‘You can choose any dish you like to make up for missing the reading, kitten,’ said Deborah. A little later she said goodbye and hung up.
‘What did she ask for?’
‘Chicken breast and salad.’
‘Wow.’
‘Well, it’s light, and we don’t often get asked for something really light.’
‘How about us?’
‘I thought you had to work all day?’
‘I’ll try to drop by later with Rashid. After two days at the Book Fair I need something sensible to eat.’
‘Shall I buy ox tongue?’
‘I love you!’
When Slibulsky arrived I quickly gave him Valerie de Chavannes’s address and phone number, and asked him to call in for the rest of my fee if he was near there in the next few days.
Then the first thing I did was to drive to my office. As I had expected, the door had been broken down, but otherwise everything seemed more or less in the right place. A minibook edition of the Koran lay in the middle of my desk, probably some kind of Best of the Koran. Inside was a handwritten inscription in German: For my sadly missed brother. It is never too late for the wisdom of the Prophet.
I put the little book on the bookshelf, called a joiner to repair the door and then drove to the Harmonia Hotel.
My second day at the Book Fair went more or less like the first. Rashid gave interviews and signed books, I sat behind him in the aromas from the hospitality room — this time there was cold ham and rocket pizza, sausage spread and Camembert rolls — and we went off to the toilets roughly every hour and a half. Rashid’s diarrhoea had cleared up, but he drank at least a litre of water per interview. In the evening Herr Thys, the lean, good-looking head of Maier Verlag, aged about fifty-five, gave a dinner in the restaurant of the Frankfurter Hof for authors and the upper echelons of the firm. Thys sat in the middle of the table, with Hans Peter Stullberg on his right, Mercedes García on his left and Rashid at the end of the table between the sales director and Thys’s cousin. I sat on my own at the next table, chewing the surprisingly dry saddle of venison in mango and bilberry sauce that the firm had ordered for all the guests.
Thys did not look at all like the usual idea someone who didn’t know the book trade would have of a publisher. More like an estate agent or a fat cat banker, with a Prada suit, a chunky watch, hair slightly too long and a little too carefully tousled, and a rather odd, smooth and generally ironic smile that sometimes turned mischievous. He liked to quote Oscar Wilde, and mentioned his acquaintances among the famous. There was usually ‘a good Bordeaux’ to drink at such occasions, but first my working day wasn’t over yet, and second Deborah and her fresh, fruity wines in the wine bar had weaned me off oak-barrely blended wines once and for all.
‘… In Manhattan you have to go to Chelsea in the evening these days, of course. I was there recently with Brandon Subotnik …’ Thys paused for a moment and smiled craftily at the company before he went on, pleased with himself. ‘His next novel will very probably come out under our imprint …’ Thys stopped again, and it was a moment before everyone realised what the new interruption was meant for. Then began a general table-drumming of applause.
After the guest on her left had translated this news for her, Mercedes García cried vivaciously, in English with a strong Spanish accent. ‘I love Subotnik!’
‘Yes,’ said Thys, also in English, ‘love is the right word when it comes to Subotnik! What an amazing author and character! We have been best friends for years and, for example, he never misses sending birthday cards to me, my wife or even my children. With all his success he is still the same kind and attentive person he always was. And what a stylist,’ he added, reverting to German, ‘what a worker! I’m reminded again of Oscar Wilde. “I was working on the proof of one of my poems all morning, and took out a comma. In the afternoon I put it back again …!” ’
General laughter. Hans Peter Stullberg, rather well gone on Bordeaux, growled, ‘Wonderful!’
Around ten the company at the table slowly began breaking up. Many of them wanted to go on to other parties, others to a late reading, others again just wanted to reach the bar of the Frankfurter Hof as quickly as possible.
Thys had addressed Rashid only once during the dinner: ‘My dear Malik, I’m so sorry — this is a fantastic wine, won’t you at least try it?’
‘Thanks, Emanuel, but you know my rule: no alcohol.’
‘I know, my dear fellow, I know. All the same: cola with venison!’
Otherwise he was either having the new stocking and delivery system explained to him by the sales director, or listening to Thys’s cousin as she waxed enthusiastic about Morocco.
‘Marrakesh, Agadir, the mountains, the sea, the cliffs — what a beautiful country! And such nice people, and the food! My husband and I have thought of buying a little place somewhere on the coast there.’
Rashid remained taciturn all the time, generally saying just, ‘Aha,’ or, ‘Well, well,’ or, ‘I see it rather differently,’ and as far as I could hear he only once said two consecutive sentences: ‘Forgive me, but I’ve written several novels about Morocco. I’d be glad if you would read the book jacket copy some time.’
‘Oh, I know! And I have! All about a homosexual police detective. Great, and such a brave subject!’
So for Rashid the evening so far had been rather unsatisfactory, and I hoped that gave me a chance to keep my date with Sheikh Hakim.
While Thys’s cousin joined the small queue of members of the publishing staff that had formed around half the table as Stullberg was leaving, and the sales director was checking the bill, I bent over to Rashid. He was eating a mousse au chocolat. Like all the other authors, he was still sitting.
‘Can I have a word with you?’
‘You’re welcome to,’ he said, and he probably meant it.
‘I have a business meeting at eleven — it won’t take more than half an hour. I could fail to turn up, but that would be awkward for me. If you feel like a moment away from the Fair, maybe something small to eat — and it would be excellent — or a fortifying ginger juice or tea to drink, I’d take you to my wife’s restaurant. A couple of my friends are there, I’m sure you would like them, and after half an hour I’d be back and take you to the Frankfurter Hof or wherever else you want.’
‘Your wife has a restaurant?’
Before I could answer, Katja Lipschitz came over to us and said, ‘Sorry, Malik, but Hans Peter is leaving now, and you two won’t see each other again tomorrow.’
Rashid half rose from his chair and waved to Stullberg. ‘See you soon, Hans Peter! And I hope you feel better!’
‘Thanks, Malik. Good luck for your new book. Great reviews! I hope the readers will flock in!’
Rashid sat down again. His mood seemed to have deteriorated even more, if anything. Without looking at me, he said, ‘Getting out of here for a moment might be a good idea.’
Just before we left the restaurant, while Rashid was getting his coat from the corner, I asked Katja Lipschitz if she could get me an invitation for two people to Stullberg’s reading in the House of Literature.
Surprised, she asked me, ‘You like Stullberg’s books?’
‘Well … please don’t say so to Rashid.’
‘Of course I won’t.’ She smiled understandingly.
We drove the first five minutes in silence. I steered my Opel down Kurt-Schumacher-Strasse, past the constable sentry house on the right. No one followed us. Rashid was looking gloomily out of the window. ‘I hope the readers will flock in!’ The best-selling Stullberg seemed to have finished him off for the evening.
Finally Rashid asked, as if to change the subject, ‘What’s your wife’s name?’