. He could have been here, couldn’t say for sure. I doubt if I remember even half of them.’ He glanced across as the Doctor and Clara arrived. ‘I remember Doctor Smith here, though.’
    ‘Doctor Smith?’ Jenny turned, surprised. ‘Oh yeah. Everyone knows Doctor Smith.’
    Michael excused himself and headed off to do another performance.
    ‘So what brings you to the Carnival of Curiosities?’ Jenny asked.
    ‘Curiosity,’ the Doctor told her.
    ‘Ask a silly question. Between you and me,’ she went on, ‘it ain’t that curious. I’ve seen better. You looked at that mermaid they’ve got?’ She shook her head. ‘Hopeless.’
    ‘Maybe they should get a Lizard Woman,’ Clara suggested.
    ‘Be a darn sight better than the Wolf Boy over there.You seen him?’ They confessed they hadn’t. ‘He just needs a good bath, he does. I asked him if he was all right, when the woman what’s in charge wasn’t looking, and he asked me if I could get him a meat pie. Polite as you like. Even said please. Wolf Boy, my elbow.’
    ‘So what are you doing here?’ the Doctor asked. ‘Apart from being singularly unimpressed with just about everything.’
    ‘Looking for a man with mutton-chop whiskers, by the sound of it,’ Clara added.
    ‘Marlowe Hapworth is his name. But I know where he is now, right enough.’
    ‘Then why are you asking about him?’ Clara wondered.
    ‘Because he’s dead is where he is. It’s
how
he died as