She’s thought about changing hideouts, but she hasn’t found another as good as this. Though the tree trunk is hard and rough, it has a fairly smooth depression where she can lean against it comfortably. The branches are covered with small, soft leaves of a silky green that extend to the sides and form a kind of shelter, dappled with light and shade. The girl just has to cross through where the hedges are less thick, just sparse enough to let someone pass. Once inside, between the hedge and tree, all she has to do is sit down and no one can see her, not even someone who passes very close by—as long as they don’t peer over. She can pee right there if she ever needs to, off to one side, because it’s nearly certain no one will see her. Besides, the park is almost empty at that time of day. She arrives around eight-thirty, walking fast, head down, trying to move with confidence—the kind of confidence she’s seen in older girls, in teenagers—backpack on her back, dragging her feet, headphones on. No one ever stops her, and only occasionally does she glimpse the park and garden workers in the distance, uniformed and busy. At eleven she eats her snack, at one she gets a little drowsy—she doesn’t plan it like that: it’s just that the midday heat puts her to sleep—and at two she’s ready to get up again and head home. She crosses paths with the kids coming out of the nearest school—and with the parents or grandparents who lead them by the hand—but no one notices her: she’s a big girl next to those children, an older kid who no longer needs anyone to pick her up. It’s possible there are other hideouts in the park—all those rows of hedges must conceal some—but she hasn’t been able to find them, and it’s not a good idea to prowl around suspiciously. During the first days, in another park that was larger but also more crowded, two different men had approached her and asked lots of questions. One of them had even grabbed her arm and tried to convince her to take a walk with him. There’d also been an elderly woman who wanted to know why she was there, whether she wasn’t expected somewhere else, and whether her parents knew about her little excursion—excursion, here, struck her as an exaggerated and malicious word. The girl decided to look for another park, quieter and farther away, where no one would ask questions. She’s been in this hideout for several days now with no interruption, save for the old man, who has shown up two days in a row. But this, she thinks, the fact that he happened to be here two days in a row, doesn’t mean he’ll come every day.

But, obviously, he does.

This time, before sitting down, he takes a cloth handkerchief from his pocket, unfolds it ceremoniously and lays it on the grass. So I don’t get dirty! he says, but she looks closely and sees that he’s already dirty. The same light-colored pants as before—so poorly suited to a walk in the park—are covered in dust, their hems blackened from dragging on the ground. The old man is sweating and a lock of hair is plastered to his forehead, the lenses of his glasses are all smeared, and he has a small pair of binoculars hanging around his neck that only accentuate his outlandish appearance. Still, in spite of his scruffiness, there’s something about him that reminds her of an old neighbor of hers, a very distinguished professor, very elegant—that’s what her mother had said, that he was very distinguished and elegant; it’s something to do with the way he pushes back the lock of hair, and it’s in spite of the freckles on his hands, the redheaded paleness of his skin, so rare.