The Bonaventure Adventures Read online

  PUFFIN

  an imprint of Penguin Canada Books Inc., a Penguin Random House Company

  Published by the Penguin Group

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  (a division of Penguin Books Ltd)

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  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  First published 2017

  Copyright © 2017 by Rachelle Delaney

  Cover art copyright © by Julene Harrison

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Delaney, Rachelle, author The Bonaventure adventures / Rachelle Delaney.

  Issued in print and electronic formats.

  ISBN 9780143198505 (hardback). —ISBN 9780143198529 (epub)

  I. Title.

  PS8607. E48254B66 2017 jc813′.6 C2016-905210-9

  C2016-905211-7

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2016948511

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Visit the Penguin Canada website at www.​penguinrandomhouse.​ca

  v4.1

  a

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Part 1: In the Crimson

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Part 2: The Bonaventure Circus School

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Part 3: Bêtes Noires

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Part 4: Jean-Loup

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Acknowledgments

  For John Delaney

  Part 1

  IN THE CRIMSON

  THE DAY THAT would later inspire The Great Adventure—the circus show that, everyone agreed, changed everything—began like any other. Sebastian Konstantinov awoke early, the first one in his caravan up, as usual. For a moment he considered changing out of the T-shirt he’d slept in—an old blue one emblazoned with THE KONSTANTINOV FAMILY CIRCUS and so threadbare you could practically see right through it. But he decided against it. None of the Konstantinovs cared what he wore, least of all those he was now going to visit.

  Seb brushed his teeth over the little sink as quietly as possible so as not to wake his slumbering roommates. They’d had a particularly rough show the previous night, and he could tell they were still reeling from it, even in their sleep. Maxime the sword swallower was snoring throatily. Juan the contortionist was curled up in a tiny ball on his pillow. And Stanley the clown (known as Snickertoot when he was in character) was testing out jokes in his sleep—something about a sheep walking into a bar. Seb couldn’t quite get the details, but he was pretty sure it wasn’t funny.

  It was a good thing Seb was a sound sleeper.

  He peered into the cloudy little mirror above the sink and attempted to flatten his hair, which, as usual, sprang right back up, making him look like he was perpetually caught in a hurricane. Which actually wasn’t a bad description of life with the Konstantinov Family Circus.

  Resigned, he tiptoed back to his bunk, grabbed the rolled-up map he kept underneath it, then slipped out the door to determine exactly where they were.

  He stood for a moment on the steps of the caravan, breathing in the chilly morning air and listening to the twitters of some nearby birds. All around him were craggy valleys and forested hills dotted with red-roofed cottages. He unrolled his map.

  It was a handmade affair, one that he and Maxime the sword swallower had been working on for years, documenting their journey back and forth across Eastern Europe. They added anything they found particularly interesting, from Slovenian castles to bookstores in Warsaw to a particularly good sausage cart in Estonia.

  He located some craggy valleys and red-roofed cottages on the map, which he vaguely remembered drawing about three years ago, when he had been nine years old, and from that he determined that today, they were in Bulgaria. It made sense, since the previous night they’d dismantled the big top in Bucharest, Romania, and headed south.

  “Bulgaria it is, then.” Seb rolled up his map and took in his surroundings. The ten caravans, each emblazoned like Seb’s T-shirt, had come to rest on the side of an empty gravel road. Everyone inside them seemed to be still asleep, possibly reluctant to face the day after last night’s performance.

  It wasn’t that anyone had messed up: the jugglers hadn’t dropped a pin, the lion hadn’t nipped its tamer, the contortionist hadn’t even thrown out his shoulder. It was, in fact, a good, solid performance.

  “Too bad no one showed up to see it,” Seb sighed to the red-roofed cottages. He shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans, recalling the rows of empty seats, an all-too-common sight these days. At the last minute, he had even run off to a nearby playground, arms laden with bags of buttery popcorn, and tried to coerce some local kids to come to the show. But they’d only laughed and chased him away—after relieving him of the popcorn.

  “They just don’t know what they’re missing,” Seb told the forested hills. Then he hopped down the steps onto the road. For no matter what had happened the previous night, the animals still needed to be fed. They were counting on him.

  He walked along the row of caravans, which weren’t actually real caravans—at least, not the kind most people pictured when they thought of a traveling circus. These were big metal shipping containers atop old flatbed trucks. But Dragan Konstantinov insisted they be called caravans, since it sounded more circus-y.

  Dragan Konstantinov also insisted the caravans travel in a particular order, beginning with his own, since he was the ringmaster. After his came the one Seb shared with Maxime, Stanley and Juan, followed by Aunt Tatiana’s caravan, which she shared with Julie the lion tamer and Maria the aerialist. Then came the kitchen caravan and two big containers packed with equipment—everything from the big top to the bleachers. And then came the largest caravan of all, home to an elephant, a
lion, a monkey, a dancing bear, some rabbits and a parakeet.

  Or rather, the animal caravan should have come after the second equipment caravan. But today, it wasn’t there.

  Seb stopped. Had someone mixed up the order? Dragan would not be pleased when he found out. He shook his head and continued down the line, past a third equipment container, another that housed two jugglers and three acrobats, and finally, the caravan belonging to a small team of workmen and riggers.

  He’d reached the end of the line. And the animals were nowhere to be seen.

  “What the…?” He turned around and jogged back, counting caravans as he passed them. When he reached his own, he stopped again. “No. Way,” he breathed.

  Seb spun around again and sprinted down the line, praying that somehow, somehow he’d overlooked a shipping container large enough to hold an elephant, a lion, a monkey, a dancing bear, some rabbits and a parakeet. But by the time he reached the last caravan, he knew it was impossible.

  The animals were gone.

  One of the riggers—a man named Miles—came strolling by just as Seb wailed, “Noooo!”

  Miles jumped a good foot off the ground. “What? What?” he cried.

  “Where…Where are they?” Seb sputtered, waving his arms around.

  “Oh. That.” Miles bit his lip and looked down at his shoes. “I’m sorry, Seb. We wanted to let you say good-bye, but you were sleeping, and the boss said—”

  That was all Seb needed to know. He turned on his heel and sprinted for Dragan Konstantinov’s caravan.

  He burst in without knocking. His father was sitting before a giant mirror rimmed with tiny lightbulbs—the soft kind he insisted on for the way they illuminated his pores. Currently, he was deep in concentration, parting his thick, shiny pelt of hair, which had always reminded Seb of a large muskrat.

  “W-what did y-you…,” Seb began, but his throat tightened and the words wouldn’t come out.

  Dragan’s eyes flicked over to his son, then back to his hair. “So you saw, then,” he said.

  “What did you do?” Seb yelled.

  Dragan frowned at him in the mirror. “I thought we discussed this.”

  “Discussed this?” Seb repeated. “Discussed this! We definitely did not discuss you getting rid of all our animals!” He was hollering now, quite possibly loud enough to wake the entire Konstantinov family. And he didn’t care a bit.

  “We did.” Dragan gave his pelt a final swipe. “We talked—many times, in fact—about needing to modernize our acts and draw in new audiences. Circus animals,” he added, setting down his comb, “have gone out of fashion.”

  “So you just let them all go?” Seb wailed. “In the middle of the night? In Romania?”

  “Of course not.” Dragan looked insulted. “I sold them to the Bucharest Zoo. And got precious little money for them, by the way,” he added. “Honestly, a perfectly good elephant is worth twice what they gave me.”

  “A zoo?” Seb felt ill. “They’re not meant to be in a zoo! They’re travelers, like us! Dad, they’ll hate it. Especially the lion—you know how she feels about having her photo taken.” He grabbed his father’s arm. “Let’s go back. Please!”

  Dragan shook him off and began rummaging through his bag of toiletries. “We are most definitely not going back.”

  “But you didn’t even let me say good-bye!”

  “You were sound asleep,” said Dragan. “I decided that was more important—we all need our beauty sleep,” he added, pulling out his tweezers.

  “Dad!” Seb put his head in his hands.

  “Oh, stop,” said his father. “They’re just animals.”

  “No, they aren’t!” Seb thought about how the elephant would snuffle his shoulder with her trunk every morning, as if to thank him for her breakfast. And how the monkey wrapping its long arms around his neck could cheer him up on even the most desolate day. Then he imagined them all, abandoned at the Bucharest Zoo while the caravans sped off into the night. His eyes began to blur. “They were family.”

  “Nonsense,” Dragan sniffed, tweezing his eyebrows.

  “It is not!” Seb cried. “They’re just as much family as everyone else!” He gestured toward the open door and the caravans beyond, inside which the performers were likely all lying awake, listening to the argument between the ringmaster and his son—the only two Konstantinovs, incidentally, who were actually related.

  “I had to do it, Seb,” his father said. “Anyway, you’re the one who’s been encouraging me to modernize.”

  “But not like this!” said Seb. “Not by selling off our performers! I said we need to—”

  “Don’t start with the stories again,” said Dragan.

  “I will start with the stories again!” Seb shot back. “There are great shows out there that—”

  “Enough!” Dragan held up his tweezers for silence. “This is not a matter of…of storytelling.” He grimaced. “This is about performances—about showcasing only the most talented and skilled Konstantinovs.” He gave Seb a pointed look—a look that clearly said, “You’re not exactly helping with that.”

  Seb flinched. Even after all these years, it still hurt.

  For a moment, they just stared at each other, pores illuminated by all the tiny lightbulbs. Then Dragan opened his mouth, likely to apologize. But before he could say another word, Seb turned and stomped out of the caravan.

  SEB STORMED BACK down the road, keeping his eyes on the gravel so everyone he passed would know he was in no mood to talk.

  Abandoned! At a zoo! He couldn’t believe it. It was by far the most unfair thing his father had ever done. And that look he’d given him—the “you’re not helping” look. That was a low blow.

  “I help,” Seb grumbled, stomping past the kitchen caravan where Aunt Tatiana was cooking her usual giant pot of porridge. He left the road and marched out onto a patch of grass, then sat down with his back to the caravans. “I do all kinds of things around here.”

  And Dragan knew that. What he had meant by that look, and all the looks over the years, was that Seb wasn’t—would never be—a circus performer.

  It certainly wasn’t for lack of trying. Seb had spent the better part of his life attempting to master every circus skill imaginable, from juggling to trapeze to tying his limbs in a knot. But it was no use. He was terrible at everything circus-y.

  He understood why it was hard for his father. Dragan had been a world-renowned aerialist before founding the Konstantinov Family Circus—of course he’d assumed his son would be just as talented. Or at least decent. Or at least able to turn a simple cartwheel without ending up in a heap on the floor.

  To his credit, Dragan had never actually come out and said he was disappointed in his son. But Seb knew. He’d known ever since the day he found the letters.

  He’d first come upon them about a year before, shortly after the Konstantinovs had finally, mercifully given up on the prospect of him ever being a circus star. They’d begun to give him odd jobs instead, like mucking out the animal stalls and popping popcorn for the shows. On this particular day, he’d been tasked with fetching a top hat from Dragan’s costume closet.

  “The one with the teal-green sequins,” his father had specified, for he owned at least a dozen top hats.

  Seb had been rooting through Dragan’s vast collection of spangled scarves, bowties and suspenders when he happened upon a small stack of letters, tied together with twine. It was the paper that first caught his eye—a nice, heavy cardstock, smooth to the touch. Paper, like books and a decent Internet connection, was hard to come by in the Konstantinov Family Circus.

  At first, he’d assumed they were from his mother, and he wondered how long ago she’d sent them. He hesitated a moment before untying the twine, then decided it really was his business. He pulled on the bow and unfolded the first page.

  The letters, it turned out, were not from his mother, but they were from a woman. A woman named, according to her swirling signature, Angélique Saint-Germain
. Disappointed, Seb was about to fold the paper back up when he spotted something of interest.

  I want so badly to meet Sebastian, Madame Saint-Germain had written. I do hope you’ll send him to us, even just for a visit.

  “Who’s us?” Seb asked his father’s accessories. They offered no explanation. So he shut the door, sat down on the floor and pulled out the flashlight he always kept in his pocket to use backstage. And he began to read the letters, one by one.

  As he made his way through them—there were about a dozen, sent over six months earlier that year—he began to piece together the story. Like Dragan, Angélique Saint-Germain had been a circus aerial star. At one time they’d even trained together on the flying trapeze. In her first letter, Madame Saint-Germain went on at length, reminiscing about competitions they’d won and performers they’d outshone.

  We were quite the pair, weren’t we, Dragan? she wrote. With my talent and your charisma, it seemed we could take on the world.

  Charisma was the word everyone used to describe Dragan. Seb had looked it up long ago and found it to mean “charm that inspires devotion in others.” He couldn’t argue with that: each time his father entered a room, everyone in it inevitably turned to revolve around him. Seb had seen it happen time and time again, while he himself blended nicely into the walls.

  Women, especially, loved Dragan. Whether it was due to the charisma or his well-groomed muskrat pelt or his meticulously plucked eyebrows, Seb couldn’t say for sure. But whatever it was, it inspired devotion in all women who met him. With the exception, of course, of Seb’s mother.

  He knew very little else about his mother. When he was small, he used to ask Dragan why she’d left the Konstantinov Family Circus. But each time he did, his father had a different story. She went off to pursue her dream of dental school. She fell from a tightrope and developed a paralyzing fear of heights. Tired of Aunt Tatiana’s goulash, she left one day in search of a croissant and never returned.

  For someone so opposed to storytelling, Dragan was basically a master.

  Unfortunately, Dragan was also the kind of storyteller whose stories were most often untrue. Over the years, Seb had developed a trick to telling when his father was making things up: he’d assume his deep, booming ringmaster voice and wave his arms around, as if telling the story to an entire rapt audience, not just a dubious twelve-year-old.