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By them?
Oh yes.
But he has such a thin, gentle face.
Oh yes. But he was actually fat and very tasty.
Him?
Oh yes.
And when the last of the caravan had passed us, I thought I should try to salvage Gallen out of this. She sat across the road from me and stared over my shoulder, or through my chest. But I couldn't face her; I looked down my
pant leg and discovered, wadded and clinging to my sock, a little mesh of fur.
Oh, I am sorry, Siggy, I thought. But you were more than illogical. You were wrong.
Then Gallen crossed the road to the bike and stood over the lumpish rucksack, for a moment, before she began to take her things out.
She'd done entirely too much thinking, for sure.
And since I had nothing to say, I said, 'Well, what do you want to do now?' She just gaped at me. So I said, 'We'll do whatever you want.' But she just pulled her things out faster; she made a sack of her ladies' leather jacket; I saw her stuff her silky blue panties up one sleeve. And that hurt me.
I thought: She's going to give me back my soccer shirt. But she gave no signs of taking it off. At least, she was sparing me the little gestures.
'Where are you going?' I said.
'To Vienna,' she said. 'May I have my hair money, please?'
'To Vienna?' I said.
'Aren't you interested in going back and reading all about it?' she asked. 'Don't you want to know, exactly, just what happened? Aren't you interested in all the details, Graff?'
But she wasn't going to get a rise out of me; I had no place to come up from. And casualty statistics were of no interest to me, for sure. After the oryx, there was no need to keep count of disasters.
I said, 'Really, please. Why is it Vienna?'
'Because,' she said, 'it's one place I can think of where you wouldn't try to come along with me.'
And I got some footing, suddenly - to rise from. I said to her, 'You won't ever sneeze again, I hope you know.' And she just glared at me. 'Well, you won't,' I said. 'Whoever gets you.'
'It was my hair,' said Gallen. 'You give me the money now, please.' So I did. She took it like suspected bait, as if she were afraid I'd touch her.
'Wherever will you go, Graff?' she said, in a bright, cold clear-sky voice. But I wouldn't allow myself to be taunted.
I said, seriously, 'To Kaprun.' And she looked away. 'When I come back,' I said, 'how can I find you?'
'If you come back,' she said, still turned away.
'I will,' I said. 'And where will you be?'
'Oh, I'm very fond of zoos,' she said, in the cold, bright voice again. 'I expect I'll visit the zoo often. You might find me there, when you decide to try it again - with a new plan.'
But I wasn't going to have us go out this way. I said, 'I'm going for a while to Kaprun, and I know I'll want to see you again.'
'You mean, when you're all better?' she said, mock-sweet. 'When you're all done with it?' But I knew that wasn't the way it worked, and was the wrong attitude to carry off with me. You can't rush getting over anything. Even the notebook is clear on this:
The figures make a certain sum, no matter how you add them up.
