“Ce n’est pas—that’s not what I…” he said, and then he had nothing to add. The other girls were leaving, each of them casting glances his way as if they had met for the first time in their lives a grave robber, an offal eater, someone who drank blood.

It was a peasant house—no parlor, but a warm, white kitchen that smelled of rosemary, with a large stove, and a long birch table at which sat a toothless woman who had been kneading dough until one of the girls whispered in her ear. Now she stared with full hatred at Lee. He wanted to say that her headscarf, which was new and fashioned from sabra silk, was lovely, but he did not know the word for “scarf,” and Irina tugged on his hand to lead him toward the back of the house.

Natalie’s room was off the corridor, no door but a beaded linen curtain. Irina knocked on the frame, and exchanged a few quick words under her breath, and then she took Lee by the biceps and, as if pitching him away with tongs, deposited him through the curtain.

It was dark in here, illuminated by a single oil lamp that flickered when Lee passed. The room was perhaps four paces across, half of it taken up by a lumpy mattress. The window faced the river, which rushed by in darkness. Natalie was propped up in bed, drawing the covers against herself. She had been reading magazines by the light of the lamp.

“Bonsoir,” she said with a ditch-digger smile.

She had thick black hair, a single eyebrow, and the smear of a mustache. She withdrew against the wall, and Lee was aware of being far taller than she was, taking up all the air in the room.

“Mademoiselle,” he said, and then she was naked, just like that. He hadn’t even seen her move.

“I am your girl,” she said. “I want your bad. Right now so good, soldier.” It was as if she were reading ingredients for a recipe she would not be eating herself. The magazines had slid off the bed, and she attempted to wriggle. She was reaching toward a washbasin with soap next to it, but she could not quite get out of bed to reach it because she was eight and a half months pregnant.

She said, “Very good all night.”

“Wait,” said Lee. “Un moment.” He opened his coat. He pulled out the puppies.

The sight of them stopped the drone of her monologue. “Les petits!” She put her hands to her face. “Petits, petits, petits. Petits pois. Oh!” She reached for them, and Lee handed them over. Her face was pretty, he realized, by the light of the lamp. She had a wonderful smile. She was cooing into the puppies’ faces, singsong country French, baby talk, the tone unmistakable: he had made her happy.