egg in German? he asked his wife.
We aren’t in Germany, said the woman.
Sie möchten Eiern? said the waitress, in German. You would like eggs?
Ja, said the man. Yes.
Scrambled, poached, fried, boiled, shirred? She apparently spoke excellent English.
What’s shirred? the man asked his wife.
I don’t know, she said. Like poached, I think.
En croûte, said the waitress. Baked in a casserole. With breadcrumbs and butter.
Sounds delicious, said the man, I’ll have that.
Potato?
Yes, please, said the man. Bacon?
The waitress nodded. And for your lady?
Toast please, said the woman. Dry.
Jam or honey?
No, thank you. Dry.
The waitress collected their menus and once again disappeared through the door in the wall.
Well, said the man. That wasn’t so difficult.
Why should ordering breakfast in a hotel be difficult?
Because everything else has been difficult, said the man. He tasted his elderberry juice. It’s delicious, he said. Very tart. A bit like pomegranate. Would you like to try it? He offered the glass to his wife.
She shook her head no and poured tea into her cup.
It’s funny, said the man, after a moment.
What?
The way things are difficult—or aren’t. I mean when we arrived here, it seemed so impossible.
What do you mean, impossible?
Just everything. Starting in the market the other night. And then last night, at the station. And yet we’re sitting here drinking elderberry juice, about to eat shirred eggs. At least I am. It amazes me, how things have a way of working themselves out, if you just persist.
The woman did not answer. She appeared to be studying the fresco nearest to them, which depicted a covey of young naked maidens chasing a somewhat obscenely tusked wild boar through a fairy-tale forest.
I’d like to remember that, he said. I think it would be good if we could both remember that.
Remember what? She did not like when he tried to interfere with, or direct, her thoughts.
That things don’t always end badly.
Yes, said the woman. Things do work themselves out. She lifted the cup of tea to her lips but quickly replaced it in the saucer. It’s too hot, she said. She looked down at the cup as if its inhospitable temperature were a personal affront.
He had gone too far, he realized. He always did. She would open up to him, and he would respond, only to shut her back up again. It was unfair of her, he thought.
They sat for a while in silence, until the waitress emerged from the kitchen, carrying a silver tray on her shoulder, on which sat two plates beneath silver domes. She placed one in front of each of them and then removed the domes, revealing on his plate a ramekin filled with eggs surrounded by fried potatoes and two slabs of very thick bacon, and on hers two slices of slightly scorched toast. A sprig of parsley had been added to her plate, perhaps to compensate for its meagerness, but it had the opposite effect, making the dry toast look even more desolate.
The man forked over his eggs, revealing a mattress of breadcrumbs beneath them. A fragrant steam rose up against his face. He looked over at his wife. She was staring despondently down at her plate of toast.
Is that not what you wanted? he asked.
She shook her head a little and smiled, sadly, at him. No, she said. It’s exactly what I want.
They had been told to arrive at the orphanage for their initial visit anytime between ten o’clock and noon. The concierge was able to arrange a taxi to pick them up and it was waiting for them outside the hotel when they emerged from the ballroom after finishing their breakfast. The woman had wanted to go up to their room to use the bathroom and put some makeup on her pale face, but she was afraid the taxi might not wait for them, and although the man said of course it would, she insisted they get into it and leave immediately.
The hotel was at the very center of the old town, and the streets around it were extremely narrow, made even narrower by the towering piles of snow, so the taxi drove slowly. The town seemed eerily underpopulated; many of the stores were vacant, their glass windows empty or occupied by a desolate naked mannequin staring out at the cold world.
The streets grew wider nearer the outskirts, and what little charm the old city had was replaced by a modern ugliness of concrete and glazed brick, but it wasn’t long before they had left the town behind and were on a