Via Dolorosa (44 page)

But everything was fine. He had reached the boat and had rescued
Emma from Leslie Hansen, had even struck Hansen in the face knocking
him clear overboard, and then pulled Emma to him, kissed her, promising
they would never let little things ruin them, baby, and she would
say—

She would say—

What?

Just as he drowned, he felt the dreamlike hands of a Chinese diver
clamp down around his ankle.

—Chapter XXIII—

Nearing dusk in the bombed alleyway…

“Don’t look at them,” he told Myles Granger. “Just sit still.”

“It’s bad,” Myles Granger panted. He was propped up against the wall of the alley, trying to strain his neck to look down and see his legs. But movement caused him great pain and he was having difficulty with it. “I can feel it…I can tell it’s bad. Is it bad?”

“It’s not pretty,” Nick admitted. He was busy trying to make tourniquets from his own shirt to wrap the kid’s legs.

“I want to see…”

“You don’t. And stop moving. I’m trying to stop the bleeding.”

“There is a lot of bleeding,” Myles Granger expelled in one monotone breath. He was beginning to shake.

“Just hold still.”

“I want to look. I can’t stop thinking about my legs.”

“Try.”

“I don’t want to lose them.”

“You won’t lose them.”

“I don’t want to lose my legs.”

“Quiet.”

“Shoot me in the head.”

“Cut that shit out, Myles. You’re going to be okay.”

“I don’t want to lose my legs.”

“Then hold still.”

“I don’t want to lose my legs. I don’t want to lose my legs. I don’t want to lose my legs. I don’t want to lose my legs.”

“Goddamn it, Myles, you’re going to make us both nuts.”

“I don’t want to lose my legs.”

“Then shut up.”

“I can’t stop thinking about them.”

“Try. Think of something else.”

“I—”

“What happened to your—”

And then the kid screamed as Nick tightened the tourniquet around his destroyed left leg. He was going to lose his legs, Nick knew.

“
Shhhh
,” he told the kid.

“Oh God!”

“Quiet!”

“Oh God! Oh God oh God oh shoot me in the—oh God!”

“Think of something. Think of something else.”

“Oh God!”

“Goddamn it!” Nick moaned. His single hand was covered in blood.

“Oh,” Myles Granger breathed, his voice dropping, dropping, dropping to nearly a whisper. “Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh.” He was caught in a skip.

“Oh.”

“Okay.”

“Oh.”

“
Shhh
, now…”

“Oh.”

“Goddamn it, kid.” But this time he said it with resignation, with pity. And self-loathing. “I’m sorry.”

“I can’t—stop—thinking—about—my legs—”

“Try.” Nick’s mind was frantic. Damn it, he couldn’t get the second tourniquet around the kid’s leg with only one hand…couldn’t…

“Can’t,” moaned Myles Granger.

“That woman in the street,” Nick said quickly, unable to come up with anything else. “The one who grabbed you. Do you remember?”

“Yes.”

“She said something to you. Do you remember?”

“Yes.”

“What was it?”

“Yes…”

“Myles…kid…stay with me…”

He realized that he hadn’t brought his eyes up to Myles’s face since he began working on the tourniquets. He did not do so now, either.

“Yes,” Myles Granger managed. “Yes…yes…yes…”

“So what did she tell you?”

“Who?”

“The woman, Myles. The woman who grabbed your arm. The woman
Karuptka
wanted to shoot. Don’t you remember?”

“Oh,” the kid said simply, “yeah, I remember.”

“What did she say to you?” And for an instant, Nick was certain the kid was going to confess that the strange woman had told him they were all going to die, all of them, every last one…

Myles Granger said, “ ‘Have baby. In stomach.’ ”

“What was that?”

“‘Have baby. In stomach.’ That’s what she said. ‘Have baby. In stomach.’ Just like that.”

“She was pregnant?”

“Have baby,” Myles said. “In stomach.”

“All right,” Nick said. The poor kid had been spooked by a pregnant woman. It wasn’t unusual—they all had their individual moments when the war finally registered. It could be the way the sun set behind a certain silhouette of buildings…it could be the way a wild dog scavenges for food in the sewers…it could be the way you got down to your last cigarette and stared at the empty cellophane package and realized that you wouldn’t be smoking anymore, not whenever you feel like it, not like you did back home, because you were at war and people were dying and expectant mothers begged for your help in the bombed streets and empty cigarette packs stared blindly back at you…

“Have baby,” Myles said. “In stomach.”

“God,” Nick muttered, “all right. Think of something else.”

“Baby,” said the kid. “Stomach.”

“Myles,” Nick said. It was impossible to work the bandage around the kid’s leg without moving it. And even then, with only one good hand…

“Baby. Stomach.”

“You’re going home after this, you know. Where you
gonna
go? What’re you
gonna
do?”

“See Pop.”

“See your father? That’s nice. Where is he?”

“South Carolina.”

“Oh yeah?”

“He works…he…he works at a hotel there…resort…resort hotel… on an island…”

“That sounds nice. Think about that, why don’t you?”

Myles Granger laughed, and coughed blood up on his shirt. “What do you think will happen to that baby? The one in her stomach?”

“Shit, Myles, I don’t know.” He chewed at his lower lip. Still, he would not bring his eyes to meet Myles’s. “Listen,” he said finally, “I’m
gonna
have to lift your leg here in a minute, so I’m
gonna
need you to—”

“I’m going to be haunted by that, you know.”

“Myles,” Nick began, shaking with pain, feeling the fever of the pain well up inside of himself.

“I won’t live—I won’t, I won’t, I won’t live—but if I did live—and I won’t, I won’t—but if I did live, I’m going to be haunted by that…”

“Okay.”

“You will, too, Lieutenant,” Myles said.

“Sure.”

“You’ll be haunted, too.”

“Okay, Myles.”

“By all this.”

“Okay.”

“Shit,” Myles said with little humility, “just shoot me in the head.”

“Myles…”

“Have baby,” Myles said, more blood frothing at his lips. “In stomach.”

“Close your eyes,” said Nick.

—Chapter XXIV—

Sound filtered back to him. Water. Lapping water against… against…

Then vision: and he opened his eyes on a midnight sky, speckled with a thousand stars. He was frozen and numb. He knew, too, that he was in pain…but he could no longer actually
feel
pain.

“Because I’m dead,” he whispered. “I’m dead.”

“Almost, but not exactly,” said a man’s voice.

Immediately Nick sat up—and immediately he vomited water into his lap. He was in a small johnboat out on the sea, staring at Roger, who was busy rowing the boat and staring back at him. Beneath the light of the full moon, Roger’s skin was pale, mealy and translucent, speckled with the roving flutter of countless cicadas. They were caught in Roger’s hair and clung like brooches to his shirt. They batted their wings against his cheeks and ears and, like conspirators, soldiered across the white terrain of his forehead…but he did not seem to notice.

“What the hell…” Nick managed, attempting to right himself into a comfortable sitting position on the floor of the boat. Doing so sent a bolt of electric pain up his right arm. He looked down, not knowing what to expect, and saw that his bandage had come loose and fallen away, and that the hand and the arm itself had swollen to twice its size. It throbbed dully. Looking quickly up at Roger, he said, “What happened?”

“You almost drowned,” said Roger.

“What…what…” But then it all started to return to him. He felt his heartbeat quicken. “The boat. Where is it? I was…I was swimming to the boat…”