Read In the Land of Armadillos for Free Online

clomped upstairs to Peter’s room. Toby was there, of course, working. Max unbuckled his jacket and undid the first buttons, throwing himself onto the bed.
    â€œWhat a day,” he grumbled. “You can’t imagine the stupidity I have to deal with.”
    Toby didn’t answer right away; he was just finishing the last stroke on one of the patrons in the café. Max was seething from the way Reinhart had gone behind his back. A week ago, he had informed the commandant of the work camp at Adampol that he required a list of his nonessential workers. Today he had received a heated tongue-lashing, by telephone, from an unknown brigadier general calling all the way from the General Government in Kraków, telling him to keep his fat fucking hooks off of Reinhart’s precious Jews. His ears were still ringing.
    But here in Peter’s room, time stopped, all such cares drained completely away. Red armadillos tramped up and down blue hills and paraded past cotton-candy-colored shops in the village, while blue cockatoos nested in the lofty branches of baobab trees. At the café, all kinds of creatures sat together in fantastic, whimsical combinations. A dog shared a table with a cat; a fish buttered a baguette for a canary. A bull wearing bifocals read a Journal while his friend the sea serpent stirred an espresso; a pink pig in a striped shirt and a beret-wearing poodle posed before tiny glasses of a clear cordial; a crocodile shared a kiss with a hare. Stranger yet were the humans: a blue man with a striped face; a beautiful girl with scales and a tail. “I know this one!” he exclaimed, pointing at a walrus who looked uncannily like Soroka the saddlemaker.
    Max noticed a man in a blue mackintosh and a blue bowler hat who bore a striking resemblance to himself, accompanied by a svelte red fox who looked very much like Gerda. Despite the overall shittiness of the day, he smiled. “It looks just like her,” he said, planting himself in front of the painting, his hands clasped behind his back. “Though I would have made her a rabbit.”
    â€œYou know, I tried that,” Toby said. Without warning, the frail body convulsed in coughing; his palette clattered to the floor as he doubled up, resting his hands on his knees.
    â€œAre you wearing the coat I sent you?” Max demanded, concerned. Toby managed to bob his head yes. “You should see a doctor. It sounds like it’s getting worse. Maybe he’ll prescribe something for that cough.”
    Toby groped for a chair, sat down. “The only thing the doctors prescribe around here is a bullet in the back of the head.”
    â€œWhat’s the matter with you, Toby?” Max said plaintively. “One of these days you’re going to say something like that to the wrong person, and bang. ” There was a soft knock at the door. “I asked the kitchen to send up some dinner,” he said to Toby, feigning casualness. “Come in and leave it on the desk, Adela.”
    The cook glided into the room in carpet slippers, set the plate on the desk. There was an apron tied around her small waist, making her look even more fetching, Max thought. “So. Have you two been introduced?” he asked slyly, taking half a sandwich.
    â€œNo, Sturmbannführer,” she replied in her provocative alto.
    â€œI told you, call me Haas. Adela, this is Tobias Rey. He’s doing some paintings for us.”
    It was an old house. Just then a gust of wind whistled up the stairway, blasting the door wide open. Too late, Max saw it coming: the door slamming squarely into the painted couple at the café table, obliterating the delicate brushwork, possibly cracking the plaster as well. In the blink of an eye, Adela’s small hand shot out and caught the doorknob.
    Max let out his breath. “Quick reflexes,” he said admiringly. “We could use someone with your instincts on the eastern front,