“Oh,” she says. “It’s just Auggie said . . .”
We sit in excruciating silence for nearly half a minute.
“So, your feet are better then?” I ask.
“Yes, thank you.” Her hands are clasped so tightly her knuckles are white. She swallows and looks at her lap. “There was something else I wanted to talk to you about. What happened in the alley. In Chicago.”
“That was entirely my fault,” I say quickly. “I can’t imagine what came over me. Temporary insanity or something. I’m so very sorry. I can assure you it will never happen again.”
“Oh,” she says quietly.
I look up, startled. Unless I’m very much mistaken, I think I’ve just managed to offend her. “I’m not saying . . . It’s not that you’re not . . . I just . . .”
“Are you saying you didn’t want to kiss me?”
I drop my hat and raise my hands. “Marlena, please help me. I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“Because it would be easier if you didn’t.”
“If I didn’t what?”
“If you didn’t want to kiss me,” she says quietly.
My jaw moves, but it’s several seconds before anything comes out. “Marlena, what are you saying?”
“I . . . I’m not really sure,” she says. “I hardly know what to think anymore. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you. I know what I’m feeling is wrong, but I just . . . Well, I guess I just wondered . . .”
When I look up, her face is cherry red. She’s clasping and unclasping her hands, staring hard at her lap.
“Marlena,” I say, rising and taking a step forward.
“I think you should go now,” she says.
I stare at her for a few seconds.
“Please,” she says, without looking up.
And so I leave, although every bone in my body screams against it.
COURTESY OF THE PFENING ARCHIVES, COLUMBUS, OHIO
Fifteen
Camel spends his days hidden behind the trunks, lying on blankets that Walter and I arrange to cushion his ruined body from the floor. His paralysis is so bad I’m not sure he could crawl out even if he wanted to, but he’s so terrified of being caught that he doesn’t try. Each night, after the train is in motion, we pull the trunks out and lean him up in the corner or lay him on the cot, depending on whether he wants to sit up or continue lying down. It’s Walter who insists he take the cot, and in turn I insist that Walter take the bedroll. And so I am back to sleeping on the horse blanket in the corner.
Barely two days into our cohabitation, Camel’s tremors are so bad he can’t even speak. Walter notices at noon when he returns to the train to bring Camel some food. Camel is in such bad shape Walter seeks me out in the menagerie to tell me about it, but August is watching, so I can’t return to the train.
At nearly midnight, Walter and I are sitting side by side on the cot, waiting for the train to pull out. The second it moves, we get up and drag the trunks from the wall.
Walter kneels, puts his hands under Camel’s armpits, and lifts him into a sitting position. Then he pulls a flask from his pocket.
When Camel’s eyes light on it, they jerk up to Walter’s face. Then they fill with tears.
“What’s that?” I ask quickly.
“What the hell do you think it is?” Walter says. “It’s liquor. Real liquor. The good stuff.”
Camel reaches for the bottle with shaking hands. Walter, still holding him upright, removes the cap and holds it to the old man’s lips.
ANOTHER WEEK PASSES, and Marlena remains cloistered in her stateroom. I’m now so desperate to lay eyes on her that I find myself trying to figure out ways of peeking into the window without getting caught. Fortunately, good sense prevails.
Every night, I lie on my smelly horse blanket in the corner and replay our last conversation, word for precious word. I follow the same tortured trajectory over and over—from my rush of disbelieving joy to my crashing deflation. I know that dismissing me was the only thing she could do, but even so, I can barely stand it. Just thinking about it leaves me so agitated I toss and writhe until Walter tells me to knock it off because I’m keeping him up.
ONWARD AND UPWARD. Mostly we stay one day in each town, although we usually make a two-day stopover Sunday. During the jump between Burlington and Keokuk, Walter—with the help of generous amounts of whiskey—manages to extract the name and last known location of Camel’s son. For the next few stops, Walter marches off to town immediately after breakfast and doesn’t return until it’s nearly show time. By Springfield, he has made contact.