She answered through gritted teeth: “I don’t want anything from you.”
“No? Then I’ll ask you something instead. Tell me, Alicia, what did being human ever get you?”
She felt disoriented; none of this made sense.
“It’s a simple question, really. Most things are, in the end.”
“I had friends,” she said, and heard the shakiness in her voice. “People who loved me.”
“Did they? Is that why you left them?”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I think I do. Your mind is an open book to me. Peter, Michael, Sara, Hollis, Greer. And Amy. The great and powerful Amy. I know all about them. Even the boy, Hightop, who died in your arms. You promised him you would keep him safe. But in the end you could not save him.”
Her being was dissolving; the sword was like an anvil in her hand, incomparably dense.
“What would your friends say to you now? I’ll answer for you. They would call you a monster. They would hound you from their midst, if they didn’t kill you first.”
“Shut up, goddamnit.”
“You’re not one of them. You never have been, not since the day the Colonel took you outside the walls and left you there. You sat there under the trees and cried all night. Isn’t that so?”
How could he know these things?
“Did he comfort you, Alicia? Did he tell you he was sorry? You were just a little girl, and he left you all alone. You have always been…alone.”
The last of her resolve was failing; it was all she could do to hold the sword aloft.
“I know, because I know you, Alicia Donadio. I know your secret heart. Don’t you see? That’s why you’ve come to me. I’m the only one who does.”
“Please,” she begged. “Please stop talking.”
“Tell me. What did you name her?”
She was undone; she had nothing left. Whoever she’d been, or wanted to be, she felt that person leaving her.
“Tell me, Lish. Tell me your daughter’s name.”
“Rose.” The word came out with a choking sound. “I named her Rose.”
She had begun to sob. At some uncharted distance, the sword fell clattering to the floor. The man had risen and put his arms around her, drawing her into a warm embrace. She made no resistance, having none to offer. She cried and cried. Her little girl. Her Rose.
“That’s why you came here, isn’t it?” His voice was soft, close to her ear. “That’s what this place is for. You came to speak your daughter’s name.”
She nodded against him. She heard herself say, “Yes.”
“Oh, my Alicia. My Lish. Do you know where you are? All your journeys are ended. What is home but a place where you are truly known? Say it with me. ‘I’ve come home.’ ”
A flicker of resistance; then she let it go. “I’ve come home.”
“ ‘And I am never leaving here.’ ”
How easy it suddenly was. “And I am never leaving here.”
A moment passed; he stepped away. Through her tears, she looked at his kind face, so full of understanding. He pulled a chair from the table.
“Now, sit with me,” he said. “We have all the time in the world. Sit with me, and I will tell you everything.”
* * *
14
Behind every great hatred is a love story.
For I am a man who has known and tasted love. I say “a man” because that is how I know myself. Look at me, and what do you see? Do I not take the form of a man? Do I not feel as you do, suffer as you do, love as you do, mourn as you do? What is the essence of a man, if not these things? In life I was a scientist, called Fanning. Fanning, Timothy J., holder of the Eloise Armstrong Distinguished Chair in Biochemical Sciences, Columbia University. I was known and respected, a figure of my times. My opinions were sought on many subjects; I walked the hallways of my profession with my head held high. I was a man of connections. I shook hands, kissed cheeks, made friends, took lovers. Fortune and treasure flowed my way; I supped at the flower of the modern world. City apartments, country houses, sleek automobiles, good wine: all of these were things I had. I dined in fine restaurants, slept in upscale hotels; my passport was fat with visas. Thrice I wooed and thrice I wed, and although these unions came to naught, each was, in its final measure, no matter of regret. I worked and rested, danced and wept, hoped and remembered—even, from time to time, prayed. I lived, in sum, a life.
Then, in a jungle in Bolivia, I died.