Water For Elephants by Sara Gruen

Author:Sara Gruen [Gruen, Sara]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Best of Decade, 2006
Published: 2010-11-22T20:30:00+00:00

When we lay Marlena down, she rolls onto her side, clutching her feet. Her face is contorted, her teeth clenched.

"Myfeet— "

"Hush, sweetie," Barbara says. "It's going to be okay. Everything's going to be okay." She leans over and loosens the ribbons on Marlena's slippers. "Oh God, oh God, they hurt..."

"Get the scissors from my top drawer," says Barbara, glancing back at me.

When I return with them, Barbara cuts the toes offMarlena's tights and rolls them up her legs. Then she lifts her bare feet into her lap. "Go to the cookhouse and get some ice," she says.

After a second, both she and August turn to look at me. "I'm already there," I say.

I'm barreling toward the cookhouse when I hear Uncle Al shouting behind me. "Jacob!

Wait!"

I pause while he catches up.

"Where are they? Where did they go?" he says. "They're in Barbara's tent," I gasp.

"Eh?"

"The cooch girl." "Why?"

W a t e r for E l e p h a n ts "Marlena's hurt. I've got to get ice."

He turns and barks at a follower. "You, go get ice. Take it to the cooch girl's tent. Go!"

He turns back to me. "And you, go retrieve our goddamned bull before we get run out of town."

"Where is she?"

"Munching cabbages in someone's backyard, apparently. The lady of the house is not amused. West side of the lot. Get her out of there before the cops come."

RosiE STANDS IN A trampled vegetable patch, running her trunk lazily across the rows. When I approach she looks me straight in the eye and plucks a purple cabbage. She drops it in her shovel-scoop of a mouth and then reaches for a cucumber.

The lady of the house opens the door a crack and shrieks, "Get that thing out of here! Get it out of here!"

"Sorry, ma'am," I say. "I'll surely do my best."

I stand at Rosie's shoulder. "Come on, Rosie. Please?"

Her ears wave forward, she pauses, and then she reaches for a tomato. "No!" I say. "Bad elephant!"

Rosie pops the red globe in her mouth and smiles as she chews it. Laughing at me, no doubt.

"Oh Jesus," I say, at a complete loss.

Rosie wraps her trunk around some turnip greens and rips them from the ground. Still looking at me, she pops them in her mouth and begins munching. I turn and smile desperately at the still-gawking housewife. Two men approach from the lot. One is wearing a suit, a derby hat, and

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