Nothing Sacred Part 5

I felt the bruises he referred to, deep, burning aches at my chin, forehead, cheekbones, knees and chest. I couldn't remember anybody laying a finger on me, though. Maybe my fall had preceded convulsions? I thought I ought to say something about it but my voice wouldn't work, so I closed my eyes and contented myself with listening.

Marsh responded in a withering voice, "If they'd done that, Du, why in the h.e.l.l would they give us back Thibideaux's transfusion kit?"

Thibideaux interrupted. "You've lost a lot of blood but fortunately the Colonel and Marsh are both O-positive. How you feelin'?"

I hurt. That was how I felt. And I didn't want to talk. Besides the bruises, my gut ached, my v.u.l.v.a burned with pain, and there was a professional-looking white gauze bandage on my left arm. I felt as if I was floating about two inches above the cot and their voices were all coming from some distance away. I could barely lift my eyelids to look at anyone.

Colonel Merridew leaned over me, "We're sorry about your baby," he said, and handed me one of the pale pink blossoms from the valley floor. "Welcome back."

Baby? Was that it, then? The cramps, the vomiting- The dream. The loss of a baby I had not known I carried is much less real to me than the dream.

The guard noticing blood puddling under my door and finding me simply didn't happen. I was in the library at the time. I had never had a baby-I was gravida zero, para zero. Had been deliberately, chemically sterile since I was eighteen. Must have worn off. Nevertheless, the pregnancy was unsought and unexpected; the baby would have been a rapist's child to be raised by an inmate mother in a prisoner of war camp-no loss. Surely no loss. (But what would it have been? Boy or girl? What color hair and eyes? What would I have called it? Maybe it would have had the best qualities from my family and whatever good might have once been in Buzz ...) Doggedly, I pursued the dream, sleeping at every opportunity.

The cell simply dissolved and re-formed into the palace or sometimes places remembered from home. The men's voices called me back periodically, then were gone altogether. The guards left me alone, although one day I rolled over and saw Wu staring at me from the door. Her expression was one I carried back into the dream-it reminded me of a programmer scanning the screen to see if a new project would run, and finding many glitches.

The men's voices ebbed and flowed with the snow-shadowed light dappling the dirty floor. The little room was bare, filled with men or with grain. Once it expanded and filled to capacity with mumbling people and a lifelike statue that remained even after the people left, until dust fell on it, and on me, and the day lengthened to fill a span of years.

Another time something cold dribbled across my lips, down my chin and neck, and I awoke to Danielson's dulcet voice saying, "Come on, Vanachek, drink up. There's a girl. Look, you got to make it. You can't just stay down like that."Why not? I wondered. The miscarriage had apparently promoted me, in the eyes of my fellow prisoners, from potential spy to Fragile Flower of Thwarted American Motherhood. But I was a thirsty fragile flower, so I sat up and took a swig from the plastic mug he held to my lips. I almost gagged on it.

"My G.o.d, it's fresh."

"From mother-f.u.c.king-nature's tap. We blew up a boulder today and uncovered more of the buried lake. The Dragon Lady was so thrilled she let me off work detail to bring you a drink. They must think you're pretty valuable-they've been keeping our bunker open during the day so we could check on you. When I first came here, she had me beaten until I thought I'd never walk, talk, or pee without bleeding again and she sure didn't have any kind of a compa.s.sionate nervous breakdown over it. Same thing with the Colonel, though she's gone a little easier on Thibideaux and Marsh, 'cause of Marsh's political connections, I guess. None of us have heard of her killing anybody yet, though, so maybe she's just squeamish about killing little kids, though I'd have sworn that broad doesn't have a soft bone in her itty-bitty body."

The water was crunchy with rock and dirt but had a sweet flavor that reminded me of flowers. What didn't slide down my throat trickled outside my mouth and down my chin, cooling my hot skin, making a little spot of awareness that lingered until the water evaporated and Danielson returned to work.

Most of the time, though, I was in that wonderful palace where I listened to intelligent and esoteric conversations on subjects and in languages I should not have been able to understand. Most people here wore Asian clothing, not always the silks and satins which I thought people who lived in such a place would wear, but often simple cottons and woolens, comfortable and utilitarian. Some did wear gorgeous costumes and there were even a few obvious Westerners among them, some in rather archaic costumes-I noticed one genuine 1960s flower child, a middle-aged woman in a nineteenth-century traveling gown, a couple of blocky blond men, one wearing what looked like Viking clothes, and a couple of dark-skinned men wearing African textiles. Also, there were several Indians, both saried women and men in historic native garb. Sometimes some of the people were gathered at the statues, as if in religious observance, but other times they simply talked in groups, attended what appeared to be lectures, read, gardened, or did craftwork of some sort. The same faces appeared frequently, lecturing, listening, praying. One monk was in almost every group: a man with a face like a Mexican opal-stony and rough-hewn-set with eyes radiant as smoky topaz, a complex and tender intelligence firing their depths.

I drifted happily from one conversation to the next, entered into the pages of the books and dreamed my way through them. Pieces of plots and bits of information blew through my mind like incense smoke when I woke long enough to eat or drink and use the toilet bucket. But as soon as possible, I dozed again and the palace reappeared, great halls lined with sublime art treasures my art history cla.s.ses had informed me were long ago lost in some war or other.

The rooms opened for me as if I were Beauty in the Beast's palace, I thought, blending the dream with a story from one of the dilapidated old books of fairy tales Mother had given me as a present after she rescued it from a library burn pile.

Finally, I was jolted into the present by the palace bathtub. The sight of a chubby monk up to his ears in bubble bath in a green porcelain tub with a bronze plaque proudly declaring it to have been made in Akron, Ohio, was so comfortingly ordinary after the magnificence of the palace and the bleakness of the camp that I woke up smiling, cool and clear-headed, enjoying the daylight pouring through the grille into the little gray stone room.

And there I was, alone with a bucket full of t.u.r.ds and urine, a half-eaten bowl of food-no momothis time but maggoty rice with a few dried vegetables stirred in to provide three basic food groups-the starchy rice, the vegetables, and the protein in the maggots. The cell no longer revolted me. It felt warm and familiar. My head still hummed with images from the dreams, pa.s.sages from the books, murmured conversations, wisps of songs and melodies, the surging rhythm of the chants, but I felt alert and perfectly content with the present experienced in the soothing wake of the dreams.

Alone, unguarded, and so full of sensation that solitary no longer held any terror for me, I began wishing for my papers and pen, and recalled that they were in my old cell. I blithely set out for the command bunker, expecting no problem since the door of my old cell no doubt opened easily from outside.

A tiny rational part of my brain rattling around somewhere in all the fairy dust and musk mist kept yelling warnings, but the rest of me ignored it. I felt serene and confident and besides, rescuing the journal seemed vital. It had surpa.s.sed all the reasons I had for beginning it and had become necessary to me.

The time to fetch it was while the others thought me still too ill to move. Later, I might be locked up again or closely guarded as I worked with the men.

My real body was far clumsier than my dream self as I stepped out into the ugly sandbagged hallway and climbed the steps. The soles of my feet barely registered the touch of stones, as if they'd been numbed, and the door took all my strength to budge. It was heavily carved, obviously made for guarding grander things than a makeshift dungeon.

Air sharp and thin as pine needles pierced the doorway and shattered the spiderwebs whose strands shimmered in a rectangle of suddenly revealed sunlight.

Outside voices murmured from the end of the compound where Wu had erected her terrace table.

Within the baffling maze of ruins and boulders under the canopy I took two wrong turns, but after a third turn the command bunker was directly in front of my nose; the door had been left open, presumably to air out the stale, stinking pa.s.sages below.

The warren of halls and rooms was dark and silent, except for the scrabble of loose rubble falling somewhere beyond the rectangle of light from the open door. No generator hum.

"This is crazy, old girl," I told myself, but down the steps I went, thinking I would figure out where I needed to go. But at the end of the hall that should have led past Wu's office was a collapsed wall. I felt along crumbly stone wall until my hands met open s.p.a.ces flanking the rubble-cluttered wall on each side.

Hopeless. I tried to turn back toward the entrance but after retracing a few steps ran into another pile of splinter and stone. This adventure was apt to lead to disaster without a light of some sort.

By that time, I'd begun to wake up and no longer floated around, feeling like my own ghost. Wide awake, I became more concerned-no, let's be honest, scared-that someone would find me here, unauthorized. If only I could find Wu's office I could snitch a candle or a flashlight from her desk. And maybe more writing paper and pens too.

But which door? Two corridors in and the third on the left, surely. But which two and which left?

After a couple of tries, I thought I had found the right route, but another landslide of debris disabused me of that illusion.

Then suddenly voices called out, footsteps trotted off in several different directions, and after a moment, the generator sputtered like a resuscitated drowning victim and the narrow corridors flooded with incriminating light.With a measured scuffle one set of feet detached from the general melee and headed in my direction.

I wedged myself behind the rubble, dislodging some of it. The steps paused and squeaked ever so slightly, the squeak of shoe sole on a hard surface as the occupant of the shoes turned. The occupant must have been peering into the debris but I crouched low behind it and closed my eyes, the better not to be seen, and after a few moments the footsteps scuffled away.

Okay. The light question was solved. But now how could I avoid detection while looking for my old cell? For that matter, how was I to return to my new cell without being discovered? Sliding from concealment, I tiptoed into the glare of the single bulb, my shadow stretching up the wall beside me.

Two corridors led into the central hall and its branches, and I hadn't really noticed the second one, the one I was in, the finer architectural details having escaped me on previous occasions when I was distracted by wondering if I was going to be killed or merely tortured a little. My corridor led into the other one from the side, just as it branched off. I had only to hang a right and I'd be headed straight back for the entrance now guarded by a cute couple sporting matching a.s.sault rifles.

My belly cramped again and I crabbed back toward the concealment of the rubble as I glimpsed two more guards headed up the second branch. One of them swung a finger this way and that, as if pointing out the color of paint he wanted on the walls, what fabric he wanted for the curtains, that sort of thing-renovation plans, in other words. When the first guard departed, the second extracted something from his pocket and made straight for my rubble pile. A flashlight beam pa.s.sed over my head, into the corridor beyond. Where the beam penetrated behind the rubble, I was surprised to see that there was another corridor, relatively clear of debris, the ceiling still pretty much intact. Deep shadows cast by the white beam sank into a series of doorways, some seemingly arched at the top. When the guard left, I crept back, feeling along the wall until first one, then another, and finally a third door gave to my touch.

Luckily for me the previous occupants hadn't believed in locks.

The room had the feeling of something vast-the air was less stale and smelly than in the hallway and I wondered if it contained an opening to the surface. If so, I had better find it cautiously, for the guard with the swinging finger looked as if he might be planning to work around here soon and any noise louder than that of your average well-fed rat would betray me.

I groped my way forward but felt nothing until my face ran into something fine and sticky, which clung to it. Spiderwebs? If so, I hoped the spiders were away from home and plunged ahead regardless, traversing the room as quickly as possible, expecting to see a flashlight beam and hear an order to halt at any moment. Perhaps I should have stayed near the door where I could mug the guard for his flashlight and escape back to the room before anyone else came, but no, if something happened to one of the guards Wu would probably not only find and punish me but vent her wrath on all of the other prisoners as well.

Besides, I wasn't here to mug anyone. I just wanted my journal.

My toe stubbed against what turned out to be a step, followed by a second and a third step, and finally by a platform that hit me at waist height. I felt the surface, my fingers encountering metal, cloth, stone and-eureka! paper.

The metal was a small noisy object perforated by cross-shaped holes. From the ringing sound it made I thought at first it was a bell, but at my touch it fell into two pieces and I recognized it as an incense burner like the ones the grandfolks had kept throughout the cabin until Granddad's emphysema made it hard for him to breathe the smoke.Incense! Of course, that was the underlying sweetish note to the stink in the hall. Incense. I felt around some more, hoping there might be something more useful. When I found it, it took me a moment to remember what it was-a little book of matches that, when I lit one (after three tries), I saw carried the advertising legend of the St. Joe, Missouri, Holiday Inn.

Holiday Inn? The chain had been defunct since before Mother quit her job-I remembered her telling stories of the great motel chains that once spanned the country in the days when civilians could travel from state to state and even cross national borders without a pa.s.s from their city council, a written and notarized invitation from a friend or relative at the destination point guaranteeing a place to stay or an authorization to use a federally regulated hostel while visiting military personnel. Nowadays, people got around the regulations by having more than one home-one near their business and another, usually more comfortable, to escape to on days off.

But the matches harked back to a time when travel had been simple and fairly inexpensive, when anyone could travel anywhere. Before the random killings and drug traffic had become so ferocious and far-flung that even police in big cities had to know who everyone was and have addresses for all citizens at all times. Still, what a shame.

More remarkable than the origin of the matches was their age and the fact that they still lit. There were only ten remaining, so when the first one died and I lit another, I controlled my antiquarian's wonder long enough to discover an equally esoteric artifact near by. A ceramic bowl with a wick that looked as if it was made of dental floss lay a few inches away, buried in the dust as the matches had been until my hand uncovered them. Under the dust, the lamp still held a layer of congealed fat. After sacrificing a few more matches, I had a dusty-smelling, smoky light.

And saw that I held this open flame in a room filled with fragile, flammable objects. What I had mistaken for cobwebs were thousands of gauzy scarves, so old and rotted that they were as thin and transparent as any spider's handiwork. They hung forlornly from the ceiling, like the remnants of ghosts who'd caught their shrouds and torn them trying to get loose.

Luckily, as that thought hit me, I spotted the connecting door to the next room. Cupping the flame of the lamp in one palm, I b.u.mped the door open with my hip and found myself staring at-the bathtub of my dreams.

The color was hard to discern, but it was dark, not white or pastel, and there was a little bronze plaque on it that, when I knelt to read it, proclaimed through the tarnish that the tub had been manufactured in Akron, Ohio.

Ooh. Deja vu, as Grandma's old crony Autumn Dawn was apt to exclaim at odd moments. At that moment vertigo overtook me and I couldn't tell if I was in the dream with my body back in my cell or perhaps even dreaming this whole thing from a barracks or a dormitory room.

What was real was that I had a deep physical longing to fill the smooth cool curves of that tub with hot soapy water and take a nice long, preferably bubbly, soak. My muscles fairly wept as I resolutely turned my back on the object of my l.u.s.t to examine the rest of the room.

Like the other cells, this one contained a stone sleeping bench but this was the deluxe edition, with a covering of some silky rotting cloth to which clung bits of dried gra.s.s. A faint smell of herbs clung to it, reminding me of Grandma's hiking manuals, in which she was wont to press various hapless plant specimens.An expletive from the next room announced that someone else had entered and had encountered an obstacle.

The room contained no other door than the one through which I had entered. Funny place for an extra john. But then, perhaps it was a ritual bath for purification, prior to worship. Certainly I was praying for all I was worth as I crawled as quietly as possible into the tub. I thought about dragging the dried gra.s.s mattress over me but first I had to extinguish the lamp and by that time the connecting door was creaking open again.

So I lay still and waited, closing my eyes so their shine wouldn't give me away (okay, maybe I hoped it would make me invisible). The incense burner, which I'd stuck into the pocket of my prison uniform, rang ever so slightly as I shifted in the bottom of the metal tub, setting up a sympathetic vibration with other bells, other chimes. Not now, I thought, then realized that the chimes and bells were from the next room, where the ritual was being celebrated.

And, sure enough, as I lay there, the monk with the Mexican opal face rose from where he was bent over the tub.

A flashlight ray brushed my eyelids, then a shadow fell over it. I allowed one eyeball a squint, but I didn't need my physical eyes to see the monk, still facing me, standing between me and the soldier with the flashlight. The monk stepped back and so did the soldier, closing the door softly behind him.

And so I was literally saved by the bell. Or my own delusions. Or the guard's nearsightedness, perhaps. His gla.s.ses might have been fogged up. Still, one thing is clear and that is that my dreams right now are the better part of reality, if they are dreams. Maybe these are not exactly ghosts, but memories I'm seeing. I used to read stories about old houses with memories, back when there were houses old enough to have such things. If this was one of the lamaseries destroyed by the Chinese invasion it was hundreds of years old. If all the monks had been murdered by the Chinese, well, then their memories might be sympathetic to another prisoner. Or maybe I'm the ghost.

The room with the altar and scarves contained neither ghosts nor men when I peered back into it, my panting breath loud and echoing in that vast place. I lit the lamp again and started back for the hall.

Then I saw the other door, off to one side, beyond a pair of supporting pillars I hadn't noticed before.

Shielding the lamp flame, I slipped through the door. The chamber was as large as the one I'd come from, but this time the rustlings came from things my feet brushed against. I lowered the lamp and its smoky glow captured the translucent paleness of a crumpled page covered in print. I scooped it up and heard a tearing sound as I sundered the last connection it had to the book that lay beneath it. As I swung the lamp a little wider, I saw that the floor was all but impa.s.sable with great drifts and piles of books and papers.

By the b.u.t.ter lamp's light I could make out only a few characters, which looked like Arabic. Next to where the page had lain on the floor, however, sprawled an only slightly disheveled softbound copy of Huckleberry Finn. Odd, picking up something you first touched in a dream. I rescued the Huck, slipping it into my trouser band. Mark Twain will be good company in prison, something the men can enjoy too.

No one will miss it. The mess on that floor surely hasn't been touched since whatever catastrophe befell it. From the actions of the guards and the pile of debris blocking most of the outer corridor, I gather that they have just uncovered this pa.s.sage. I'm glad I found the books before some zealous revolutionary makes a bonfire of them. I've read about the atrocities the PRC committed against the literature of this region-throwing ancient hand-copied Buddhist scriptures into the streets so that people either had to stay in their houses or trample the sacred writings underfoot. Very clever and very mean to force peopleto destroy their own symbols. Not that Huck is much of a symbol of anything, but its value as humorous entertainment will no doubt be lost on these fanatics.

After a moment I realized that I now had the opportunity to leave my diary in its hiding place and take advantage of the paper all around me for further entries. With a little sifting, I found plenty of empty front and back pages, wide margins, and more reading material. On the bottom layer there were even broken pencils and old-fashioned ballpoints (ash dry). I stuffed two of the pencils into my pocket to keep the incense burner company and added the least-printed pages from several ruined books.

The dream ran true and there was a door where there should have been. It opened inward so I had to scoot back enough of the literary carpet to tug the door toward me and slide through to where the music room should have been. Instead, I stepped once more into a ruin, perforated by light and riddled with fresh air that blew out my lamp and sent the pages in the room behind me scuttling like road trash in the wake of a big rig.

Once beyond the rubble I was back in the open, with the ruined mountain looming moodily over me, its cleft full of mist, as if it had a cold that day. Below, my fellow prisoners including some who looked like women and children, worked up and down the ridge and in the boulder-strewn valley.

And up the, slope, wending her way among her empire of boulders, slaves and minions, minced Wu, in earnest conversation with a companion whose gait was more straightforward but no less sprightly. The pair of them were headed straight toward me.

All of my instincts said, "Run" but every system in my body said, "No way." Logic said, "Run where?" Besides, I would have lost Huck and the lamp whereas if I bluffed it out... After all, the cell door hadn't been locked.

So I called out, "Commandant Wu, there you are. I was hoping I might get a chance to speak with you."

PART FOUR.

a.s.sIGNMENT.

"Ah, I see you are feeling better," said Wu's companion, none other than the peasant woman-doctor-hypnotist colonel. "Commandant Wu tells me you have been ill." The seamed face wore an overly solicitous expression-I almost expected her to click her tongue in a grandmotherly fashion.

"I can't think why," I said. "Fresh air and exercise are supposed to be so good for one and you did see to it that I got plenty of that sort of thing. The commandant considerately added a prescription forrest and quiet as well."

"Which you have disobeyed," Wu reminded me. "You have left your cell without permission." She all but hissed through her teeth. It is a particular refinement of torment to have such a woman for commandant because when she is at her harshest I still keep getting the feeling that after she makes such a p.r.o.nouncement she will go backstage, take off her makeup, put on her party dress and go out dancing, a perfectly normal young woman. Her personnel manager style is more convincing, since I've known lots of apparently perfectly normal young women who turn into authoritarian b.i.t.c.hes given that little bit of power. But a prison camp commandant? It would have helped if they could have gotten someone who naturally looked a little meaner.

I a.s.sumed my own role, that of thoroughly cowed prisoner, even managing to hang my head a little.

"The door was open. I a.s.sumed-"

"a.s.sumptions of that sort have been known to prove painful," she said.

Now the old woman did hiss, in that admonishing way some older Asian women use. She wasn't hissing me, however, she was hissing Wu, who looked oddly wounded, a child unjustly admonished for fighting when her brother started it first.

Both reactions were intriguing-that the old woman should disapprove not of my leaving my cell but of Wu threatening me, and that Wu should listen to her, and react with more hurt than anger at such an obvious countermanding of her authority. Nothing further developed at that moment, however, because Marsh appeared from around a sandbagged corner.

"Ah, Mr. Marsh," Wu said in her Dragon Lady voice.

He steepled his hands in a short bow to both of them and with a sidelong glance at the old doctor, asked Wu, "You wanted to see me, Commandant?"

She nodded curtly but her pretty face was not quite as sour as it had been. Marsh's face was carefully bland and congenial.

"Mr. Marsh, we have uncovered a new pa.s.sage which will require some delicacy in further excavation, cataloging and restoration. Perhaps you would like such an a.s.signment?" She made the suggestion loftily, a queen bestowing a favor, but her eyes flicked nervously to the old woman.

Marsh surprised me. I would think he'd go for this more intellectual sort of job but for some reason he looked wary and shook his head. "I'm not really qualified for that kind of work."

Wu's china-doll face hardened a little. "Then perhaps you can suggest another more suitable applicant."

Marsh made another polite bow. I swear he was enjoying it. "Commandant Wu, I am a civilian and would of course have no idea about the capabilities of the soldiers. And segregated as we are from the other prisoners, I would have no idea of their apt.i.tudes either. Perhaps you should consult Colonel Merridew, who would surely know if any of his men have the experience you require."

"Marsh, you are a spy and a liar," Wu said sweetly. "You have been here many years and you are the sort of man who makes it his business to know others. I fear I-"

The old woman made a funny, throat-clearing hum and said, "Miss Vanachek, I believe, has sometraining in anthropology and related areas."

"Very good," Wu snapped, sounding disappointed to be distracted from her game with Marsh. "She should be good for something besides hysterics and lying about." And to the nearest guard she said, "Take this prisoner to Captain Taring."

Marsh winked at me as I turned to follow the guard. We returned to the entrance to the bunkers, down the corridors I had so recently traveled, and walked straight up to the man I'd avoided by crawling into the bathtub. This Captain Taring was bent over a rubble pile when we arrived and when the guard presented me, he merely nodded and waved his hand that I should wait.

The guard marched away and I duly shifted from one foot to another and tried to peer over the man's shoulder to see what was so fascinating. When he still didn't seem inclined to take notice of me I leaned a little farther over-cautiously, becoming very aware of how badly I needed a bath. I still smelled of sweat and sickness and my hair was matted and felt crawly. Fresh patches of dust overlay the generally dirty condition of my trousers. I hitched Huck up and brushed a cobweb from my sleeve, then stopped moving around as I heard the deafening crackle of the contraband paper in my pockets.

My new boss handed me back something over his shoulder and when it took me a moment to realize he wanted me to take it, he turned and offered it more openly, bouncing his hand slightly to indicate I should relieve him of it and raising his eyebrows encouragingly.

But I could only stare at him, expecting to hear the chanting and see my body lying dreaming below me. His face was pitted with old scars and rough as a gravel pit, but his eyes had the same clear topaz beauty as those of the monk in my dreams. The two men were so much alike it was hard to believe they weren't the same, but of course, this man could be a descendant or even a relative-or maybe just a fellow sufferer of whatever disease blemished the face so that the clarity and depth of the eyes made such a remarkable contrast.

"This humble person begs your ill.u.s.trious pardon," I began in obsequious Mandarin, but he waved his hand and said, "Whoa there, little lady. Hang on to that thought until I am having me a closer look at this here piece of carving."

He sounded like a foreign version of those old John Wayne films my Great-uncle Medicine Bear Kowalski used to bring over to amuse Grandpa Ananda after Grandma died. He looked more like the other old films Uncle Bear used to bring over, though, the ones about the adventurous anthropologist with the name of the state, who was always hunkering over something ancient and valuable when he wasn't leaping over something or running from something.

Captain Taring handed me a splinter of the carving. "What are you thinking of this?"

"Ruined ceiling beam?" I ventured brightly. That wasn't hard. I'd seen the entire beam intact, in my dream. It was the one with birds soaring through stylized clouds.

He grunted, standing up and, oddly enough, offering his hand. "You are being new around these parts, are you not?"

"Yes. Yes, I am," I said, giving him my name and restraining my impulse to add that I was the new schoolmarm, providing rank and serial number instead. He vigorously pumped my hand, which he had had to retrieve from my side since I was too slow to offer it.