Toomai of the Elephants

I will remember what I was, I am sick of rope and chain.

　　I will remember my old strength and all my forest affairs.

I will not sell my back to man for a bundle of sugar-cane,

　　I will go out to my own kind, and the wood-folk in their lairs.

I will go out until the day, until the morning break,

　　Out to the winds' untainted kiss, the waters' clean caress:

I will forget my ankle-ring and snap my picket-stake.

　　I will revisit my lost loves, and playmates masterless!

Kala Nag, which means Black Snake, had served the Indian GovernmI will remember what I was, I am sick of rope and chain.

I will remember my old strength and all my forest affairs.

I will not sell my back to man for a bundle of sugar-cane,

I will go out to my own kind, and the wood-folk in their lairs.

I will go out until the day, until the morning break,

Out to the winds' untainted kiss, the waters' clean caress:

I will forget my ankle-ring and snap my picket-stake.

I will revisit my lost loves, and playmates masterless!

Kala Nag, which means Black Snake, had served the Indian Government in every way that an elephant could serve it for forty-seven years, and as he was fully twenty years old when he was caught, that makes him nearly seventy—a ripe age for an elephant. He remembered pushing, with a big leather pad on his forehead, at a gun stuck in deep mud, and that was before the Afghan War of 1842, and he had not then come to his full strength. His mother, Radha Pyari—Radha the darling—who had been caught in the same drive with Kala Nag, told him, before his little milk-tusks had dropped out, that elephants who were afraid always got hurt; and Kala Nag knew that that advice was good, for the first time that he saw a shell burst he backed,screaming, into a stand of piled rifles, and the bayonets pricked him in all his softest places. So before he was twenty-five he gave up being afraid, and so he was the best-loved and the best-looked-after elephant in the service of the Government of India. He had carried tents, twelve hundred pounds' weight of tents, on the march in Upper India; he had been hoisted into a ship at the end of a steam-crane and taken for days across the water, and made to carry a mortar on his back in a strange and rocky country very far from India, and had seen the Emperor Theodore lying dead in Magdala, and had come back again in the steamer, entitled, so the soldiers said, to the Abyssinian War medal. He had seen his fellow-elephants die of cold and epilepsy and starvation and sunstroke up at a place called Ali Musjid, ten years later; and afterward he had been sent down thousands of miles south to haul and pile big baulks of teak in the timber-yards at Moulmein. There he had half killed an insubordinate young elephant who was shirking his fair share of work.

After that he was taken off timber-hauling, and employed, with a few score other elephants who were trained to the business, in helping to catch wild elephants among the Garo hills. Elephants are very strictly preserved by the Indian Government. There is one whole department which does nothing else but hunt them, and catch them, and break them in, and send them up and down the country as they are needed for work.

Kala Nag stood ten fair feet at the shoulders, and his tusks had been cut off short at five feet, and bound round the ends, to prevent them splitting, with bands of copper; but he could do more with those stumps than any untrained elephant could do with the real sharpened ones.

When, after weeks and weeks of cautious driving of scattered elephants across the hills, the forty or fifty wild monsters were driven into the last stockade, and the big drop-gate, made of tree trunks lashed together, jarred down behind them, Kala Nag, at the word of command, would go into that flaring, trumpeting pandemonium (generally at night, when the flicker of th torches made it difficult to judge distances), and, picking out the biggest and wildest tusker of the mob, would hammer him and hustle him into quiet while the men on the backs of the other elephants roped and tied the smaller ones.

There was nothing in the way of fighting that Kala Nag, the old wise Black Snake, did not know, for he had stood up more than once in his time to the charge of the wounded tiger, and, curling up his soft trunk to be out of harm's way, had knocked the springing brute sideways in mid-air with a quick sickle-cut of his head, that he had invented all by himself; had knocked him over, and kneeled upon him with his huge knees till the life went out with a gasp and a howl, and there was only a fluffy striped thing on the ground for Kala Nag to pull by the tail.

“Yes,” said Big Toomai, his driver, the son of Black Toomai who had taken him to Abyssinia, and grandson of Toomai of the Elephants who had seen him caught, “there is nothing that the Black Snake fears except me. He has seen three generations of us feed him and groom him, and he will live to see four.”

“He is afraid of me also,” said Little Toomai, standing up to his full height of four feet, with only one rag upon him. He was ten years old, the eldest son of Big Toomai, and, according to custom, he would take his father's place on Kala Nag's neck when he grew up, and would handle the heavy iron ankus, the elephant-goad that had been worn smooth by his father, and his grandfather, and his great-grandfather. He knew what he was talking of; for he had been born under Kala Nag's shadow, had played with the end of his trunk before he could walk, had taken him down to water as soon as he could walk, and Kala Nag would no more have dreamed of disobeying his shrill little orders than he would have dreamed of killing him on that day when Big Toomai carried the little brown baby under Kala Nag's tusks, and told him to salute his master that was to be.

“Yes,” said Little Toomai, “he is afraid of me,” and he took long strides up to Kala Nag, called him a fat old pig, and made him lift up his feet one after the other.

“Wah!” said Little Toomai, “thou art a big elephant,” and he wagged his fluffy head, quoting his father. “The Government may pay for elephants,but they belong to us mahouts. When thou art old, Kala Nag, there will come some rich Rajah, and he will buy thee from the Government, on account of thy size and thy manners, and then thou wilt have nothing to do but to carry gold earrings in thy ears, and a gold howdah on thy back, and a red cloth covered with gold on thy sides, and walk at the head of the processions of the King. Then I shall sit on thy neck, O Kala Nag, with a silver ankus, and men will run before us with golden sticks, crying, ‘Room for the King's elephant!’ That will be good, Kala Nag, but not so good as this hunting in the jungles.”

“Umph!” said Big Toomai. “Thou art a boy, and as wild as a buffalo-calf. This running up and down among the hills is not the best Government service. I am getting old, and I do not love wild elephants. Give me brick elephant-lines, one stall to each elephant, and big stumps to tie them to safely, and flat,broad roads to exercise upon, instead of this come-and-go camping. Aha, the Cawnpore barracks were good. There was a bazaar close by, and only three hours' work a day.”

Little Toomai remembered the Cawnpore elephant-lines and said nothing. He very much preferred the camp life, and hated those broad, flat roads, with the daily grubbing for grass in the forage-reserve, and the long hours when there was nothing to do except to watch Kala Nag fidgeting in his pickets.

What Little Toomai liked was to scramble up bridle-paths that only an elephant could take; the dip into the valley below; the glimpses of the wild elephants browsing miles away; the rush of the frightened pig and peacock under Kala Nag's feet; the blinding warm rains, when all the hills and valleys smoked; the beautiful misty mornings when nobody knew where they would camp that night; the steady, cautious drive of the wild elephants, and the mad rush and blaze and hullabaloo of the last night's drive, when the elephants poured into the stockade like boulders in a landslide, found that they could not get out, and flung themselves at the heavy posts only to be driven back by yells and flaring torches and volleys of blank cartridge.

Even a little boy could be of use there, and Toomai was as useful as three boys. He would get his torch and wave it, and yell with the best. But the really good time came when the driving out began, and the Keddah—that is, the stockade—looked like a picture of the end of the world, and men had to make signs to one another, because they could not hear themselves speak. Then Little Toomai would climb up to the top of one of the quivering stockade-posts, his sun-bleached brown hair flying loose all over his shoulders, and he looking like a goblin in the torch-light; and as soon as there was a lull you could hear his high-pitched yells of encouragement to Kala Nag, above the trumpeting and crashing, and snapping of ropes, and groans of the tethered elephants. “Ma?l, ma?l, Kala Nag! [Go on, go on, Black Snake!] Dant do! [Give him the tusk!] Somalo! Somalo! [Careful, careful!] Maro! Mar! [Hit him, hit him!] Mind the post! Arré! Arré! Hai! Yai! Kya-a-ah!” he would shout, and the big fight between Kala Nag and the wild elephant would sway to and fro across the Keddah, and the old elephant-catchers would wipe the sweat out of their eyes, and find time to nod to Little Toomai wriggling with joy on the top of the posts.

He did more than wriggle. One night he slid down from the post and slipped in between the elephants, and threw up the loose end of a rope, which had dropped, to a driver who was trying to get a purchase on the leg of a kicking young calf (calves always give more trouble than full-grown animals). Kala Nag saw him, caught him in his trunk, and handed him up to Big Toomai, who slapped him then and there, and put him back on the post.

Next morning he gave him a scolding, and said, “Are not good brick elephant-lines and a little tent-carrying enough, that thou must needs go elephant-catching on thy own account, little worthless? Now those foolish hunters, whose pay is less than my pay, have spoken to Petersen Sahib of the matter.” Little Toomai was frightened. He did not know much of white men, but Petersen Sahib was the greatest white man in the world to him. He was the head of all the Keddah operations—the man who caught all the elephants for the Government of India, and who knew more about the ways of elephants than any living man.

“What—what will happen?” said Little Toomai.

“Happen! The worst that can happen. Petersen Sahib is a madman. Else why should he go hunting these wild devils? He may even require thee to be an elephant-catcher, to sleep anywhere in these fever-filled jungles, and at last to be trampled to death in the Keddah. It is well that this nonsense ends safely. Next week the catching is over, and we of the plains are sent back to our stations. Then we will march on smooth roads, and forget all this hunting. But, son, I am angry that thou shouldst meddle in the business that belongs to these dirty Assamese jungle folk. Kala Nag will obey none but me, so I must go with him into the Keddah; but he is only a fighting elephant, and he does not help to rope them. So I sit at my ease, as befits a mahout—not a mere hunter—a mahout, I say, and a man who gets a pension at the end of his service. Is the family of Toomai of the Elephants to be trodden underfoot in the dirt of a Keddah? Bad one! Wicked one! Worthless son! Go and wash Kala Nag and attend to his ears, and see that there are no thorns in his feet; or else Petersen Sahib will surely catch thee and make thee a wild hunter—a follower of elephants' foot-tracks, a jungle-bear. Bah Shame! Go!”

Little Toomai went off without saying a word, but he told Kala Nag all his grievances while he was examining his feet. “No matter,” said Little Toomai, turning up the fringe of Kala Nag's huge right ear. “They have said my name to Petersen Sahib, and perhaps—and perhaps—and perhaps—who knows? Hai! That is a big thorn that I have pulled out!”

The next few days were spent in getting the elephants together, in walking the newly caught wild elephants up and down between a couple of tame ones, to prevent them from giving too much trouble on the downward march to the plains, and in taking stock of the blankets and ropes and things that had been worn out or lost in the forest.

Petersen Sahib came in on his clever she-elephant Pudmini. He had been paying off other camps among the hills, for the season was coming to an end, and there was a native clerk sitting at a table under a tree to pay the drivers their wages. As each man was paid he went back to his elephant, and joined the line that stood ready to start. The catchers, and hunters, and beaters, the men of the regular Keddah, who stayed in the jungle year in and year out, sat on the backs of the elephants that belonged to Petersen Sahib's permanent force, or leaned against the trees with their guns across their arms, and made fun of the drivers who were going away, and laughed when the newly caught elephants broke the line and ran about.

Big Toomai went up to the clerk with Little Toomai behind him, and Machua Appa, the head-tracker, said in an undertone to a friend of his, “There goes one piece of good elephant-stuff at least. ’Tis a pity to send that young jungle-cock to moult in the plains.”

Now Petersen Sahib had ears all over him, as a man must have who listens to the most silent of all living things—the wild elephant. He turned where he was lying all along on Pudmini's back, and said, “What is that? I did not know of a man among the plains-drivers who had wit enough to rope even a dead elephant.”

“This is not a man, but a boy. He went into the Keddah at the last drive, and threw Barmao there the rope when we were trying to get that young calf with the blotch on his shoulder away from his mother.”

Machua Appa pointed at Little Toomai, and Petersen Sahib looked, and Little Toomai bowed to the earth.

“He throw a rope? He is smaller than a picket-pin. Little one, what is thy name?” said Petersen Sahib.

Little Toomai was too frightened to speak, but Kala Nag was behind him, and Toomai made a sign with his hand, and the elephant caught him up in his trunk and held him level with Pudmini's forehead, in front of the great Petersen Sahib. Then Little Toomai covered his face with his hands, for he was only a child, and except where elephants were concerned, he was just as bashful as a child could be.

“Oho!” said Petersen Sahib, smiling underneath his mustache, “and why didst thou teach thy elephant that trick? Was it to help thee steal green corn from the roofs of the houses when the ears are put out to dry?”

“Not green corn, Protector of the Poor—melons,” said Little Toomai, and all the men sitting about broke into a roar of laughter. Most of them had taught their elephants that trick when they were boys. Little Toomai was hanging eight feet up in the air, and he wished very much that he were eight feet under ground.

“He is Toomai, my son, Sahib,” said Big Toomai, scowling. “He is a very bad boy, and he will end in a jail, Sahib.”

“Of that I have my doubts,” said Petersen Sahib. “A boy who can face a full Keddah at his age does not end in jails. See, little one, here are four annas to spend in sweetmeats because thou hast a little head under that great thatch of hair. In time thou mayest become a hunter too.” Big Toomai scowled more than ever. “Remember, though, that Keddahs are not good for children to play in,” Petersen Sahib went on.

“Must I never go there, Sahib?” asked Little Toomai, with a big gasp.

“Yes.” Petersen Sahib smiled again. “When thou hast seen the elephants dance. That is the proper time. Come to me when thou hast seen the elephants dance, and then I will let thee go into all the Keddahs.”

There was another roar of laughter, for that is an old joke among elephant-catchers, and it means just never. There are great cleared flat places hidden away in the forests that are called elephants' ball-rooms, but even these are only found by accident, and no man has ever seen the elephants dance. When a driver boasts of his skill and bravery the other drivers say, “And when didst thou see the elephants dance?”

Kala Nag put Little Toomai down, and he bowed to the earth again and went away with his father, and gave the silver four-anna piece to his mother, who was nursing his baby brother, and they all were put up on Kala Nag's back, and the line of grunting, squealing elephants rolled down the hill-path to the plains. It was a very lively march on account of the new elephants, who gave trouble at every ford, and who needed coaxing or beating every other minute.

Big Toomai prodded Kala Nag spitefully, for he was very angry, but Little Toomai was too happy to speak. Petersen Sahib had noticed him, and given him money, so he felt as a private soldier would feel if he had been called out of the ranks and praised by his commander-in-chief.

“What did Petersen Sahib mean by the elephant-dance?” he said, at last, softly to his mother.

Big Toomai heard him and grunted. “That thou shouldst never be one of these hill-buffaloes of trackers. That was what he meant. Oh, you in front, what is blocking the way?”

An Assamese driver, two or three elephants ahead, turned round angrily, crying: “Bring up Kala Nag, and knock this youngster of mine into good behavior. Why should Petersen Sahib have chosen me to go down with you donkeys of the rice-fields? Lay your beast alongside, Toomai, and let him prod with his tusks. By all the gods of the Hills, these new elephants are possessed, or else they can smell their companions in the jungle.”

Kala Nag hit the new elephant in the ribs and knocked the wind out of him, as Big Toomai said, “We have swept the hills of wild elephants at the last catch. It is only your carelessness in driving. Must I keep order along the whole line?”

“Hear him!” said the other driver. “We have swept the hills! Ho! ho! You are very wise, you plains-people. Anyone but a mud-head who never saw the jungle would know that they know that the drives are ended for the season. Therefore all the wild elephants tonight will—but why should I waste wisdom on a river-turtle?”

“What will they do?” Little Toomai called out.

“Ohé, little one. Art thou there? Well, I will tell thee, for thou hast a cool head. They will dance, and it behoves thy father, who has swept all the hills of all the elephants, to double-chain his pickets tonight.”

“What talk is this?” said Big Toomai. “For forty years, father and son, we have tended elephants, and we have never heard such moonshine about dances.”

“Yes; but a plains-man who lives in a hut knows only the four walls of his hut. Well, leave thy elephants unshackled tonight and see what comes; as for their dancing, I have seen the place where—Bapree-Bap! how many windings has the Dihang River? Here is another ford, and we must swim the calves. Stop still, you behind there.”

And in this way, talking and wrangling and splashing through the rivers, they made their first march to a sort of receiving-camp for the new elephants;but they lost their tempers long before they got there.

Then the elephants were chained by their hind legs to their big stumps of pickets, and extra ropes were fitted to the new elephants, and the fodder was piled before them, and the hill-drivers went back to Petersen Sahib through the afternoon light, telling the plains-drivers to be extra careful that night, and laughing when the plains-drivers asked the reason.

Little Toomai attended to Kala Nag's supper, and as evening fell wandered through the camp, unspeakably happy, in search of a tom-tom. When an Indian child's heart is full, he does not run about and make a noise in an irregular fashion. He sits down to a sort of revel all by himself. And Little Toomai had been spoken to by Petersen Sahib! If he had not found what he wanted, I believe he would have burst. But the sweetmeat-seller in the camp lent him a little tom-tom—a drum beaten with the flat of the hand—and he sat down, cross-legged, before Kala Nag as the stars began to come out, the tom-tom in his lap, and he thumped and he thumped and he thumped, and the more he thought of the great honour that had been done to him, the more he thumped, all alone among the elephant-fodder. There was no tune and no words, but the thumping made him happy.

The new elephants strained at their ropes, and squealed and trumpeted from time to time, and he could hear his mother in the camp hut putting his small brother to sleep with an old, old song about the great God Shiv, who once told all the animals what they should eat. It is a very soothing lullaby, and the first verse says—

Shiv, who poured the harvest and made the winds to blow,

Sitting at the doorways of a day of long ago,

Gave to each his portion, food and toil and fate,

From the King upon the guddee to the Beggar at the gate.

All things made he—Shiva the Preserver.

Mahadeo! Mahadeo! He made all—

Thorn for the camel, fodder for the kine,

And mother's heart for sleepy head, O little son of mine!

Little Toomai came in with a joyous tunk-a-tunk at the end of each verse, till he felt sleepy and stretched himself on the fodder at Kala Nag's side.

At last the elephants began to lie down one after another, as is their custom, till only Kala Nag at the right of the line was left standing up; and he rocked slowly from side to side, his ears put forward to listen to the night wind as it blew very slowly across the hills. The air was full of all the night noises that, taken together, make one big silence—the click of one bamboo-stem against the other, the rustle of something alive in the undergrowth, the scratch and squawk of a half-waked bird (birds are awake in the night much more often than we imagine), and the fall of water ever so far away. Little Toomai slept for some time, and when he waked it was brilliant moonlight, and Kala Nag was still standing up with his ears cocked. Little Toomai turned, rustling in the fodder, and watched the curve of his big back against half the stars in heaven; and while he watched he heard, so far away that it sounded no more than a pinhole of noise pricked through the stillness, the “hoot-toot” of a wild elephant.

All the elephants in the lines jumped up as if they had been shot, and their grunts at last waked the sleeping mahouts, and they came out and drove in the picket-pegs with big mallets, and tightened this rope and knotted that till all was quiet. One new elephant had nearly grubbed up his picket, and Big Toomai took off Kala Nag's leg-chain and shackled that elephant fore-foot to hind-foot, but slipped a loop of grass-string round Kala Nag's leg, and told him to remember that he was tied fast. He knew that he and his father and his grandfather had done the very same thing hundreds of times before. Kala Nag did not answer to the order by gurgling, as he usually did. He stood still, looking out across the moonlight, his head a little raised, and his ears spread like fans, up to the great folds of the Garo hills.

“Look to him if he grows restless in the night,” said Big Toomai to Little Toomai, and he went into the hut and slept. Little Toomai was just going to sleep, too, when he heard the coir string snap with a little “tang,” and Kala Nag rolled out of his pickets as slowly and as silently as a cloud rolls out of the mouth of a valley. Little Toomai pattered after him, barefooted, down the road in the moonlight, calling under his breath, “Kala Nag! Kala Nag! Take me with you, O Kala Nag!” The elephant turned without a sound, took three strides back to the boy in the moonlight, put down his trunk, swung him up to his neck, and almost before Little Toomai had settled his knees slipped into the forest.

There was one blast of furious trumpeting from the lines, and then the silence shut down on everything, and Kala Nag began to move. Sometimes a tuft of high grass washed along his sides as a wave washes along the sides of a ship, and sometimes a cluster of wild-pepper vines would scrape along his back, or a bamboo would creak where his shoulder touched it; but between those times he moved absolutely without any sound, drifting through the thick Garo forest as though it had been smoke. He was going uphill, but though Little Toomai watched the stars in the rifts of the trees, he could not tell in what direction.

Then Kala Nag reached the crest of the ascent and stopped for a minute, and Little Toomai could see the tops of the trees lying all speckled and furry under the moonlight for miles and miles, and the blue-white mist over the river in the hollow. Toomai leaned forward and looked, and he felt that the forest was awake below him—awake and alive and crowded. A big brown fruit-eating bat brushed past his ear; a porcupine's quills rattled in the thicket; and in the darkness between the tree-stems he heard a hog-bear digging hard in the moist, warm earth, and snuffing as it digged.

Then the branches closed over his head again, and Kala Nag began to go slowly down into the valley—not quietly this time, but as a runaway gun goes down a steep bank—in one rush. The huge limbs moved as steadily as pistons, eight feet to each stride, and the wrinkled skin of the elbow-points rustled. The undergrowth on either side of him ripped with a noise like torn canvas, and the saplings that he heaved away right and left with his shoulders sprang back again, and banged him on the flank, and great trails of creepers,all matted together, hung from his tusks as he threw his head from side to side and ploughed out his pathway. Then Little Toomai laid himself down close to the great neck, lest a swinging bough should sweep him to the ground, and he wished that he were back in the lines again.

The grass began to get squashy, and Kala Nag's feet sucked and squelched as he put them down, and the night mist at the bottom of the valley chilled Little Toomai. There was a splash and a trample, and the rush of running water, and Kala Nag strode through the bed of a river, feeling his way at each step. Above the noise of the water, as it swirled round the elephant's legs, Little Toomai could hear more splashing and some trumpeting both upstream and down—great grunts and angry snortings, and all the mist about him seemed to be full of rolling, wavy shadows.

“Ai!” he said, half aloud, his teeth chattering. “The elephant-folk are out tonight. It is the dance, then!”

Kala Nag swashed out of the water, blew his trunk clear, and began another climb; but this time he was not alone, and he had not to make his path. That was made already, six feet wide, in front of him, where the bent jungle-grass was trying to recover itself and stand up. Many elephants must have gone that way only a few minutes before. Little Toomai looked back, and behind him a great wild tusker, with his little pig's eyes glowing like hot coals, was just lifting himself out of the misty river. Then the trees closed up again, and they went on and up, with trumpetings and crashings, and the sound of breaking branches on every side of them.

At last Kala Nag stood still between two tree-trunks at the very top of the hill. They were part of a circle of trees that grew round an irregular space of some three or four acres, and in all that space, as Little Toomai could see, the ground had been trampled down as hard as a brick floor. Some trees grew in the center of the clearing, but their bark was rubbed away, and the white wood beneath showed all shiny and polished in the patches of moonlight. There were creepers hanging from the upper branches, and the bells of the flowers of the creepers, great waxy white things like convolvuluses, hung down fast asleep; but within the limits of the clearing there was not a single blade of green—nothing but the trampled earth.

The moonlight showed it all iron-grey, except where some elephants stood upon it, and their shadows were inky black. Little Toomai looked, holding his breath, with his eyes starting out of his head, and as he looked, more and more and more elephants swung out into the open from between the tree-trunks. Little Toomai could count only up to ten, and he counted again and again on his fingers till he lost count of the tens, and his head began to swim. Outside the clearing he could hear them crashing in the undergrowth as they worked their way up the hillside; but as soon as they were within the circle of the tree-trunks they moved like ghosts.

There were white-tusked wild males, with fallen leaves and nuts and twigs lying in the wrinkles of their necks and the folds of their ears; fat, slow-footed she-elephants, with restless little pinky-black calves only three or four feet high running under their stomachs; young elephants with their tusks just beginning to show, and very proud of them; lanky, scraggy old-maid elephants, with their hollow, anxious faces, and trunks like rough bark; savage old bull-elephants, scarred from shoulder to flank with great weals and cuts of bygone fights, and the caked dirt of their solitary mud-baths dropping from their shoulders; and there was one with a broken tusk and the marks of the full-stroke, the terrible drawing scrape, of a tiger's claws on his side.

They were standing head to head, or walking to and fro across the ground in couples, or rocking and swaying all by themselves—scores and scores of elephants.

Toomai knew that, so long as he lay still on Kala Nag's neck, nothing would happen to him; for even in the rush and scramble of a Keddah-drive a wild elephant does not reach up with his trunk and drag a man off the neck of a tame elephant; and these elephants were not thinking of men that night. Once they started and put their ears forward when they heard the chinking of a leg-iron in the forest, but it was Pudmini, Petersen Sahib's pet elephant, her chain snapped short off, grunting, snuffling up the hillside. She must have broken her pickets, and come straight from Petersen Sahib's camp; and Little Toomai saw another elephant, one that he did not know, with deep rope-galls on his back and breast. He, too, must have run away from some camp in the hills about.

At last there was no sound of any more elephants moving in the forest, and Kala Nag rolled out from his station between the trees and went into the middle of the crowd, clucking and gurgling, and all the elephants began to talk in their own tongue, and to move about.

Still lying down, Little Toomai looked down upon scores and scores of broad backs, and wagging ears, and tossing trunks, and little rolling eyes. He heard the click of tusks as they crossed other tusks by accident, and the dry rustle of trunks twined together, and the chafing of enormous sides and shoulders in the crowd, and the incessant flick and hissh of the great tails. Then a cloud came over the moon, and he sat in black darkness; but the quiet, steady hustling and pushing and gurgling went on just the same. He knew that there were elephants all round Kala Nag, and that there was no chance of backing him out of the assembly; so he set his teeth and shivered. In a Keddah at least there was torch light and shouting, but here he was all alone in the dark, and once a trunk came up and touched him on the knee.

Then an elephant trumpeted, and they all took it up for five or ten terrible seconds. The dew from the trees above spattered down like rain on the unseen backs, and a dull booming noise began, not very loud at first, and Little Toomai could not tell what it was; but it grew and grew, and Kala Nag lifted up one fore-foot and then the other, and brought them down on the ground—one-two, one-two, as steadily as trip-hammers. The elephants were stamping all together now, and it sounded like a war-drum beaten at the mouth of a cave. The dew fell from the trees till there was no more left to fall, and the booming went on, and the ground rocked and shivered, and Little Toomai put his hands up to his ears to shut out the sound. But it was all one gigantic jar that ran through him—this stamp of hundreds of heavy feet on the raw earth. Once or twice he could feel Kala Nag and all the others surge forward a few strides, and the thumping would change to the crushing sound of juicy green things being bruised, but in a minute or two the boom of feet on hard earth began again. A tree was creaking and groaning somewhere near him. He put out his arm and felt the bark, but Kala Nag moved forward, still tramping, and he could not tell where he was in the clearing. There was no sound from the elephants, except once when two or three little calves squeaked together. Then he heard a thump and a shuffle, and the booming went on. It must have lasted fully two hours, and Little Toomai ached in every nerve; but he knew by the smell of the night air that the dawn was coming.

The morning broke in one sheet of pale yellow behind the green hills, and the booming stopped with the first ray, as though the light had been an order. Before Little Toomai had got the ringing out of his head, before even he had shifted his position, there was not an elephant in sight except Kala Nag, Pudmini, and the elephant with the rope-galls, and there was neither sign nor rustle nor whisper down the hillsides to show where the others had gone.

Little Toomai stared again and again. The clearing, as he remembered it, had grown in the night. More trees stood in the middle of it, but the undergrowth and the jungle-grass at the sides had been rolled back. Little Toomai stared once more. Now he understood the trampling. The elephants had stamped out more room—had stamped the thick grass and juicy cane to trash, the trash into slivers, the slivers into tiny fibers, and the fibers into har earth.

“Wah!” said Little Toomai, and his eyes were very heavy. “Kala Nag, my lord, let us keep by Pudmini and go to Petersen Sahib's camp, or I shall drop from thy neck.”

The third elephant watched the two go away, snorted, wheeled round, and took his own path. He may have belonged to some little native king's establishment, fifty or sixty or a hundred miles away.

Two hours later, as Petersen Sahib was eating early breakfast, the elephants, who had been double-chained that night, began to trumpet, and Pudmini, mired to the shoulders, with Kala Nag, very foot-sore, shambled into the camp.

Little Toomai's face was grey and pinched, and his hair was full of leaves and drenched with dew; but he tried to salute Petersen Sahib, and cried faintly: “The dance—the elephant dance! I have seen it, and—I die!” As Kala Nag sat down, he slid off his neck in a dead faint.

But, since native children have no nerves worth speaking of, in two hours he was lying very contentedly in Petersen Sahib's hammock with Petersen Sahib's shooting-coat under his head, and a glass of warm milk, a little brandy, with a dash of quinine inside of him; and while the old hairy, scarred hunters of the jungles sat three-deep before him, looking at him as though he were a spirit, he told his tale in short words, as a child will, and wound up with—

“Now, if I lie in one word, send men to see, and they will find that the elephant-folk have trampled down more room in their dance-room, and they will find ten and ten, and many times ten, tracks leading to that dance-room.They made more room with their feet. I have seen it. Kala Nag took me, and I saw. Also Kala Nag is very leg-weary!”

Little Toomai lay back and slept all through the long afternoon and into the twilight, and while he slept Petersen Sahib and Machua Appa followed the track of the two elephants for fifteen miles across the hills. Petersen Sahib had spent eighteen years in catching elephants, and he had only once before found such a dance-place. Machua Appa had no need to look twice at the clearing to see what had been done there, or to scratch with his toe in the packed, rammed earth.

“The child speaks truth,” said he. “All this was done last night, and I have counted seventy tracks crossing the river. See, Sahib, where Pudmini's leg-iron cut the bark off that tree! Yes; she was there too.”

They looked at each other, and up and down, and they wondered; for the ways of elephants are beyond the wit of any man, black or white, to fathom.

“Forty years and five,” said Machua Appa, “have I followed my lord the elephant, but never have I heard that any child of man had seen what this child has seen. By all the Gods of the Hills, it is—what can we say?” and he shook his head.

When they got back to camp it was time for the evening meal. Petersen Sahib ate alone in his tent, but he gave orders that the camp should have two sheep and some fowls, as well as a double ration of flour and rice and salt, for he knew that there would be a feast.

Big Toomai had come up hot-foot from the camp in the plains to search for his son and his elephant, and now that he had found them he looked at them as though he were afraid of them both. And there was a feast by the blazing campfires in front of the lines of picketed elephants, and Little Toomai was the hero of it all; and the big brown elephant-catchers, the trackers and drivers and ropers, and the men who know all the secrets of breaking the wildest elephants, passed him from one to the other, and they marked his forehead with blood from the breast of a newly killed jungle-cock, to show that he was a forester, initiated and free of all the jungles.

And at last, when the flames died down, and the red light of the logs made the elephants look as though they had been dipped in blood too, Machua Appa, the head of all the drivers of all the Keddahs—Machua Appa, Petersen Sahib's other self, who had never seen a made road in forty years: Machua Appa, who was so great that he had no other name than Machua Appa—leaped to his feet, with Little Toomai held high in the air above his head, and shouted: “Listen, my brothers. Listen, too, you my lords in the lines there, for I, Machua Appa, am speaking! This little one shall no more be called Little Toomai, but Toomai of the Elephants, as his great-grandfather was called before him. What never man has seen he has seen through the long night, and the favor of the elephant-folk and of the Gods of the Jungles is with him. He shall become a great tracker; he shall become greater than I, even I—Machua Appa! He shall follow the new trail, and the stale trail, and the mixed trail, with a clear eye! He shall take no harm in the Keddah when he runs under their bellies to rope the wild tuskers; and if he slips before the feet of the charging bull-elephant, the bull-elephant shall know who he is and shall not crush him. Aihai! my lords in the chains”—he whirled up the line of pickets—“here is the little one that has seen your dances in your hidden places—the sight that never man saw! Give him honour, my lords! Salaam karo, my children! Make your salute to Toomai of the Elephants! Gunga Pershad, ahaa! Hira Guj, Birchi Guj, Kuttar Guj, ahaa! Pudmini—thou hast seen him at the dance, and thou too, Kala Nag, my pearl among elephants!—ahaa! Together! To Toomai of the Elephants. Barrao!”

And at that last wild yell the whole line flung up their trunks till the tips touched their foreheads, and broke out into the full salute, the crashing trumpet-peal that only the Viceroy of India hears—the Salaam-ut of the Keddah.

But it was all for the sake of Little Toomai, who had seen what never man had seen before—the dance of the elephants at night and alone in the heart of the Garo hills!

象倌陶迈

我要记住我从前的身份，我尝够了绳捆链锁的滋味。

　　我要记住我原有的力量，记住我在森林里的所有事情。

我不愿为一捆甘蔗把自己的脊背出卖给人类；

　　我要出去找自己的同种，找穴居的林地乡亲。

我要出去，一直待到黎明，一直待到白天——

　　出去接受清风的亲吻，净水的爱抚——

我要忘记我的脚环，扯断我的栅栏。

　　我要重访自由的玩伴，失去的情侣。

喀拉·纳格，这个名字是黑蛇的意思，作为一头大象，他已经为印度政府服役了四十七年，干遍了一头大象能干的各种活儿。他被捕时，才二十周岁，现在他接近七十岁了，一头大象到了这个岁数可以说是个老寿星了。他记得那还是在1842年的阿富汗战争前，他的前额上垫了块大皮垫，用劲儿推过深陷在泥坑里的一门大炮，那时候他劲儿还没长足呢。他的妈妈拉德哈·皮雅雷——那个和他在同一次围猎中被捉住的他亲爱的拉德哈，在他小乳牙还没脱落时，就对他说过，胆小怕事的象总是最容易受到伤害。喀拉·纳格明白这是一个好忠告，他头一次看见一个炮弹爆炸，吓得尖叫着后退到一排步枪中间，身上最柔软的部位都让刺刀扎伤了。从此，还不到二十五岁，他就不再害怕了，他也因此在为印度政府服役中成为最受人宠爱、最受人照顾的大象。他在去印度地区的行军中驮运过帐篷，那可有一千二百磅重呢。他曾被蒸汽起重机吊到一艘船上，在海里航行了好多天，到远离印度的一个陌生而多山的国家去驮运迫击炮。他还见到西奥多皇帝死在默克德拉，然后他又坐船回来了。士兵们说，他应该被授予阿比西尼亚战役勋章。十年后，在一个叫阿里·穆斯基德的地方，他看到很多伙伴死于寒冷、癫痫、饥饿和日晒。后来，他又被送到南方几千里之外的毛淡棉的储木场，拖运、堆积粗壮的柚木梁木。在那里，他差点儿杀掉一头不听从指挥、偷懒不愿干分内活儿的年轻大象。

后来，从拖运木材的活儿上退下来，他又和几十头受过训练的大象一块儿受雇，帮忙捕捉加洛山脉中的野象。印度政府对大象严格保护，有一个完整的部门什么活儿都不干，专管搜捕野象，然后训练他们，再把他们派遣到需要干活的全国各地。

喀拉·纳格站起来从地面到肩膀足有十英尺高，两根象牙被截短了，还有五英尺长。他的牙根部还被铜箍缠住固定好，防止劈裂。他用这两根残牙干过许多活儿，那些没有受训过的野象们用真正的尖牙干的活儿都不如他多。

通常，经过一个又一个星期小心翼翼地驱赶，分散的野象们被赶过一座座山头，其中的四五十头庞然大物被赶进了最后一道围栏。随后树干扎成的大吊门突然在他们身后放了下来。一声令下后，喀拉·纳格会冲进火光冲天的混战中。一头头野象怒气冲冲，吼声震天（这往往是在夜里，火把闪烁摇晃，野象无法辨别远近）。喀拉·纳格会瞅准这群暴徒中个头最大、野性最凶的公象，不断撞击猛打，迫使他安静下来。这时，骑在其他象背上的人们会用绳索绑住个头较小的大象。

喀拉·纳格，这头上了年纪，叫作黑蛇的聪明的大象，对战术无所不知。他一生中曾经好几次勇敢地面对受伤老虎的攻击。他为了避免自己受到伤害，卷起柔软的长鼻，然后头像挥舞镰刀那样迅速一甩，腾空而起的猛兽就会被撞到半空中。这可都是他无师自通的本事。撞翻老虎后，他又弯下自己粗壮的膝盖，压住老虎不放，直到老虎气喘吁吁，声嘶力竭，最后咽了气。这时，瘫在地上的只不过是让喀拉·纳格拖着尾巴拉走的带条纹的毛茸茸的东西。

“不错，”喀拉·纳格的象倌大陶迈，也就是曾经带着喀拉·纳格去阿比西尼亚的黑陶迈的儿子，亲眼看到喀拉·纳格被捉的象倌陶迈的孙子，说道，“黑蛇在世界上除我以外谁都不怕。他经历了我们一家三代的看护饲养，他会活到看到我们家的第四代继续饲养他呢。”

“他也怕我。”小陶迈说。他站直才四英尺高，身上只披了一块破布。他只有十岁，是大陶迈的大儿子。按照风俗，他长大后会接替爸爸的位置，骑在喀拉·纳格的脖子上，掌管沉甸甸的安库斯，也就是驯象刺棒。那可是根被他的祖爷爷、爷爷和爸爸磨得滑溜溜的铁刺棒。他知道他可没有说大话，因为他是在喀拉·纳格的身影下出生的，还没学会走路就玩弄象鼻尖儿了，刚会走路就带着喀拉·纳格下水了。自从大陶迈把这个棕色皮肤的小娃娃带到喀拉·纳格的长牙下，叫他招呼他未来的主人的那天，喀拉·纳格做梦都没想过会不服从这个小家伙尖声尖气的命令，更不会想到要杀死他了。

“对极了。”小陶迈说，“他怕我。”他大步走到喀拉·纳格面前，管他叫老肥猪，命令他一条一条地轮换着抬腿。

“哇，你真是头大象，”他摇着毛茸茸的脑袋，学着爸爸的话。“政府会为你们大象花钱，不过你们真正的主人可是我们驭象人。喀拉·纳格，你老了以后，一些有钱的王公就会因为你个头大，守规矩，从政府那儿买下你的。到那时你就不用干活儿了，只是耳朵上挂着金耳环，背上驮着金象轿，身上披着镶金大红布，走在国王仪仗队的前头。我就骑在你的脖子上，哦，喀拉·纳格，握着银制的象刺棒。一些人会跑在我们前面开路，拿着金手杖大声喊：‘给国王的大象开道！’那真会是件美滋滋的事儿。喀拉·纳格，不过这都比不上在丛林中围猎呀。”

“哼！”大陶迈说，“你真是小孩子，还和野生仔一样野，在山林里跑上跑下可不是政府里吃香的差事。我可是越来越老了，不喜欢野象。给我砖砌的象栏，一个象厩关一头大象，再给我大木桩子把他们牢牢拴住，并让我在平整的大路上训练他们，不像现在这样来来回回地到处野营。哈，坎普尔营地就不错，附近还有个集市，一天只干三个钟头的活儿。”

小陶迈想起坎普尔的象栏，就不吱声了。他更喜欢这种野营的日子，恨透了宽敞平坦的大路，因为要么就是整天给储备场挖草储存饲料，要么就是一连好几个钟头都无所事事，光瞅着拴在象桩上烦躁不安的喀拉·纳格。

小陶迈喜欢爬只有大象能走的小道；喜欢那深入谷底的斜坡；喜欢瞥见数英里外若隐若现的野象群低头吃草；喜欢看见受惊吓的野猪和孔雀在喀拉·纳格脚下仓皇乱跑；喜欢看眯眼的暖雨，那时候满山满谷烟雾迷蒙；喜欢那雾气朦胧的清晨，那时候没有人知道今晚在哪儿宿营；喜欢稳扎稳打、小心翼翼地驱赶野象，赶到最后一夜，野象们像山崩时的巨石，以势不可当之势涌进围场后，发现无路可走，便猛撞沉重的大柱子，却又被呐喊声、闪烁的火把和齐射的长枪空鸣声逼得退了回去，好一幅狂奔疯跑、火光冲天、吼声震地的混乱景象。

这种时候一个小孩都会派上用场，更不用说能够以一顶三的小陶迈了。他举着火炬，拼命挥舞，使出吃奶的劲儿大声叫喊。不过，只有开始捕捉大象时，真正激动人心的时刻才会来。那时，窠达——也就是捕象围场——看起来就像是世界末日。人们连自己说话也无法听清，只能相互打手势。小陶迈爬到一根晃晃悠悠的围栏柱子的顶端，他那被太阳晒得褪了色的棕发散披在肩上，在火把的照耀下，他看上去就像个精灵。只要有稍许的安静，你就能听到他对喀拉·纳格的尖叫鼓劲，声音盖过了号角声、撞击声、绳子噼啪噼啪的响声和被捆绑的野象发出的呻吟声。“迈而，迈而，喀拉·纳格！（冲啊，冲啊，黑蛇！）丹特嘟！（用象牙顶！）索马洛！索马洛！（小心！小心！）马若！马若！（撞他！撞他！）小心柱子！啊！啊！嗨！哟！呀哈！”他就这样高声叫喊着。喀拉·纳格和野象爆发了一场恶战，从围场这头打到那头，又从那头打到这头，打得不分高下。老捕象人一把擦掉流进眼睛里的汗水，抽空儿向在柱子顶上高兴得直扭身子的小陶迈点点头。

小陶迈可不光在柱子上扭扭身子。一天晚上，一个赶象人试图抓住一头乱蹬乱踢的小象的腿（小象崽常常比成年大象更难对付），没想到绳头掉到了地上。小陶迈滑下柱子，溜进了象群，把松掉的绳头扔给了那个赶象人。喀拉·纳格看到他，用鼻子把他卷起来，递给了大陶迈。大陶迈当场给了小陶迈一记耳光，然后把他放回到围场柱上。

第二天早晨，他把小陶迈训了一顿：“你这没用的小子，待在砖砌的象栏里有什么不好，难道运送帐篷不是一件好差事？你就非得自作主张捕大象？那些愚蠢的捕象人，工钱拿得比我少，现在可好，他们把这件事向彼特森老爷说了。”小陶迈吓坏了，尽管他对白人几乎一无所知，但在他眼里，彼特森老爷可是世界上最伟大的白人，他是所有捕象围场行动计划的头儿——一个为印度政府捕捉所有大象的人，一个世界上最了解大象生活习惯的人。

“那——那会有什么事？”小陶迈问。

“有什么事！最倒霉的事都会发生。彼特森老爷是个疯子。要不他为什么去捉这些野魔鬼？他说不定要你去当一个捕象人，热病流行的丛林就是你睡觉的地方，最后的下场就是被活活踩死在捕象围场。但愿这次胡闹最后能平安无事。下星期，捕猎结束，我们这些来自平原的人会回到我们自己的基地。我们会走在平平整整的大路上，把这次围猎忘得一干二净。不过，儿子，我生气的是你不应该搅和到这种下贱的阿萨姆丛林佬干的事情当中。喀拉·纳格只听我的命令，我不得不和他一块儿去捕猎围场。不过他是一头战象，用不着帮他们捆绑野象。我悠闲自在地坐着，这才符合看象人的身份，看象人——不是一个单纯的捕象人，我说，那可是退休后能领取养老金的人。象倌陶迈的家族岂能在肮脏的围场上让野象踩在脚下？你这个坏家伙！调皮鬼！没用的仔！去把喀拉·纳格洗洗干净，小心他的耳朵，看看他脚上有没有刺。要不彼特森老爷一定会把你抓住，让你去做野蛮的捕象人——一个跟踪大象脚印的家伙，一个丛林熊。呸！丢人！滚吧！”

小陶迈一言不发，走了出去，可是他在察看喀拉·纳格的脚掌时，把自己所有的委屈都讲给喀拉·纳格听了。“没有关系，”他翻起喀拉·纳格巨大的右耳垂说，“他们向彼特森老爷告了我的状，说不定——说不定——说不定——谁知道呢？嘿！我拔出了一根大刺呢！”

接下来的几天时间都花在赶拢野象上了，把新捕获的野象在一对驯象中间来来回回地遛，以免这些野象在下山去平原的途中惹出很多乱子。这几天还被用来清查毯子、绳索和一些在森林中损坏或丢失的物件。

彼特森老爷骑着他那头聪明的母象普得密妮来了。捕象的季节接近尾声，他已经结清了山里其他营地的薪水。一个当地办事员坐在树下的一张桌子旁边，给赶象人付工钱。每个人拿到钱后，回到自己的大象旁，加入了即将起程的一行人中。捕手、猎手、敲山震象的猎人助手，这些都是围场的正规队员，一年到头待在丛林中，现在他们有的坐在大象背上，这些大象都属于彼特森老爷的常备部队。有的抱着枪，靠着树站着，拿要动身的赶象人开涮。一看到新捕的野象冲破界线，到处乱跑，他们就哈哈大笑。

大陶迈走到办事员跟前，小陶迈跟在后面。捕头马楚阿·阿帕低声对他的朋友说：“来的倒是一块捕象的好材料，把丛林鸡送到平原上煺毛真可惜。”

彼特森老爷可有耳听八方的本事，一个人只有这样才能倾听生灵中最不声不响的动物——野象的动静。一直躺在普得密妮背上的他这时转过了头，说：“你在说谁？我不知道平原上的赶象人中谁有本事能捆住一头死象呢。”

“那不是个大人，是个男娃。上次赶象时，他进入围场，把绳子扔给了巴茅。当时我们正拼命把那头肩上有块记的象崽子从他妈妈那儿拉开。”

马楚阿·阿帕指了指小陶迈，彼特森老爷定睛细看，小陶迈鞠了一个躬。

“他扔的绳子？他个子比木桩钉还小。小家伙，你叫什么名字？”彼特森老爷问。

小陶迈吓得说不出话来，不过喀拉·纳格在他后面，陶迈做了个手势，喀拉·纳格把他卷到鼻子上，举到和普得密妮前额齐平，送到了高贵的彼特森老爷面前。小陶迈双手捂住脸，毕竟他只是个孩子，除了谈象，他和其他孩子一样腼腆。

“噢嗬！”彼特森老爷笑着说，但笑容被胡子遮掩住了，“你为什么教你的大象玩这种鬼把戏？是不是帮你偷屋顶上揪掉穗子往干晒的青玉米？”

“穷人的保护者，不是青玉米——是甜瓜。”小陶迈说。坐着的人都哄堂大笑起来，他们中的大多数小时候都教大象玩过这种把戏。小陶迈被举到八英尺高的空中。可他恨不得钻到八英尺深的洞里去呢。

“老爷，他叫陶迈，是我儿子。”大陶迈愁眉苦脸地说，“老爷，他是个坏孩子，将来是蹲大牢的下场。”

“这可不一定，”彼特森老爷说，“一个在他这个年龄就敢面对整个捕象围场的孩子，是不会有蹲大牢的下场的。看，小家伙，这是四安那，给你买糖吃，因为在你浓密的头发下有一颗聪明的小脑袋。说不定到时候你也会成为一名猎人。”大陶迈愁容更深了。“但是要记住，围场可不是小孩闹着玩的地方。”彼特森老爷接着说道。

“老爷，我永远不能去那儿吗？”小陶迈喘了一口大气说。

“对。”彼得森老爷又笑了，“等你看到大象跳舞的时候，才可以去。你如果看到大象跳舞，就来找我，我会让你到所有的围场去的。”

又是一阵哄堂大笑，因为这是流传在捕象人中间的一个老掉牙的笑话，就是不可能发生的意思。在丛林深处隐藏着大块大块空旷的平地，被称之为大象的跳舞场。即使有人偶然发现过这样的空地，但从来没有人看到过大象跳舞。当一个赶象人吹嘘他的技术和胆识时，其他赶象人就会说：“你什么时候见过大象跳舞呢？”

喀拉·纳格把小陶迈放下来，他又鞠了一个大躬，就和爸爸离开了。他把四安那交给了正在给小弟弟喂奶的妈妈。四个人骑到喀拉·纳格的背上，一溜尖叫着、咕哝着的大象沿着山道滚滚而下，冲向平原。因为有新添的野象，这一路倒是热闹得很，他们每到要过河的地方总要捣捣乱，时时需要哄一哄他们，或者揍他们一顿。

大陶迈生气极了，恶狠狠地用刺棒戳着喀拉·纳格。小陶迈却高兴得说不出话来，彼特森老爷已经注意到他了，给过他赏钱。他觉得自己就像一个士兵被叫出队列，受到司令的夸奖一样。

“彼特森老爷说的大象跳舞是什么意思呀？”终于，他忍不住了，怪声问起了妈妈。

大陶迈听到了，咕咕哝哝地答道：“你永远也当不了追捕野象的山地野牛。他就是这个意思。喂，你，前面的，什么东西挡住了去路？”

一个在两三头大象前面的阿萨姆赶象人转过身，气鼓鼓地嚷道：“把喀拉·纳格带上来，教训教训我这头小象，让他安分点儿。干吗彼特森老爷偏偏选中我和你们这群稻田里的蠢驴一起下山？陶迈，把你的畜生赶过来，让他用长牙戳这头小象。凭山里的众神起誓，这些新捕来的野象全都中了邪，要不他们肯定闻到丛林中同伴的气味了。”

喀拉·纳格撞了撞那头象的肋骨，杀掉了他的威风。大陶迈说：“我们最后一次围捕把野象出没的山林来了一次大扫荡。只怪你赶象不小心。难道一路都要我来维持整个队伍的秩序吗？”

“听他说的！”另一个赶象人说话了，“是我们扫荡了整个山林！嗬！嗬！你可真聪明，平原人。除了从未见过森林，脑袋里一团泥浆的家伙，所有人都清楚，野象们知道围猎的季节结束了，所以今晚所有的野象都要——我干吗要在一只土鳖身上费脑筋呢？”

“他们要干吗？”小陶迈喊道。

“哦呵，小子，你在哪儿？好吧，看你头脑冷静，我告诉你，他们要跳舞。你那扫荡了所有山林里的所有野象的爸爸，今晚就应该给桩子加上双链了。”

“这是什么话？”大陶迈说，“我们父子照看大象四十年啦，压根儿就没听过大象跳舞，简直是一派胡言。”

“倒也是，住在棚屋里的平原人，除了他屋子里的四面墙，其余啥都不懂。好吧，今晚把大象的链子松开，看会有什么情况。说到大象跳舞，我可见过那个地方——巴布瑞巴布！迪杭河到底有多少道弯？又是个浅水河滩。我们得让象崽子游过去。等等，你排在后面。”

就这样，他们又说又吵，哗啦哗啦蹚过了一条又一条河，进行着头一段跋涉，要到一个接待新象的营地去。不过还没有到那儿，大象们早就发脾气了。

大象们的后腿都被链子绑住，拴在了大木桩上，新捕的大象多绑了几道绳索，他们前面还堆放了饲料。山地的赶象人要顶着下午的阳光回到彼特森老爷那儿去，交代平原赶象人那晚要格外小心，平原人问为什么，他们却大笑了一通。

小陶迈照料喀拉·纳格吃了晚饭，夜幕降临的时候，他心里有说不出的高兴，便在营地里到处转悠，想找一面手鼓。当一个印度小孩心潮澎湃时，他是不会到处乱跑，胡喊乱闹的，他会坐下来，一个人偷着乐。彼特森老爷跟小陶迈说话了！他要是找不到自己想要的东西，我相信他会急出病来的。幸亏营地里卖糖果的人借给他一面小手鼓——一种用手掌拍击的鼓——他在喀拉·纳格跟前盘腿坐下来，那时星星开始出来了，他自个儿坐在大象饲料堆里，把手鼓放在腿上，拍了起来。他拍呀，拍呀，想到他获得的荣耀，他拍得更带劲儿了。尽管没有调子，也没有歌词，光是这样拍拍打打，就让他无比开心啦。

新捕获的大象死命地拽着拴他们的绳子，时不时发出阵阵尖叫和怒吼。小陶迈可以听见妈妈在营棚里哄着弟弟睡觉，哼着一首古老的歌谣。那首歌是歌颂伟大的湿婆神的，她告诉世上生灵应该吃什么。那是一首非常甜美的摇篮曲，它的第一节是这样唱的：

湿婆神让丰收滚滚地来，让清风习习地刮，

他在很久很久以前的一天的门口坐下，

个个有份，他把食物、辛苦和命运分发给大家，

从宝座上的国王到大门口的乞丐，一个也不落。

万事万物他造下——保护大神湿婆啊。

主神啊，主神！万事万物他造下——

把荆棘给骆驼，把草料给牛马，

把妈妈的爱心交给熟睡的脑袋瓜，我的宝贝儿子呀！

小陶迈欢快地和着曲子，在每一节的结尾都咚——咚拍两下，拍到后面，上下眼皮开始打架了，他就在喀拉·纳格的饲料堆上伸展身子躺下了。

最后大象们一头接一头躺下了，他们的习惯就是这样，象栏右边的喀拉·纳格却依然站着。他慢悠悠地左右晃动着，耳朵向前伸，倾听着习习的晚风翻山越岭。夜里的种种声响弥漫在空气中，集中起来却组成一片巨大的寂静——竹节互相碰撞的咔嗒声，丛林下层什么生物的沙沙声，一只半睡半醒的鸟儿的咯咯声（鸟儿在夜间惊醒的次数常常超过我们的想象），还有远处的落水声。小陶迈睡了一会儿，醒来时，月光皎洁。喀拉·纳格还在那儿站着，耳朵竖着。小陶迈在草堆上窸窸窣窣地翻了个身，瞅着喀拉·纳格那遮住半个星空的弯弯的阔背。就在这时，他听到远处一头野象发出的呼噜声，那声音是那么的遥远，听上去只不过是在一片寂静上扎了一个噪声的针孔。

营里的大象们，就像挨了一枪似的，全都跳了起来。他们的呼噜声终于吵醒了熟睡的看象人。他们跑出来，用大木槌把象柱钉牢，把这根绳子绑紧，把那根绳子的结打实，一直等到一切都安静下来。一头刚捕的大象差点儿拔出拴住他的象栏，大陶迈赶紧卸下喀拉·纳格的腿链，把那头大象的后脚拴到一起，只用草绳在喀拉·纳格的一条腿上绕了一圈，还告诫喀拉·纳格要记住他已经被拴得牢牢实实了。他知道他爷爷、他爸爸和他自己把这样的事情已经干过几百次了。喀拉·纳格没有像往常那样，咯咯地回答这个命令，而是静静地站着，耳朵张得像大蒲扇。透过月光，他的头微微抬起，眺望着远处重重叠叠的加洛山脉。

“要是他夜里不安稳，看好他。”大陶迈对小陶迈交代完，就回棚子里睡觉去了。小陶迈也正要睡，突然听到草绳叭的一声绷断了。就像云从河谷口涌出一样，喀拉·纳格慢慢地、悄无声息地从象桩间走出来。小陶迈光着脚，吧嗒吧嗒跟在后面，踏着月光走到路上，屏住气喊道：“喀拉·纳格！喀拉·纳格！噢，带上我，喀拉·纳格！”大象不出一声，转过身，跨了三个大步回到月光下的男孩身旁，放下鼻子，把他卷到脖子上，几乎不等小陶迈把双膝夹紧，就溜进了森林。

从象营里传来一阵狂怒的吼叫声，接着万籁俱寂，喀拉·纳格开始往前走。有时，一簇高草拍打他的侧腹，就像一个波浪拍打船帮一样；有时，一串胡椒藤擦过他的背；有时，一根竹子碰到他的肩膀，咯吱一声。除了这些声音，他向前移动时，绝对不发出一丝响动，好像茂密的加洛森林是一片烟雾，他从中飘游而过似的。喀拉·纳格一直朝山坡上走，虽然小陶迈透过树缝儿瞅着星星，他却辨别不出走的方向。

随后，喀拉·纳格到达了坡顶，稍作休息。小陶迈看到月光下的树冠斑斑点点，茸茸地铺展开好多好多英里，看见山谷里河面上罩着灰蓝的薄雾，小陶迈探身细看，他感到下面的森林醒着——醒着，活着，拥挤涌动着。一只吃野果的棕色大蝙蝠从他耳边掠过，豪猪的硬刺在灌木丛中发出咔嗒咔嗒的声响，他还听到在树干之间的暗处，一只野猪在使劲儿拱着温暖潮湿的泥土，一边拱，鼻子一边呼哧。

然后，头顶上的树枝又密集起来，喀拉·纳格开始朝下往河谷冲去——这回他不再是静悄悄的，而是像失去控制的大炮，一口气冲到了陡峭的岸旁。他粗大的四肢移动起来如同活塞一般稳扎稳打，一步跨八英尺，肘关节的皱皮沙沙作响。他两旁的矮树丛被划开了，发出撕裂帆布似的声音。他的肩膀左顶右扛，受撞后倒向两旁的小树苗又反弹回来，重重地打在他身体的两侧。他的头东甩西摆向前开路，一串串蔓草缠结成一团，吊在他的长牙上。小陶迈低下身子，紧紧贴着喀拉·纳格的粗脖子，生怕摇摇晃晃的树枝把他扫落到地上。这时他恨不得再次回到营地去。

野草开始变得又湿又软，喀拉·纳格的脚踩下去发出咂吧咂吧的响声。谷底的夜雾让小陶迈感到寒气逼人。流水潺潺，哗啦一声溅泼，扑通一下踩踏，喀拉·纳格迈着大步蹚过一条河的河床，每一步都谨慎小心。水绕着喀拉·纳格的腿打旋，激起哗哗一片水声，小陶迈却还能听到从上下游传来的更多的哗啦哗啦的溅水声和一些吼叫声——巨大的呼噜声和愤怒的喷鼻声，他觉得周围的薄雾里尽是滚动起伏的影子。

“啊！”他牙关磕得咯咯地响，差点儿大叫出声来。“象民们今晚都出动了。看来，他们是去跳舞的！”

喀拉·纳格从河里哗啦啦冲出来，喷干净鼻子里的水，又开始往上攀登。但这次他不是独自一个，也用不着自己开路。路早就在那儿，有六英尺宽，前面弯下去的丛林野草正努力重新挺直。几分钟前肯定有很多大象才从这条路上经过。小陶迈回头一看，身后有一头大象，他刚从夜雾笼罩的河里登上岸，一对小猪眼睛炯炯发光，就像烧红的煤球。接着，树木又密集起来。他们继续往前向上爬，吼叫声、撞击声、树枝折断的声音，一直从四面八方传来。

终于，喀拉·纳格在山顶上停了下来，一动不动地站到了两棵大树干中间。这两棵树和其他的树长成一个圆圈，围绕着三四英亩不规则的空地。小陶迈看到整个空地已经被踩踏得结结实实，像砖地一样硬了。空地中心还留着几棵树，不过树皮已经被剥去了，下面白花花的木头在斑驳的月光下显得更加光滑闪亮。藤蔓从高高的树枝上吊下来，还有铃铛似的藤蔓花，蜡白色的像牵牛花这样的大花儿吊下来，睡意沉沉。整个空地内，没有一片绿叶——仅仅剩下被踩实的泥土。

月光把一切都照成了铁灰色，除了一些大象站立的地方，他们的影子漆黑漆黑的。小陶迈屏息凝视，眼珠子都要迸出来了。就在那时，越来越多、越来越多的大象从一根根树干中间大摇大摆地走出来，走进空地。小陶迈只会数到十，他掰着手指头，数了一遍又一遍，最后自己都记不得数了多少个十，数得头都开始发晕了。小陶迈可以听到空地外面，大象们开路上山时下层灌木丛中发出的噼里啪啦的响声，不过他们一踏进这个树围成的圈子，他们的行动就像幽灵一样了。

那里有长着白牙的公象，脖子的皱褶里、耳朵的褶层里夹着落叶、坚果和细枝；有胖嘟嘟的、慢吞吞的母象，带着吵吵闹闹的小象崽子，他们的皮肤黑里透红，只有三四英尺高，在妈妈的肚子底下跑来跑去；有年轻的大象，得意扬扬地炫耀自己刚长出来的象牙；有瘦骨嶙峋的老母象，焦虑挂在深陷下去的脸上，鼻子粗糙得像老树皮；有野蛮的老公象，从肩膀到侧腹疤痕累累，都是昔日战斗的印记，他们单独泥浴后结成的干泥块从肩上掉下来；还有一头大象，只剩下一根断牙，身子一侧从前到后有一条一条的划痕，那是一只老虎的爪子死命抠出来的。

他们有的头对头站着，有的成双成对在空地上来回走动，有的自个儿摇来摆去——成十成百头大象呢。

小陶迈知道，只要他静静地趴在喀拉·纳格的脖子上，就不会出什么事，因为即便是在赶入围场的争抢奔涌中，一头野象也不会伸出鼻子，把一个人从驯象的脖子上拽下来，何况这个夜晚，这些象根本就没有想到人。只有一次，他们受到惊吓，把耳朵伸向前面，因为当时他们听到森林里有一条腿链在叮当作响。原来彼特森老爷的爱象普得密妮拖着挣断的锁链，呼噜呼噜、哼哧哼哧爬上山来。她一定是扯断了象桩，从彼特森老爷的营地直奔过来的。小陶迈看到还来了一头大象，他的背上和胸部带有深深的绳子勒痕。小陶迈不认识他，他也准是从周围山林里某个营地跑过来的。

终于，森林里听不到大象走动的声音了。喀拉·纳格左摇右晃地离开了他两棵树之间的位置，加入到象群中来。咯咯咕咕、咯咯咕咕，大象们开始用自己的语言交谈，并开始走来走去。小陶迈仍旧趴着，他看到下面有成千成百宽阔的背，摆动着的耳朵，甩动着的鼻子，还有骨碌碌转动着的小眼睛。他听到象牙和象牙偶然相撞时发出的咔嚓声，象鼻子缠在一块儿的干涩的沙沙声，象群庞大的身躯和肩头相互的摩擦声，还有大尾巴甩来甩去的啪啪声。这时一朵云彩遮住了月亮，小陶迈在一片漆黑里坐着，不过平和稳定的推推搡搡和咯咯咕咕的交谈仍在继续。小陶迈知道喀拉·纳格周围全是大象，他根本没机会退出会场。他咬紧牙关，浑身打战。围场里至少还有火把和呐喊，可这儿只有他孤零零一人待在黑暗中。有一次一条长鼻子甩过来，居然碰到他的膝盖上。

这时，一头大象吼起来，于是一呼百应，持续了五到十秒钟，恐怖极了。树上的露水像雨点一样滴滴答答落下来，打在那些看不见的背上。随后传来一阵沉闷的轰隆声。起初声音不大，小陶迈辨别不出是什么声响。随后，声音越来越响，喀拉·纳格抬起一只前脚，紧跟着抬起另一只，然后让他们着地——一二，一二，像杵槌一样节奏均匀。这会儿大象们一起跺起了脚，听起来就像在山洞口擂响了战鼓。露水从树上淅淅沥沥洒下来，直到一滴都不剩为止。隆隆声仍在继续，震得山摇地动，小陶迈用手捂住耳朵，想遮住声音。但剧烈的震动穿过了他的全身，那可是数百只重脚跺在糙地上的巨响。有一两次，他觉得喀拉·纳格和其他所有的大象向前冲了好几大步，沉重的跺脚声变成了一种多汁的绿东西被碾碎时发出的压榨声，不过一会儿，似乎他们的脚又踏在了坚硬的地面上，隆隆的声音再次响起来。有棵树就在他附近的什么地方嘎吱嘎吱的响，他伸出臂膀，摸着了树皮，不过喀拉·纳格仍在重重地踏着步子，往前走，小陶迈辨不清自己到底在空地的哪个地方。除了有一次，两三头小象崽齐声尖叫外，大象们没有发出一丝声音。接着，他又听到了跺脚滑步声，隆隆的声音一直没有停下来。这声音足足持续了两个多小时，小陶迈的每一根神经都生疼生疼的，不过他根据夜气的味道知道天就要亮了。

绿葱葱的山林后面露出一片淡黄色，破晓了。随着第一缕光线射出来，隆隆声戛然而止，仿佛那束光就是命令。小陶迈的脑袋里还萦绕着嗡嗡的响声，他连个姿势都没有换，周围一头大象都不见了，只剩下喀拉·纳格、普得密妮和那头身上有绳子勒痕的大象。没有一点儿迹象，没有一丝沙沙声，没有一句低语声显示其他象到什么地方去了。

小陶迈瞧了又瞧，凭他的记忆，空地好像一夜之间变大了，中心好像多了好几棵树，边上的野草和矮灌木丛都被踩倒了。小陶迈又仔细打量了一番，他现在明白这种踩踏的底细了。大象踩出了更多空地——他们把浓密的野草和多汁的梗秆踩压成碎片，再把碎片踏成碎屑，把碎屑踩成纤维，最后把纤维踩成了硬地。

“哇！”小陶迈叫道，他的眼皮已经沉沉的了，“喀拉·纳格，我的爷，我们和普得密妮一块儿去彼特森老爷的营地吧。要不我准会从你的脖子上掉下来。”

另一头大象瞅着这两头象走了，呼哧呼哧喷了两声鼻息，一转身，自顾自走了。他多半是某个小土邦主家的大象，离这儿有五六十或一百英里远。

两个钟头以后，彼特森老爷吃着早饭，那些头一天夜里用双链拴住的大象们吼了起来，满身污泥的普得密妮，和一瘸一拐的喀拉·纳格摇摇晃晃地走进营地。

小陶迈脸色灰白，蔫头耷脑，头发被露水浸透，里面尽是树叶，但他还是强打精神向彼特森老爷行礼，有气无力地喊道：“跳舞——大象跳舞！我见到了，我——要死了！”喀拉·纳格蹲了下来，小陶迈从象脖子上滑下来，昏死过去了。

不过，当地的孩子可没有什么值得一提的神经质的毛病，所以不到两个钟头，小陶迈已经志得意满地躺在彼特森老爷的吊床上，脑袋枕着彼特森老爷的猎装，一杯热牛奶，一点儿白兰地，外加一点点奎宁已经下了肚，在他面前坐了三层毛烘烘的疤痕累累的丛林老猎人，他们一个个目不转睛地盯着他，仿佛他是个精灵似的。他毕竟是个小孩子，三言两语就把故事讲完了，最后他说：

“要是我说了一句谎话，你们就叫人去看好啦。他们会发现大象们把他们的舞场踩得更大了。他们会看到十条、又十条，好多个十条的小路，条条都通往那个舞场。大象们用脚把那个地方踩大了。我亲眼看见的。是喀拉·纳格带我去的，所以我看见了。喀拉·纳格的腿都累得走不动了！”

小陶迈往后一躺，睡了整整一个下午，一直睡到黄昏，他睡觉的时候，彼特森老爷和马楚阿·阿帕循着两头大象的足迹，翻山越岭，走了十五英里。彼特森老爷捕了十八年的象，以前这样的舞场只见过一次。马楚阿·阿帕用不着把空地多看两眼，也不必用脚指头刮擦挤压那夯实的泥土，就清楚发生过什么事了。

“孩子说的是实话，”他说，“这都是昨晚干的。我数了数，有七十条小路穿过了河。看，老爷，普得密妮的腿链还在那棵树皮上划了个口子！对，她也到这儿来过。”

他们相互看了看，又上上下下查看了一番，心里都挺纳闷儿。大象的行为方式是任何人，无论是黑人还是白人，都无法参透的。

“四十五年来，”马楚阿·阿帕说，“我跟随我的象爷们，却从没听说过哪个人的孩子见过这个孩子见到的事情。凭众山神起誓，这是——我们说什么好呢？”说罢便摇了摇头。

他们回到营地时，已经该吃晚饭了。彼特森老爷自个儿在帐篷里吃了，可是他下命令营地不仅给双份的面粉、米饭和盐，而且还要宰两只羊，几只家禽，因为他知道要举办一次宴会。

大陶迈急匆匆地从平原营地赶来找儿子和大象，现在他找到了，便瞅着自己的儿子和大象，好像害怕他们似的。在一排排拴住的大象的面前，篝火熊熊燃烧，宴会已经开始了，小陶迈就是宴会的主角。那些身材魁梧、皮肤棕黑的捕象人、搜象人、赶象人、套索人，以及那些通晓制服最凶猛的野象的诀窍的人，一个接一个从他面前经过，每一个人都在他的额头上点上一滴刚宰的丛林鸡胸部流出的血。这表示他已经是一个丛林人，被丛林接纳了，可以自由出入丛林的任何一个角落。

最后火焰渐渐熄灭，圆木的红光使大象们看上去好像也沾上了鲜血，马楚阿·阿帕，所有捕象围场所有赶象人的头头——马楚阿·阿帕，彼特森老爷的化身，这个四十多年来从没见过人修的路的马楚阿·阿帕，这个行不改名、坐不改姓的大名鼎鼎的马楚阿·阿帕——跳了起来，把小陶迈高高举过头顶，大声喊道：“听着，兄弟们，听着，营地里我的爷儿们，我，马楚阿·阿帕，有话要说！从今往后，这个小孩不再叫小陶迈，而要叫象倌陶迈了，以前他的祖爷爷就是被这样称呼的。从没有人看到过的事，他看到了，而且看了整整一个晚上。象群宠爱他，丛林众神宠爱他，他必将成为一名了不起的搜象人。他会比我，马楚阿·阿帕，更了不起！他会分辨新足迹、旧足迹、新旧混杂的足迹，凭着他明亮的眼睛！他冲到围场里，在野象的肚子底下捆绑野公象也不会受到伤害。就是他滑到在横冲直撞的公象脚前，公象也知道他是谁，不去踩他。哎嗨！拴在链子上的我的爷儿们，”他忽地一下转向那一溜儿象桩，“就是这个小孩见过你们在隐蔽的地方跳舞——这种场面还没有人见过呢！向他致敬，我的爷儿们！平安吉祥，我的孩子们。向象倌陶迈致敬！贡加·佩夏德，欢呼！希拉·古吉、伯奇·古吉、库塔·古吉、欢呼！你，普得密妮，在跳舞的地方见过他，还有你，喀拉·纳格，象群中的明珠！——欢呼吧！一起欢呼！向象倌陶迈致敬！”

听到那最后一声狂野的呼叫，整个象群都把长鼻子卷起来，直到鼻尖触到额头，突行大礼——山崩地裂般的悠长的吼叫，这种捕象围场的致敬，只有印度总督才听到过。

而这一切都是为了小陶迈，他看到了以前从来没有人看到过的场面——象群夜里独自在加洛山脉的心脏跳舞！