Dreamers of the Day by Mary Doria Russell Page B

luxuriant mustache, and he leaned over to place Rosie on the floor.
    Crying “Woo-hoo!” she sprinted across the lobby and pirouetted at my feet as if to say,
Look, Agnes, look! I found us a new friend!
    I picked her up, careful to bend at the knees, and straightened just in time to see the gentleman hand the little boy a coin and dismiss him with a word or two in Arabic. “You are English, miss?” the gentleman inquired cheerily with a slight but pleasant accent.
    “American,” I said.
    “You must forgive my forwardness, Miss—?”
    “Shanklin.”
    “You see, Miss Shanklin, I had a dachshund when I was small, just the same as your—?”
    “Rosie.”
    “Such memories your Rosie brings me! My Tessa was just the same,” he said again, astonished by this coincidence. “Black and brown with markings just the same.” He held out his hands with a pleading look, begging for the opportunity to hold Rosie once more. Disarmed, I passed her to him, and the hussy allowed herself to be transferred without a struggle.
    “She is a vamp,” the gentleman said with mock disapproval, as though reading my mind. “My Tessa was the same. But I forget my manners as well.” Rosie looked put out when he offered me the hand that had been stroking her long back. “Permit me to introduce myself, Miss Shanklin. I am Karl Weilbacher. Please,” he urged, extending an arm toward a sunny room just off the lobby. “You must allow me to buy you and Rosie some breakfast.”
    This meal was included in the price of my accommodation, or it had been at the Semiramis. Uncertain if the same arrangement obtained at the Continental as well, I turned toward the desk clerk to inquire.
    Herr Weilbacher must have misread my hesitation. “Please, Miss Shanklin, I assure you that my intentions are entirely honorable.”
    The notion that a man’s intentions toward me were anything else seemed improbable but intriguing. I tried to think if I was properly attired for a meal in public, and yes—even preoccupied by Rosie’s fate, I’d taken time to select the longest frock Mildred had allowed me to purchase and had pulled the navy jacket on over it. I wore neither gloves nor hat, but I could feel the marcelled wave that Antoine had created swagging low and becomingly over my wayward eye. And I was in Cairo! I was far from home, you see, and free from all my own ideas of myself. It seemed just possible that—
    “Not another thought,” Herr Weilbacher declared. “Please, do me this favor,” he pleaded, looking sweetly sad as he added, “It has been so long since my Tessa has been gone from me.”
    When I agreed, his face lit up. Chatting cheerily, he led me to a dining room ringed with ferns and orchids where gleaming silver and cut glass on white linen caught the glorious morning light. The waiters all seemed to know Herr Weilbacher, and if they were unenthusiastic about Rosie’s presence in their domain, his good humor—and perhaps a history of genially distributed tips—overcame their dismay.
    “Now, what would you enjoy for breakfast?” he asked, rubbing his hands together with anticipatory relish.
    “Anything, as long as it’s not oatmeal,” I said and listened, dazed, as he ordered for us while keeping up a steady stream of amiable small talk. Soon a team of waiters delivered large trays bearing tea and coffee, and boiled eggs, and rolls with butter and marmalade, and sausages, and oranges and melon.
    I thought it was all delicious, but Herr Weilbacher’s face twisted as he chewed and swallowed a forkful of meat. “This is not so good as our sausages at home,” he told me in a low voice and then explained, “Like serious Jews, Muslims eat no pork and so: there is rarely any sausage worth eating in Egypt, not even in hotels that cater to Europeans. This sausage is fit only for dogs.” His face lit up again. “But we are in luck: here is a dog!” he cried and slipped a tidbit to Rosie.
    “Oh, don’t feed her from the table,” I