She returned to the kitchen. Johnson Johnson was deep inside his refrigerator. “So, you want a glass of milk with your cookies?” he said. “I even have”—he waited a reverential beat—“strawberry milk.”
“No, no. I just wanted to say thank you. Your cookies were the best things that happened all day.”
“Uh oh,” he said.
“Yeah.”
“Hey! If you’re hungry we could get a pizza, maybe.”
Neva immediately put her hand on the doorknob. “Look, I’m sorry. All I can think of is a shower and then bed. I’m beat.”
“You do, like, smell of something.”
“Elephant.” The subject was getting a little too personal. Neva backed out the door. “Okay. So thanks again, okay?”
“Okay,” said Johnson Johnson. As she was pulling the door to, Neva saw him bite into a cookie and close his eyes.
Neva had just finished drying off after her shower when the telephone rang. She considered not answering it, but she was trying to freshen up her social skills, and as her mother often admonished her, socially successful people answered their phones when they rang. Truman Levy was on the other end of the line.
“Look, how are you?” he asked.
Neva let out a long breath. “Okay. My landlord gave me a plate of home-baked chocolate chip cookies, so that’s one good thing.”
“Tough day?”
“Yeah.”
“Please tell me you’re not going to quit,” Truman said.
“What a strange thing to say. I’m not going to quit. I may start taking tranquilizers, I might even consider something stronger, but I have no intention of quitting. I wouldn’t mind a few suggestions about how to go below her radar, though.”
“It helps to be male.”
“So that’s out. Am I the only one she doesn’t like?”
“No, you’re just the most recent. Here’s my suggestion: steer clear of her whenever you can, and avoid disagreeing with her when you can’t.”
“Like that’s going to help,” Neva said. “Thanks for the concern, though.”
“All right,” said Truman. “Good night, then.”
“Good night.”
Just as Neva hung up the phone, she heard a faint porcine grunting coming through the receiver, and smiled the first real smile of the evening.
Truman hung up the phone with a mighty sigh. At his feet, Miles was pushing around a child’s plastic ring-toss ring, bright pink and filthy after days of pig slobber, backyard mud, and carpet fibers. Truman reached down absently and scratched him behind one ear.
Harriet had shown him storyboards of the zoo’s new ad campaign. There was a three-quarter profile of Hannah and, ghosted behind her, a picture of Harriet as Maxine Biedelman, squinting heroically into the jungle interior as suggested by a few ghosted palm fronds. Truman hadn’t given her much of a reaction, buying time by saying he would prefer to give the matter a night’s thought before offering his opinion. Of course, this amounted to feet of clay, since he knew that tomorrow he’d advise her to use a picture of the real Max Biedelman instead. God knew how she would take it. He wondered how much unemployment he might be able to collect if he found himself suddenly out of work. Not enough, probably, to cover Winslow’s art and music lessons, plus Miles and his expenses, including food, ring-toss games, other miscellaneous toys, and new blankets and towels.
Miles and Truman had bonded.
It was not what Truman had had in mind.
The little pig followed him everywhere, and when Truman went beyond the baby gate that limited Miles to the kitchen and den, the pig cried, making little snuffling sounds. It was heartbreaking. He showed no such devotion to Winslow. Happily, the boy didn’t seem to mind, taking only the faintest interest in the animal he’d once so desperately wanted.
Truman heaved himself up from the depths of the sofa Rhonda had insisted he keep because she knew he hated it. Why weren’t more women like Neva Wilson? Though he would be the first one to concede that he didn’t know her, really, she seemed balanced, reasonable, and completely professional. She even seemed to have a sense of humor. He wondered what she would think of Harriet’s ad campaign.
As he began dinner preparations, Winslow shuffled into the kitchen in his socks. Truman wondered for the zillionth time why no matter what brand or style of socks he bought for the boy, they all ended up flapping off the ends of his son’s feet like clown shoes. He had always held to the highest standards of personal grooming—one thing he had very much in common with his orderly mother, Lavinia. While Truman was growing up she had brooked no compromise, insisting that his shirt be tucked in, its elbows intact, and all buttons accounted for. He had never been allowed to wear badly fitting slacks or messy shoes.
“Pull up your socks, Winnie.”
“What?”
“Your socks. They’re bagging.”
Winslow shrugged and halfheartedly pulled up his socks. Miles came over to investigate.
“He’s got such little tiny eyes,” Winslow said, peering at them. “They look like polished onyx.”
“Where have you seen onyx?”
“Morris brought some into school once. He has a rock tumbler.” Morris was a brainy kid with whom Winslow was often paired for science projects. Last year, they’d performed elaborate experiments with bread mold that Truman had never quite understood, but which had won first place at the school’s science fair.
Truman assembled chopped meat, an egg, fresh breadcrumbs, and ketchup in a mixing bowl and, shuddering, plunged his hands in. The combined feel of cold animal fat and raw egg was almost more than he could bear. He squished the stuff through his fingers. “Hand me that pan, would you Winnie?”
Winslow handed him a glass baking dish, and Truman dumped the meat loaf out of the bowl. “You want to shape it, or no?”
“You can.”
Truman slapped the clammy stuff into a tidy loaf, iced it with ketchup, and, with infinite relief, slid it into the oven. He set down the bowl for Miles to lick. The pig pushed it around the floor, running it into the baseboards, cupboard doors, Truman’s feet and ankles, and Winslow’s terrible socks.
“Do you think he’s smart?” Winslow said.
Truman regarded the pig doubtfully. “They’re supposed to be.”
“But is he?”
“It’s hard to imagine.”
“Yeah,” said Winslow.
“So tell me about your day.”
The boy shrugged. “It was okay.”
“Okay, like you couldn’t wait for it to end, or okay, like there were some bright spots?”
“I don’t know. We got to draw in art class. Mr. Warner put some crushed cans, a fern, and two marbles on a table, and we were supposed to draw it.”
“Yes, it’s called a still life. And did you?”
“Yeah, but I was the only one. Jeremy Ireland called me a kiss-ass.”
“I’m sure that Vincent van Gogh’s classmates called him names, too.”
“I don’t care, anyway.”
“Really?” Truman drizzled halved baby red potatoes with olive oil and rosemary. “I always cared.”
“What exactly is a kiss-ass?” Winslow asked after a minute.
“Well, that depends. If you want to be literal, it’s a person who kisses a donkey. I, for instance, might be called a kiss-pig, though I don’t think I’ll ever do it again because he didn’t smell very good close up.”
Winslow snorted.
“Or it can mean a suck-up, a person who wants to win favor by helping or cooperating with a person in a position of greater power,” Truman continued. “Personally I prefer the first meaning, but you can choose for yourself.”
He slid the potatoes into the oven with the meat loaf, and fished lettuce, carrots, cauliflower, and radishes out of the vegetable bin. He didn’t feel that Winslow got enough vegetables, so he insisted on making a salad for them every night, a chore he detested. As additional penance, he refused to use pre-washed and bagged lettu
ces, struggling with messy heads of red leaf and romaine, vigilant for the omnipresent aphids.
“Have you talked to your mother lately?”
“Nah.”
“Why don’t you give her a call while dinner’s cooking?”
“That’s okay.”
Truman decided to let it go. In his heart he was relieved that the boy wasn’t pining, though he worried about unforeseen emotional fallout in Winslow’s later life. On the other hand, his reluctance might be simple dislike of talking to Rhonda on the phone, an experience Truman himself likened to a jousting match where only one person had a lance and that person wasn’t you.
“Then go do piano until dinner’s ready.” Truman tripped over Miles snuffling around under the open dishwasher door. “And Winnie? Take Miles with you.”
“He doesn’t want to come.”
“Yes he does, he just doesn’t know it.”
One morning in early fall, 1956, Sam had found a note taped to the door of the elephant barn, asking him to come up to the house. He’d gotten Hannah squared away in a hurry and headed up the hill. Miss Biedelman and Miss Effie weren’t strong, either one of them—Miss Biedelman’s rheumatism was bothering her more and more, and Miss Effie had a nasty little cough. He was relieved when the old woman herself answered the door, her quick old eyes dancing with excitement.
“Mr. Brown! It’s a pleasure to see you. Come in for just a moment while I get my coat and see if Effie would like to join us. Sit, sit!” She bullied him into a chair in the front room and then hurried out. He could hear a faint conversation in the hall and then she came back alone, wearing a man’s heavy canvas barn coat and brandishing one of her walking sticks. “I’m afraid Effie won’t be walking with us today—her cough is worse. I’ve insisted that she call the doctor. Come, Mr. Brown.” She urged him out the door with a hand on his back. “I’ll explain as we go.” She led the way back to the barn, hobbling along at a remarkably fast clip.
“Looks like you’re feeling better today,” Sam said.
“Yes, yes, I feel quite myself, Mr. Brown. Slow as the dickens, of course, but never mind. At my age it’s best to lower one’s standards.” She chuckled to herself as they got near the elephant barn. “Now here’s my plan. We’re going to take Hannah for a walk.”
Sam frowned. “We don’t have a lead or a halter.”
“We don’t need one, Mr. Brown! Could you restrain her even if we had? No, the mahouts work their elephants without restraints of any kind, and so shall we. Do you have an elephant hook? I know we did at one time. Go and see, Mr. Brown.”
Sam went inside and rummaged around in a closet. The last keeper had had the habits of a hog, leaving nasty messes where you’d find them days later, stinking and caked onto something—the man hadn’t grown up around clean folks, that was obvious. Sam finally found the tool beneath a pile of old feed sacks. The stick was about a foot and a half long, not quite as stout as an axe handle, and with a blunt metal hook coming out of one end.
“Yes, that’s it!” Max cried when Sam reappeared with it. “Yes, yes! Come on, then.” She took the stick from him, tucking it beneath one arm.
Sam regarded it doubtfully. “Looks like a mean thing, sir, with that hook and all.”
“No, no. It’s used to suggest, Mr. Brown, not to punish. I’ll show you. Why don’t you bring her to the gate?”
Hannah was chewing her hay contemplatively when Sam approached her and said, “Guess what, sugar? Me and Miss Biedelman are going to take you out, give you a look at some things.”
Hannah sucked on her trunk apprehensively. Sam looked at Max Biedelman.
“It’s all right, Mr. Brown. We have to expect some nervousness. After all, the last time she was taken from her normal surroundings she was put in a cage for three weeks and brought here.”
“It about breaks my heart seeing her fearful, a big girl like her.”
Max patted Hannah’s shoulder. “She’ll be fine, Mr. Brown. You’ll see. Go and load your pockets with fruit. Fill this, too, please.” She dug a string bag out of a trouser pocket and handed it to Sam.
“All right, sir, only take me a minute—I’ve got food cut up already from before I went home last night.” Sam hurried into the barn and filled his canvas pouch, then Max Biedelman’s string bag, with yams, gourds, squashes, and apples. When he was done he found Max Biedelman patting Hannah and talking to her quietly. The elephant browsed around the old woman’s feet, occasionally lifting her trunk to sniff her pockets.
“We’re all set now, sir.”
“Good, good.” The old woman attached her bulging string bag to her sturdy leather belt, and Sam slung a leather pouch over his shoulder.
“Come along, Hannah,” she said. With the twin lures of apples and yams, Hannah took small steps forward until she was out of the yard, but there she stopped, lifting her head nervously.
“We’re going to have an adventure,” Sam soothed. “We’re taking you places you’ve never been before, maybe let you root around in the woods. You might even find a sweet leaf or two.” He handed her another yam and, evidently resigned, she started walking again, following Max Biedelman.
“Why, what a very good elephant you are, Hannah!” the old woman cried, hobbling backwards, offering a trail of treats. “Worlds will open up to her, Mr. Brown, once she’s regained her confidence. Small worlds, I’ll grant you, but new ones just the same.”
“Think she remembers walking free?” Sam asked. The thought disturbed him, her remembering freedom and now this.
“Only Hannah knows that, Mr. Brown, but I believe it’s possible—even quite likely.”
“Makes me sad, thinking about that.”
“Yes, I can see why you might say so, but you must remember that in the wild she was starving. No one was cutting up cantaloupes for her, were they, Mr. Brown? Nature is never so simple as we like to think, a veritable Garden of Eden. I have never seen the Garden of Eden, not in all my travels.”
“Yes, sir,” Sam said, but he still felt the way he felt.
They had reached the edge of Havenside’s lawns, where a sketchy trail led into the woods. Sam had seen Max and Miss Effie go that way sometimes on their nature walks. Hannah drew up short.
“It’s okay, shug,” Sam said, patting her. “This right here is where the fun starts. You’ve been in forests before. There’s nothing here to be afraid of. Miss Biedelman and me are going to be right here with you, sugar.”
Hannah rolled her eye nervously, first looking to Sam, then Max Biedelman. The old woman reached out and gently touched Hannah’s right knee with the hook. “Come along, Hannah. There’s a good girl.” Slowly, Hannah walked into the woods. Max Biedelman continued to coax with the elephant hook and Sam kept a firm hand on her for reassurance. She trumpeted once and tossed her head a time or two, but out of a growing excitement rather than nervousness. Finally she began browsing among the leaves and ferns on the forest floor. Max folded her arms across her chest and watched with keen satisfaction.
“Hannah has done very well, indeed,” she said. “I think this is as far as we’ll take her today, Mr. Brown. It would be best if we just let her root and get comfortable.” The old woman opened her shooting stick, turning it into a little seat and settling herself with a small grunt of discomfort.
“Now, isn’t that handy!” Sam said. “I’ve never seen anything like it before.”
“Yes, the British have always been good at coming up with this sort of thing.”
Sam crossed his arms over his chest and watched Hannah bend several small alder trees with her trunk to strip off and sample the leaves. When he took a step or two away from her and sat on a tree stump, she lifted her head, but Sam said, “I’m right here, sugar.”
“May I ask you a question, Mr. Brown?” Max Biedelman said.
“You go right ahead.”
“When you were a small boy, what did you dream of?”
“Well, now, that’s a hard question. I don’t know that I had any dreams.
I always figured I’d have to help my daddy on the farm. Took him dying for me to figure out I could go my own way.”
“I don’t mean practical considerations, Mr. Brown. I mean if you could have been anything, what would you have chosen?”
Sam shifted, patting Hannah. “You’ve got to understand that my kind of people, sir, we don’t always have dreams, at least not in the way you’re thinking. It’s better not to, sometimes.”
Max Biedelman looked at him keenly. “Why is it better? One should always dream, Mr. Brown, even if we know the dream can only come true in our imaginations.”
“Well, maybe that’s so, sir, but I’d rather appreciate what I’ve got than die of wanting what I can’t have.”
“And what is it that you’ve got, Mr. Brown?”
“Everything. I’ve got Corinna, got my sugar, got you and Miss Effie to talk to sometimes, got this beautiful place to come to every day.”
Max Biedelman smiled a little smile. “You’re a fortunate man, Mr. Brown, to want so little.”
“No, sir. It’s not little at all.”
“Well, perhaps not.”
“Corinna, now, she’s something different. She wants a way to get back at God, and that’s a sad thing because there isn’t a way to get back at God, never has been, never will be. Corinna, though, she won’t believe that. She keeps turning her back on God and waiting for Him to notice she’s missing from His flock. But the fact is, God doesn’t notice people like me and Corinna in the first place, so how’s He supposed to miss us? But Corinna, she just goes on taunting Him and being disappointed when He doesn’t care.” Sam shook his head sadly.
“You have a harsh god, Mr. Brown.”
Hearing Sam, Hannah had come over to slip her trunk into his fruit satchel, lifting out an apple. “You having a nice time out here, sugar?” he said. “Yeah, I think so.” He watched her wander off a few feet. “What about you, sir? What did you dream of when you were a little girl out there in Africa?”
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