Elephant on a unicycle with birds on the ribs

The elephant was called Bessamy, and she belonged to Harrow's Travelling Marvels, which had wintered at the Coldharbour Inn when the Gallow pass shut behind them. Each morning the manager made her ride a great iron-wheeled cycle across the flagstones of the yard, because he said a beast that sulked was a beast that didn't sell tickets. Only Jem Furrow, the stable boy, saw her lift her trunk and look up at the sky while she pedalled.

Jem made her a bundle of black paper birds, the kind the children folded at the kitchen table, and tied one to each ear and one to the curl of her tail. When the wind came down off the tops, the birds tugged at their strings, and the strings tugged at her, and each day she rose a little further off the cobbles. The landlady counted the cracks in the ceiling and said nothing, because the ceiling was not the thing going up.

On the last night of the storm the pass cleared, and the whole household ran into the yard in their nightshirts to see the stars. Bessamy pedalled once, twice, and the wheel lifted clear of the snow with the banner blazing its one word across the spokes. Jem let go of the last string. Come morning the yard was empty but for a single track in the snow, a wheel's width wide, leading straight up into the dark.