The Butterfly Plague Read Free Page B

beholding an act of vandalism or of blindness. Ruth settled for blindness.
    “I—am—so—sorry…” she forced. “The sun. The sun, you see.” She wiped her eyes, as though removing the sun itself, and smiled.
    The waiter, satisfied and relieved, retreated with a sigh.
    Now was the moment to do it. Before thought. Before confusion could be blamed. Before regret. She rose, using the pretext of the spilt coffee. She took up Mein Kampf. She took up her purse. She paid her bill. She strode eight steps in the right direction, and the train lurched. Ruth set her gaze on the distant stare of the seated figure. Swimming in its direction against the current of the disturbed gravity beneath her feet, she arrived at the woman’s table.
    “Hello.”
    The head rose.
    Its veiling billowed slightly.
    There was no vocal response.
    Ruth went right on. “I must introduce myself. Pm Ruth Haddon. I was Ruth Damarosch. Perhaps we’ve met. I couldn’t avoid the fact that you were looking at me. I thought perhaps you wondered who I was. I…”
    “No.”
    “No?”
    “No. And please leave at once.”
    “But…”
    “Leave me immediately, Mrs. Haddon. Or I shall have you removed.”
    The Negro.
    Ruth looked down, frozen with panic, into the depths of the veiling.
    “Who are you?” she said.
    The eyes lifted. Ruth could just perceive them. They glistened. Dragonfly’s eyes. On the tablecloth the little gloved hands took delicate hold of one another.
    “I am no one,” said the voice (vaguely recognizable—deadly), “I am— no one . Go away.”
    Ruth shivered. All at once, she knew who it was.

    2:05 p.m.

    Ruth hurried along the corridor toward her compartment, impelled by the knowledge of her discovery.
    The blond man followed in leather-scented pursuit.
    Ruth got to her door. She opened it and went inside. She turned then and hissed at the man, speaking to him for the very first time. Her words ridiculously echoed the words of the woman in veils: “Go away,” she whispered. “Go away and leave me alone. I am no one.” Then she slammed the door and burst into tears.

    2:10 p.m.

    Finished with her crying, Ruth sat back and counted: One, two, three and four. Five and six and seven. Eight. Nine and ten. Eleven.
    The suspense was unbearable for her. To be losing one’s mind. To be followed. To be stared at. To see, after so many years, that woman, and to look again into that gaze, too well remembered.
    Something was going to happen. Something more terrible than anything that had happened before. It would happen to Ruth first, but she sensed that it would also happen to someone else. Perhaps to everyone. It was in the air of her mind: in the air around her. Did she carry it? She wondered.
    She refocused her gaze.
    The train whizzed on through an intersection, and Ruth saw carloads of waving people stopped at the crossing. She waved back and then she thought, Why do I wave? I hate you.
    The Santa Fe Super Chief went on by, its brown and yellow cars going clickety-click.
    The people went on waving, unaware of being hated.

    2:17 p.m.

    “There goes Bully Moxon.”
    “Where? Where?”
    “Right there. Going into the station. Oh, Dolly—Bully Moxon!”
    “Calm yourself, Myra.”
    “I can’t. It’s too exciting. He’s marvelous.”
    “I thought he was dead,” said Dolly.
    “Well, there he is,” said Myra, standing up in the front seat of the car. “Just as alive as you and me or anybody.”
    “Pickled to the gills, no doubt.”
    “No. Not at all. Looking wonderful.”
    Dolly stroked his beard, which was red. He did not mind shaving his cheeks—they were pretty straightforward and safe—but his chin was doubtful territory and he did not dare to lay a razor to it. So he wore a chin beard—handsome and short.
    “I don’t see him,” he said.
    “Stand up, then,” said Myra.
    “In the rumble seat?” Dolly whined.
    “Of course, in the rumble seat.”
    Dolly carefully hoisted himself until he stood on the cushions