“I’m glad you came to see my land,” Hannah said to Connolly. “This is my whole country now.”
“But you have to leave it,” Emma said, joining them.
“I’ll come back. I have nowhere else to go. Hollywood is not a place-you can’t live there. This is a place.”
“Can’t you find someone to live here?” Emma said. “Then at least you wouldn’t have to send the horses away.”
“No, it’s better this way. I don’t want other people here. You come once in a while and be my caretaker. You always know where the key is,” she said, looking directly at Emma. “Anytime. Then I won’t worry.”
Emma, flustered, simply nodded her head.
“I don’t mind friends,” Hannah said to Connolly. “It’s the idea of strangers I don’t like.”
“But you had people here before,” Connolly said.
Hannah looked at him, puzzled at his interest. “Well, I couldn’t refuse then. Robert asked me.”
“Robert Oppenheimer?”
“Yes. Robert asked all the old-timers. We all knew him, you see. What could we do? Some army man said it was our patriotic duty-you know, they talk like that-but Robert, he was clever. He just said he needed a favor, and, you know, he’s charming, no one could refuse him.”
“I’d forgotten he had a ranch here,” Connolly said, backing off.
“Yes, in the mountains. For years. He loved to ride in those days. Does he still?”
“You haven’t seen him?”
“No one has. He never comes here. Is he still up on the Hill, or is that one of your classified questions?”
Connolly shrugged.
“Well, then, I don’t ask. But if you do see him somewhere, give him my regards. He should take care of his health, that one. And tell him that we’re still waiting to hear what it was all about. Making history, he said. Oo la, that sounds important, but what kind of history, eh? Anyway, never mind about history, my darling,” she said to Emma, giving her a goodbye kiss on her cheek. “Be happy.” She shook Connolly’s hand. “And you. Good luck with your destiny.”
“And yours,” he said, smiling.
“Oh, don’t worry about me,” she said, “I have the Ciro’s touch.”
Emma asked to drive back to Santa Fe, and he was surprised to find her inexperienced, coming up fast on curves and then jerking the clutch at the last minute as if she were pulling on reins. He was by now so used to her self-assurance that this inadequacy behind the wheel seemed touching, an opening. She held the wheel tightly, afraid the car would bolt.
“Sorry,” she said after an audible moan from the gears. “I haven’t got the hang of this one yet.” She spoke straight ahead to the road, unable to switch her concentration.
“It’s all right. It’s stiff.”
“No, it’s not. But thanks. How did you like Hannah?”
“She seemed to think we’d known each other for some time.”
“Did she? I wonder why. What did you say to her?”
“I didn’t get a word in edgewise.”
Emma grinned. “Yes. She can be like that. I wish she’d listen to Hector, though. There’s something wrong there. He was positively churlish. He’s usually rather sweet, in a way.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“No, really. But he seemed all on edge. Something’s happened.”
“The bust-up?”
“Maybe. Oh, don’t laugh. I know they’re an odd couple. Still, it’s sad to see any couple come to an end. They suited each other in a way.”
He felt for an instant that now they were a couple, falling aimlessly into a postmortem after dinner with friends. “What way?”
“Now you’re going to be impossible. I don’t know-the way people do. There’s no explaining it.”
“No.”
She glanced over at him quickly, then looked back to the road.
“She said you married your husband to get him out of Germany.”
“Did she?” Emma said nervously. “I married him. He got out of Germany. They’re not necessarily connected.”
“Not necessarily.”
She was quiet for a minute, avoiding the conversation. “Anyway, what does Hannah know about it?” she said, concluding an argument.
“I thought maybe you’d told her.”
“I didn’t. It’s her imagination.”
“Maybe she’s intuitive.”
“Maybe you’re not a very good intelligence officer. Do you always believe the first thing you hear?”
“When I want to.”
“Well, don’t.” She downshifted, flustered. “What else did she have to say?”
“Not much. This and that and Germany and destiny.”
“Quite a chat.”
“Very gloomy and Wagnerian.”
“Hannah?” She laughed. “You must bring out something in her. She doesn’t usually get much further than Louella Parsons. Louella O. Parsons. What do you think the O stands for?”
“Are you trying to change the subject?”
“Trying.”
“All right. How about banks?”
“What do you mean?”
“Is there a bank in Santa Fe everyone uses? Where do you go, for instance?”
She laughed. “That’s certainly changing it. I don’t go anywhere. We’re not allowed to have accounts off-site.”
“What do you do? Keep it in a sock under the bed?”
“There’s not very much to keep, for a start. What there is we keep in a post account. I suppose everyone does. Why do you want to know?”
“So if you made a large cash purchase, you’d have to withdraw the money from this account? I mean, you wouldn’t write a check?”
