“Nothing to drink, thank you,” Catherine said. She enjoyed hearing herself say the
words and she repeated them. “Nothing to drink. I want to see Madame Piris. Is she here?”
The waiter gestured toward an empty table in the corner of the room and Catherine
walked over and sat down. A few minutes later, she felt someone standing at her side, and
looked up.
The woman was incredibly old and thin, dressed in black, with a face that had been
washed by time into desiccated angles and planes.
“You asked to see me?” Her English was halting.
“Yes,” Catherine said. “I would like a reading, please.”
The woman sat down and raised a hand, and the waiter came over to the table bearing
a cup of thick black coffee on a small tray. He set it down in front of Catherine.
“Not for me,” Catherine said. “I…”
“Drink it,” Madame Piris said.
Catherine looked at her in surprise, then picked up the cup and took a sip of the
coffee. It was strong and bitter. She put down the cup.
“More,” the woman said.
Catherine started to protest, then thought, What the hell. What they lose on the
fortune-telling, they make up on the coffee. She swallowed another mouthful. It was vile.
“Once more,” Madame Piris said.
Catherine shrugged and took a final sip. In the bottom of the cup were thick, viscous
dregs. Madame Piris nodded, reached over and took the cup from Catherine. She stared
into it for a long time, saying nothing. Catherine sat there feeling foolish. What’s a nice,
intelligent girl like me doing in a place like this, watching an old Greek nut staring into an
empty coffee cup?
“You come from a faraway place,” the woman said suddenly.
“Bull’s eye,” Catherine said flippantly.
Madame Piris looked up into her eyes and there was something in the look of the old
woman that chilled Catherine.
“Go home.”
Catherine swallowed. “I—I am home.”
“Go back where you came from.”
“You mean—America?”
“Anywhere. Get away from this place—quickly!”
“Why?” Catherine said, a sense of horror slowly filling her. “What’s wrong?”
The old woman shook her head. Her voice was harsh and she was finding it difficult