Another day, another night. A storm rose from the east then, a regular yet violent storm. A column of air twisting and turning like a majestic predator, crossing the land. The tornado threatened to swoop them up and carry them elsewhere. The Conjurer cursed and fired short bursts of flame from the burner. The hot air balloon dropped but the edges of the storm had them then and they were helpless in its grasp. It twisted them round and round, high and then low. Below, the Stranger saw a curious procession. A small white chapel stood on the hard ground beside a wide cemetery in which were laid rows and rows of headstones. Beside the chapel stood several figures, and it occurred to him that one man was about to be hanged from a tree, and that another man, astride a horse, was directing this execution. He saw all this in but a moment as the storm brought them up again and then, by what forces of nature he could not tell, decided abruptly to change direction again and violently released them. The Fat Lady hurled downward at speed. The three men were tossed and turned within the Fat Lady’s belly. The Stranger held on to the sides of the basket, which badly shook. The air rushed all about them, and they hit the ground with a terrible cracking sound and a terrified whinny, and the deflated envelope came down on them, burying them in a dank darkness.

“Screw this lot!” the Conjurer said. He must have reached for a knife, for next thing they knew the envelope had been sliced open and sunlight poured down along with fresh air. The three men emerged through this breach, guns at the ready, but they were not prepared for the scene that greeted their hatching.

A man’s legs stuck out from under the hot air balloon’s gondola. Over by the dilapidated chapel, several men and women stood like mourners at a funeral, dressed in sombre black clothes and wearing whiteface makeup. They stood peering at them stoically with hands crossed. Standing facing the hot air balloon in an uncertain semicircle were four rough-looking men holding guns. From a thick branch of the solitary tree there hung a thick rope. It, in turn, was looped around the neck of a man.

The man was desperately pedalling a unicycle to try and stay upright.

The four armed-men drew their guns, but the Conjurer, the Kid and the Stranger were faster. Three shots rang out, and then three more, and then a final seventh shot, which severed the hanging rope. The man on the unicycle shot forward, hit a trampoline, bounced up into a full aerial cartwheel, and landed improbably on his face in a custard pie that had been lying there.