The Top of the Volcano by Harlan Ellison

Author:Harlan Ellison [Ellison, Harlan]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Harlan Ellison, award-winning short stories
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

They were lying down side-by-side because they were tired. Nothing more than that. The Battle of the Ardennes, First World War, was all around them. Not a sound. Just movement. Mist, fog, turretless tanks, shattered trees all around them. Some corpses left lying in the middle of no man’s land. They had been together for a space of time…it was three hours, it was six weeks, it was a month of Sundays, it was a year to remember, it was the best of times, it was the worst of times: who could measure it, there were no signposts, no town criers, no grandfather clocks, no change of seasons, who could measure it?

They had begun to talk freely. He told her again that his name was Ian Ross and she said Catherine, Catherine Molnar again. She confirmed his guess that her life had been empty. “Plain,” she said. “I was plain. I am plain. No, don’t bother to say you think I have nice cheekbones or a trim figure; it won’t change a thing. If you want plain, I’ve got it.”

He didn’t say she had nice cheekbones or a trim figure. But he didn’t think she was plain.

The Battle of the Ardennes was swirling away now.

She suggested they make love.

Ian Ross got to his feet quickly and walked away.

She watched him for a while, keeping him in sight. Then she got up, dusted off her hands though there was nothing on them, an act of memory, and followed him. Quite a long time later, after trailing him but not trying to catch up to him, she ran to match his pace and finally, gasping for breath, reached him. “I’m sorry,” she said.

“Nothing to be sorry about.”

“I offended you.”

“No, you didn’t. I just felt like walking.”

“Stop it, Ian. I did, I offended you.”

He stopped and spun on her. “Do you think I’m a virgin? I’m not a virgin.”

His vehemence pulled her back from the edge of boldness. “No, of course you’re not. I never thought such a thing.” Then she said, “Well…I am.”

“Sorry,” he said, because he didn’t know the right thing to say, if there was a right thing.

“Not your fault,” she said. Which was the right thing to say.

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