people, horses, and wagons. "Goddammit. Goddammit!" says Camel, tearing his hat from
his head
and throwing it to the ground.
"It's okay, Camel," I say. "I appreciate you trying." "No, it ain't okay," he shouts.
"Camel, I—"
"Just shut it. I don't want to hear it. You're a good kid, and I ain't about to stand by and
watch you mope off cuz that fat old grouch don't got
time. I just ain't. So have a little respect for your elders and don't give me no trouble."
His eyes are burning.
I lean over, retrieve his hat, and brush the dirt off. Then I hold it out to him.
After a moment, he takes it. "All right then," he says gruffly. "I guess that's all right."
CAMEL TAKES ME to a wagon and tells me to wait outside. I
lean against one of the large spoked wheels and pass the time alternately Sara Grucn
picking slivers from beneath my nails and chewing long pieces of grass. At one point my
head bobs forward, on the cusp of sleep.
Camel emerges an hour later, staggering, holding a flask in one hand and a roll-your-own
in the other. His eyelids flutter at half-mast. "This here's Earl," he slurs, sweeping an arm
behind him. "He's gonna take care of ya."
A bald man steps down from the wagon. He is enormous, his neck thicker than his head.
Blurred green tattoos run across his knuckles and up his hairy arms. He holds out his
hand.
"How do you do," he says.
"How do you do," I say, perplexed. I swing around to Camel, who's zigzagging through
the crispy grass in the general direction of the Flying Squadron. He's also singing. Badly.
Earl cups his hands around his mouth. "Shut it, Camel! Get yourself on that train before it
leaves without you!"
Camel drops to his knees.
"Ah Jesus," says Earl. "Hang on. I'll be back in a minute."
He walks over and scoops the older man off the ground as easily as if he were a child.
Camel lets his arms, legs, and head dangle over Earl's arms. He giggles and sighs.
Earl sets Camel on the edge of a car's doorway, consults with someone inside, and then
returns.
"Stuffs gonna kill the old fellow," he mutters, marching straight past me. "If he don't rot
out his guts, he'll roll off the goddamned train. Don't touch the stuff myself," he says,
looking over his shoulder at me.
I'm rooted to the spot where he left me.
He looks surprised. "You coming, or what?"
WHEN THE FINAL SECTION of the train pulls out, I'm crouched under a bunk in a
sleeping car wedged against another man. He is the rightful owner of the space but was
persuaded to let me hang out for an hour or two for a price of my one dollar. He grumbles
anyway, and I hug my knees to make myself as compact as possible.
W a t e r for E l e p h a n ts
The odor of unwashed bodies and clothes is overwhelming. The bunks, stacked three
high, hold at least one and sometimes two men, as do the spaces beneath them. The
fellow wedged in the floor space across from me
punches a thin gray blanket, trying in vain to form a pillow.
A voice carries across the jumble of noise: "Ojcze nasz ktorysjest w niebie, swiec sieimie
Twoje, przyjdz krolestwo Twoje—"
"Jesus Christ," my host says. He pokes his head into the aisle. "Speak
in English, you fucking Polack!" Then he retreats back under the bunk, shaking his head.
"Some of these guys. Right off the fucking boat."
"—/ nie wodz nasz napokuszenie ale nas zbaw ode ztego. Amen. "
I nestle against the wall and close my eyes. "Amen," I whisper.
The train lurches. The lights flicker for a moment and go out. From somewhere ahead of
us a whistle screeches. We begin rolling forward and the lights come back on. I'm tired
beyond words, and my head bumps unbuffered against the wall.
I wake some time later and find myself facing a pair of huge work boots.
"You ready then?"
I shake my head, trying to get my bearings.
I hear tendons creaking and snapping. Then I see a knee. Then Earl's face. "You still
down there?" he says, peering under the bunk. "Yeah. Sorry."
I shimmy out and struggle to my feet. "Hallelujah," says my host, stretching out.
"Pierdolsie, " I say.
A snort of laughter comes from a bunk a few feet away.
"Come on," says Earl. "Al's had enough to loosen him up but not enough to get mean. I
figure this is your opportunity."
He leads me through two more sleeping cars. When we reach the platform at the end,
we're facing the back of a different kind of car. Through
its window I can see burnished wood and intricate light fixtures. Earl turns to me. "You
ready?"
"Sure," Isay. S a r a G r u en
I am not. He grabs me by the scruff and smashes my face into the doorframe. With his
other hand, he yanks open the sliding door and chucks
me inside. I fall forward, my hands outstretched. I come to a stop against a brass rail and
straighten up, looking back at Earl in shock. Then I see the rest of them.
"What is this?" says Uncle Al from the depths of a winged chair. He is seated at a table
with three other men, twaddling a fat cigar between the finger and thumb of one hand and
holding five fanned cards in the other. A snifter of brandy rests on the table in front of
him. Just beyond it is a large pile of poker chips.
"Jumped the train, sir. Found him sneaking through a sleeper."
"Is that a fact?" says Uncle Al. He takes a leisurely drag from his cigar and sets it on the
edge of a standing ashtray. He sits back, studying his cards and letting smoke waft from
the corners of his mouth. "I'll see your three and raise you five," he says, leaning forward
and flinging a stack of
chips into the kitty.
"You want I should show him the door?" says Earl. He advances and lifts me from the
floor by the lapels. I tense and close my fists around his wrists, intending to hang on if he
tries to throw me again. I look from Uncle Al to the lower half of Earl's face—which is
all I can see—and then back again.
Uncle Al folds his cards and sets them carefully on the table. "Not yet, Earl," he says. He
reaches for the cigar and takes another drag. "Set him down."
Earl lowers me to the floor with my back to Uncle Al. He makes a halfhearted attempt to
smooth my jacket.
"Step forward," says Uncle Al.
I oblige, happy enough to be out of Earl's reach.
"I don't believe I've had the pleasure," he says, blowing a smoke ring. "What's your
name?"
"Jacob Jankowski, sir."
"And what, pray tell, does Jacob Jankowski think he is doing on my train?"
W a t e r for E l e p h a n ts "I'm looking for work," Isay.
Uncle Al continues to stare at me, blowing lazy smoke rings. He rests his hands on his
belly, drumming a slow beat on his waistcoat.
"Ever worked on a show, Jacob?" "No sir."
"Ever been to a show, Jacob?" "Yes, sir. Of course."
"Which one?"
"Ringling Brothers," I say. A sharp intake of breath causes me to turn my head. Earl's
eyes are wide in warning.
"But it was terrible. Just terrible," I add hastily, turning back to Uncle Al. "Is that a fact,"
says Uncle Al.
"Yes, sir."
"And have you seen our show, Jacob?"
"Yes, sir," I say, feeling a blush spread across my cheeks. "And what did you think of it?"
he asks.
"It w a s ... spectacular." "What was your favorite act?"
I grasp wildly, pulling details out of the air. "The one with the black and white horses.
And the girl in pink," I say. "With the sequins." "You hear that, August? The boy likes
your Marlena."
The man opposite Uncle Al rises and turns—he's the man from the
menagerie tent, only now he's minus the top hat. His chiseled face is impassive, his dark
hair shiny with pomade. He also has a moustache, but unlike
Uncle Al's, his lasts only the length of his lip.
"So what exactly is it that you envision yourself doing?" asks Uncle
Al. He leans forward and lifts a snifter from the table. He swirls its contents,
and drains it in a single gulp. A waiter emerges from nowhere and refills it.
"I'll do just about anything. But if possible I'd like to work with animals."
"Animals," he says. "Did you hear that, August? The lad wants to work with animals.
You want to carry water for elephants, I suppose?"
Sara Gruen
Earl's brow creases. "But sir, we don't have any—"
"Shut up!" shrieks Uncle Al, leaping to his feet. His sleeve catches the snifter and knocks
it to the carpet. He stares at it, his fists clenched and face growing darker and darker.
Then he bares his teeth and screams a long, inhuman howl, bringing his foot down on the
glass again and again and again.
There's a moment of stillness, broken only by the rhythmic clacking of ties passing
beneath us. Then the waiter drops to the floor and starts scooping up glass.
Uncle Al takes a deep breath and turns to the window with his hands clasped behind him.
When he eventually turns back to us, his face is once again pink. A smirk plays around
the edges of his lips.
"I'm going to tell you how it is, Jacob Jankowski" He spits my name
out like something distasteful. "I've seen your sort a thousand times. You think I can't
read you like a book? So what's the deal—did you and Mommy have a fight? Or maybe
you're just looking for a little adventure between semesters?"
"No, sir, it's nothing like that."
"I don't give a damn what it is—even if I gave you a job on the show, you wouldn't
survive. Not for a week. Not for a day. The show is a well-oiled machine, and only the
toughest make it. But then you wouldn't know anything about tough, would you, Mr.
College Boy?"
He glares at me as though challenging me to speak. "Now piss off," he says, waving me
away. "Earl, show him the door. Wait until you actually see a red light before chucking
him off—I don't want to catch any heat for haningMommy's widdle baby. "
"Hang on a moment, Al," says August. He's smirking, clearly amused. "Is he right? Are
you a college boy?"
I feel like a mouse being bounced between cats. "I was."
"And what did you study? Something in the fine arts, perhaps?" His eyes gleam in
mockery. "Romanian folk dancing? Aristotelian literary criticism? Or perhaps—
M.r.Jankowski—you completed a performance degree on the accordion?"
Water for E l e p h a n ts
"I studied veterinary sciences."
His mien changes instantly, utterly. "Vet school? You're a vet?" "Not exactly."
"What do you mean, 'not exactly'?" "I never wrote my final exams."
"Why not?" "I just didn't."
"And those final exams, those were in your final year?" "Yes."
"What college?" "Cornell."
August and Uncle Al exchange glances.
"Marlena said Silver Star was off, " says August. "Wanted me to get
the advance man to arrange for a vet. Didn't seem to understand that the advance man
was gone out in advance, hence the name."
"What are you suggesting?" says Uncle Al. "Let the kid have a look in the morning."
"And where do you propose we put him for tonight? We're already past capacity." He
snatches his cigar from the ashtray and taps it on the edge. "I suppose we could just send
him out on the flats."
"I was thinking more along the lines of the ring stock car," says August.
Uncle Al frowns. "What? With Marlena's horses?" "Yes."
"You mean in the area where the goats used to be? Isn't that where
that little shit sleeps—oh, what's his name?" he says, snapping his fingers. "Stinko?
Kinko? That clown with the dog?"
"Precisely," smiles August.
AUGUST LEADS ME BACK through the men's bunk cars until we're standing on a
small platform facing the back of a stock car. "Are you sure-footed, Jacob?" he inquires
graciously.
"I believe so," I answer. Sara Gruen
"Good," he says. Without further ado, he leans forward, catches hold of something
around the side of the stock car, and climbs nimbly to the roof.
"Jesus Christ!" I yell, looking in alarm first at the point where August disappeared, and
then down at the bare coupling and ties that race beneath the cars. The train jerks around
a curve. I throw my hands out to keep my balance, breathing hard.
"Come on then," yells a voice from the roof.
"How the hell did you do that? What did you grab?"
"There's a ladder. Just around the side. Lean forward and reach for it. You'll find it."
"What if I don't?"
"Then I guess we'll take our leave, won't we?"
I advance gingerly to the edge. I can see just the edge of a thin iron ladder.
I train my eyes on it and wipe my hands on my thighs. Then I tip forward.
My right hand meets ladder. I grasp wildly with my left until I ensnare
the other side. I jam my feet in the rungs and cling tightly, trying to catch my breath.
"Well, come on then!"
I look up. August peers down at me, grinning, his hair blowing in the wind.
I climb to the roof. He moves over, and when I sit down next to
him he claps a hand on my shoulder. "Turn around. I want you to see something."
