This story revolves around the idioms " elephant in the room" and " white elephant". Jig repeatedly brings up the topic of how the hills looked like white elephants. This was her way of subtly asking the american man about what they were going to do about the fact that Jig was carrying his child. The american man tries his best to ignore the silent pleas because not only does he not want to face the issue but also because the child itself was a white elephant or an unwanted gift. Perhaps it was because he did not want to disturb the superficial, lighthearted, and free flowing nature of their relationship. The phrase in the story, from all the hotels where they had spent the night." implies that the couple had no plans of pursuing a stable relationship. Additionally, love was never mentioned between the couple in the story. In the end it was unclear whether the couple kept the child or proceeded to go through the process of abortion.
This story made excellent use of the figures of speech.
