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Show 225 And finally, there was no way that she could not look. Although the rescue truck and the ambulance largely concealed the Volkswagen from view, there was one clear angle between them as they crept by-with the deserted stretcher the only intervening object, the perfectly fitted sheet a sharp whiteness in the sun. The hulk of jagged metal, from here up close, attested to the terrific force of the crash. It almost seemed as if some giant monster had crammed the Volkswagen into the steel divider. What had happened? Somehow, the harmony of the traffic flow had been broken-a misjudgement, a lapse in attention-whatever it had been, and instantly the monster-that Great Chaos-had asserted itself. Just like that-wham! So that now someone was lying in there-it was probably not even that person's error that had put him there-dying; she was sure that he was dying. As they accelerated away, out into the open lanes ahead, she realized that she was nauseated. It was a good thing she hadn't eaten any breakfast, that she had fasted for mass. And with the wind now tugging at her scarf, she remembered the feeling of being in church that morning-it wasn't an hour ago, but it seemed so far away!-the feeling of the wafer on her tongue. Had that anonymous person-now lying in that hell of twisted metal and glass- attended church this morning? It was possible, she supposed, that at the very moment she had been receiving communion, that person had also been kneeling at the altar. At the very moment. And now, that. She could not comprehend it. Her mind refused the paradox: the wafer on her tongue, the rosey wash of the people's faces-all was suddenly sucked into the vacuum of that twisted metal. |
