Elephant Song

TWELVE

Upon returning to Miira most of the road gang repaired harness, tools, and wagons. The remainder constructed a piling, beam, and plank bridge across the Fake Foot River, opening the southern route around Table Lake, the first step in constructing the Miira—Kuumic Road. Daybreak of the morning following the completion of the bridge saw the bullhands lead their charges from the kraal to the bridge against a hushed background of harness jingles and the low grumble a planet seems to make when more than one elephant at a time walks.

The bulls were clucked to a halt, the soil of Momus stopped shaking, and the grumble was replaced by the shouts, curses, profanities, blasphemies, obscenities, and other affectionate expressions of the hostlers bringing into line their wagons and timber-skidding teams. As morning's progress filled in the night's grays with color, Cookie Jo Wayne pulled up her cookhouse wagon at the end of the column.

Little Will's thoughts skipped among her memories of the many mornings standing in line with the bulls. There were the chilly mornings in the Snake Mountain Gap, standing next to Reg. But there were the many mornings sitting on Bullhook Willy's shoulders next to Ming. The shadows of the bulls had stood against strange skies of orange, red, purple, and blue. At times the air would be so dry her tongue would stick to the top of her mouth. Elsewhere, moving onto the lot of another strange city on another strange planet, the air might be so humid that everyone's clothes were drenched before the sun peeked over the horizon. On one planet, every morning was greeted by flurries of fat snowflakes that would melt as soon as they touched the ground.

She looked at her gold-tipped bullhook and remembered her father putting Ming through her paces. Both bulls and bullhands were killed, or just grew old and disappeared. But the more the show changed, the more it became to her a fixed place in a constantly changing universe. She turned, looked down the line of bulls, and watched Ming until the waving of a hand caught her attention. Shiner Pete was climbing into the harness wagon.

"All ready to go, Little Will?"

She waved back. "All ready." She turned to Reg and petted the bull's shoulder. "Are you all ready, girl?" Reg snorted and nodded her head.

"Little Will?" She looked forward and saw Packy motioning with his hand for her to come on. She walked up and stood next to the boss elephant man as he held out his map, and pointed at the lines and scribbles that had been entered upon it by the trailblazing gang. "What the hell does that say?"

She glanced at it, then looked up at Packy. "It says, 'Soft area. Follow the north trail.'"

Packy slowly shook his head as he looked again at the map. "Well, I guess it's my glasses instead of Short Mort's writin'." He looked back at Little Will. "You think you can read this map, follow the blazes, and push Reg at the same time?"

"I think so."

Packy rubbed his chin, then pointed toward the bridge. "Then when we get across the bridge, move Reg to the front end. I don't want us rollin' into a quicksand bath because my glasses don't work so good."

Little Will took the map. "What did Mange say about your eyes?"

"He's a damned vet." Packy dismissed the subject with a wave of his hand, then raised an eyebrow and glared at Little Will. "And don't you go peekin' inside my head—or anyone else's—without permission. Hear?"

They both turned and looked as Waxy Adnelli came from the door of his house and walked up to Packy. Waxy looked past the bridge toward the southern edge of the lake, then looked back at Packy. "You about ready?"

"About."

Little Will observed Waxy's apparently permanent frown. "Good morning, Waxy."

Waxy shook his head. "I'll let you know."

"Is something wrong?"

Packy studied the town of Miira's record keeper. "Waxy, you do look sort of in the middle of something sticky."

Waxy snorted, rubbed his chin, and pointed his hand toward the south. "Turtlehead came up from Tarzak last night. You know what Warts has me doin' now? I'm supposed to interview everybody and record their remembrances of the show."

"What's wrong with that?"

"With the old wheeze population we got, do you have any idea how long that's goin' to take? And Warts wants copies before we go down to Tarzak for The Season next. What am I supposed to record on? Blacky Squab hasn't sent any more paper up here in more'n a month. I'm already keepin' notes on the damn walls."

Packy grinned and shook his head. "Sounds like you found your life's work."

Little Will placed a hand on Waxy's shoulder. "Look upon it as a challenge."

Waxy shrugged off her hand. "This is too early in the day for cracks from the back of the blues." He looked at Packy. "I don't have to do this stuff. It's not like I was bein' paid."

Little Will pointed a finger at Waxy. "You are too being paid. Stew Travers gave you a whole sack of cobit roots for marrying him to Diamonds Mary." She turned to Packy. "What are you going to pay to have Waxy marry you to Cookie Jo?"

Packy snorted. "I already got me an elephant, short stuff. What do I need a wife for?"

Little Will frowned and grinned at the same time. "You don't know?"

Waxy waved his arm about. "Enough, you two! I got serious problems." He lowered his voice and moved more closely to Packy. "That's the thing." He pointed his thumb at this chest. "Me marryin' people. My Great Boolabong, Packy! Poge Loder came to me after I married Stew and Diamonds and told me I'd burn in hellfire, brimstone, and such for doin' that."

"You worryin' about that, Waxy?"

"No. Not that." Waxy sighed. "It's just that some others want to get married, too. That'll have Poge screamin' damnation in the square twenty-three hours a day." He looked at Little Will, then up at Packy. "And what if he's right? Who am I to be marryin' people?"

Little Will smiled, a glint of mischief in her eyes. "Waxy, who better than the boss harness man to tie the knot?"

Waxy's glowering face studied Little Will for a moment. He then spoke: "If you know what's good for you, sprout, don't risk readin' my mind right about now." He looked at Packy. "Look, the reason I'm here is to find out if you can find something for Dot the Pot to do on the road gang."

"There's nothin' for her to do now that Queenie's dead. Why do you want her out of town?"

"Why?" Waxy's voice lowered. "She's after my bones, that's why!"

Packy held out his hands. "There's nothin' I can do, 'cept give the bride away."

Waxy turned abruptly and marched back to his house. "Goddamn bullhands been shovelin' plop so long their heads're packed solid with it!"

A call came from the column, and Packy answered it by waving his bullhook above his head. He lowered the bullhook and faced Little Will. "Get on back to your rubber mule, bullhand. We got a mess of trees to push over and clear before making camp." She began walking toward Reg when Packy called out. "Hey!" She turned and looked back at the boss elephant man. "And you put that nonsense about Cookie Jo out on the lot. Don't want to be givin' her any dumb ideas."

Packy clucked at Robber and the column began to move, lifting the dust into the still morning air as it followed the boss elephant man across the Fake Foot River Bridge.

Deep in the Great Muck Swamp, Waco Whacko awakened from a troubled dream. He lifted himself up on one elbow and studied the interior of his hut. Nothing seemed unusual except for the many improvements that Fireball had made. He looked at the woven curtain he had made to separate their sleeping quarters.

"Fireball?" he whispered. Getting no reply, Waco lowered himself back down upon his sleeping mat and closed his eyes. He tried to drift into sleep, but strange, threatening thoughts interfered. He and Fireball lived almost as brother and sister. Her company, once thought by Waco to be an intrusion on his isolation, turned out to be not only pleasant and entertaining, but had become a vital part of his existence.

In his head he conjured up a vision of the shuttle pilot. Hanah Sanagi. Long black hair against the creaminess of her skin; her face always something of joy, sensualness, or serenity—

Waco suddenly sat up. "Yes, Waco, you stupid bastard," he said quietly to himself. "You've done it again." Love. Goddamned love.

Although it seemed like yesterday, it must have been months ago that Hanah Sanagi and he sat outside, facing each other across the night's cooking fire. And Hanah was talking. Waco had noticed that he wasn't listening to her words; he was watching the movement of her lips, the black flash of her long-lashed eyes, the subtle motion of the muscles beneath the skin of her long neck. And he had stopped—had frozen everything that he could or ever would feel. He had left the fire and had walked the darkness until he stood next to the mound of eggs.

"Are you leaving us, Waco? Will you leave with the female?"

He looked up at the stars. "No. I won't leave you."

"We can feel your feelings, Waco. There is a war within you. Who will care for us when you leave?"

Waco lowered his glance, rubbed his eyes, and shook his head. "I won't leave you. I promised your parents."

"You think you do not feel, Waco. But we can see past the walls you have built in your mind. You feel, Waco. You love the female."

"Silence!" Waco breathed hard for a moment, then closed his eyes. "It doesn't matter. It will never matter. I made my promise."

He turned and looked down the hill toward the wash of yellow light made by the cooking fire. Beyond that place of light was the absolute blackness of the jungle and the cloud-covered night sky. Almost in the center of that light, Hanah knelt as she made tea from the strange-tasting leaves she had discovered. That light, that woman; the center of Waco's universe. He lowered a shield of icy indifference over his realization. There would be—could be—no love.

To love is to risk too much.

He returned to the fire, had his cobit bread and tea, and listened with detachment as Hanah talked about trying to capture and train one of the swamp monsters. He had joined the conversation, his internal war placed far behind him.

He had thought it was far behind him. As he sat upon his sleeping pallet cursing himself, his feelings, and Hanah Sanagi, he knew that he had once again opened himself up to the sickness. He pulled on his clothes and spoke in the direction of the grass curtain. "Hanah? Hanah? We have to talk."

He stood, pulled on his shirt, and looked around the edge of the curtain. "Hanah?" She was not upon her sleeping mat. He turned, walked through the hut's entrance, and stood in the early morning light searching the treeline. He heard a low moan, and when he faced the direction of the sound, he saw Hanah's half-dressed body collapsed upon the mound of eggs.

"Hanah!" The scream came from his gut. He ran up the hill, pulled her body from the mound, and cradled her head as he knelt upon the grass. "Dammit, Hanah. I told you to stay away from them. I told you!"

Her eyes fluttered open and her mouth worked at soundless words. Waco faced the mound. "Stop it! Stop whatever you're doing! Stop it, or I'll smash every damned one of you!"

Hanah seemed almost to turn to liquid in his arms as a timid whimper fought itself from her mouth. "I didn't... Waco, I didn't. In my sleep. They came to me... in my sleep." Her whimper evolved into racking sobs as she lifted her arms and wrapped them around Waco's waist, her face buried in his chest.

He placed his cheek against the top of her head. "Why? Dammit, why?"

And the eggs spoke to him. "A precaution, Waco."

"Against what?"

"You love her. We need you, but you love her. She is dangerous to us."

"She is no threat to you! I promised your parents!"

"Promises can be broken, Waco. She must die."

"Die?" Waco placed his right arm beneath Hanah's knees and stood lifting her. "I'm moving her out of your range. She does not die!"

"She dies. We must protect ourselves. We will kill her mind before you can take her away from us."

Waco moistened his lips. "Don't do this. Don't do this to me."

"We must protect ourselves, Waco."

Waco lowered his head until his cheek was against Hanah's. "Don't you understand that you are going to need someone else to take care of you after I'm dead? It will take almost three hundred years before you may leave your shells. I will only be alive, perhaps, another fifteen or twenty years, if that."

The eggs were silent.

Waco lifted his head. "There will have to be someone to take care of you after I die. For that, I must have a child. To do that, I need this woman. I need... Hanah. Kill her and you kill yourselves." He turned away from the mound. "May I take her away, now? Speak to me!"

The thought came, timid and repentant. "If we let you have her, Waco, do you promise not to punish us?"

"I promise."

Waco walked from the mound carrying the now unconscious woman. He whispered into her unhearing ear, "Damn me. Damn me, but I love you."

Many nights later, in the road gang's camp deep in the Great Muck Swamp, Little Will drew her lips away from Pete's, her glance cast down. "My face, Pete, it feels so hot."

"Mine, too."

She looked around at the dark of the camp. "What if someone saw us?"

"What if they did?" He nestled her head in the crook of his arm. "Come on, Little Will. You're stiff as a board. Pocky's going to be getting us up at the crack. He wants five miles of road cleared before tomorrow night. Go to sleep."

"I can't." She sniffed.

"Now what's wrong?"

She buried her face in his chest. "I don't know. I'm so confused."

He wrapped his arms around her. "Now, look, you. You love me and I love you. That's how it's always going to be. There's nothing confusing about that."

She looked up into his face. He wiped the tears from her cheeks. "Pete..."

"Quit crying, Little Will. We haven't done anything."

"Pete?"

He kissed the tip of her nose. "What?"

Her hand stole beneath his shirt and caressed his chest. "Pete, I love you."

Pete swallowed, and quickly glanced around. The rest of the road camp was dead asleep. "Er..." He swallowed again. His face was burning up, and in other districts strange and wonderful things were happening. "I, uh..."

"Pete?" Her hand began unbuttoning his shirt.

"Who... what?"

"Say you love me, Pete. Say you love me more than anything else in the world." She opened his shirt and kissed his chest.

Pete wrapped his arms around her, held her tight, then released one hand to lift her chin toward his face. "I feel so crazy right now. I love you. Little Will. I love you more than anything else in the Universe."

He swallowed, then touched his lips to hers.