Piper Houdini Apprentice of Coney Island

PROLOGUE

Myrtle Corbin hobbled across the wooden planks, trying not to disturb the delicate bundle clasped to her chest. She was no longer a young woman and her lungs burned with each step.

A painted stork guarding a nest of cherubs peered down at her from a tall gable overhead. Myrtle fell against the door of the building. She had to do something to arouse the people inside!

But she wasn’t able to knock. One hand was carrying the bundle while the other pinched the blanket together, protecting its precious contents from the corrosive sun. And because Myrtle was born with a clubbed right foot, her left foot supported all her weight, rendering them both useless as well.

The sun was peeking over the Atlantic horizon, growing brighter with each passing second. The blankets would soon provide no protection at all.

Out of habit, Myrtle looked around to make sure that no one would catch a free glimpse. Then she nudged her hips forward. Two tiny legs protruded from the slit of her custom-made skirt and kicked at the front door like a child throwing a temper tantrum.

The ground floor of the structure was made of brick and the upper floor was a lattice of wood-framed panels. It resembled a half-timbered German farmhouse, but Myrtle knew better. This was a hospital.

Under its tiled roof, a staff of nurses cared for frail or underdeveloped infants that had been born too early. To fund its operation, the hospital doubled as a sideshow exhibit, displaying the premature babies in incubators behind a large picture window so people could gawk at them.

The boardwalk attractions wouldn’t open for several hours, but that wouldn’t keep Myrtle’s family from meddling. Already they had begun to gather.

“Whatcha got there, Myrtle?” Elastic Skin Joe called out to her, bouncing down the boardwalk on his fingers and toes. His spindly arms were wrapped behind even spindlier legs so that he resembled a ball with hands and feet. “The Nightgaunt leave us another present?”

On most days she would find it amusing that these so-called “Curiosities” were in fact the most curious creatures of all. But today she had no patience for their nonsense.

“Yes,” she replied, once more striking her tiny shoes against the door. “I found it by the drainpipe next to the Foolish House.”

“Figures you’d be the one to find it then, huh?” Joe chuckled, untangling himself and vaulting to his full length beside her. The four-legged woman kicked him in the funny bone with one of her extra feet and the elastic man howled in pain.

“Should’ve booted him somewhere else,” said a girl in a pink dress, poking her heads between Joe’s spiderlike legs.

“Must you always be so vile?” asked the girl’s other head.

“Charlotte! Scarlet! We have no time for your bickering!” Myrtle chided. “If we don’t get into the Hatchery soon, we’ll lose another one!”

“The doctor’s not in?” Baby Bunny’s fleshy face scrunched with worry, making it look like the underside of a pumpkin. As always, she brought up the rear of the troupe with her boyfriend, the Living Skeleton, in tow. The shadow of Bunny’s massive frame shrouded Myrtle’s precious bundle, offering additional protection from the vicious sun. But it wouldn’t last long.

“If they don’t open the door, can we eat it before it goes poof?” asked Lionel the Dog-Faced Boy, licking his chops.

“There will be no feeding on the foundlings!” declared a voice with a heavy German accent as the door to the Child Hatchery flew open. A pale man in his early forties appeared in its frame, yanking the sash of his robe to conceal his nightshirt. He swatted Lionel on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper.

“I hate when they do that,” the hairy boy growled, rubbing his furry snout.

“Dr. Couney! Thank God!” Myrtle exclaimed, still catching her breath. “The Nightgaunt—he brought us another one. But I don’t understand why he would leave it so exposed this close to daybreak…?”

“Calm yourself, Myrtle,” said Dr. Couney, patting the knees of her smaller appendages. “Despite his own aversion to the sun, I do not believe the Nightgaunt would be so reckless, no matter how much of a rush he was in.”

The doctor leaned over the bundle and peeled away the blanket as though he were unwrapping a fragile present. He plucked a wriggling figure from the folds and held it out for all to see. The bright green eyes of a baby girl beamed back at them.

Myrtle and the other Curiosities gasped. Instead of turning to dust, the baby giggled as the sun’s rays glinted off her tender white skin and fine red hair. An odd pattern of dots on the infant’s cheeks sparkled like glitter and then dimmed as the sun grew brighter in the sky.

Myrtle saw a grin spread across Rosita the Painted Lady’s face. Like an artist struck with inspiration, the tattooed woman glanced at the insides of her wrists and nodded. Other than her face, they were the only remaining spots of unmarked flesh on her body.

Beneath the brim of his floppy fur hat, Zip the What-Is-It peered at something shiny in the blanket. He sunk his huge hand into the soft fabric and pulled out a silver padlock. Running his fingers over some cursive letters on the lock, Zip reached under his cap and scratched the tuft of hair on his scalp. Myrtle knew that Zip didn’t like words.

A young girl beside Zip—whose head, like his, was shaved except for a patch at the tip to emphasize its small size—extended a frail arm from her pink muumuu and reached for the babe.

“No, Elvira,” Dr. Couney said, gently swatting her wrist. Elvira withdrew her hand, bit her lip, and lowered her tapered cranium.

In the distance, the El Dorado carousel chimed its first refrain of “Twelfth Street Rag.” Couney turned from his fellow attractions, hoisted the infant girl over his head, and let her bathe in the full glow of the morning sun.

“This one is meant for the light.”