at me and only gradually did I realize that her expression meant nothing. It was only a mask for her pain. The pain was in her lungs and in her heart and in her bones. The pain was all through her. The soothing drugs she'd taken before she left New York were gone out of her body. Her heart was faint.
I cradled her hands in mine.
There came that noise again, the bell ringing, the alarm buzzing, and this time there was more than one. I heard the noise of a motor. It came from the elevator shaft.
"Ignore it," she said. "They can't get in." She pushed at the covers with her hands.
"What is it?" I asked.
"Help me, help me get up. Get my heavier robe for me, the heavy silk. Please . . ."
I got the robe, the one to which she pointed, and she put it on. She stood trembling beneath the weight of the ornate robe.
There was huge noise outside the main door.
"Are you sure they can't get in?"
"You don't have to fear, do you?" she asked.
"No, not at all, but I don't want them . . ."
"I know . . . ruining my death," she said.
"Yes."
She was completely white.
"You're going to fall down."
"I know," she said. "But I intend to fall where I want to fall. Help me out there, I want to look at the ocean."
I picked her up and carried her out the doors to the balcony. This was due east. The doors faced not the bay but the true sea. I realized it was the same sea that washed the banks of Europe, the shores of ruined Greek cities, the sands of Alexandria.
A pounding noise came from behind us. I turned around. It was coming from within the elevator. There were people in the car of the elevator. But the doors were locked.
The breeze ripped across the broad terrace. Under my feet the tiles felt cool. She seemed to love it, putting her head against my shoulder, looking out over the dark sea. A great ship, hung with lights, glided by, just short of the horizon, and above, the clouds made their spectacle.
I cuddled her and held her, and started to pick her up.
"No, let me stand," she said. She tugged herself gently free of me and put her hands on the high stone railing. She looked down. I saw a garden far down there, immaculate and mil of trees and bright lights. Egyptian lilies galore, and large fanlike plants, all waving just a little in the breeze.
"It's empty down there, isn't it?" she asked.
"What?"
"The garden. It's so private. Only the flowers beneath us, and beyond, the sea."
"Yes," I said.
The elevator door was being forced open.
"Remember what I said," she said. "You can't go wrong killing him. I mean it. He'll try to seduce you, or destroy you, or use you in some way. You can bet he is already thinking in those terms, how best to use you."
"I understand him perfectly," I said. "Don't worry. I will do what is right. Who knows? Maybe I will teach him right and wrong. Maybe I know what they are. Maybe I'll save his soul." I laughed. "That would be lovely."
"Yes, it would," she said. "But you're craving life, craving it. Which means you can be lured by him with all his fiery life, the same way you were lured by mine."
"Never, I told you. I'll put it right."
"All of it, put it all to right."
Several men had just broken through the front door, with a clumsy pounding noise. I heard the wood splinter.
She sighed. "Maybe Esther did call you down. Maybe she did," she said. "My angel."
I kissed her.
The men were blundering into the room behind us. I didn't have to look at them to know they were there. They stopped short; there was a rumble of urgent voices. Then Gregory's voice carried.
"Rachel, thank God you're all right."
I turned and I saw him and he saw me, and he looked hard and determined, and cold. "Let my wife go," he said. Liar.
He was blazing with anger, and anger made him evil; anger took away his charm. I suppose it had done that to mine before. And I realized slowly as I stood there that I loved again, and didn't hate. I loved Esther and I loved Rachel. I didn't hate even him.
"Go to the door and stand between us," Rachel said. "Do that for me, please." She kissed me on the cheek. "Do that, my