Mandala tattoo on a hand holding a tabby cat

You will not believe what the Halloran crowd has done this week. Mr Halloran sold the big top to a scrap man in Doncaster for the poles and canvas, and we are wintering in a field behind the Co-op in Selby with one elephant fewer than last spring and one ring left that still has a floor. Nobody says the word closing. They say next season, the way you say grace over a dry loaf.

Pru has been sleeping badly. Since the tattooist from Hull came through with his box of needles, she has been sitting up with the grey tabby that came with the lion cage and never learned to leave. The tattooist inked a mandala onto the lid of the old props trunk in exchange for a bed, a ring of petals in black with red filled in like poppies pressed in a book. Pru says the pattern is a map of the ring, every petal one of our town stops, and that if she traces it right the show will come back round to us. I told her that is what Father used to say about the weather.

Last night the cat walked the length of the trunk and settled his chin on the middle of the design, and would not be moved. Pru laughed and said he was reading it. This morning there was frost on the caravan window and the field was empty, and the cat was sat on the bottom step looking out at the road with his paws tucked under, as if he were waiting for a van that was never going to come back. I have sewn the last of the sequins onto the spare costume. Keep the back bedroom warm, love. I will come home when the tent comes down for good.