burns from a house fire. It had been a terrible thing, quick, and nothing to do with the fighting. In fact, Tarancon had seen almost none of the fighting. The Guardia had quickly pledged themselves to the Republic and had even stepped in to make sure the killing was kept to a minimum. Tragedy remained a thing of fires and falling trees and a boy drowned in early spring-as it had been for as long as anyone could remember. It was so much easier to understand than the news of the horrors sprouting up everywhere around them. The two inside were dying. Infection had set in. And the comfort of a woman doctor-so strange and yet perhaps a miracle (although no one would have called it such a thing)-gave them peace as they slipped quietly away through the morphine.
It was hours before Mila emerged from the house, walking with a man a good deal older. He had come the night before from Cuenca. He was a doctor as well, but the woman and the girl had already been fighting the burns for five days-why had it taken so long to send a boy on the two-day ride for him? — and there was nothing he could do. He hadn’t slept and was grateful that Mila had been there to take the two to the end.
Hoffner tossed the ball to one of the boys, then ran his handkerchief over his neck as he walked toward her.
“They’re both gone,” she said.
“I’m sorry,” said Hoffner.
“No, it’s better. It should have happened three days ago.” She introduced the doctor. He said he was tired of watching peasants die this way. He needed to sleep and get back to Cuenca. He left them to each other.
She said. “He was a good doctor, but he would have tried to keep them alive.” They sat on a bench. Hoffner’s hat was lying on it.
He said, “You need to eat something.” She said nothing, and he added, “Some of the men remembered Georg. ‘The man with the camera’ they called him. They said he was here for a few hours. The day before the house burned. They don’t remember anyone else.”
She stared across the courtyard. She nodded distantly.
He said, “I didn’t mention any names.”
Again she nodded. Finally she said, “The name from the contact list, here in Tarancon.” Hoffner had shown her everything from Captain Doval and Major Sanz. She had memorized the names as well. “He was called Gutierrez,” she said. “What was the first name?”
He knew she knew it, but he answered anyway. “Ramon,” said Hoffner. “Why?”
It took her another moment to answer. “Because he was in the room with me the entire time. Because the woman was his wife, and the girl was his daughter.”
Hoffner had trouble looking at the man, not because Gutierrez hadn’t bathed or shaved in five days, or that his face was bloated from the crying, or even that his left arm to the shoulder was an oozing scar of blisters and flaked skin beneath a thin wrapping of gauze. It was because he sat there, unaware that he damned Georg with every breath he took.
Hoffner imagined the crates, the guns, the fire set to destroy them all. Had Georg really been capable of this? Had he been so callous, so cowardly, as to slink off in the night knowing that this was to come? Hoffner wore his son’s shame as if it were his own.
Gutierrez continued to stare across at the sheeted bodies, his good elbow on his knee, his body leaning forward, hand pressed against his brow. Hoffner had no idea if the man was even aware they had stepped inside the room.
Mila knelt down next to Gutierrez. She ran her hand across his back and spoke softly. Slowly, Gutierrez began to nod. He looked at her. His eyes moved to Hoffner, then the sheets. With her hand still on his back, Mila helped him past the curtain and down the hall. She led him to a chair by the door to the courtyard, and Gutierrez said, “I want the air. We’ll go outside.”
“No,” she said. “Outside isn’t good until they dress your burns again. You should sit here.”
Gutierrez seemed aware of his arm only now. He looked at it as if someone had just handed it to him, a thing to be studied: an arm had been burned, flesh, but whose was it and how? Gutierrez sat and asked for water.
There was a table across from him with a pitcher and two glasses. Mila filled one and handed it to him. Gutierrez held it but did not drink.
Hoffner was a few paces down the hall, breathing air heavy with the smell of rotting limes and soap. So this was the scent of burned flesh, he thought. He stepped over and filled the other glass. He drank.
Hoffner said, “You should drink as well.”
Gutierrez’s gaze was fixed on the wall, mindlessly searching for something. “Should I?”
Hoffner was glad to hear the anger. It colored Gutierrez’s despair and gave it purpose. The man would find his way back.
Hoffner said, “I’m sorry for your loss.”
Gutierrez barely moved.
“There was a man with a camera,” Hoffner said. “A German. A few days ago.”
Gutierrez showed nothing.
Hoffner repeated, “There was a man with a camera-”
“Why are you asking me this?”
“You know why I ask.”
Gutierrez continued to stare at the wall. Finally he said, “Yes.” He was unrepentant. “I know why.”
“He came about the crates, about Hisma.”
“Yes.”
Hoffner waited and then said, “Did he set the fire?”
The question came so effortlessly-questions like these always did-even if every moment beyond them lay in their grasp.
Gutierrez’s stare hardened. “You mean did he murder my wife and daughter?”
And there it was. Why not call it what it was. A low humming began to fill Hoffner’s ears, but he refused to look at Mila. “Yes.”
Gutierrez said, “You ask only about the one with the camera. Why not the other?”
“The other is not my concern.”
“No? He also wanted the one with the camera.”
There was a pounding now in Hoffner’s chest, the urge to grab Gutierrez by the arm, scream in his face-Was this Georg? Was this what my son has become? — but instead he asked again, “Did he set the fire?”
Gutierrez waited, his cruelty unintended.
“No,” he finally said. “That is my misfortune. Are you here to rid me of my burden?”
Hoffner felt his breath again. He said, “Then the fire was an accident?”
“There are no such things.”
“And the guns?”
“Guns,” Gutierrez said, with quiet disbelief. “What guns? We have no guns. There will be no guns.” Self- damning made such easy work of the truth. He refused to look at Hoffner. “You need something more from me, you tell Sanz to come and get it himself. He does me a favor. Otherwise no more messengers, no more visitors, no more questions from this German, that German, talk of those crates”-his voice trailed off-“make room for those fucking crates.”
Gutierrez shut his eyes, trying not to see it.
“A can of oil”-it was little more than a whisper, the creases of his eyes wet from the memory-“a tiny can of oil and all that heat.” The tears ran and he forced his eyes open. He looked at Hoffner. “God has sent His message, and I damn Him for it.” Gutierrez looked upward.
Gutierrez stood. He moved past Hoffner to the curtain. He was about to step through when Hoffner said, “The other German. When was he here?”
Again Gutierrez’s gaze hardened. He peered into the room. This time, though, he hadn’t the strength for it. He was suddenly aware of the tears, and he wiped them. “I don’t know,” he said. “Two days ago, three.”
“He came to ask about the one with the camera?”
“Yes.”
