‘Willer the Wonder? No – he was here before my partner and I took over the place. He died while performing a trick, or so the story goes. There are many stories about him. He left detailed instructions about maintaining what he called his temple of wonders, which we try to follow. As far as we know it is exactly as he left it. The guys service it every year. I’ll come with you. We can’t let anyone in there without supervision. Willer was adamant about that. His cabinets can trap you inside if you don’t know what you’re doing.’

‘Yes, we’d be grateful if you’d show us around,’ I said.

‘I have to run the concession,’ she said. ‘But – are you gentlemen hungry? If you’d like to have lunch now I could close up afterwards and take you down to Willer’s.’

One of the guys high on the rollercoaster began noisily banging a wooden slat. The pop record came to an end and another one started immediately.

‘Would you like to ride the carousel before you eat?’ she said.

‘No, thanks.’ Spoder and I exchanged a quick look. ‘But we’ll have something to eat. Thank you.’

She went behind the counter, threw a hidden switch and the lights and music from the carousel instantly died.

Spoder and I took a table under the shade of an awning, perching on unsteady little stools. In a while she brought us burgers with onion rings and salad, a huge plate each of curly fries, iced fizzy drinks in plastic beakers with lids and coloured straws, and afterwards two cups of extremely weak coffee.

‘Delicious!’

That was Spoder, not me.

Into the Cabinets of Death

17

Into the Cabinets of Death

She told us her name was Ketty. She and her partner owned and managed the park together. No, neither of them was called Bonnzo – they didn’t know where the name came from, but the park had been here for many years and that was what it was always called.

She walked us through the heat of the unshaded aisles between the sideshows, past several children’s rides and other food concessions. All closed. There were several larger rides. They were compactly arranged to save space. For instance, built between the main supports of the wooden rollercoaster, which Ketty told us was more than fifty years old and still in working order, was a compact modern mini-coaster, with a steel skeleton and several terrifying twists, turns and sudden plunges. The cars would pass with minimal headroom beneath the wooden trusses of the rollercoaster. Many of the other rides were positioned close to each other, ingeniously taking up a minimum of space.