"What, then?"
"A sign."
"What sort of sign?"
* * * * *
Hendricks did not answer. In the flickering light his eyes were
glazed, two sightless orbs. Tasso's fingers dug into his arm.
"What sort of sign? What is it?"
"I--I can't think. Let me rest."
"All right." She let go and stood up. Hendricks lay back against the
ground, his eyes closed. Tasso walked away from him, her hands in her
pockets. She kicked a rock out of her way and stood staring up at the
sky. The night blackness was already beginning to fade into gray.
Morning was coming.
Tasso gripped her pistol and walked around the fire in a circle, back
and forth. On the ground Major Hendricks lay, his eyes closed,
unmoving. The grayness rose in the sky, higher and higher. The
landscape became visible, fields of ash stretching out in all
directions. Ash and ruins of buildings, a wall here and there, heaps
of concrete, the naked trunk of a tree.
The air was cold and sharp. Somewhere a long way off a bird made a few
bleak sounds.