Green fanged creature with flame scrolls

The big top came down in Shrewsbury on Tuesday, and the lads had it folded and loaded before the rain reached the second pole. You'll want to know about the Green Serpent, because Mr Okonedo asked me to write. He says the banner has gone to mildew in the wagon and the paint has lifted off the mouth where the fangs were. I told him you'd know a better glue for canvas than anyone living.

The creature hasn't been out since the Bristol fire. You remember how it hung over the ring with its arms spread and the flame scrolls curling round its head, and how the old boys stood beneath it swearing the narrow eyes followed them? Dolores stopped doing the knife act after that season. She said she could feel it watching her back. Now it's rolled in the corner of the caravan, wrapped in a bedsheet, and the tassels keep catching on the stove.

Last night I unrolled it on the grass beside the tent pegs to check the damage, and the moon came up over the field. Two of the feathered claws had split at the seams, and beneath the green there were brushstrokes of orange I'd forgotten, a second sky Jonah painted before he left us. I sat with a torch and traced the scrolls with my finger until the dew soaked through my trousers.

We have four weeks of pitches left, then the council wants the field back. Mr Okonedo says we'll sell the beast to a scrap man or a theatre in Leeds. I've told him I'll mend it first. If you can spare a Saturday, come and hold the other end of the canvas. It still looks best with the lamps lit behind it.

Yours in sawdust, Edie