two
A few kilometres further down the road and refusing to admit that, for a moment, his nerve had failed him and that the sight of the girl had struck him like almost nothing else in his life, Paulo imagines that some lorry (even though not a single vehicle has passed him going in the opposite direction) must have stopped already and offered her a lift. He goes on for a few hundred metres, pulls over, turns off the engine. Takes a deep breath, twists round towards the back seat of the Beetle, pulls off the dark grey cloth covering the various bags holding the clothes from the theatre company, opens one, takes out a white face towel that looks unused, a sweater and a pair of tracksuit bottoms, size S. He also finds a little retractable umbrella in the worst sort of green, a luminous lime colour. He looks ahead, then again into the rearview mirror, starts the engine, switches the indicator left and gets back onto the southbound lane, keeping his speed slow because of the storm that is getting ever stronger and the worn-out tyres which threaten to send the vehicle skidding on the water. He feels put out, a feeling that gets worse as the number of kilometres increases: three hundred and sixty, three hundred and sixty-one, three hundred and sixty-two, sixty-three, four, five, six, three hundred and sixty-seven. (He hadn’t realised he had driven so far.)