“I was glad enough to do this, knowing it might be my last view of it in a lifetime, and we went out again into the balmy night. We wandered toward the river, staying, as Helen had promised, on the main thoroughfares. At the great bridge we paused, and then she strolled onto it, running one hand thoughtfully along the railings. Above the vast water we paused again, looking back and forth at the two sides of Budapest, and I felt again its majesty and the explosion of war that had nearly destroyed it. The lights of the city shone everywhere, quivering in the black surface of the water. Helen stood for a while at the railing, then turned, as if reluctantly, to walk back toward Pest. She had taken off her jacket, and when she turned I saw a jagged shape on the back of her blouse. Leaning closer, I suddenly realized it was an enormous spider. It had spun a web all the way across her back; I could clearly see the glinting filaments. I remembered then that I’d seen cobwebs all along the bridge railing, where she’d been running her hand. ‘Helen,’ I said softly. ‘Don’t get upset-there’s something on your back.’

“‘What?’ She froze.

“‘I’m going to brush it off,’ I said gently. ‘It’s just a spider.’

“A shudder went through her, but she stood obediently motionless while I flicked the creature off her back. I admit that it gave me a shudder, too, because the spider was the largest I’d ever seen, almost half the width of my hand. It hit the railing next to us with an audible thwack and Helen screamed. I’d never heard her express fear before, and that little scream made me suddenly want to grab her and shake her, even hit her. ‘It’s all right,’ I said quickly, taking her by the arm, trying to stay calm. To my surprise, she gave a sob or two before she could steady herself. It astonished me that a woman who could shoot at vampires was so shaken by a spider, but this had been a long day and a strained one. She surprised me again by turning to look at the river and saying in a low voice, ‘I promised I would tell you about Géza.’

“‘You don’t have to tell me anything.’ I hoped I didn’t sound irritable.

“‘I don’t want to lie by silence.’ She walked a few feet away, as if to leave the spider completely behind, although it had vanished, probably into the Danube. ‘When I was a university student, I was in love with him for a little while, or thought I was, and in return he helped my aunt to get me my fellowship and passport to leave Hungary.’

“I recoiled, staring at her.

“‘Oh, it wasn’t so crude,’ she said. ‘He did not say, ”You sleep with me and then you can go to England.“ He is actually rather subtle. He did not get everything he wanted from me, either. But by the time I was no longer charmed with him, I had my passport in my hand. That was how it happened, and when I realized it, I already had a ticket to freedom, to the West, and I was not willing to give it up. And I thought it was worth it to find my father. So I played along with Géza until I could escape to London, and then I left him a letter breaking my ties with him. I wanted to be honest about that, at least. He must have been very angry, but he never wrote me.’

“‘And how did you know he was with the secret police?’

“She laughed. ‘He was too vain to keep it to himself. He wanted to impress me. I did not tell him that I was more frightened than impressed, and more disgusted than frightened. He told me about people he had sent to jail, or had sent to be tortured, and implied that there was worse. It is impossible not to hate such a person, ultimately.’

“‘I’m not glad to hear this, since he’s interested in my movements,’ I said. ‘But I’m glad to know that’s how you feel about him.’

“‘What did you think?’ she demanded. ‘I’ve been trying to stay away from him from the minute we got here.’

“‘But I sensed some complicated feeling in you when you saw him at the conference,’ I admitted. ‘I couldn’t help thinking that perhaps you had loved him, or still loved him, something like that.’

“‘No.’ She shook her head, looking down at the dark current. ‘I could not love an interrogator-a torturer-probably a murderer. And if I did not reject him for all this-in the past and even more now-there would be other things for which I would reject him.’ She turned slightly in my direction, but without meeting my gaze. ‘They are smaller things, but still very important. He is not kind. He does not know when to say something comforting and when to be silent. He does not really care about history. He does not have soft gray eyes or bushy eyebrows, or roll his sleeves up to the elbow.’ I stared at her, and now she looked me full in the face with a kind of determined courage. ‘In short, the biggest problem with him is that he is not you.’

“Her gaze was almost unreadable, but after a moment she began to smile, as if in spite of herself, as if fighting herself, and it was the beautiful smile of all the women in her family. I stared, an unbeliever still, and then I took her into my arms and kissed her passionately. ‘What did you think?’ she murmured, as soon as I could let her go for a second. ‘What did you think?’

“We stood there for long minutes-it might have been an hour-and then she suddenly drew back with a groan and put her hand to her neck. ‘What is it?’ I asked quickly.

“She hesitated for a moment. ‘My wound,’ she said slowly. ‘It has healed, but sometimes it hurts me for a moment. And just now I thought-what if I should not have touched you?’

“We stared at each other. ‘Let me see it,’ I said. ‘Helen, let me see it.’

“Silently, she untied her scarf and lifted her chin in the light of the streetlamp. On the skin of her strong throat I saw two purple marks, nearly closed over. My fears receded a little; she had clearly not been bitten since the first attack. I leaned over and touched my lips to the spot.

“‘Oh, Paul, don’t!’ she cried, starting back.

“‘I don’t care,’ I said. ‘I will heal it myself.’ I searched her face, then. ‘Or did that make it hurt?’

“‘No, it was soothing,’ she admitted, but she put her hand over the spot, almost protectively, and after a minute tied her scarf on again. I knew then that even if her contamination had been slight, I must watch her more carefully than ever. I fished in my pocket. ‘We should have done this long ago. I want you to wear this.’ It was one of the little crucifixes we’d brought from Saint Mary’s Church at home. I fastened it around her neck, so that it hung discreetly below the scarf. She seemed to breathe a sigh of relief, touching it with her finger.

“‘I am not a believer, you know, and I felt I was too much the scholar to -’

“‘I know. But what about that time in Saint Mary’s Church?’

“‘Saint Mary’s?’ She frowned.

“‘At home, near the university. When you came in to read Rossi’s letters with me, you put some holy water on your forehead.’

She thought a minute. ‘Yes, I did. But that was not belief. It was from a feeling of homesickness.’

“We walked slowly back over the bridge and along the dark streets without touching each other. I could still feel her arms twined around me.

“‘Let me come to your room with you,’ I whispered as we came in sight of the hotel.

“‘Not here.’ I thought her lips quivered. ‘We are being watched.’

“I didn’t repeat my request, and was glad for the distraction that awaited us at the front desk of the hotel. When I asked for my key, the clerk handed it over with a scrap of paper scrawled in German: Turgut had called and wanted me to call him back. Helen waited while I went through the ritual of begging for the phone and giving the guard a little incentive to help me-I had stooped low, in these last days here-and then I dialed hopelessly for a while until it rang far away. Turgut answered with a rumble and a quick switch to English. ‘Paul, dear man! Thank the gods you have called. I have news for you-important news!’