The Snow Gypsy(97)
A short, sharp bark brought Lola back to reality. Gunesh was charging downhill, his tail wagging furiously. Lola scrambled off the rock, shading her eyes. A lone figure was coming up the steep bank of a stream, arms outstretched, hair trailing in the breeze.
“Rose!”
Rose didn’t spot her at first. She was too busy making a fuss of Gunesh, who had launched himself like a missile out of the wild thyme bushes cloaking the hillside. Then Nieve, who had gone running after the dog, entered the fray. With a whoop of joy, she wrapped her arms around Rose’s legs.
Nieve gave a theatrical sigh when they reached the spot where Lola was standing. “We thought she was never coming, didn’t we?”
“You walked?” Lola glanced at Rose’s rucksack as she laid it on the ground.
“I couldn’t have taken one of his mules, could I?” Rose pressed her lips together. She looked as if she was trying hard not to cry.
“It’s true, then,” Lola whispered.
Rose nodded, looking away. “I didn’t have time to pack much. Just my passport and purse and some underwear. And the little horse that Nathan carved. I left all the rest behind.”
“Come and sit down.” Lola patted the rock. “Are you hungry? We’ve had something already.” She glanced at Nieve. “Why don’t you take him down to the stream, cari?o? He’s probably thirsty.”
Lola waited until Nieve was a safe distance away. “What did he say?”
Rose dug her thumbnail into a patch of lichen growing on the rock. “That he was only following orders. That he had no choice about sending people to the gas chambers.” She brought her thumb up to her face, staring at the smudge of yellow on her skin. “He said he wasn’t that person anymore—but he is. He’s just killed your . . . that man . . . in cold blood. You saw what he did: he took aim and shot him, twice. He could have thrown the gun away, couldn’t he? He could easily have overpowered a man of that age—tied him up somewhere while we all got away—but he just killed him.”
Lola gazed into the distance, at the blur of blue and gray where land gave way to sea. “I killed a man, too.”
“But you were being attacked—that’s different.” Rose shook her head slowly. “He asked me to forgive him. But how could I do that? How could I go on living with him, knowing he was responsible for killing all those people in the camp—people just like me and you?”
“Do you still love him?”
“I . . .” Rose hesitated. “I don’t know. I love the person I thought he was—that’s not the same, is it?” She scraped off another fragment of lichen. “The Gypsies I knew in England used to say that not to forgive someone is like drinking poison and expecting someone else to die.”
“That’s how I felt about . . .” Lola clamped her mouth shut. She couldn’t, wouldn’t, call him “my father.”
“How could you possibly have forgiven what he did?”
“I couldn’t,” Lola whispered. “What does it really mean, anyway, when someone says they forgive a person? Someone who’s destroyed their life?”
Rose let out a long breath. “I suppose it’s about letting it go—not letting the person off, but refusing to carry them around inside your head any longer.”
“I wish I’d never seen him. I don’t think I’ll ever get that face out of my head.”
“You will,” Rose murmured.
“Will I? What about Zoltan? Can you erase the memory of him? Do you want to?”
“No . . . yes . . . I don’t know.” Rose closed her eyes tight.
Chapter 36
Granada, Spain: Three days later
Rose was gazing into the mirrored surface of a pool, watching the reflection of a swift as it swooped low over the water. It was little more than a month since she had sat in this same spot in the perfumed gardens of the Alhambra, trying to put the past behind her, thinking about how Cristóbal had behaved.
Yet again, she had been deceived. Had allowed herself to believe. Which one was worse—Cristóbal or Zoltan? Cristóbal had not actually lied to her—he had simply withheld the facts. But Zoltan had woven a fabric of lies—a whole fake identity—made even more abhorrent by the fact that he had pretended to be one of the very people he was responsible for murdering.
So why did she feel so empty? Why did it feel like a bereavement, losing him?
A body doesn’t have to leave this world to stir up those feelings. Bill Lee’s words drifted through her mind. That sense of grief, of living with someone who was no longer there, was overwhelming.
She thought how ironic it was that right from the start, it was Zoltan’s compassion that had impressed her—the many small acts of kindness and thoughtfulness that had eased the pain of her search for Nathan. She remembered how he had lifted her spirits at the San Juan fiesta with the simple gift of a flower for her hair. How she missed that feeling of being cherished. But that had all been part of the act, hadn’t it?
I’d never do anything to hurt you.
She had believed him. Trusted him. How could he have thought there was any kind of future for them when he had broken that trust? Not just broken it—smashed it to smithereens.
Her hand strayed to the side of her face, her fingers finding the beaded copper wire hooked through her ear. This earring had once belonged to Jean Beau-Marie’s mother—a woman who had died at the hands of men just like Zoltan. The thought of what Jean would say if he knew that Rose had slept with a Nazi made her feel physically sick.