whether you mess with my stuff.”
He is unshaven, his blue eyes burning in a face that is the color of beets.
“You’re right,” I stammer. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have touched your things.”
“Listen, pisshead. I had a nice gig going here until you came along. Plus I’m in a bad mood anyway. Some asshole used my water today, so you’d best stay out of my way. I may be short, but don’t think I can’t take you.”
My eyes widen. I recover but not soon enough.
His eyes narrow to slits. He scans the shirt, my clean-shaven face. He chucks the eight-pager onto his cot. “Aw hell. Haven’t you done enough already?”
“I’m sorry. Honest to God, I didn’t know it was yours. August said I could use it.”
“Did he also say you could go through my stuff?”
I pause, embarrassed. “No.”
He gathers his books and stuffs them into the crate.
“Kinko—Walter—I’m sorry.”
“That’s Kinko to you, pal. Only my friends call me Walter.”
I walk to the corner and sink down on my horse blanket. Kinko helps Queenie onto the bed and lies down beside her, staring so pointedly at the ceiling I half-expect it to start smoldering.
BEFORE LONG, THE TRAIN pulls out. A few dozen angry men chase us for a while, swinging pitchforks and baseball bats, although it’s mostly for the benefit of the tale they’ll get to tell at dinner tonight. If they had really wanted a fight there was plenty of time before we pulled out.
It’s not that I can’t see their point—their wives and children had been looking forward to the circus for days, and they themselves had probably been looking forward to some of the other entertainments rumored to be available in the back of our lot. And now, instead of sampling the charms of the magnificent Barbara, they’ll have to content themselves with their eight-pagers. I can see why a guy might get steamed.
Kinko and I clatter along in hostile silence as the train gets up to speed. He lies on his cot, reading. Queenie rests her head on his socks. Mostly she sleeps, but whenever she’s awake, she watches me. I sit on the horse blanket, bone-weary but not yet tired enough to lie down and suffer the indignities of vermin and mildew.
At what should be dinnertime, I get up and stretch. Kinko’s eyes dart over from behind his book, and then back to the text.
I walk out to the horses and stand looking over their alternating black and white backs. When we reloaded them, we moved everyone up to give Silver Star all four empty stalls’ worth of space. Even though the rest of the horses are now in unfamiliar slots, they seem largely unperturbed, probably because we loaded them in the same order. The names scratched into the posts no longer match the occupants, but I can extrapolate who’s who. The fourth horse in is Blackie. I wonder if his personality is anything like his human namesake’s.
I can’t see Silver Star, which means he must be lying down. That’s both good and bad: good, because it keeps the weight off his feet, and bad because it means he’s in enough pain he doesn’t want to stand. Because of the way the stalls are constructed, I can’t check on him until we stop and unload the other horses.
I sit across from the open door and watch the landscape pass until it gets dark. Eventually I slide down and fall asleep.
It seems like only minutes later when the brakes begin screeching. Almost immediately, the door to the goat room opens and Kinko and Queenie come out into the rough foyer. Kinko leans one shoulder against the wall, hands pushed deep in his pockets and ignoring me studiously. When we finally come to a stop, he jumps to the ground, turns, and claps twice. Queenie leaps into his arms and they disappear.
I climb to my feet and peer out the open door.
We’re on a siding in the middle of nowhere. The other two sections of train are also stopped, stretched out before us on the track, a half mile between each.
People climb down from the train in the early morning light. The performers stretch grumpily and gather in groups to talk and smoke as the workmen drop ramps and unload stock.
August and his men arrive within minutes.
“Joe, you deal with the monkeys,” says August. “Pete, Otis, unload the hay burners and get them watered, will you? Use the stream instead of troughs. We’re conserving water.”
“But don’t unload Silver Star,” I say.
There’s a long silence. The men look first at me and then at August, whose gaze is steely.
“Yes,” August finally says. “That’s right. Don’t unload Silver Star.”
He turns and walks away. The other men regard me with wide eyes.
I jog a little to catch up with August. “I’m sorry,” I say, falling into stride beside him. “I didn’t mean to give orders.”
He stops in front of the camel car and slides the door open. We’re greeted by the grunts and complaints of distressed dromedaries.
“That’s all right, my boy,” August says cheerily, slinging a bucket of meat at me. “You can help me feed the cats.” I catch the bucket’s thin metal handle. A cloud of angry flies rises from it.
“Oh my God,” I say. I set the bucket down and turn away, retching. I wipe tears from my eyes, still gagging. “August, we can’t feed them this.”
“Why not?”
“It’s gone off.”
There’s no answer. I turn and find that August has set a second bucket beside me and left. He’s marching up the tracks carting another two buckets. I grab mine and catch up.
“It’s putrid. Surely the cats won’t eat this,” I continue.
“Let’s hope they do. Otherwise, we’ll have to make some hard decisions.”
“Huh?”
“We’re still a long way from Joliet, and, alas, we’re out of goats.”
I am too stunned to answer.
When we reach the second section of the train, August hops up onto a flat car and props open the sides of two cat dens. He opens the padlocks, leaves them hanging on the doors, and jumps down to the gravel.
“Go on then,” he says, thumping me on the back.
“What?”
“They get a bucket each. Go on,” he urges.
I climb reluctantly onto the bed of the flat car. The odor of cat urine is overwhelming. August hands me the buckets of meat, one at a time. I set them on the weathered wooden boards, trying not to breathe.
The cat dens have two compartments each: to my left is a pair of lions. To my right, a tiger and a panther. All four are massive. They lift their heads, sniffing, their whiskers twitching.
“Well, go on then,” says August.
“What do I do, just open the door and toss it in?”
“Unless you can think of a better way.”
The tiger rises, six hundred glorious pounds of black, orange, and white. His head is huge, his whiskers long. He comes to the door, swings around, and walks away. When he returns, he growls and swipes at the latch. The padlock rattles against the bars.
“You can start with Rex,” says August, pointing at the lions, which are also pacing. “That’s him on the left.”
Rex is considerably smaller than the tiger, with mats in his mane and ribs showing under his dull coat. I steel myself and reach for a bucket.
“Wait,” says August, pointing at a different bucket. “Not that one. This one.”
I can’t see the difference, but since I’ve already ascertained that it’s a bad idea to argue with August, I oblige.
When the cat sees me coming, he lunges at the door. I freeze.
“What’s the matter, Jacob?”
I turn around. August’s face is glowing.
“You’re not afraid of Rex, are you?” he continues. “He’s just a
