That evening Yara ushered Snow into a narrow corridor off the dining area ranged by a series of small bedrooms – like cells, really – each with plain concrete walls, a bath, and no lock on the door. She installed him in one of these and told him she was down the hall if he needed anything. He started to say that what he needed was her honesty, her help, but if her help were forthcoming, a direct approach was not the way to achieve it. Subtle pressure such as he had been applying ever since their initial conversation, reminding her of their golden moments years before, touching her as often as possible and sowing doubts about Jefe whenever he saw an opening, yet doing so slyly, indirectly – that was his best hope of influencing her. He knew he had made some progress, but how much longer could he afford to be subtle?
Lying in bed, he gave the situation a turn or two, but soon dozed off, waking some time later (an hour or two later, judging by his stupor) with the impression that someone else was in the room. He slit his eyes and saw a man standing beside the bed – just his trouser legs – and pretended to be asleep. The seconds slogged past. His circulatory system whined, his heart thudded and then he felt the man’s breath warm on his cheek. Recalling Yara’s talk about Jefe’s savagery, picturing him squatting beside the bed, sniffing out his fright and deliberating his fate, it was all he could do to refrain from shouting and scrambling away – yet he kept his eyes shut and his respiration normal until he heard the faint click of the door closing. Still terrified, he went over to the sink and splashed cold water onto his face. The mechanisms of his thought were gummed up, gears clotted with a sludge of fear. He pulled on his jeans and, after making certain the coast was clear, with no plan in mind, a frightened man making for the known, the familiar, he padded along the hall toward Yara’s room. Her door was open half an inch. He eased it wider.
