Water for Elephants (30 page)

At this point in her story, she dissolves into tears. I’m still holding her, still rocking back and forth. Eventually she pulls away, wiping her eyes with her hands.

“You should go,” she says.

“I don’t want to.”

She whimpers, reaching across the divide to stroke my cheek with the back of her hand.

“I want to see you again,” I say.

“You see me every day.”

“You know what I mean.”

There’s a long pause. She drops her gaze to the ground. Her mouth moves a few times before she finally speaks. “I can’t.”

“Marlena, for God’s sake—”

“I just can’t. I’m married. I made my bed, and now I have to lie in it.”

I kneel in front of her, searching her face for a signal to stay. After an agonizing wait, I realize I’m not going to find one.

I kiss her on the forehead and leave.

•  •  •

B
EFORE
I’
VE GONE
forty yards, I’ve heard more than I ever wanted to about how Rosie paid for the lemonade.

Apparently August stormed into the menagerie and banished everyone. The puzzled menagerie men and a handful of others stood outside, their ears pressed to the seams of the great canvas tent as a torrent of angry screaming began. This sent the rest of the animals into a panic—the chimps screeched, the cats roared, and the zebras yelped. Despite this, the distraught listeners could still make out the hollow thud of bull hook hitting flesh, again and again and again.

At first Rosie bellowed and whimpered. When she progressed to squealing and shrieking, many of the men turned away, unable to take any more. One of them ran for Earl, who entered the menagerie and hauled August out by his armpits. He kicked and struggled like a madman even as Earl dragged him across the lot and up the stairs into the privilege car.

The remaining men found Rosie lying on her side, quivering, her foot still chained to a stake.

“I
HATE THAT MAN,”
says Walter as I climb into the stock car. He’s sitting on the cot, stroking Queenie’s ears. “I really, really hate that man.”

“Someone wanna tell me what’s going on?” Camel calls from behind the row of trunks. “’Cuz I know something is. Jacob? Help me out here. Walter ain’t talking.”

I say nothing.

“There was no call to be that brutal. No call at all,” Walter continues. “He damn near started a stampede, too. Could have killed the lot of us. Were you there? Did you hear any of it?”

Our eyes meet.

“No,” I say.

“Well, I wouldn’t mind knowing what in blazes you’re talking about,” says Camel. “But it seems I don’t count for squat here. Hey, ain’t it dinnertime?”

“I’m not hungry,” I say.

“Me either,” says Walter.

“Well, I am,” says Camel, disgruntled. “But I bet neither one of you thought of that. And I bet neither one of you picked up so much as a piece of bread for an old man.”

Walter and I look at each other. “Well, I was there,” he says, his eyes full of accusation. “You wanna know what I heard?” he says.

“No,” I say, staring at Queenie. She meets my gaze and whacks the blanket a few times with her stump.

“You sure?”

“Yes I’m sure.”

“Thought you might be interested, you being the vet and all.”

“I am interested,” I say loudly. “But I’m also afraid of what it might make me do.”

Walter looks at me for a long time. “So who’s going to get that old git some grub? You or me?”

“Hey! Mind your manners!” cries the old git.

“I’ll go,” I say. I turn and leave the stock car.

Halfway to the cookhouse, I realize I’m grinding my teeth.

W
HEN
I
COME BACK
with Camel’s food, Walter is gone. A few minutes later he returns, carrying a large bottle of whiskey in each hand.

“Well, God bless your soul,” cackles Camel, who is now propped up in the corner. He points at Walter with a limp hand. “Where in tarnation did you come up with that?”

“A friend on the pie car owed me a favor. I figured we could all use a little forgetting tonight.”

“Well, go on then,” says Camel. “Stop yapping and hand it over.”

Walter and I turn in unison to glare.

The lines on Camel’s grizzled face furrow deeper. “Well, jeez, you two sure are a couple of sourpusses, ain’t you? What’s the matter? Someone spit in your soup?”

“Here. Pay him no mind,” says Walter, shoving a bottle of whiskey against my chest.

“What do you mean, ‘pay him no mind’? In my day, a boy was taught to respect his elders.”

Instead of answering, Walter carries the other bottle over and crouches down beside him. When Camel reaches for it, Walter bats his hand away.

“Hell no, old man. You spill that and we’ll all three be sourpusses.”

He raises the bottle up to Camel’s lips and holds it as he swallows a half-dozen times. He looks like a baby taking a bottle. Walter turns on his heels and leans against the wall. Then he takes a long swig himself.

“What’s the matter—don’t like the whiskey?” he says, wiping his mouth and gesturing at the unopened bottle in my hand.

“I like it just fine. Listen, I don’t have any money so I don’t know when or if I can ever make it up to you, but can I have this?”

“I already gave it to you.”

“No, I mean . . . can I take it for someone else?”

Walter looks at me for a moment, his eyes crinkled at the edges. “It’s a woman, isn’t it?”

“Nope.”

“You’re lying.”

“No I’m not.”

“I’ll bet you five bucks it’s a woman,” he says, taking another drink. His Adam’s apple bobs up and down and the brown liquid lowers by almost an inch. It’s astounding how quickly he and Camel manage to get hard liquor down their gullets.

“She
is
female,” I say.

“Ha!” snorts Walter. “You better not let her hear you say that. Although whoever or whatever she is, she’s more suitable than where your mind’s been lately.”

“I’ve got some making up to do,” I say. “I let her down today.” Walter looks up in sudden understanding.

“How ’bout a little more of that?” Camel says irritably. “Maybe he don’t want none, but I do. Not that I blame the boy for wanting a little action. You’re only young once. You gotta get it while you can, I says. Yessir, get it while you can. Even if it costs you a bottle of sauce.”

Walter smiles. He holds the bottle up to Camel’s lips again and lets him have several long swallows. Then he caps it, leans across, still on his haunches, and hands it to me.

“Take her this one, too. You tell her I’m also sorry. Real sorry, in fact.”

“Hey!” shouts Camel. “There ain’t no woman in the world worth two bottles of whiskey! Come on now!”

I rise to my feet and slip a bottle in each pocket of my jacket.

“Aw, come on now!” Camel pleads. “Aw, that just ain’t no fair.”

His wheedling and complaining follow me until I’m out of earshot.

I
T’S DUSK, AND
several parties have already started at the performers’ end of the train, including—I can’t help but notice—one in Marlena and August’s car. I wouldn’t have gone, but it’s significant that I wasn’t invited. I guess August and I are on the outs again; or rather, since I already hate him more than I’ve ever hated anyone or anything in my life, I guess I’m on the outs with him.

Rosie is at the far end of the menagerie, and as my eyes adjust to the twilight I see someone standing beside her. It’s Greg, the man from the cabbage patch.

“Hey,” I say as I approach.

He turns his head. He’s holding a tube of zinc ointment in one hand and is dabbing Rosie’s punctured skin. There are a couple of dozen white spots on this side alone.

“Jesus,” I say, surveying her. Droplets of blood and histamine ooze up under the zinc.

Her amber eyes seek mine. She blinks those outrageously long lashes and sighs, a great whooshing exhalation that rattles all through her trunk.

I’m flooded with guilt.

“What do you want?” grunts Greg, continuing with his task.

“I just wanted to see how she was.”

“Well, you can see that, can’t you? Now, if you’ll excuse me,” he says, dismissing me. He turns back to her.
“Nog
,”
he says.
“No, daj nogel”

After a moment, the elephant lifts her foot and holds it in front of her. Greg kneels down and rubs some ointment in her armpit, right in front of her strange gray breast, which hangs from her chest, like a woman’s.

“
,”
he says, standing up and screwing the cap back on the ointment.
“
.”

Rosie sets her foot back on the ground.
“Masz, moja
,”
he says, digging in his pocket. Her trunk swings around, investigating. He pulls out a mint, brushes off the lint, and hands it to her. She plucks it nimbly from his fingers and pops it in her mouth.

I stare in shock—I think my mouth may even be open. In the space of two seconds, my mind has zigzagged from her unwillingness to perform, to her history with the elephant tramp, to her lemonade thievery, and back to the cabbage patch.

“Jesus Christ,” I say.

“What?” says Greg, fondling her trunk.

“She understands you.”

“Yes, so what?”

“What do you mean, ‘so
what?
’ My God, do you have any idea what this means?”

“Now wait just a cotton-pickin’ minute,” Greg says as I come up to Rosie. He forces his shoulder between us, his face hard.

“Humor me,” I say. “Please. About the last thing in the world I’d do is hurt this bull.”

He continues to stare at me. I’m still not entirely sure he won’t clobber me from behind, but I turn to Rosie, anyway. She blinks at me.

“Rosie,
nog
”
I say.