Tua and the Elephant (15 page)

Nang pulled himself onto a large bough, turned around to scan the horizon below—and came face to face with an upside-down face.

An elfish-looking man stared back at him. He had round brown eyes like polished teak, and a pointy nose and ears. He was wearing a fuzzy brown sweater and had a long black leather coat draped over his shoulders. The little man blinked his eyes,
threw open his coat, dropped from the branch above, and swooped into the air on a five-foot wingspan. Then the entire banyan tree seemed to come apart as the air filled with the flapping wings and squeaking cries of a hundred flying foxes.

Shaking like a kitten, Nang crawled along on all fours, wrapped his arms and legs around the thick bough, whispered a chant, and pinched his eyes closed. Seeing the elephant quit the chase, Nak quickly climbed to the lowest-hanging branch. He was about to drop to the ground when the snapping jaws and bloodcurdling howls of the sanctuary dogs sent him scampering up the tree again.

Stuffed inside the sidecar, Tua wriggled under the blanket. “Hmm-hmm-hmm? Hmm!”

She caught her breath as a long arm reached out of the dark and drew back the cover.

“Hmmmmm!” she squirmed.

“Tua?” Kanchanok gently pulled the tape off her mouth. “What happened?”

“Kanchanok,” Tua said with her first big breath. “Where’s Pohn-Pohn?”

Pohn-Pohn reached over Kanchanok’s shoulder, inspected Tua from the top of her head to the soles of her bare feet, slipped her trunk under her back, lifted her out of the sidecar, and sat her standing on the ground.

“Pohn-Pohn,” she gasped. “I knew you would come—but the mahouts, Kanchanok! They’re getting away!”

“Don’t worry about them.” Kanchanok began unwinding the tape from around Tua’s body. “They’re up a tree and won’t be coming down again anytime soon if Fudge, Shadow, and Peppy have anything to say about it.”

“Thank you for saving me, Pohn-Pohn.” Tua stretched on tiptoes and touched her forehead to the base of Pohn-Pohn’s trunk.

Nak was led away to a police car in handcuffs, but Nang, frozen with fear, couldn’t be coaxed down from the tree. Two policemen climbed up and pried him loose, tied a rope around his waist, and lowered him through the branches while the volunteers and staff covered him with their flashlights.

“I’m not a kidnapper,” he began confessing before his feet touched the ground. “It was him,” he pointed an accusing finger at Nak. “He made me do it.”

The sun rose at last, chasing away the shadows, rousing the birds to song, and warming the wings of drowsy insects. Flowers lifted their faces, turned down their collars, and spread out their arms to greet the morning light.

“I’m feeling hungry, Pohn-Pohn,” Tua said, responding to her rumbling stomach. She stretched and yawned. “How about you?”

Pohn-Pohn didn’t need convincing. She lifted Tua to her feet and steered her toward the feeding platform. When they came upon Mae Noi sitting on a log under her floppy hat, Tua sat down beside her. She was watching an old man leaning on a stick at
the edge of the pasture. He beckoned Pohn-Pohn to come to him, pawing the air with a gnarled hand.

“Who is that man?” Tua asked Mae Noi.

“That’s Ek, the shaman. He lives deep in the forest and is as shy around people as a mouse deer. But because there are so few elephants living in the wild anymore, he must come to the sanctuary to talk to them.”

“He talks to the elephants?” Tua gasped.

“Why does that surprise you? Don’t you talk to Pohn-Pohn?”

“Yes, but …”

“How do you talk to her?” Mae Noi asked.

“I don’t know. I just do.”

“You speak to her with your heart, Tua, the same way she speaks to you. And you speak with your eyes, the tone of your voice, and the touch of your hand. The language of the heart is a tongue all of us would understand if we only took the time to learn it. And you, my little Tua, have a very big heart indeed.”

“I do?”

“I’ve never seen one bigger.”

They watched the old man talking to Pohn-Pohn and drawing his hand in the air as if illustrating a story. He cackled at the end, patted her cheek and shoulder as if dismissing a grandchild, waved his stick over his head to Mae Noi, hoisted up his sarong, and waded into the river.

“I guess I’ll have to go back to Chiang Mai today,” Tua said, looking down between her feet.

“Don’t you want to go home?”

“I miss my mother. And I miss my auntie and all my friends.”

“But you don’t want to leave Pohn-Pohn, is that it?”

Tua looked up at Mae Noi and shook her head.

“I don’t ever want to leave Pohn-Pohn.”

“You may come here whenever you want,” Mae Noi said. “And stay for as long as you like. We’re only an hour away by car. This is your home, too, Tua.”

“Thank you.” Tua gave her a tight smile and looked away. She was staring vacantly across the
pasture when Pohn-Pohn reached out to comfort her, and she hugged the trunk to her cheek.

“What do you want for breakfast, Pohn-Pohn?” she smiled, holding back her tears.

Pohn-Pohn nodded her head and flapped her ears, then turned Tua around on the log and gave her a nudge.

“Okay, Pohn-Pohn, I’m coming.” She giggled, slid to her feet, and looked up. Her mother was standing on top of a hillock above them, looking down and smiling.

“Mama!” Tua cried, and ran into her mother’s outstretched arms. Taking Suay Nam by the hand, she led her down the hillock while telling her all about the excitement of the night before.

“Pohn-Pohn saved my life, Mama,” she said. “How can I ever leave her?”

“And you saved Pohn-Pohn’s life, Tua,” Mae Noi added, standing up from the log and bowing a wai to Suay Nam. “Sawatdee kha. Welcome. I’m Mae Noi.”

Suay Nam returned the bow. “Thank you. And
thank
you,
Pohn-Pohn, for saving my Tua.” She bowed again, this time to the elephant.

“This is my mother, Pohn-Pohn,” Tua said.

But Pohn-Pohn already knew that by the way Suay Nam smelled, looked, and sounded. She reached out and caressed this larger version of Tua.

“Oh,” Suay Nam laughed, and touched the rough skin on Pohn-Pohn’s trunk.

“Can I stay with Pohn-Pohn, Mama?” Tua asked.

“But how would I ever live without you, darling?” said Suay Nam. “Who’s going to find my shoes for me when they’ve run off and I’m late for work? Who’s going to wake me in the morning and tell me about her dreams?”

“
I
am,” Tua said. “But sometimes I’ll be with Pohn-Pohn—like when I stay over at Auntie Orchid’s for girls’ night.”

“I don’t know, Tua. What does Mae Noi say? And what about school? You have to go to school.”

Suay Nam pulled Tua close and hugged her, as if to keep her from slipping away.

Mae Noi spotted Kanchanok squatting in the tall grass and waved him over. He approached wearing a grin and, draping his arm over Pohn-Pohn’s neck, leaned against her. She slung her trunk around his waist in a similar friendly embrace.

“This is my mother, Kanchanok,” Tua said.

“
Sawatdee khrap
.” Kanchanok bowed.

“I’m glad you’re here, Kanchanok,” Mae Noi said. “I want you to hear this as well.

“Pohn-Pohn is going to need a mahout to look after her,” she continued. “Elephants at the sanctuary choose their own mahouts, and it’s pretty clear to me that Pohn-Pohn has chosen you, Tua. And since she’s so fond of Kanchanok as well, I was thinking that maybe the two of you could train to be mahouts together. What do you say? Would you like the job?”

Tua swept a radiant smile over Mae Noi, Kanchanok, and Pohn-Pohn before shining it on her mother.

“Can I, Mama?”

“I don’t know,” said Suay Nam. “Is it really what you want to do?”

“More than anything,” Tua answered.

“Mind you,” Mae Noi continued, “it’s a lot of hard work and responsibility. And you’ll have to attend the village school and do your schoolwork as well. Come,” she smiled, “let’s talk about it over breakfast.”

She took Suay Nam’s arm and guided her toward the main building, while Tua, Pohn-Pohn, and Kanchanok fell in behind them.

“I hope you will consider the sanctuary your second home,” Mae Noi said.

“Thank you. But if Tua began staying overnight at the sanctuary, I’d see even less of her than I do now. How could I bear it?” Suay Nam bit her lip.

“Tua certainly is a remarkable little girl, isn’t she?” Mae Noi said. “You must be very proud.”

“I love her so much,” Suay Nam declared before turning her head away.

“I was wondering,” Mae Noi pulled her close,
“if you would consider coming to work at the sanctuary as well?”

As they followed behind her mother and Mae Noi, Tua declared, “We made it, Pohn-Pohn! This is your home now.”

Pohn-Pohn tossed her trunk about like a newborn calf. It was in the air, all over the ground, and on everything they passed: the musky scent of elephants.

“Yoo-hoo,” hailed a voice from the feeding platform. “Tu-ahh, darling! Pohn, my honey! Look at the pair of you! I could eat you both up, you know I could.”

Auntie Orchid descended the stairs like a monarch. The volunteers and staff followed her off the platform like flowers chasing the sun. She tiptoed across the pasture, sidestepping large piles of elephant dung, before pushing Tua’s cheeks together
and kissing her bulging lips. Then she hugged Pohn-Pohn’s trunk and planted a pair of scarlet lips between her eyes. Tua wiped the lipstick off her mouth with the back of her hand.

Auntie Orchid then spun around to face her public, gathered niece and trunk into her arms, and struck a fetching pose.

“Don’t you feel glamorous?” she crooned.

“I’m going to be a mahout, Auntie,” Tua said.

Saying it out aloud seemed to make it all come true.

“That’s nice, darling,” said Auntie Orchid. “Every girl should have a hobby. Smile for the cameras, cherubs.”