Solar system orbits on the thigh

The tent went up again on Tuesday, though only just. Mr Hollis has the wheel of lamps rigged over the centre pole the way your father used to, nine bulbs for nine worlds, and he insists the little brass one by the ring is Pluto, though the Harrow boys say it stopped counting last year. The lamps don't turn anymore, so the whole thing hangs there, crooked, like a clock that has given up.

Cora, who does the high wire, has been walking the orbit each night in her stockinged feet, round the outer rope and back in, slow as a planet, counting the dots we chalked into the sawdust for the children to hop between. Thirty-one dots from the sun to the edge. I asked her why she bothers with a crowd of forty and a leaking roof. She said a thing that goes round a fixed point is never really finished, and I thought that was the sort of thing you say when you have nothing left to sell.

On the last night the rain came in sideways and only eleven people paid. Hollis stood in the ring under the crooked lamps and announced the planets one by one, and when he reached the big ringed one he stopped, took off his hat and let the rain fall on his bald head. Nobody clapped. Then Cora stepped out onto the wire, and the whole tent went quiet and followed her round.

Come home if you can. I'll save you a seat by the sawdust sun.

Your brother, Tom