“Fine, I’ll consider your proposal. Now, please, leave me alone.”
“No way. I’ve no intention of leaving you alone. I’m going with you as far as Bilbao. I want a reply before we get there. If it’s ‘yes’, you’ll come with us. If it’s ‘no’, …”
The policeman snorted and turned towards her.
“If it’s ‘no’, dear Irene,” he went on, stressing every syllable, “if it’s ‘no’ …”
“I know. The photos will appear in the newspapers, and bang,” she broke in.
“But before that, there’ll be the odd broken bone. You’ve no idea how I long to do it, Irene. I’d almost prefer it if you said ‘no’. I’m only doing this because I have no option but to obey orders, but if it was up to me I’d finish off the lot of you once and for all.”
Again she felt the policeman’s fist in her ribs and couldn’t suppress a cry. For a second, she imagined a passenger coming over to them and asking them what was going on, but she immediately dismissed the possibility. The bus was still speeding along, its engine humming, people had their eyes closed and were dozing. She felt like giving up, like dying. She should have foreseen what was going to happen to her. She knew poems that spoke of it, poems that told the truth.
The Whole of it came not at once –
‘Twas Murder by degrees –
A Thrust — and then for Life a chance –
The Bliss to cauterize –
The Cat reprieves the Mouse
She eases from her teeth
Just long enough for Hope to tease –
Then mashes it to death –
’Tis Life’s award — to die –
Contenteder if once –
Than dying half — then rallying
For consciouser Eclipse –
Suddenly it was as if her head and her hand began to operate independently. While her head was filling with dark thoughts, her hand grasped the cigarette. It was almost finished, but there was still a glowing tip above the filter. She reached her arm over the seat in front and let it drop onto the skirt of the woman sitting there. She heard a shriek.
“Who did that? Who did that?” asked the young man travelling with the woman, stepping out into the aisle and looking at the policeman. He was so upset he could barely speak, he just kept repeating the question over and over, “Who did that? Who did that?” The policeman withdrew his fist from her side.
The aisle began to fill with passengers. No, it wasn’t right. No one respects the no smoking rules. What a cheek, smoking upstairs when there was a special section set aside for smokers downstairs.
The policeman didn’t react.
“What happened?” asked someone from behind. No one answered. They were all looking at the policeman, albeit rather warily. His burly appearance inspired respect. Someone switched on the main light. It seemed as if no one was in their own seat.
“Why did you do that, eh? Why did you do it?” said the young man, addressing the policeman. He felt humiliated.
“It was the girl. It was the girl who was smoking,” said a little boy, pointing at her.
“Really? Is that true?” asked the young man, rather disconcerted. He seemed like a decent chap.
“Yes, it’s true. I saw her,” said the little boy.
“Why did you do that? My wife is pregnant,” said the young man. After that first reaction, he didn’t know what to do.
“And what if I wasn’t pregnant? Would it have been all right if she’d done it then?” said the young man’s wife from her seat. “It doesn’t matter, Eduardo. There’s no point talking to crazy people like her.”
There was a silence. Almost all the passengers had returned to their seats. The incident was about to end as quickly as it had begun. Very soon the hum of the bus would again occupy the foreground and the journey would continue as before.
“Did I burn you?” she asked, standing up and addressing the woman in the seat in front.
“No, but you nearly made a hole in my dress,” said the woman sharply.
“I’d like to compensate you in some way,” she said. She put on her jacket in one movement and reached out her arm towards the young man, who was still in the aisle. “Can you help me? My companion here takes up such a lot of room and he won’t let me out.”
The policeman was moving his chin and mouth as if trying to suck in the ends of his moustache. Would he stop her getting out? After the incident, it wasn’t very likely. The passengers might make even more fuss, and one of them might easily denounce him to the press. In that case, the newspaper article wouldn’t be the one he had predicted — “The price of freedom. The pacts terrorists make to get out of prison” — but something very different, accusing the police of blackmail. Besides, the policeman seemed at a loss to know what to do in a situation like that.
Nothing happened. The young man took her hand and pulled hard, while she rested her other hand on the back of the seat and jumped into the aisle. Once free, she opened the suitcase and took out the picture of Adam and God reaching out to each other.
“It’s lovely!” said the young man. The two passengers occupying the seats on the other side of the aisle nodded approvingly. They liked it too.
“It’s a copy,” she said. “I’d like you to have it.”
“It’s lovely!” said the young man again, taking the picture and holding it so that his wife could see. “Who is it by?”
“It’s on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.”
“We spent our honeymoon in Italy, but we didn’t go to any museums,” said the young man.
“This copy was made by a woman in prison. Her name’s Margarita.”
“It doesn’t matter. It’s still lovely.”
She was about to say that it was lovely precisely because of that, because it had been made in prison, because the maker of the copy had had an awful lot of time to work on it, but she decided not to. At last, she was in the aisle, safe. She picked up her suitcase and went downstairs.
The bus was heading down to the bottom of a valley above which you could see the coppery glow of the lights of Bilbao. The journey would soon be over. Less than half an hour. What could she do until then? How could she keep the two policemen at bay? She only knew three people on the bus, the two nuns and the large woman. Only they could protect her.
The three of them — the large woman and the two nuns — were sitting in the downstairs compartment. Beside the coffee machine, leaning on the small counter, the policeman in the red tie was chatting to the hostess.
“Would you bring me a cup of coffee, please?” she said to the hostess as she passed. As soon as he saw her, the policeman in the red tie gave an alarmed glance up the stairs. He couldn’t understand what had happened. Where was his colleague?
“Ah, there you are, at last,” said the nun with green eyes by way of greeting. She sounded worried. “What did they do to you? That man told us that they had to interrogate you, that they had some grave matter to sort out with you.”
“That’s what they said, and they wouldn’t let me go back upstairs,” added the large lady, casting a glance at the policeman.
“And what grave matter was that?” she asked, taking off her jacket. She felt suddenly hot.
“A bomb,” said the other nun. Close to, she seemed even older. She was angry.
“They don’t have much imagination,” she said, as she took out a cigarette and lit it. “They always use the same old story. What else did they say? That the bomb might explode right here?”