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He’d taken the books he listed for Mr. White and thirteen others he’d not read yet. Novels likeThe Giver, Lord of the Flies. Catcher in the Rye. These were all in English. If ever he was caught with a book, chances were good he could lie about the plot. Not many could read English, much less speak it. Out here, well, no one could even read. That included Amu.
He was re-reading Anne Frank, probably because, like him, she was trapped and had to hide what and who she was. Of course, things ended badly for her and her family.
But I’m different. The times are different.Well, in some ways. If he stayed in Afghanistan, he would be condemned by what he was just as Anne had been.
He checked his mother’s cellphone. Only six-thirty.Plenty of time.In fact, maybe he’d read a bit before his bath. Just a page or two. Tucking the cell back into a pocket, he sat on his favoritepart of the flowstone: a natural, butt-sized depression about half a foot from the wall. Being this close to the stream, the wall was also pleasantly warm, and he’d often imagined that the long-ago artist who’d left that handprint might have chosen this very spot to sit and dream.
He found where he’d left off: Anne’s diary entry on October 20th, 1942. That was the day a carpenter nearly discovered where Anne and her family were hiding. He could practicallytasteher fear. He knew what it was like to hide, to always take such care not to slip up. He wasn’t hiding the way Anne had been but close enough. The same men who’d probably caught up to Mami would be just as happy to kill him.
Or they just might do something else that was, in its way, even worse. There were rumors about men and boys in Sarhad: men who bought, borrowed, or paired young beautiful boys with men old enough to be their grandfathers. The prospect made Poya light-headed and sick with fear. Givenhisbody, even bigger problems waited in a future that wasn’t as distant now as it had been only five years ago.
On second thought, maybe he would bathe. Skip the book for a day. He didn’t need to read about near-misses.
He slipped the paperback into its plastic baggy and zippered that shut. Wriggling his left foot and then his right from their boots, he peeled away his socks then stood to shuck his coat. Pulling the hammer and then his flashlight from their slings, he placed those on his coat and then went to work on his belt. Hooking his thumbs under the waistband of his trousers, he shoved these down to his feet. Slipping out of his vest, he gathered his tunic in both hands to pull over his head?—
Just as, from the darkness to his left, something moaned.
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He froze,still half-in, half-out of his tunic. Sudden gooseflesh pebbled his naked flesh. The fine hairs along the back of his neck stiffened. His tongue seemed to shrivel to a piece of old shoe leather while his pulse throbbed.
Someone here. A person?Animals, especially big ones, could moan like that. He listened hard over his banging heart but heard nothing. Because it hadbeennothing? What made a sound like that? Had there been tracks? Had he seen any blood or bits of hair? No, no, he hadn’t. Really, he should throw on his clothes and run. On the other hand?—
The moan came again.
Oh.Fear made him shrink into himself, try to grow small. Slowly, carefully, he smoothed his tunic down over his body and reached for his pants. He had to get out of here, he had to run. But, as he slipped his trousers out from under his belt, the steel claw of his hammer scraped rock like something from a horror movie:screeee.
Oh!Still crouched, he stopped moving for a second.Be quiet, be quiet!
Another moan.
His heart banged. He should leave, right now! He could run, couldn’t he? There’d been a movie Baba had about an American Eskimo who ran, naked, across the ice andhelived.
That was a movie.This was real life. Moving the hammer to one side, he stood, got one leg into his trousers and then the other. He got his socks on and then his boots. Buckling his belt, he picked up the hammer in one hand and the flashlight in the other.
Now, back out. Go slow.Once he was around the bend, he would turn and?—
That moan, low and guttural, came again.
And he paused. He stayed where he was even as his brain screamed that he was an idiot, he needed to run, to get out!
Except…that sound was a little off. Camels lowed like that. So did cattle. But, again, the absence of tracks?—
He pulled in a sudden gasp.No tracks.But no snow or ice at the entrance either. Hadn’t he just noticed that? Yes, but he’dassumedthat the spring’s heat had somehow kept the cave’s entry clear.
Except that had never happened before.
Say, an animal decided the cave was a good place to die. He knew from all his reading that animals often intuited when death was near. They frequently stole away to someplace quiet where they could die in peace. So, this might be an animal, wounded and dying or just old and drying. He could buy that.
What he could not buy was that any animal would know to sweep away its tracks.
Another long moan.
There was enough natural light from the opening overhead for him to see a clear path. Stepping carefully, he eased his way along the stream, passed its mouth, and then slid to the extreme left of the entrance into that next chamber. Pressing back against the rock, he listened. Nothing.
Although he now detected a bizarre mélange of odors that did not belong.
One, so thick and potent that Poya’s eyes watered was unmistakable. Anyone who had ever visited an outhouse or, come to think of it, a public toilet recognized the stink was of stale urine and old feces.