She was sitting in a bar in Presseburg, near an American airbase forty km from the Border. Mareile was blonde and thin, not boyishly healthy the way American models were, but pinched, like someone who has gone through adolescence without enough to eat. There was a jukebox in the bar, with the Bee Gees and Donna Summers playing loudly while Mareile fended off too many hands. She did not even notice the quiet man when she pushed off a drunk Airman First Class and walked out into the rainy street.

Details. Concentrate on the details. She stood under the awning of a closed shop and tried to light a cigarette. Spilled oil on the street made iridescent rings in the puddles under the streetlights. Her hands were shaking a little as she tried to light the cigarette. And the lighter didn’t work.

The door to the bar closed. A man had come out and was watching her, an older man, forty-five maybe, with a dark trench coat and hat. He had been in the bar, she thought, sitting away from the television, reading the evening edition.

"Let me," he said. Light, flexible baritone with the faintest hint of an accent. He took the lighter and looked at it, then flicked it swiftly and presented the flame to her.

"Bitte," she said, letting him light her cigarette. He folded the case shut and handed it back to her.

"In there, the servicemen…they were bothering you?"

Mareile’s eyes were hard. "No. I just didn’t want all of them."

"Ah." American overcoat with tailoring ten years older than what you see on Dallas, and the accent was Polish. A businessman or a contractor. "You go with them?"

"Yes." Mareile took a savage draw on the cigarette. "So?"

"Would you go with me?"

She almost smiled. Businessmen far from home. "Yes. For the right price. I want dollars, not marks."

He was not in a hurry. It was neither bad nor good. God is in the details. The wind had picked up and was blowing the branches against the window of his room in the glorious 1920’s hotel he was staying in. The carpet was a little worn, but the bedside lamp was green fluted glass. He turned the lights out right away.

Afterwards, she turned to light a cigarette before she went. The lighter worked perfectly. In the flare of light she saw his face, relaxed and curious. "What color," he said, "are your eyes?"

She felt claws of panic close around her. "Brown," she said defiantly. "They’re brown." She flicked the lighter shut.

"Ah." Outside the rain pounded against the street. "Where are you from?"

"Prstina, in the East." She took a long draw. American cigarettes, from someone yesterday. "I got over the Border a year ago." Mareile reached up and turned the light on. Normal. Deliberate.

"How did you do that?"

She shrugged. "There are guards who will let you pass if you give them what they want." Unprovable, inarguable.

"Of course."

She looked at him then. Dark hair, light eyes, left arm still under the pillow. "You’re not an American."

"I’m an American citizen now. I was born in Poland."

His wallet lay on the bedside table, a neat stack of business cards on top. "Dr. Erik Lehnsherr. You’re a doctor?"

"It’s an academic degree."

Mareile turned the cards over. The addresses and numbers meant nothing to her. "So what did you study?"

"Metallurgical engineering."

She shrugged. "Are you rich?"

"Not hardly."

"I thought all Americans were rich."

Dr. Lehnsherr propped up on one elbow. "It’s not like television, I’m afraid."

"I watch American television. Movies too." Mareile took a long draw on her cigarette. "Dallas. James Bond. I liked On Her Majesty’s Secret Service best. I liked the girl with the helicopter."

"Why did you leave the East?"

She shrugged, elaborately, typically. "Why does anyone?"

"Anyone who can." He was watching her very carefully. "Most people don’t make it across the Border."

"I’m lucky." Just the Border, then. He probably has family in Poland, and futile hopes of some kind. Nothing more. She was tired. So very, very tired. It was warm in here, and the bed was warm behind them.

"Why did you go?"

Green glass lamp, a neat stack of business cards. A black leather wallet worn to creases. No credit cards. Anger and fear and shame. God is in the details.

"Have you ever been somewhere everyone hated you?" she said, drawing deeply on the cigarette.

He didn’t move. "Yes."

She realized what she had said and flushed. "I mean…. I’m sorry. Of course you have. I didn’t think…."

"What?"

"Because you’re a Jew."

"Why do you think that?"

"It’s pretty obvious. In bed, I mean."

He laughed. Dr. Lehnsherr threw back his head and actually laughed, "Of course. I’m not in America!"

He had blue-gray eyes. They were really quite beautiful when he laughed. "Do American men really…all of them?"

"Most do, I understand. I can’t speak for all of them. Do you care?" There was a harder sound in his voice.

She did not look at him. "Why should I? It makes no difference to me." She looked at him then, dark hair and tangled bedclothes, unsurprised to see the numbers on his arm. "How can you stand to be here? To speak German like you do?"

"I have a job here, work to do for one year. You can stand nearly anything for a while."

Mareile stabbed her cigarette out. "I understand." She looked up defiantly. "I’m not staying here. I’m saving money in dollars. I’m going to America, and I’m going to be rich."

"An actress? A singer?" She couldn’t tell if he was mocking her or not.

"A psychiatrist. I was very good in school, before…I stopped going."

He looked at her suddenly, intently. Mareile tried to remember if her eyes were brown.

"I should go," she said. And she did.

Mareile was not careful enough. She did not see the clerk kneeling to restock a low shelf when she put the cigarettes in her purse, but she did hear her when she stood up yelling "Thief! Police!" And Mareile ran.

The sun was out, but her breath was crystal in the air as she ran down the street, the sounds of pursuit behind her. She could imagine the description: young blonde woman, 5’2", navy blue coat with white trim, navy knit hat and white scarf. Mareile rounded the corner and saw a city bus standing at the corner. She got in line quickly, listening.

Horns down the street. One siren. Someone had called the police.

She did not see the quiet man at the newsstand.

Mareile got on the bus and took a seat in the last row. The policeman came around the corner. Through the window she saw him talking with the bus driver. Young woman, navy coat, white scarf. The bus driver nodded.

Now the policeman was getting on the bus, walking back slowly, row by row.

The last row was occupied by a tall brunette in her thirties, hair fashionably layered like Kate Jackson. She was wearing a navy coat and white scarf, and looked at him curiously. "Your pardon, fraulein," he said. The policeman got off the bus.

She watched him through the window. He was talking with two other beat cops. They gestured to the bus. He nodded and explained. Yes, a woman in a navy coat with a white scarf, but a brunette and ten years older. They looked past the bus, down the street. A café was crowded with lunch customers.

A shadow fell across her. It was Dr. Lehnsherr. She did not look away quickly enough. He knew he was no stranger to her.

"I want to talk to you."

"I beg your pardon? I don’t know you, sir."

"I think you do." He sat down next to her, intent and dangerous as a hunting bird.

"I don’t know who you are," she protested.

He leaned in close. Someone observing would have thought he was flirting. "I know what you are."

She made an inarticulate sound.

"Look." Concealed from the rest of the bus by the back of the seat, he took off his watch and arranged it carefully on his palm.

The back of the seat was plaid, navy blue and green. The watch had a square face, and a band of plain square steel links. Fear, and details.

"See," he said gently. And slowly the watch lifted into the air above his hand, and began to spin.