“Just don’t.”
Camel scurries up to Uncle Al and steps into his path. “Er, there you are,” he says, his voice artificial and mewling. “I was wondering if I could have a word, sir?”
“Not now, boy. Not now,” booms Al, goose-stepping past like the Brownshirts you see in the grainy news trailers at the movies. Camel limps weakly behind, popping his head around one side, and then falling back and running along the other like a disgraced puppy.
“It won’t take but a moment, sir. It’s just I was wondering if any of the departments was short of men.”
“Thinking of changing careers, are we?”
Camel’s voice rises like a siren. “Oh no, sir. Not me. I’m happy right where I am. Yes sir. Happy as a clam, that’s me.” He giggles maniacally.
The distance between them widens. Camel stumbles and then comes to a stop. “Sir?” he calls across the growing distance. He comes to a stop. “Sir?”
Uncle Al is gone, swallowed whole by people, horses, and wagons.
“Goddammit. Goddammit!” says Camel, tearing his hat from his head and throwing it to the ground.
“It’s okay, Camel,” I say. “I appreciate you trying.”
“No, it ain’t okay,” he shouts.
“Camel, I—”
“Just shut it. I don’t want to hear it. You’re a good kid, and I ain’t about to stand by and watch you mope off ’cuz that fat old grouch don’t got time. I just ain’t. So have a little respect for your elders and don’t give me no trouble.”
His eyes are burning.
I lean over, retrieve his hat, and brush the dirt off. Then I hold it out to him.
After a moment, he takes it. “All right then,” he says gruffly. “I guess that’s all right.”
CAMEL TAKES ME to a wagon and tells me to wait outside. I lean against one of the large spoked wheels and pass the time alternately picking slivers from beneath my nails and chewing long pieces of grass. At one point my head bobs forward, on the cusp of sleep.
Camel emerges an hour later, staggering, holding a flask in one hand and a roll-your-own in the other. His eyelids flutter at half-mast.
“This here’s Earl,” he slurs, sweeping an arm behind him. “He’s gonna take care of ya.”
A bald man steps down from the wagon. He is enormous, his neck thicker than his head. Blurred green tattoos run across his knuckles and up his hairy arms. He holds out his hand.
“How do you do,” he says.
“How do you do,” I say, perplexed. I swing around to Camel, who’s zigzagging through the crispy grass in the general direction of the Flying Squadron. He’s also singing. Badly.
Earl cups his hands around his mouth. “Shut it, Camel! Get yourself on that train before it leaves without you!”
Camel drops to his knees.
“Ah Jesus,” says Earl. “Hang on. I’ll be back in a minute.”
He walks over and scoops the older man off the ground as easily as if he were a child. Camel lets his arms, legs, and head dangle over Earl’s arms. He giggles and sighs.
Earl sets Camel on the edge of a car’s doorway, consults with someone inside, and then returns.
“Stuff’s gonna kill the old fellow,” he mutters, marching straight past me. “If he don’t rot out his guts, he’ll roll off the goddamned train. Don’t touch the stuff myself,” he says, looking over his shoulder at me.
I’m rooted to the spot where he left me.
He looks surprised. “You coming, or what?”
WHEN THE FINAL SECTION of the train pulls out, I’m crouched under a bunk in a sleeping car wedged against another man. He is the rightful owner of the space but was persuaded to let me hang out for an hour or two for a price of my one dollar. He grumbles anyway, and I hug my knees to make myself as compact as possible.
The odor of unwashed bodies and clothes is overwhelming. The bunks, stacked three high, hold at least one and sometimes two men, as do the spaces beneath them. The fellow wedged in the floor space across from me punches a thin gray blanket, trying in vain to form a pillow.
A voice carries across the jumble of noise: “Ojcze nasz jest w niebie, sie imie Twoje, królestwo Twoje—”
“Jesus Christ,” my host says. He pokes his head into the aisle. “Speak in English, you fucking Polack!” Then he retreats back under the bunk, shaking his head. “Some of these guys. Right off the fucking boat.”
“—i nie wódz na pokuszenie ale nas zbaw ode zlego. Amen.”
I nestle against the wall and close my eyes. “Amen,” I whisper.
The train lurches. The lights flicker for a moment and go out. From somewhere ahead of us a whistle screeches. We begin rolling forward and the lights come back on. I’m tired beyond words, and my head bumps unbuffered against the wall.
I wake some time later and find myself facing a pair of huge work boots.
“You ready then?”
I shake my head, trying to get my bearings.
I hear tendons creaking and snapping. Then I see a knee. Then Earl’s face. “You still down there?” he says, peering under the bunk.
“Yeah. Sorry.”