not to get through.” He stood and moved to her door. “You’ll drive so I can light them before jumping in.” He opened her door. “Move over.”
She sat staring up at him. “You’re going to light the fuses and then jump in the car?”
“Yes.”
“And then I speed us away so you can light the next one?”
“Yes.”
“And this does what?”
“Did Sancho Panza always ask so many questions?”
“Yes.”
“Well, at least we’re true to form. Move over.”
She drove them to each of the four poles. Hoffner set the bricks in place, and she took the car back around to the first. She watched him as he stepped out. “This is madness,” she said.
“Yes.” He leaned over. “Ready?” He looked back to see that she had the car in gear. She nodded and he lit the fuse. He then ran and jumped in.
“Ride, Sancho, ride!”
Dust and earth kicked up as she accelerated, then more smoke as she screeched to a stop at the second pole. Another match, another mad dash. It was just as Hoffner was diving back in the car for the fourth time that the first of the bricks exploded.
She drove off, looking back through the mirror, while he angled his head and shoulders out the window.
It was a wonderful thing to see, the pole ripped from its roots, the wire limp to the ground. Suddenly the second exploded and the pole jumped into the air, tearing at its mooring and keeling over. The third and fourth followed suit, the last stripping the wire with such force that it snapped across the ground like the lash of a whip. Mila stopped the car, and they both got out.
Pale clouds hovered above the four felled poles, the remaining stumps jagged shards of wood cutting through the plumes of smoke. The standing poles at either end of the gap stared helplessly across at each other, as if they could conceive of nothing to fill the chasm between them: one world at an end, another begun.
Hoffner listened. There was absolute silence, not even the sound of settling dust. It was such a small thing- four meaningless poles of wood-yet he felt a surge of energy. Even the knot at the back of his neck was gone. Mila drew up next to him.
“Are we done?” she said, no less gratified.
He watched for another few seconds and said, “Get in the car.” He stepped around and slid in behind the wheel. They drove and he glanced back in the mirror, this time for the sheer pleasure of it.
That night, they stopped twenty kilometers from Teruel. It was late and they were exhausted. They found a tavern with two rooms above. Mila took a bath while he smoked. Hoffner bathed while she went for a second bottle of wine. And they shared a bed and knew that this was how they would find their way through.
5
She was still asleep when his eyes opened. There was the sound of plates or cups being stacked on a shelf somewhere beyond the door and down the stairs, but Hoffner lay quietly. She had pulled the sheet to just above her waist, her bare back to him, curved to the pillow, and her hair loose against her neck. The shoulder rose almost to her cheek, and he saw the two long scars he had traced with his fingers through the darkness last night. She had said nothing, his thumb gliding along the small of her back and across the spine, the raised skin like jagged lines of wire against the pale smoothness of the rest. He brought his face toward her neck, and she said, “You hardly move when you sleep.”
She turned and looked up at him. It would have been so easy to show the expectation of a kiss, that dizzying and ageless hope of a first morning together, but instead they simply stared. It was effortless, and Hoffner nearly mistook it for the hollow comfort of a shared loneliness. That at least would have been familiar. But this was other. It brought a softening to his face, and she smiled, and he felt its warmth like the distant pull of an unknown faith.
“I thought you were dead,” she said. “I had to listen to make sure you were breathing.”
“I’ll remember to make more noise.” He gave her a kiss on the forehead and brought his legs over the side. He sat.
“Coward,” she said.
He looked back and was thankful for the smile. “Yes. Petrified.” He stood and pulled on his shorts, then reached for his cigarettes. He tapped out two and lit them. “Do you think they’ll have eggs? For some reason I’m wanting eggs.”
She pulled back the sheet and propped her head on an elbowed hand as she rolled on her side. He imagined he had never seen this kind of perfect beauty, not for the litheness of her shape or the delicacy of her face, but for the absolute peace she felt in her own uncovered body. It brought him back to the bed, and he sat, and she took a cigarette.
“Thank you,” she said.
“For what?”
“The cigarette.”
“Oh-yes.”
“What else did you think I was saying?” This was payment for the kiss on the forehead. “Was the young captain helpful?”
Hoffner took hold of the water jug and poured out a glass. He handed it to her. “Yes.”
“You must be very good at what you do.”
“You don’t need to be so good.”
She took a drink. “You should stop saying that. It’s not the truth, and it’s not all that endearing. He would have shot you.” She finished the glass and held it out to him. He poured a second, and he drank.
She said, “I’ll need to find a place to wash some clothes.” She sat and moved to the edge of the bed. She picked up her chemise and dress from the floor. “I can do it in Teruel while you”-she had to think a moment-“do whatever it is you’ll be doing there.”
Hoffner watched her slip the clothes over her shoulders. She reached back to button the collar of the dress, and he said, “You don’t have to come, you know. It’s probably safer if you head back to Barcelona.” At least he was trying to sound noble.
She reached for her hose and began to slide them on. “So it’s this you’re not terribly good at.” She finished and looked back at him. “I don’t want to go back to Barcelona, Nikolai. And I don’t think you want me to, either. Do you?”
He waited and then shook his head.
“You see? That wasn’t so hard.” She stood.
Hoffner was suddenly aware he was sitting in nothing but his shorts. He stood, found his shirt, and began to button the buttons with a newfound resolve.
She reached over and picked up his pants. She held them there and waited. “There’s no rush, Nikolai. The pants aren’t going anywhere.”
He nodded absently, took them, and slid them on.
She said, “You’re not going to tell me you don’t do this sort of thing, or that you haven’t for a very long time, or ever-are you?”
He looked across at her and, not wanting to betray himself, again shook his head.
“Good.” She moved closer and brought his suspenders up and over his shoulders. She smoothed them against his chest. “Even if it’s true, what would be the point in saying it? Love isn’t meant to stand back and stare at its past.”
