Horned helmet with quote on the arm

The fair pulled into Hexham on Tuesday with two wagons short, and Mr Pryce has decided the Horned Man is to be the new centre board on the Waltzer. You'll remember him, the strongman with the paper crown who used to throw the mallet. Now he wants a helmet painted across the front of the big wooden gondola, black with gold cut-outs, and a quote underneath in curly letters. I'm doing the lettering because my hand is steadier than Dougie's, though you'd not believe it after the cider on Saturday.

The quote was Pryce's idea. He'd read it on a beer mat in Carlisle and got it into his head that every man who ever worked the pitch thinks he's the good one. I told him the ghost-train lad would say the same about himself, and he laughed so hard he dropped the chalk pot. We argued all afternoon over the spelling of "there" and "their", and in the end I wrote it the way it sounded in my head, which Pryce says is the only honest thing on the whole fairground.

On the last night, a boy from the Ferris wheel came to watch me finish. He asked whether the helmet was meant to be a villain, and I said it depends who's sitting in the seat. He nodded as if that made perfect sense, then climbed onto the gondola and sat in the front car, holding both rails and grinning at the dark. Pryce switched the lights on, the paint caught the bulbs, and the horns flared gold across the cut-outs.

Love to Mum. I'll post this from Newcastle.

Lou