The Hotel New Hampshire

“Of course not,” Father said.

“The King Brothers!” Frank said; he had a King Brothers tiger-act poster in his room.

“No, I mean really small,” Father said. “A sort of private circus.”

“One of those second-rate ones, you mean,” Coach Bob said.

“Not the kind with freaky animals!” Franny said.

“Certainly not,” said Father.

“What do you mean, ‘freaky animals’?” Lilly asked.

“Horses with not enough legs,” said Frank. “A cow with an extra head—growing out of her back.”

“Where’d you see that?” I asked.

“Will there be tigers and lions?” Egg asked.

“Just so they’re on the fourth floor,” said Iowa Bob.

“No, put them with Mrs. Urick!” Franny said.

“Win,” my mother said. “What circus?”

“Well, they can use the field, you see,” Father said. “They can pitch their tents on the old playground, they can eat in the restaurant, and some of them might actually stay in the hotel, too—although most of those people have their own trailers, I think.”

“What will the animals be?” Lilly asked.

“Well,” said Father, “I don’t think they have too many animals. It’s small, you see. Probably just a few animals. I think they have some special acts, you know—but I’m not sure what animals.”

“What acts?” said Iowa Bob.

“It’s probably one of those awful circuses,” Franny said. “The kind with goats and chickens and those everyday junky animals everyone’s seen—some dumb reindeers, a talking crow. But nothing big, you know, and nothing exotic.”

“It’s the exotic ones I’d just as soon not have around here,” Mother said.

“What acts?” said Iowa Bob.

“Well,” Father said. “I’m not sure. Trapeze, maybe?”

“You don’t know what animals,” Mother said. “And you don’t know what acts, either. What do you know?”

“They’re small,” Father said. “They just wanted to reserve some rooms, and maybe half the restaurant. They take Mondays off.”

“Mondays off?” said Iowa Bob. “How long did you book them for?”

“Well,” Father said.

“Win!” my mother said. “How many weeks will they be here?”

“They’ll be here the whole summer,” Father said.

“Wow!” cried Egg. “The circus!”

“A circus,” said Franny. “A weirdo circus.”

“Dumb acts, dumb animals,” I said.

“Weird acts, weird animals,” Frank said.

“Well, you’ll fit right in, Frank,” Franny told him.

“Stop it,” Mother said.

“There’s no reason to get anxious,” Father said. “It’s just a small, private circus.”

“What’s its name?” Mother asked.

“Well,” said Father.

“You don’t know its name?” asked Coach Bob.

“Of course I know its name!” Father said. “It’s called Fritz’s Act.”

“Fritz’s act?” Frank said.

“What’s the act?” I asked.

“Well,” Father said. “That’s just a name. I’m sure there’s more than one act.”

“It sounds very modern,” Frank said.

“Modern, Frank?” Franny said.

“It sounds kinky,” I said.

“What’s kinky?” said Lilly.

“A kind of animal?” Egg asked.

“Never mind,” said Mother.

“I think we should concentrate on the Exeter weekend,” Father said.

“Yes, and getting yourselves, and me, all moved in,” said Iowa Bob. “There’s lots of time to discuss the summer.”

“The whole summer is booked in advance?” Mother asked.

“You see?” Father said. “Now, that’s good business! Already we’ve taken care of the summer, and the Exeter weekend. First things first. Now all we have to do is move in.”

That happened a week before the Exeter game; it was the weekend when Iowa Bob’s ringers rang up nine touchdowns—to match their ninth straight victory, against no defeats. Franny didn’t get to see it; she had decided not to be a cheerleader anymore. That Saturday Franny and I helped Mother move the last things that the moving vans hadn’t already taken to the Hotel New Hampshire; Lilly and Egg went with Father and Coach Bob to the game; Frank, of course, was in the band.

There were thirty rooms over four floors, and our family occupied seven rooms in the southeast corner, covering two floors. One room in the basement was dominated by Mrs. Urick; that meant that, together with the fourth-floor resting place of Max, there were twenty-two rooms for guests. But the headwaitress and head maid, Ronda Ray, had a day-room on the second floor—to gather herself together, she’d said to Father. And two southeast-corner rooms on the third floor—just above us—were reserved for Iowa Bob. That left only nineteen rooms for guests, and only thirteen of those came with their own baths; six of the rooms came with the midget facilities.

“It’s more than enough,” Father said. “This is a small town. And not popular.”

It was more than enough for the circus called Fritz’s Act, perhaps, but we were anxious how we were going to handle the full house we expected for the Exeter weekend.

That Saturday we moved in, Franny discovered the intercom system and switched on the “Receiving” buttons in all the rooms. They were all empty, of course, but we tried to imagine listening to the first guests moving into them. The squawk-box system, as Father called it, had been left over from the Thompson Female Seminary, of course—the principal could announce fire drills to the various classrooms, and teachers who were out of their homerooms could hear if the kids were fooling around. Father thought that keeping the intercom system would make it unnecessary to have phones in the rooms.

“They can call for help on the intercom,” Father said.

“Or we can wake them for breakfast. And if they want to use the phone, they can use the phone at the main desk.” But of course the squawk-box system also meant that it was possible to listen to the guests in their rooms.

“Not ethically possible,” Father said, but Franny and I couldn’t wait.

That Saturday we moved in, we were without even the main-desk phone—or a phone in our family’s apartment—and we were without linen, because the linen service that was going to handle the hotel laundry had also been contracted to do ours. They weren’t starting service until Monday, Ronda Ray wasn’t starting until Monday, either, but she was there—in the Hotel New Hampshire—looking over her dayroom when we arrived.

“I just need it, you know?” she asked Mother. “I mean, I can’t change sheets in the morning, after I wait on the breakfast eaters—and before I serve lunch to the lunch eaters—without having no place to lay down. And between lunch and supper, if I don’t lay down, I get feeling nasty—all over. And if you lived where I lived, you wouldn’t wanna go home.”