Chained (20 page)

He reaches for his cup again. With one hand I lift his head while I give him a sip of water.

“One summer evening many years later, I sat outside my tent by torchlight to carve a new bell for a young elephant. I remember a cool gust of wind, and I hoped it would bring rain, for the river was low and the trees dry.

“I do not remember falling asleep, but I woke to the smell of smoke and the heat of flames. My knife and wood block had fallen to the ground. So had my torch.”

Ne Min takes a few wheezing breaths.

“From one tent to another I ran, to warn everyone of the fire. As we escaped from the forest, I listened for the bell of Myit Ko Naing, but I heard nothing over the crackling of flames and the snapping of tree limbs. Other animals ran away from the fire, so I decided she must be safe somewhere, and we would find each other soon. But the fire moved on and the panic died down, and still I did not see my elephant.”

As Ne Min rests, I listen to the wooden bell that swings on the branch outside his window.

“I hurried back into the village,” he says. “Near the place my hut had been, I found her. Why would she be there? What kind of animal runs into a fire? Maybe the black smoke that had surrounded us confused her, and she had not known which way to run. Or is it possible she was looking for me?

“I ran to her and called her name. I fell to my knees and placed my hand on her side. She was still breathing.”

Ne Min pauses again, then speaks louder than I have ever heard him speak.

“‘
Tah!
Stand up!’ I ordered her. She opened one eye and looked up at me, as if to say she was sorry she could not obey my command. She moved her trunk, just a little, and touched my hand. Then she was gone.

“In the days after she died, I found myself listening for her bell. But only the notes that were too high, or too low, or too hollow filled the air. When I first awoke in the mornings I would set out to look for her, wondering if she was eating bamboo or if I would find her in a patch of tall kaing grass near the river. Then the remembering would hit me with a pain that dropped me to the ground.”

Ne Min breaks from his storytelling to rest, and his breathing is shallow and crackly.

Suddenly everything makes sense to me. How he seems to know all there is to know about elephants, always knows how to help Nandita, and shows such pain when she is hurt. And of course he never wanted to talk about why, and at times was too hurt by his memories to even go near Nandita. Just then I remember Timir’s comments about Ne Min being an “elephant killer.”

“You told Timir about this?” I ask.

“A long time ago. He wanted to know why I left home, and I told him the whole story—my fallen torch, the fire, the pain and guilt I have lived with every day since I lost her.”

And Timir used Ne Min’s guilt to make him feel even worse.

“When I told my family I was leaving,” Ne Min continues, his voice shaky, “they tried to talk me out of it. That’s who we were, that’s what we always did—we took care of the elephants who hauled timber. I didn’t know any other life. But no one understood. Her silence made everything else too loud.”

He speaks so quietly now, I have to lean closer to hear him.

“You were not born among elephants, but somehow you have a heart for them, like I do. And Nandita has a heart for you. She would lay down her life for you, like Myit Ko Naing did for me. You must do all you can now to save her. And yourself.”

“But, Ne Min, I don’t know how. I can’t get the ax, or the keys…”

He squeezes my hand. “If you do not want to carry her death on your shoulders for the rest of your life, you will not let anything stop you.”

I used to think the guilt I’d seen on Ne Min’s face was about Anju, from Timir’s old circus, since he couldn’t talk Timir out of killing her. He must have felt so much worse about Myit Ko Naing, having grown up with her and knowing she died in the fire he caused.

His hand starts to slip away from mine. I grip it tighter.

“Ne Min, wait—” There are so many more questions I have for him, so much more I want to say to him, so much to thank him for.

“No, Hastin,” he says. “Remember the candles? It is time for my flame to die out now. What keeps me alive will breathe life into something new.”

I cling to Ne Min to keep him from slipping away. He can’t leave. I don’t care about the something new out there—I need the old Ne Min here. I lay my head on his shoulder and drape my arm across his chest like I’m shielding a candle flame from the wind. My arm moves up and down with Ne Min’s breathing, then grows still.

The light that is Ne Min’s life fades away, and moves on to give life to someone else, somewhere else. All that’s left here is sadness, and it fills the room.

Outside, the wind blows, and rings the wooden bell with a sound that is not too high, or too low, or too hollow.

28

A young elephant that is chained will try hard to free itself, but once it gives up, it gives up forever. Even when it is strong enough to break its chains, it will not. So it is that the smallest chain can hold the largest elephant.

—From
Care of Jungle Elephants
by Tin San Bo

From the nightstand I take the elephant book and slip the picture of Ne Min and Myit Ko Naing between the pages. I clutch the book as if a part of Ne Min still lives within.

I place the book in my lap to flip through it, and I recognize some things Ne Min taught me. There’s a picture of a man tending to an injured elephant, pouring what looks like sugar onto the wound. On another page, an elephant lies in a river while someone rubs its skin with a coconut husk. I can almost hear the rumbling purr of the elephant as the dust and dry skin are scrubbed away.

A herd surrounds a fallen elephant, some of them nudging it with their trunks.

On one of the last pages I see an elephant chained to a tree. The elephant looks larger than any others pictured in the book, but the chain that holds him is so thin it is almost lost in the grass. Why does such a strong elephant allow such a small chain to hold him? Doesn’t he know he could break free if he tried? I run my hands over the rounded letters on the page and wish I knew what the words said. Those letters, written smoothly and with no sharp edges. Those words, that must say so much and hold such wisdom within their soft lines.

I hold Ne Min’s hand once more. He finally looks like he is at peace, not holding on to the pain of elephants. He looks free, and I hope that he is.

I take the stone from my pocket and press it into Ne Min’s hand. He is even more like this stone than I thought.

“This stone has quite a story.” I don’t know if Ne Min can hear me anymore, but I tell him about the stone anyway. About how it survived the weight and pressure bearing down on it, how it broke away and rolled far from home and spent many lifetimes knocked around by the river currents.

“This stone even passed through heat like fire,” I tell him. “A weaker stone would have crumbled away into nothing.”

I’ll never know how the stone ever stopped tumbling and found its way out of the river. But I have to find my own way out of here. I wrap Ne Min’s hand around the stone in his palm and let go.

I rush back to the stable and grab my bag. It holds my Ganesh figure, Nandita’s carving, the empty iodine bottle, Ne Min’s leaf, and the elephant box for Chanda. Nandita trumpets and swings her trunk back and forth. I think she knows that something important is happening.

As I place Ne Min’s book in the bag, I stare at the marks I’ve carved. The lines I scratched with my pocketknife each day make a long row across the stable wall. I unfold my knife and stab the point into the end of the row. My final mark.

Nandita follows me out of the stable, then bumps into me when the roar of Timir’s truck freezes me in place. The cook shed blocks my view of the truck, so I can’t see who is with him.

The engine quiets, and the wooden gate behind the cook shed creaks open, then closes. I peer around a tree and see three men following Timir to his office. One of them holds a large rifle.

Together Nandita and I run to the main gate. I find Sharad standing near the elephant truck.

“I am sorry about your father,” I tell him.

He freezes, then turns away from the coil of rope he just loaded into the truck. His eyes narrow when he looks at me. “What are you talking about?”

“I know how much it hurts, losing your father. But it wasn’t anyone’s fault.”

“You don’t know—”

“—not even Anju’s fault.”

Sharad pounds the side of the truck with his fist so hard that I jump back from the noise.

“No, it was mine.” He walks to the arena fence and leans on it. As he talks he stares at the ground. “I was the last one to close the lion cage that day. I thought I had locked it properly, but…”

We are both quiet for a long time. I wonder who Sharad has blamed more all these years, himself or the elephant. The pain on his face answers my question.

“It was an accident,” I finally say. “And it was a long time ago. But did Anju’s death help you feel any better? What would Nandita’s death solve?”

“She could have killed me,” he says.

“If she wanted to, she would have. And I could have left you on the ground and escaped, but I didn’t. So now you can return the favor.”

“What?”

“Give me the keys.”

Sharad moves his hand to his key ring. His goodness has been buried for so long underneath so much anger, fear, and, I know now, guilt. I do not expect him to magically change, but if a bit of that goodness could dig its way out, just enough to help …

My hand in my pocket grips my knife. If I have to, I will slice open the pocket that holds Sharad’s keys.

He stares at Nandita as she sways back and forth next to me.

I think I can win if he puts up a fight. He is still sore from Nandita’s attack.

“This is a mistake,” Sharad says. He pulls the keys from his pocket. “She is a wild animal, you know.”

The hand on my knife relaxes. “I know, and she wants to go home.”

He does not look at me as he asks, “How is Ne Min? I told Timir he needs a doctor. He doesn’t want to get one, but maybe—”

When I don’t answer he glances up at me. I shake my head to let him know it is too late for Ne Min.

Sharad sets the keys on a fence post and walks away.

I grab the keys and kneel next to Nandita. My hands shake as I slip the shackle key into the lock and turn it. The shackles clatter to the ground, followed by the chains around her neck and leg when I unlatch them.

As soon as I unlock and open the gate, Nandita runs through it and heads toward the forest that was once her home. She turns back to me and calls out a trumpet blast.

A hand grabs my shoulder.

“That animal is mine!” Timir yells. “Now go get her and bring her back, or you will never work off your debt to me.”

I cannot move. But we have come so far, I can’t let us fail now. If Nandita would just keep running, I could get myself out of here later. But she doesn’t move either. Timir glances at her and says, “Fine. If you won’t do the job yourself—” Only when he turns toward his office do I notice the workmen standing at the doorway. One of them holds the elephant gun. Timir waves him over. I back away from the fence.

“Take care of it now,” he says as the man approaches.

Sharad runs to us, then leans on the fence while he catches his breath.

The workman raises the gun and aims it toward Nandita. My hand, so used to the comfort of the stone, reaches for my pocket before I realize the stone is no longer there. But I no longer need it. I know what to do. The same thing Nandita did for me when I faced danger.

I step in front of the barrel of the elephant gun. Standing here might not stop the man from firing, but it’s the only chance I have now of saving Nandita.

The man moves aside and aims again. I follow.

“Fire!” Timir yells at the man.

Maybe this is where my story ends. I think of my village. I almost made it back. I think of my family, who will never know what happened to me. More than ever I hope that Chanda recovered from her illness, so Amma will not be alone.

“I can’t,” the man says. “The boy’s in the way!”

“Just shoot him,” says Timir.

The man steps aside and aims the gun. Again I follow, and stare into the blackness of the barrel.

He lowers the gun. “You hired me to shoot an elephant,” he says to Timir. “I’m not shooting a boy, too.”

Timir grabs the gun. “Then leave the job to someone who can do it.” He hands the gun to Sharad. “Take care of it.”

Sharad looks from the gun to Timir, then to me. He raises the gun. I place myself between him and Nandita.

This must be what Ne Min meant about being brave. Never in my life have I been so afraid, but here I stand.

We all jump at the rifle blast when Sharad fires—straight up into the sky. I look behind me to see Nandita galloping toward her forest home again. I know I should run, too, but my knees will give out under me if I move.

Nandita stops and turns back to us.

What is she doing?
“Go on!” I yell as I wave her away. “Go home!”

But Nandita does not go. She kneels onto her front legs.

I turn back to Timir, and for the first time ever I look him right in the eyes. For all his yelling, for all his demands, he has never done anything. He might kill a mouse and never feel it, but he’s afraid of anything that takes real work. He never lifted a shovel to dig Nandita’s trap, never spent a moment training her, never even filled the trough or pitched hay. He is like a thundercloud that never produces rain. And he will not come after us.

“She has worked for you long enough,” I say to him. “And so have I. If you are so brave, go get her yourself. She won’t be as gentle with you as she was with Sharad.”

I run to Nandita, to take the last ride she will ever give.

Nandita heads to the forest with me on her back. I close my eyes to feel the wind on my face as she runs home. The wooden bell on her neck
clip-clops
along with her gallop. She trumpets and runs faster when we hear the answering calls of her herd. I lean forward and cling tighter to her neck so I will not fall off.