They went through a series of old, crotchety mountains. They were so old they didn’t look dangerous anymore. Occasionally a big boulder rolled off them into the middle of a road or landed on top of a deer, but on the whole they had found their place in the world. The rain had worn their peaks down, one argument at a time.
Rose understood why hobos would ride the train. It made you feel like you had escaped from time. That you had gotten ahead of it. It was as though you were the hare and time was the tortoise. And now you could just dally until the future caught up with you. Rose plopped down in one of the seats among a group of girls and decided to enjoy the journey with them.
They had packed sandwiches for their daylong train ride south, so nobody was hungry. There was a peacefulness that settled over everyone in the train now that their bellies were full. It allowed them to luxuriate in the moment as if it were a warm bath.
The girls were having thoughts they hadn’t been allowed to have before. Rose liked listening to conversations. Every conversation was like a scientific experiment that sought to find a cure for the human condition.
“I’d like to have a stage name. Something with a little razzmatazz.”
“Once you start with the razzmatazz, you’ll never be able to knock it off.”
“I read Frankenstein. Do you know that a woman wrote it? She ran away with this poet named Percy Shelley. They had an orgy in a castle and she made up the story to amuse their friends.”
“Where did you find out all this?”
“At the library. If you keep reading past Winnie-the-Pooh, most books are actually really dirty.”
“I hated school so much. I was so happy to leave it.”
“I couldn’t make out the blackboard. I have bad eyesight. When my grandfather died, I took his glasses. All the other girls laughed at me but I was able to read the blackboard.”
“There’s going to be another war, and there will be all sorts of jobs opening up. You can do what you want.”
“Penses-tu qu’ils ont les même tablettes de chocolat aux états-Unis?”
“My mom wanted to get a job to make more money, but my father said he would die of shame if she did that. I like having money in my pocket.”
“Nothing feels as good as having money in your pocket. Rien du tout.”
“I never minded giving my parents my whole paycheck, because they pay the rent and buy the food and they have all my brothers. But I have to beg and beg and beg just to keep enough money to go to the movies on Saturdays.”
“I love the movies.”
“Did you see King Kong? It was the first movie I ever saw, and I couldn’t stop screaming. I couldn’t sleep at night. I kept looking out the window. I was sure that a big gorilla’s hand was going to reach in the window and snatch me out of my bed.”
“I know what you mean. After I saw Frankenstein, I was cycling down the street. I was sure the monster was just behind me. I started hurrying to get home.”
“Joannie read that book.”
Rose adored the brilliant repartee of the girls. It was like the train itself, traversing all domains—trivial and profound subjects, both at once.
? ? ?
IN THE DINING CAR, Rose sat across from a ventriloquist clown. He had a rat in a jar. He opened the lid of the jar and once he took the lid off, the rat began to sing in a melodic, high-pitched voice. He had been working with the clown since he was a pup. He liked to be rocked to sleep in the clown’s pocket.
The rat was nervous. The rat had come from Montreal. It had heard of the New York rats. They could intimidate dogs. And if cats saw them coming, they would cross to the other side of the street.
The clown told him not to worry, they wouldn’t be meeting any New York rats. This was a very reputable theater, and there wouldn’t be any rats in the audience.
But the rat knew that all he needed was for some New York rat to say he was a loser and he would never, ever recover. They would say that no respectable rat would be traveling with a clown. He sat behind the glass, wringing his hands, worrying about being judged. He had never felt so small in his whole entire life.
? ? ?
SHE STOPPED IN A COMPARTMENT to talk to Fabio, who had a huge accounts book spread open. The two of them looked at the book as though they were children searching for a foreign city in an atlas. Fabio had turned out to be unexpectedly good with numbers, and Rose was the first person in his life who had found use for that skill. She had been consulting more and more with Fabio about numbers and business affairs. Fabio was the only person in the company other than Pierrot who knew about the drugs. There was no point telling the others. They believed they were on this trip because of their artistic abilities. They looked so innocent, they would never be suspected. They were just enjoying the ride. They were all crowded up against the window, gaping at the Adirondacks. Even the sad clowns were laughing. The sad clowns weren’t worried about their arthritis, or their ex-wives, or their failures. They were all smiling.