She groaned more loudly. She moved her legs farther apart. Both her arms were around him now, and they remained in that balance between tension and lassitude as the glow from the fire softened their movement and warmed them. In a while she shifted and helped him as he slid between her legs. She said, "Yes," once and raised her head and shoulders slightly to kiss him as their bodies moved in intuitive union.
When it was over and they were spent she looked up at him in the rose-tinged semidarkness and said, "I love you very much." "I love you," he said. There were tears on his face. Then he put his face down beside hers and they lay still on the floor in front of the fire with their arms around each other, still pressed together. A log shifted as the center burned through and the two halves slowly settled toward the center.
"Don't expect too much next time," she said. Her eyes were closed and she lay with her head resting on his right arm.
"I'll take what I can get," he said. His voice was hoarse.
She opened her eyes and looked at him without moving her head. Then she said, "The floor is quite hard."
"True."
"Let's get up and eat." "Okay," he said. "Let's get dressed before we eat, though. I'm freezing my ass off."
The clothes were still warm from the dryer when they put them on. His shirt had gone overboard with the knapsack. He wore the vest over his bare upper body. She sipped her bourbon while she set the table in front of the fire. He forked the half-thawed steak onto the swing-out grill in the fireplace. It began to sizzle almost at once as the flame touched it. The coals were thick on the fire bed now, and the fireplace was very hot. She brought him another can of beer. He drank from it. She put the casserole of beans on a hot pad on the table. They were bubbling softly. She put out the rye bread, some ketchup, some pickles, two dinner plates, knives and forks. He turned the steak on the grill, feeling the heat blistering his hand as he did. She finished setting the table and sat in one of the chairs and sipped her bourbon. The steak sizzled for three more minutes on the grill and then he put it on a plate and brought it to the table. He cut it in two pieces with his pocket knife, gave one half to her and put the other half on his own plate. Then he sat down and they ate.
They ate in silence. The food occupied them completely. And as they ate they thought of when they had eaten a granola bar for dinner.
"It's lovely to eat," she said.
He put some ketchup on his beans. "Yes," he said. "One of the great meals."
They finished eating and wiped the plate clean with the last of the bread. He went to the kitchen and brought out coffee in thick china mugs with pictures of vegetables on them.
"What do we do now?" Janet said.
Newman sipped the coffee. "We drive Chris's car home, time it to arrive at night, put it in his garage in the dark, go home to our house, and take up our lives again. There's nothing to connect us. The rent's paid in aavance on this place. When the week's up, we're gone. The owner will think nothing of it. Before we leave tomorrow I'll wipe the place for fingerprints."
"Everywhere? That's a big order." She sipped at her coffee, holding the mug at chin level and breathing in the steam.
"No, just refrigerator, chrome sink-handles, bathroom and toilet handles, that stuff. They can't pick anything up off fabric and floors and stuff."
"How do you know about fingerprints?" "It stands to reason," he said. "It's got to be something smooth that the oils of the fingertips will leave a trace on, right?"
She shook her head, "I have no idea about fingerprints," she said.
"I'll have to trust you. How's the arm? It looked clean when I bandaged it."
"Seems pretty good. I looked at it in the shower. I don't see any infection. It's not swollen or very red. We'll keep an eye on it. If it gets worse I'll go to some suburban hospital emergency room and give a phony name. Happens all the time."
"And how in hell do you know that?" "I asked Teddy Schroeder. He interned in the emergency room at United Hospital. I was doing a book where the question came up. He says that's no sweat. They report it to the police but it's routine, and they don't ask for ID or anything." She smiled. "You do know things. The shelter in the woods. I know you've never built a shelter before."
"Yeah, but I've carp entered I have built a lot of things. There's logic to things. You build one thing you learn the logic of building.
How else would you make a shelter there?"
"I don't know. But it worked. You made it work." "Thank you," he said.
"How do you feel?" she said.
"Physically? Or emotionally?"
"Both," she said. "You've had to do an awful thing and it was terrible and frightening and you did all of it. How does it make you feel?" He drank some of his coffee. "Strong," he said. "Strong and close-knit, and not very much thinking. You know. I don't want to think very much. I want to work on intuition and feeling and eat what tastes good and drink what's cold and do a lot of screwing and sleeping and wearing clean clothes."
They were quiet, drinking coffee, looking at the fire.
"I couldn't have gone into the woods without you," he said. "And I could never have gotten out." "We went together," she said. "And came out the same way." "More together," he said. "Much more together." "Don't do that," she said. "Don't start expecting too much." He smiled at her, the smile widening across his face as if it would distort. Even in the dimness of the firelight his eyes gleamed.
"I don't expect anything," he said. "I take what comes. And we make do."
Epilogue.
It was two weeks before Thanksgiving and the wound in Newman's arm was only a smooth red scar when Vincent and Croft came to call. They came in a dark blue Chevrolet with a whip antenna but no other markings and parked under Newman's ancient maple tree in the early evening.
Croft rang the bell and Newman answered. His face was blank when he saw the two policemen, and he said, "What can I do for you gentlemen?" Croft said, "We'd like to come in and talk for a few minutes." Vincent said, "We're not here to arrest you."
Newman said, "That's good. Come in. We're having dinner. Would you be willing to sit and have a drink or something with us while we finish?" Vincent said, "Sure."
Janet Newman, still dressed from work in a black pantsuit with vest, and black boots with high spike heels, was eating linguine with clam sauce at the kitchen table across from Newman's now empty place. There was a bottle of Graves and two glasses. Janet sipped some wine, put the glass down, and smiled at them.
"This is my wife, Janet," Newman said. "These are state policemen.
Corporal Croft and Lieutenant Vincent." Janet smiled more brightly and said, "How do you do. Can we get you some wine or coffee? Piece of pie? Have you eaten?" "We've eaten," Vincent said, "thank you. I'd be happy to have a drink though. Bobby?" Croft said, "Yeah, me too. I'll take a beer1 if you've got one."