"Lonely without your father?"
Magda thought about that. She had missed Papa sorely at first and had felt at a loss as to what to do with herself without him. But at the moment she was very content to be sitting here with Glenn, listening to him play, and yes, even arguing with him. She should never have allowed him in her room, even with the door open, but he made her feel safe. And she liked his looks, especially his blue eyes, even though he seemed to be a master at preventing her from reading much in them.
"Yes," she said. "And no."
He laughed. "A straightforward answer—two of them!"
A silence grew between them, and Magda became aware that Glenn was very much a man, a long-boned man with flesh packed tightly to those bones. There was an aura of maleness about him that she had never noticed in anyone else. It had escaped her last night and this morning, but here in this tiny room it filled all the empty spaces. It caressed her, making her feel strange and special. A primitive sensation. She had heard of animal magnetism ... was that what she was experiencing now in his presence? Or was it just that he seemed so alive? He fairly bristled with vitality.
"You have a husband?" he asked, his gaze resting on the gold band on her right ring finger—her mother's wedding band.
"No."
"A lover then?"
"Of course not."
"Why not?"
"Because..." Magda hesitated. She didn't dare tell him that except in her dreams she had given up on the possibility of life with a man. All the good men she had met in the past few years were married, and the unmarried ones would remain so for reasons of their own or because no self-respecting woman would have them. But certainly all the men she had ever met were stooped and pallid things compared with the one who sat across from her now. "Because I'm beyond the age when that sort of thing has any importance!" she said finally.
"You're a mere babe!"
"And you? Are you married?"
"Not at the moment."
"Have you been?"
"Many times."
"Play another song!" Magda said in exasperation. Glenn seemed to prefer teasing to giving her straight answers.
But after a while the playing stopped and the talking began. Their conversation ranged over a wide array of topics, but always as they related to her. Magda found herself talking about everything that interested her, starting with music and with the Gypsies and Romanian rural folk who were the source of the music she loved, and on to her hopes and dreams and opinions. The words trickled out fitfully at first, but swelled to a steady stream as Glenn encouraged her to go on. For one of the few times in her life, Magda was doing all the talking. And Glenn listened. He seemed genuinely interested in whatever she had to say, unlike so many other men who would listen only as far as the first opportunity to turn the conversation to themselves. Glenn kept turning the talk away from himself and back toward her.
Hours slipped by, until shadows began darkening the inn. Magda yawned.
"Excuse me," she said, "I think I'm boring myself. Enough of me. What about you? Where are you from?"
Glenn shrugged. "I grew up all over western Europe, but I guess you could say I'm British."
"You speak Romanian exceptionally well—almost like a native."
"I've visited often, even lived with some Romanian families here and there."
"But as a British subject, aren't you taking a chance being in Romania? Especially with the Nazis so close?"
Glenn hesitated. "Actually, I have no citizenship anywhere. I have papers from various countries proclaiming my citizenship, but I have no country. In these mountains, one doesn't need a country."
A man without a country? Magda had never heard of such a thing. To whom did he owe allegiance? "Be careful. There aren't too many red-haired Romanians."
"True." He smiled and ran a hand through his hair. "But the Germans are in the keep and the Iron Guard stays out of the mountains if it knows what's good for it. I'll keep to myself while I'm here, and I shouldn't be here that long."
Magda felt a stab of disappointment—she liked having him around.
"How long?" She felt she had asked the question too quickly, but it couldn't be helped. She wanted to know.
"Long enough for a last visit before Germany and Romania declare war on Russia."
"That's not—!"
"It's inevitable. And soon." He rose from the stool.
"Where are you going?"
"I'm going to let you rest. You need it."
Glenn leaned forward and pressed the mandolin back into her hands. For a moment their fingers touched and Magda felt a sensation like an electric shock, jolting her, making her tingle all over. But she did not pull her hand away ... Oh, no ... because that would make the feeling stop, would halt the delicious warmth spreading throughout her body and down along her legs.
She could see that Glenn felt it, too, in his own way.
Then he broke contact and retreated to the door. The feeling ebbed, leaving her a trifle weak. Magda wanted to stop Glenn, to grasp his hand and tell him to stay. But she could not imagine herself doing such a thing and was shocked that she even wanted to. Uncertainty held her back, too. The emotions and sensations boiling within were new to her. How would she control them?
As the door closed behind him, she felt the warmth fade away, replaced by a hollow space deep within her. She sat quietly for a few moments, and then told herself that it was probably all for the best that he had left her alone now. She needed sleep; she needed to be rested and fully alert later on.
For she had decided that Papa would not face Molasar alone tonight.
TWENTY-ONE
The Keep
Thursday, 1 May
1722 hours
Captain Woermann sat alone in his room. He had watched the shadows grow long across the keep until the sun was out of sight. His uneasiness had grown with them. The shadows shouldn't have disturbed him. After all, for two nights in a row there had been no deaths, and he saw no reason why tonight should be different. Yet there was this sense of foreboding.
The morale of the men had improved immensely. They had begun to act and feel like victors again. He could see it in their eyes, in their faces. They had been threatened, a few had died, but they had persisted and were still in command of the keep. With the girl out of sight, and with none of their fellows newly dead, there was a tacit truce between the men in gray uniforms and those in black. They didn't mingle, but there was a new sense of comradeship—they had all triumphed. Woermann found himself incapable of sharing their optimism.
He looked over to his painting. All desire to do further work on it had fled, and he had no wish to start another. He did not even have enough ambition to get out his pigments and blot out the shadow of the hanging corpse. His attention centered now on the shadow. Every time he looked it appeared more distinct. The shape looked darker today, and the head seemed to have more definition. He shook himself and looked away. Nonsense.
No ... not quite nonsense. There was still something foul afoot in the keep. There had been no deaths for two nights, but the keep had not changed. The evil had not gone away, it was merely... resting. Resting? Was that the right word? Not really. Holding back was better. It certainly had not gone away. The walls still pressed in on him; the air continued to feel heavy and laden with menace. The men could slap one another on the back and talk one another out of it. But Woermann could not. He had only to look at his tainted painting and he knew with leaden certainty that there had been no real end to the killings, merely a pause, one that might last for days or might end tonight. Nothing had been overcome or driven out. Death was still here, waiting, ready to strike again when the occasion suited it.