A Time of Miracles by Anne-Laure Bondoux Read Free Book Online

fell and their house collapsed. Stambek stayed for three days and nights under the debris, and everybody thought he was dead.
    “But when the rescuers got him out, he was whole!” Maya smiles. “It took us a while to notice that his mind had stayed in the rubble.”
    Suki sighs. “Maybe one day we’ll find it again,” she says. “The war has taken many things from many people.”
    I shiver under my blankets. “But if your house hadn’t collapsed,” I say, “if the train hadn’t derailed, if the militia hadn’t taken Vassili’s orchard, and if they hadn’t chased us to the other side of the Psezkaya River, I wouldn’t have fallen in the lake.”
    “So?” Suki inquires, perplexed.
    I turn red and shut my eyes. War is bad, that much is true. And it’s true that it has taken many things from many people. But it has also given me Gloria and my first taste of love. How can you explain something so strange? I wonder.
    When Gloria comes back from work, her face so coated in road dust that she looks like a relative of Abdelmalik, I ask her if one has the right to be happy in wartime. She looks at me gravely and wipes her dirty cheeks before answering.
    “To be happy is recommended at all times, Monsieur Blaise!” she says.

chapter fourteen
    UNFORTUNATELY , the best of times have to come to an end. I have no choice but to get better and go back to work on the mountain. From now on I am forbidden to accompany Stambek on his walks, and he’s not allowed to go to the lake anymore. But Suki and Maya still visit us in the evening.
    We are less tired now that we’re used to working hard. We sit on the tarp and play with cards that I made out of cardboard. I teach them the rules of poker, bridge, and blackjack the way Kouzma taught us, which means cheating. Suki has lots of fun, and Maya gets irritated because she doesn’t like to lose. When we need a fourth player, we call Stambek.
    “It’s very simple,” I say. “You have five cards. When two of them have the same numerical rank, you’ve got a pair. If you have three of the same numerical rank, it’s even better. If all your cards are of the same color, it’s a flush.”
    Stambek concentrates so hard that he breaks into asweat. It’s sad to see him like this, with his brain full of holes! I promise myself that one day I’ll take my grapnel and, instead of looking for nickel wires, I’ll dig in the ruins to recover Stambek’s intelligence.
    “Well, I’m sleepy,” Maya says suddenly.
    “Yes, I’m exhausted,” Suki adds.
    We put the cards aside, and Stambek is relieved to be going back home. Before they leave, the twins kiss me on the cheek. My heart lights on fire faster than dry straw. But as soon as they’re gone, the fire dies down and a feeling of emptiness fills my stomach. Love makes me feel hot and cold; the pure and simple truth is that I’m not sure I can survive it.
    More and more wounded soldiers arrive in Souma-Soula. Some have lost an eye, a leg, an arm. Some have lost their minds and wander around shouting like crazy. That’s all we see of the war. Mr. Betov says that “the theater of operations” is far from us, somewhere up north, and that we are refugees. I like the word “refugees.” It must mean that we are sheltered, which reassures me.
    In my mind, war looks like a ferocious and famished beast hiding in the nooks of the mountains and the dark forests shown on page 79 of my green atlas. I put my finger on the winding roads and imagine the unavoidable advance of armies looking for one another. Bombs crush and rip villages open. War chases families away, destroys pasturelands, gobbles up soldiers. It is voracious.
    Sometimes I think about Zemzem and about Gloria’s brothers. This monstrous animal may have devoured them.I don’t dare ask Gloria what she thinks, because I don’t want to make her sad.
    “And what if the war comes to Souma-Soula?” is the only thing I say. “What will we do?”
    “What we’ve always done,