Cuza experienced a strange floating sensation, a new emotional buoyancy as he imagined Hitler and Himmler cowering before Molasar, and then their torn and lifeless—better yet, headless—bodies strung up for viewing at the entrance to an empty death camp. It would mean an end to the war and the salvation of his people; not merely Romanian Jewry, but his entire race! It promised a tomorrow for Magda. It meant an end to Antonescu and the Iron Guard. It might even mean reinstatement at the university.
But then reality brought him back down from those heights, back down to his wheelchair. How could he carry anything from the keep? How could he hide it in the hills when his strength could barely wheel him through the door?
"You will need a whole man," he said to Molasar in a voice that threatened to break. "A cripple like me is useless to you."
He sensed rather than saw Molasar move around the table to his side. He felt light pressure on his right shoulder—Molasar's hand. He looked up to see Molasar looking down at him. Smiling.
"You have much to learn about the scope of my powers."
TWENTY-FIVE
The Inn
Saturday, 3 May
7020 hours
Joy.
That's what it was. Magda had never imagined how wonderful it could be to awaken in the morning and find herself wrapped in the arms of someone she loved. Such a peaceful feeling, a safe feeling. It made the prospect of the coming day so much brighter to know that there would be Glenn to share it with.
Glenn lay on his side, she on hers, the two of them face to face. He was still asleep, and although Magda did not want to wake him, she found she could not keep her hands off him. Gently, she ran her palm over his shoulder, fingered the scars on his chest, smoothed the red tumble of his hair. She moved her bare leg against his. It was so sensuously warm under covers, skin to skin, pore to pore. Desire began to add its own kind of heat to her skin. She wished he would wake up.
Magda watched his face as she waited for him to stir. So much to learn about this man. Where exactly was he from? What had his childhood been like? What was he doing here? Why did he have that sword blade with him? Why was he so wonderful? She was like a schoolgirl. She was thrilled with herself. She could not remember being happier.
She wanted Papa to know him. The two of them would get along marvelously. But she wondered how Papa would react to their relationship. Glenn was not Jewish ... she didn't know what he was, but he was certainly not Jewish. Not that it made any difference to her, but such matters had always been important to Papa.
Papa...
A sudden wave of guilt doused her burgeoning desire. While she had been snuggling in Glenn's arms, safe and secure between bouts of thrashing ecstasy, Papa had sat cold and alone in a stone room, surrounded by human devils while he awaited an audience with a creature from Hell. She should be ashamed!
And yet, why shouldn't she have stolen a little pleasure for herself? She had not deserted Papa. She was still here at the inn. He had driven her away from the keep the night before and had refused to leave it at all yesterday. And now that she thought of it, if Papa had come back to the inn with her yesterday morning she would not have entered Glenn's room, and they would not be together this morning.
Strange, how things worked.
But yesterday and last night don't really change things, she told herself. I'm changed, but our predicament remains unaltered. This morning Papa and I are at the mercy of the Germans, just as we were yesterday morning and the morning before that. We are still Jews. They are still Nazis.
Magda slipped from Glenn's side and rose to her feet, taking the thin bedspread with her. As she moved to the window she wrapped the fabric around her. Much had changed within her, many inhibitions had fallen away like scale from a buried bronze artifact, but still she could not stand naked at a window in broad daylight.
The keep—she could feel it before she reached the window. The sense of evil within it had stretched to the village during the night ... almost as if Molasar were reaching out for her. Across the gorge it sat, gray stone under a gray, overcast sky, the last remnants of night fog receding around it. Sentries were still visible on its parapets; the front gate was open. And there was someone or something moving along the causeway toward the inn. Magda squinted in the morning light to see what it was.
It was a wheelchair. And in it ... Papa. But no one was pushing him. He was propelling himself. With strong, rapid, rhythmic motions, Papa's hands were gripping the wheel rims and his arms were turning them, speeding him along the causeway.
It was impossible, but she was seeing it. And he was coming to the inn!
Calling to Glenn to wake up, she began to run around the room gathering her strewn-about garments and pulling them on. Glenn was up in an instant, laughing at her awkward movements and helping her find her clothes. Magda did not find the situation even slightly amusing. Frantically, she pulled her clothes on and ran from the room. She wanted to be downstairs when Papa arrived.
Theodor Cuza was finding his own kind of joy in the morning.
He had been cured. His hands were bare and open to the cool morning air as they gripped the wheels of his chair and rolled them along the causeway. All without pain, without stiffness. For the first time in longer than he wished to remember, Cuza had awakened without feeling as if someone had stolen in on him during the night and firmly splinted every one of his joints. His upper arms moved back and forth like well-oiled pistons, his head freely pivoted to either side without pain or protesting creaks. His tongue was moist—there was adequate saliva again to swallow, and it went down easily. His face had thawed so that he could once again smile in a way that did not cause others around him to wince and glance away.
And he was smiling now, grinning idiotically with the joy of mobility, of self-sufficiency, of being able once again to take an active physical role in the world around him.
Tears! There were tears on his cheeks. He had cried often since the disease had firmed its grip upon him, but the tears had long since dried up with the saliva. Now his eyes were wet and his cheeks were slick with them. He was crying, joyfully, unabashedly, as he wheeled himself toward the inn.
Cuza had not known what to expect as Molasar stood over him last night and placed a hand on his shoulder, but he had felt something change within him. He had not known what it was then, but Molasar had told him to go to sleep, that things would be different come morning. He had slept well, without the usual repeated awakenings during the night to grope for the water cup to wet his parched mouth and throat, and had risen later than usual.
Risen ... that was the word for it. He had risen from a living death. On his first try he had been able to sit up, and then stand up without pain, without gripping the wall or the chair for support. He had known then that he would be able to help Molasar, and help him he would. Anything Molasar wanted him to do, he would do.
There had been some rough moments leaving the keep. He could not let anyone know he could walk, so he imitated his former infirmities as he wheeled himself toward the gate. The sentries had looked at him curiously as he rolled by, but they did not stop him—he had always been free to visit his daughter. Fortunately, neither of the officers had been in the courtyard as he had passed through.
And now, with the Germans behind and an unobstructed causeway ahead, Professor Theodor Cuza spun the wheels of his chair as fast as he could. He had to show Magda. She had to see what Molasar had done for him.
The wheelchair bounced off the end of the causeway with a jolt that almost tipped him headfirst out of it, but he kept rolling. It was rougher going in the dirt but he didn't mind. It gave him a chance to stretch his muscles, which felt unnaturally strong despite their years of disuse. He rolled by the front door of the inn, then turned left around its south side. There was only one first floor window there, opening into the dining alcove. He stopped after he passed that and wheeled up close to the stucco wall. He was out of sight here—no one from the inn or the keep could see him, and he simply had to do it once more.