Tua and the Elephant (12 page)

Tua turned and pressed her forehead to the base of Pohn-Pohn’s trunk. Pohn-Pohn blinked and hugged her back.

“Come on,” said Kanchanok. “We’ll be able to see the sanctuary from the ridge.”

They climbed up and down the side of the mountain until they came to a clearing in the forest.

“That’s it down there,” said Kanchanok. “That’s the sanctuary.”

Tua looked down to what at first appeared to be a large farm. There were buildings and orchards, fields and gardens. But what made this farm unusual was the presence of so many elephants. There were elephants everywhere! Elephants bobbed and floated in the river. More were taking mud baths in pits on the shore. One elephant stood chest-deep in the shallows while people with buckets and brushes scrubbed it down.

“Pohn-Pohn loves playing in the mud,” Tua said.

“It protects their skin from mosquito bites and sunburn,” said Kanchanok.

“Oh!” Tua patted Pohn-Pohn’s trunk. “Aren’t you smart, Pohn-Pohn?”

“Look! That’s the new baby, Mojo. He’s only three months old.”

A small calf with a thin tuft of black hair sprouting from the top of his head ran between the legs of his mother and auntie, his small trunk flailing in
the air like a runaway hose. The skin sagged on his little body as he romped on stubby legs, flapping his ears and flicking his tail.

“He’s so cute,” Tua gushed.

“That’s Poon under the tree,” Kanchanok pointed his finger. “She stepped on a landmine in Laos and lost part of her foot. That elephant with the limp is Roy. He was hit by a truck and came here with a broken hip. And that old bull over there is Kanda,” he nodded toward the river bank. “He’s blind, because some men cut off his tusks with a chainsaw and it infected his eyes. Pranee and her two calves, Lucky and Mee, look after him now.”

Tua swallowed a lump in her throat. “It’s a hard life for an elephant, Kanchanok, isn’t it?”

“Not so easy,” Kanchanok shook his head.

“But they’re safe now?”

“As safe as Mae Noi can make them. Come,” he said, “I’ll take you and Pohn-Pohn to meet her.”

The motorcycle and sidecar turned onto a dirt track and followed a crudely made sign with the words rafts for rent painted above a crookedly drawn arrow. The track ended at a crudely made house on the bank of the river. Nak and Nang walked around to the back and lifted their visors.

There were two boys asleep in either end of a hammock as if wrapped in a cocoon. Chickens scratched at a yard strewn with bamboo poles and coconuts. A dog came out from under the porch, murmured a bark, scratched his ear, and crawled back under the house.

“
Sawatdee khrap,
” Nak said to an old man in a swing chair on the porch.

The old man stared down at them, as still as a spider.

“Do you have any rafts for rent?” asked Nak. “We saw your sign on the road.”

Instead of speaking, the old man tapped his cane on the floor three times.

A pig came out of the back door, followed by a man. The man yawned and blinked his eyes.

“
Khrap
.” He squinted.

“We’d like to rent a raft,” said Nak.

“A raft?” He scratched his chin as if trying to recall where he’d heard that word before.

“You do rent rafts, don’t you?”

“Of course. They’re all out at the moment,” he shrugged. “But now that I think of it, I might have one I could sell you.”

“And how much would that cost me?” Nak raised an eyebrow.

“Let’s see … I could let you have it for …
oh … say a thousand
baht.
”

“A thousand
baht
?” squeaked Nak. “It’s a bamboo raft, not the king’s yacht.”

“Handmade native crafts fetch a handsome price in the city these days,” the man shrugged.

Nak pulled a note out of his pocket and waved it in the air. “Five hundred,” he said. “And that’s my final offer.”

“One thousand,” smiled the man. “And that’s my final price.”

Nak couldn’t risk letting the elephant enter the sanctuary while he haggled over five hundred
baht
with this river rat. He pulled out another note and handed the money over.

“Follow me, gentlemen,” said the man with a grin. “You won’t regret your decision. She glides like a dream.”

The old man on the porch began cackling like a mynah bird, and Nang reached for his medallion.

Standing over the raft they’d just purchased, the mahouts winced. “Does it float?” Nang asked.

“Sound as a cork,” the man beamed. “Don’t let appearances fool you.”

“But it’s a bundle of sticks.” Nang nudged the raft with his foot.

“Never mind about that,” Nak leapt in. “How does it work?”

“You’ll need a pole to steer by. Then climb aboard, push her out to the middle of the river, and let the current do the work.”

“Where’s the pole?” Nak searched the ground for something to steer by.

“Did you want to buy a pole as well?” asked the man.

A cackling in the tree above sent Nang reaching for his medallion again. But it was only a pair of mynahs.

Tua, Pohn-Pohn, and Kanchanok took a narrow path along the ridge and down to a beach on the
river. While Pohn-Pohn frolicked in the water, Tua sat on the bank and stared at the sanctuary on the other side.

They had made it. Pohn-Pohn’s new home was just across the river—and it was beautiful over there. The elephants seemed so kind to one another. And the people seemed so kind to the elephants. Pohn-Pohn would be very happy here. She already loved the river, rolling in the current and blowing spouts with her trunk. Tua smiled. But there was a touch of sadness in her eyes.

“What is it?” Kanchanok asked, sitting down beside her. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” she sighed. “It’s just that … well … Kanchanok … would you look after Pohn-Pohn for me … when I’m gone?”

Before he could answer, they heard voices on the river and, shielding their eyes, turned to look upstream.

A raft was coming around the bend sideways. There was a man on one end stabbing the river
with a pole, and a man on the other end shouting instructions and insults. And then the raft began a slow spin, as if caught in a whirlpool.

After much paddling and stabbing with the pole, the raft corrected itself and was careening downstream nose first.

Tua sprang to her feet and shouted: “It’s them, Kanchanok! It’s the mahouts!”

“What mahouts?” Kanchanok asked, leaping up beside her. “Where?”

Pohn-Pohn was nowhere in sight.

Nak, who had been urging Nang to give up the pole, turned around to face downstream … when he saw an elephant’s trunk—and then its head—rise up out of the water in front of him. It seemed to be bearing down on him like a wrecking ball.

“Turn away!” he shouted to Nang. “Turn, turn, turn!”

Nak began rocking the raft with his feet in an attempt to steer it around the elephant, but succeeded only in breaking its bonds. There were
now two rafts, held together by Nak and Nang’s legs. Nak leapt onto one half while Nang leapt onto the other. The two halves parted, taking separate currents around the elephant.

Pohn-Pohn whirled her trunk around her head and soaked them both as they surfed past, bouncing on the current toward the rapids below.

A large floppy hat was watching from the opposite shore. The person sitting under it stood up, lifted the hat in the air, and waved it over her head.

“What have you got for me today,
hoon lai ga
?” she shouted across the river.

“That’s Mae Noi,” Kanchanok said to Tua. “Sometimes I bring her injured animals from the forest.”

“She’s so little.” Tua shielded her eyes and squinted.

“She’s bigger than she looks,” he said. Then he shouted to the woman across the river: “What are you going to cook for me today, Little Mother?”

“Sticks and rocks and weeds, with coconut milk and red curry paste,” she called back, and giggled at her own joke.

Pohn-Pohn emerged dripping from the river and approached the little woman on the shore who smelled like an elephant. Mae Noi crouched down and allowed Pohn-Pohn to inspect her with her trunk. Then she reached in her pocket and offered Pohn-Pohn a banana. Pohn-Pohn accepted the gift while Mae Noi petted and cooed over her.

Just then a sausage-shaped dog, painted brown and white like a pinto, bounded out of the tall grass and tumbled down to the shore to inspect the newcomer. She began weaving around Pohn-Pohn’s legs and sniffing her feet for clues. She counted five toes on the front feet and four toes on the rear. That much was as it should be, at least.

Pohn-Pohn tossed her trunk between her front legs to say hello, but the little dog yapped at the trunk and darted out of the way. She had not finished her inspections and didn’t like being
interrupted. But once her job was completed, she trotted in front of Pohn-Pohn and introduced herself. Then she climbed into Mae Noi’s lap and reported all that she’d learned. She did this by licking Mae Noi’s face, whining, and twirling her stubby tail.

“Isn’t she gorgeous, Peppy?” Mae Noi gushed.

Peppy humored Mae Noi, licking her face and whining all the more. Mae Noi had never met an elephant she didn’t think was gorgeous, including cross-eyed Pinkie with the missing tail and pink ears. Mae Noi was a pushover for elephants.