Steampunk!: An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories by Kelly Link

Author:Kelly Link [Link, Kelly]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2011-07-21T10:40:56+00:00

Once the girl had left them, the old man had taken Mary's hands and laid them with his own, clasped, on McCahon's chest. They bent over

McCahon, very intent, on him as well as each other. They seemed so calm. McCahon was in pain, but the pain was remote. He didn't have to be patient, because he wasn't hoping to be rescued. He only wished that the girl had stayed. He wanted to see her. To see her and what would happen. He hoped he'd still be conscious when the fireworks really got under way. And he hoped that before she was killed, girlie got to see something truly beautiful.

The old people were talking, and after a moment he began to attend.

Mary told her story. She explained how she had come to be on the road where she and the girl had met, and how she had followed the girl to Gethsemane just to see what she did. "But," Mary said, "I didn't want to survive. I only wanted a moment free of the pain. So I made a promise to it: I won't be long—I said—I won't stay in a room I can't pay for."

The old man pressed his palm against her cheek. He touched her very tenderly.

She said, "I only wanted one moment free, to climb to a high place and look back on my whole life, not just the final low place it had taken me to."

McCahon slipped away for a moment and woke when the earth tossed him, as if it meant to turn him like a pancake on a skillet. Mary was asking the old man questions. "He's your kin, isn't he, the boy?"

"Yes, my grandson, though he goes by another name. It's understandable. He wants what he can have. And I don't feel disowned." He sounded like someone making an effort to make his peace.

A volley of stones went by, vicious and hissing, over their heads.

"God save them," Mary said — of everyone.

"Tell me about your girl."

"She's a runaway. She stole her father's horses and sold them in Gethsemane, and that's all I know. I don't even know her name."

"That's not all you know, though, is it?" the old man said.

Mary thought for a moment. "No. You're right. We know this, too What? Could you not even watch with me one hour?"

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