Only a few moments after Jon had started working his way through the minutes from court meetings and hearings, the man with the bottle of stout began shifting about and uttering grunts of dissatisfaction. Jon glanced up, and their eyes met. This was clearly not the first stout the man had had; his eyes were bloodshot and bleary.
Jon looked away, took a gulp of his beer and returned to his reading.
'Hey, do you think this is some sort of reading room?'
Surprised, Jon glanced up at the man with the stout. With a jab of his index finger, his neighbour made it clear it was Jon he was talking to.
'I said, do you think this is some sort of reading room?'
'No, of course not,' Jon replied, flustered. 'But surely I'm not bothering anybody as long as I don't read aloud, am I?' Jon gave him a friendly smile.
'That's exactly what you're doing.' The man now jabbed his finger at the table. ' Reading can be very bothersome, even downright dangerous.' He reached for his beer but stopped in mid-motion. 'And not just for those who do the reading, but for everyone in the vicinity… passive reading is no joke!'
The man with the stout finally took a gulp of his beer. Unable to work out what reply would satisfy him, Jon did the same.
'Just imagine if everyone around you started recklessly reading,' the man went on after slamming the bottle down on the table. 'All the formulated words and sentences would fly around in the air like snowflakes in a blizzard.' The man held his hands up in front of him and began making a series of circling motions. 'They would get all mixed up with each other, stick together in incomprehensible phrases, then split up and reconnect in completely new words and passages, which would drive you crazy if you tried to find some meaning and sense where no meaning exists.'
'I've never experienced anything like that,' Jon ventured.
'Ha! That's because you're not listening, not properly anyway. But once you've learned to listen, you're lost. Then you have to live with the voices of the books for the rest of your life, whether you want to or not. You have no choice. The most beautiful poems, thrillers or whatever trash you happen to be sitting with, they'll all muscle their way in and poison the air around you.' The man sniggered and drank more of his stout.
Jon pointed at the file in front of him. 'Do you mean to say that this is speaking to you right now?'
The man laughed scornfully. 'Texts without a reader can't speak. A reader is required, but then they certainly do speak. They sing, they whisper, they even scream.' He leaned across the table with a lurch that threatened to topple his bottle of stout. 'Imagine a reading room,' he said, pausing to allow the image to sink in. 'A whole cheering section can come out of a place like that. Bloody awful.' He slumped back in his chair and scowled at Jon with his red eyes.
'But you don't hear any voice in here?' asked Jon.
The man ignored the sarcasm and threw out his hands. 'This is my sanctuary. Not many readers in here, you see.' He picked up the bottle and aimed the top at Jon. 'Until you turned up, of course,' he added and put the bottle to his lips.
'I'm sorry about that,' said Jon.
'Sheesh. You don't understand a thing, do you?' snarled the man and stood up, still holding the bottle. 'Go ahead and read whatever you like.' He swayed a bit before he got his body moving. 'But your father understood.'
Astonished, Jon watched the man as he set his bottle down hard on the bar and staggered out of the door.
4
After a fifteen-year absence, Jon decided to visit Libri di Luca the day after the funeral. Over the years he had driven past the place many times and it always looked as if it were open, even late at night. Occasionally he had caught a glimpse of Luca through the windows, busily occupied at the counter or in the process of straightening the books in the window.
The bells over the door were undoubtedly the same as the last time he had been there, and the sound welcomed him back like a distant member of the family. There was no one in the shop and yet he was still met by familiar faces – the long rows of bookshelves, the lamp hanging from the ceiling, the light from the glass cases on the balcony and the old silver-chased cash register on the counter. Jon stopped inside the door and breathed in the air of the place. He couldn't hold back the small, crooked smile that formed on his lips.
Before his mother's death, the bookshop had been his favourite place. When both Luca and Iversen were too busy to read to him, he would go exploring in the shop, acting out the stories among the books from which they originated. And so the staircase became a mountain he had to climb, the shelves were transformed into skyscrapers in futuristic cities and the balcony became the bridge of a pirate ship.
But what he remembered most clearly were the many hours when Iversen or Luca had read stories to him, sitting in the green leather chair behind the counter with Jon either on their lap or on the floor at their feet. During those hours he became a witness to fantastic tales whose images he could still recreate, even today.
The antiquarian bookshop looked exactly as he remembered it, with the exception of two things: a piece of the railing of the pirate ship had been replaced by a new section of fresh, light-coloured wood; and a bouquet of white tulips stood on the dark counter. Both items seemed out of place in the tranquil atmosphere of the room, as if it were a picture in a quiz that posed the question: what doesn't belong here?
'He'll be back in a moment,' Jon heard behind him.
He gave a start and turned to face the voice. Half-hidden behind the far bookshelf was a red-haired woman wearing a black sweater and a long, burgundy-coloured skirt. Her hand was resting on the edge of the shelf in such a way that it hid her mouth and the tip of her nose. The only parts visible were the red hair and one shining green eye that regarded him coolly.
Jon nodded to her and was about to say something in reply, but then she retreated once more behind the bookshelf. In the front of the shop stood a long table where the newly arrived books were on display. Under the pretence of studying the new volumes, he moved along the table and over to the corridor between the shelves where the woman had disappeared. She had made it halfway down the aisle, and since her back was turned, Jon could see that her red hair was tied in a ponytail and reached to the middle of her back. With light, cat-like steps she made her way down the shelves, running the very tips of her fingers along the spines of the books as if reading Braille or looking for irregularities. She didn't seem to be reading the titles of the books as she passed. A couple of times she stopped and placed her whole palm on the spines, as if she were absorbing the stories through her hand. At the end of the aisle the woman turned the corner, but managed to cast a quick glance in Jon's direction before she once again disappeared from view.
Jon turned his attention back to the books in front of him. It was a collection of fiction and non-fiction, both in hardback and paperback. Some of the books were new, virginal copies without a scratch or a crease, while others had clearly been taken to the beach or on a lengthy backpacking trip.
Until Jon was big enough to read for himself, one of his favourite pastimes had been to look through the newly arrived volumes for bookmarks. It became a collector's mania, just as other people go in for stamps or coins, and the variety was almost as great. There were the official bookmarks, rectangular pieces of cardboard adorned with an image that had – or didn't have – some relation to the book itself. Then there were the more neutral types – blank pieces of paper, pieces of string, elastic bands or banknotes. Other bookmarks indirectly revealed something about the reader's habits or interests. It might be a receipt, a bus pass, a cinema or theatre ticket, a shopping list or newspaper clipping. Finally, there were the personal bookmarks such as business cards, drawings, letters, postcards and photographs. The letter or card might be from a sweetheart, the photo might have a greeting or an explanation written on the back, the drawing might have been a present from a child.