Later, as she patrolled the aisles of the children's section, she was almost able to put the restaurant incident from her mind. Mrs Schumann was reading Hans Christian Andersen fairy tales to a story group at the table in the corner. Carol passed by from time to time on her rounds and caught the tale in snatches: 'The Girl Who Trod on a Loaf.' No doubt the little monsters had specifically asked for that one. It was the most repellently bloody-minded of the lot: a little girl who pulled the wings off flies, and her bizarre punishment, standing helpless and frozen while these same insects crawled over her face and body.
She was glad to see that two little boys, at least, were having no part of such sick fantasies. They were crouched before the bottom shelf of the biology section, a shelf that, Carol knew, contained some junior-level health and medical texts. Strolling round the floor, she passed them twice; they appeared to be engrossed in an oversize anatomy book, their small, intense faces studying something hidden by its covers. Carol surmised, from the way one of them glanced guiltily over his shoulder at her the second time she walked by, that the two were searching for nude pictures; it was a common preoccupation among the children who used the library. The bank of fans atop the bookshelves hummed, and Mrs Schumann's voice continued to drone across the room, echoing like a memory.
On Carol's third round she noticed that the thinner of the two boys was sitting cross-legged on the floor, the other kneeling. She was debating whether to direct them to chairs – their pants were going to be filthy when they got up – when suddenly the larger of the two made a little dip of his head and fell forward onto the other boy, clutching him in a furious hug. In a second they were rolling over on the floor, grunting with exertion and tearing at one another's faces, the book tossed aside. Carol was bigger than they were – as the assistant supervisor had once reminded her – but not so much bigger that she was able to tear the two apart. She ran for Mrs Schumann, who stood up from the reading circle like some great plump monster rising from a pool, and together they managed to separate the two combatants. They were brothers, it turned out, fighting not over the volume on the floor but over a small pocketknife which each claimed as his own. The fight ended with the knife in Mrs Schumann's desk drawer, permanently confiscated, and the two boys warned not to set foot inside the library again without a note from their mother – a note which, both women knew, would never be produced.
It was the knife that brought the memories back, memories of the previous night, the incident at dinner…
She had been so happy as they'd all sat down, happy that Rosie and Jeremy seemed to be hitting it off; happy, in a way, perhaps, that Rosie had arrived in time to stop her from doing something irrevocable; happy just to be spending a summer night in the company of two men she liked, in a comfortable candlelit restaurant with good food and an air conditioner that worked.
She remembered how Rosie, smiling fondly, had been talking to her of her future; how all his words had gone to her head, all his talk about courses and openings and opportunities. 'You're an unusually talented young lady,' he'd been saying, exuberantly waving his steak knife. 'I expect great things from you!'
Then suddenly, like the ending of a dream – she felt a chill even now as she remembered it – suddenly the lights had flickered once, twice, and gone off, leaving only the candles on the table.
It had all happened in an instant. Seconds later the power had come back on; once again the air conditioner's hum had filled the room, and with it movement, conversation, laughter. But in that frozen moment of shadows and silence, with only the candle on the table for illumination, she had seen Rosie regarding her – and it had been like seeing him for the first time. In the altered light, that instant, everything had looked different: the old man's face had been hard, icy, cruel. He had held the knife poised in her direction, and his tiny eyes had glittered like razors in the candlelight.
The bed was wide and almost filled the little room. They lay naked, the two of them, drugged with the heat of the evening, staring at the lantern light that flickered from the table by the wall. Deborah's hair, unfastened, was spread beneath her like a cape, black against the whiteness of the sheet. Around them lay their seven cats: Dinah and Tobias by Deborah's head, Habakkuk, or 'Cookie,' at her feet, Zillah with her face buried just behind Sarr's ear, 'Riah and Rebekah on the corner of the bed, and Bwada half beneath it on the wooden floor, yet well within reach of Sarr's caressing hand.
They lay silently, listening, waiting for Freirs to leave for the night. They could hear him downstairs in the bathroom, noisily brushing his teeth, rinsing his mouth, zipping up his toilet kit, and blowing out the kerosene lamp. The thin wooden door opened with a rattle, followed by footsteps in the kitchen directly below them. Deborah leaned from the bed and watched his progress; through the chinks in the wide-plank floor, with its warped and tilted boards, she saw the faint gleam of Freirs' flashlight moving toward the back door. The door opened, closed, the latch clicked shut, and they heard footsteps descending the back steps. There was silence, broken only by a faint muttered 'God-damn!' – he had stepped on something in the grass – and then they were left alone with their thoughts.
'He was in a bad mood tonight, wasn't he?' whispered Deborah. 'I think it was over Carol. Every time he spoke of her his face got angry.'
Sarr half closed his eyes, settling back against the hard mattress as if it were of down. 'It's only what he deserved,' he said slowly. 'He went back to the city for one reason, and you and I both know what it was. His heart was filled with lust, and the Lord made him suffer for it.'
'He misses her, honey, it isn't any more than that. He's courting her, just the way you courted me.'
He appeared to consider this a moment. 'Well, maybe it's only natural to follow after someone your heart's set on… But he should never have followed her to that place!' His face had become hard again; he looked like the faded photograph of his father which glared sternly from atop the bureau.
'He was only going home.'
'He was leaving all the things we've offered him here, leaving it all behind like it meant nothing to him, like we mean nothing. And for what? For a mess of light and noise and show. 'Twas a mistake, going back there.'
Deborah was silent a moment. 'I guess so,' she said. 'But you know, honey, this place is quite a change for him. He's not used to our ways yet. He likes having people around.' She paused. 'Can't say I blame him, either.'
'Oh, I see.' A hint of smile played about his lips; without turning his head to look at her he reached over and cupped a breast in his hand. 'You're saying I'm not man enough for you anymore, is that right? And you want him instead?'
She giggled and edged closer to him, dislodging two of the cats. 'That's right,' she said. 'I'm getting sick of the likes of you. I'm thinking I'll take me a lover.' She rolled over and pressed her body next to his. He ran his fingers through her hair, brushing it away from the pale skin of her shoulders.
'Guess I should have listened to my mother,' he said, planting a kiss on her mouth. He looked into her face, then smiled. 'Glad I didn't, though.'
The cats moved out of the way, reluctantly, as they made love. The old bed creaked and trembled.
Afterward, even while still inside her, his eyes still closed and his breathing heavy, he was reaching out for the Bible on the night-stand. He slipped out of her just as his hands closed on the book's worn leather binding.
She sighed. 'You know, honey, this is the last night we can do this for a while.'
'Hmmm?' He lay on his elbows in the bed, already thumbing through the dog-eared pages, squinting at the columns of print in the flickering light.
'I said we can't do this for a while -' less you want another mouth to feed.'