okay?” Mia asks, almost timidly, stepping forward.
“I’m fine.” Though Phil Cozens didn’t diagnose it, Julian knows he’s got a muscle tear in his calf, a common injury in contact sports. For the next few weeks, it’s not going to be easy for him to walk around the bomb sites. “Are you okay? Was Finch right? Did I hurt you?”
“No,” she says. “The beam in my face would’ve hurt a lot worse, so Finch was not right.”
Facing each other, they stand next to the medi truck.
“I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you,” she says. “But it was just a freak accident.”
Julian says nothing.
“Okay, how did you do that?” she says. “You came over at just the right moment, almost as if you knew it was going to happen.”
“Mia, did you see what you were doing? It didn’t take a genius.”
“But why did you do that?” she says quietly.
“Do what?”
“Why did you throw yourself in front of me like that?”
“Like what?”
She can’t say.
“Anyone would’ve done the same, believe me,” Julian says.
She stares into his face a moment and doesn’t say anything.
13
Gold Rings
RIGHT AFTER A BOMBING, THE SITE IS UNSTABLE IN ALL WAYS, physical and metaphysical. Fire damage, charring, demolition. Destruction of both people and property. There is bitter cold and falling rain, and wind. There is also frustration, impatience, disagreement. There are short tempers, even among the British.
The day after the beam incident, Mia gets into it with a woman who accuses Mia of stealing her jewelry. It’s unusual for Mia to argue back. She is normally so placid. She keeps repeating that she did not find any jewelry in the house, but the woman doesn’t believe her, so Mia keeps repeating it but louder. The woman is soon joined by her son and her uncle, both equally truculent, the uncle beefy and intimidating. All three are accusing the beset Mia of taking the woman’s gold rings. Mia is too nice, even when she is arguing. She doesn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings. Having listened to this from a distance, Julian is about to walk over to deal with the situation his own way, even though he knows it’s not his place, but instead Finch saunters over, to deal with the situation his way. At first, Julian condemned Finch’s response time to Mia’s crisis, which, to put it politely, was somewhat dilatory. But as Julian listens in disbelief, Finch asks Mia to turn out her pockets to prove to the irate family that she took nothing from them. Before Mia can respond, the woman herself declares that turning out the pockets will prove nothing. Mia would have to strip naked, the woman says. The uncle joins in by saying even stripping naked will prove nothing because Mia could’ve swallowed the rings. That’s when Julian has really had enough.
Ignoring Wild’s admonition to stay out of it, Julian drops what he’s doing, limps down from the mound of bricks, favoring his injured calf, slowly walks into the street where the quarrel is proceeding unabated, and steps between Mia and her three aggressors. He steps between them so forcefully that the teenage son loses his balance and falls. Pulling Mia behind him, Julian stands in front of her and turns to Finch. He doesn’t even bother addressing the family.
“Do you know what your job is?” Julian says quietly. “Your first job? It’s not to write down the quantity of their fucking gold rings. It’s to protect your own fucking valuables. How can you be so crap at that?”
“Please step away,” Finch says, all officious and prim. “You’re making the situation worse, as always. I’m trying to defuse it.”
“Mum, he knocked me down!” the teenager cries.
“Get up, my darling, to your feet at once! Who are you?” the woman barks at Julian.
The uncle joins in. “Yeah, bugger off, this don’t concern you—”
Julian won’t hear another word. He shoves the uncle in the chest. “Shut your fucking mouth before I shut it for you,” Julian says to him before turning to the woman. “Lady, take your son, take whoever that idiot is, and get out of here. A bomb fell inside your house. You understand that, don’t you, at least theoretically? The house is unstable. It can collapse any second, yet she still walks through it, searching for your shit while you loiter in the street drinking tea and yelling at her. Trust me, she doesn’t need your gold rings. She’s got forty sovereigns of her own.”
The stupefied uncle scrambles forward, huffing and puffing. “I’m not afraid