“What do you think?” I asked.
“He’d be delighted,” Alterio maintained.
The others nodded. Even Viviana. She explained to Alberto that the man had been a famous boxer. I had no doubt Rogelio would only find the peace the owner talked about with someone like that. We kissed the urn and covered the boxer’s body with my brother’s ashes.
PART III
RRevenge
Death and the Canoe
by Claudia Piñeiro
San Telmo
Translated by M. Cristina Lambert
Just a few weeks earlier, the Spanish bookstore Papiros had opened a branch in Buenos Aires, in San Telmo, in front of Dorrego Square, betting on the constant tourism in the city’s southern area. There was no better way to draw attention to the opening than to invite the star writer of the day, Martín Jenner, to give a talk and sign copies of his books.
Jenner would be punctual, as was his habit. He had decided to walk, despite the fact that it would take him almost half an hour to get there from his apartment in Puerto Madero—rented for him by his publisher, after his divorce, as part of his latest fabulous contract. No other author in Argentina had ever managed such a book deal, but no other author had ever sold more than half a million copies of every work he published, no matter what kind of book it was, simply because it carried his name.
On the way, he was surprised by how dirty that part of the city was, and he was especially surprised to see the groups of boys blasting loud music, sitting in the middle of the sidewalk, drinking beer. Martín Jenner felt invisible as he walked by, unlike in many of the other Buenos Aires neighborhoods. Being ignored outraged more than surprised him.
These people don’t read, he concluded as he passed in front of the statue of the comic strip character Mafalda. A woman asked him to take her picture, though not with him, of herself sitting on the bench next to the statue.
“I’m in a hurry,” he said, continuing on his way.
Despite the long walk, he looked impeccable when he arrived at the bookstore. He checked his reflection in the glass door and smoothed his hair and lapel. The bookstore was already full, and that took away the unease he had felt being ignored on his walk. Indeed, surrounded by so many people who had come to see him made him feel like himself once again. The new Papiros was quite large, but the audience exceeded the organizers’ expectations, and they had to add more chairs.
As soon as he went in he was welcomed by his editor—who also played the part of being a slave to all of his requests, no matter what they were—and the publishing house’s business manager, who only went to presentations by their best-selling authors. The conversation would be led by the editor in chief of a widely read cultural magazine.
By the third question, it was clear that the insecure woman was trying to show off by making obscure connections between Jenner’s different texts, crowning her theory with: “It’s obvious there’s a deep tie between them, don’t you think? From the language, I mean.”
“No, I don’t think so,” the author replied, and from that point he spoke about whatever he felt like, without passing the microphone back to her until the talk concluded.
Exactly one hour after the event started, Jenner said goodbye without taking questions from the public. He thanked everyone, received great applause, and announced he would be there awhile longer to sign copies of his books. With his usual smile, his perfectly manicured hands polished in blue, and a Lamy pen—more common among architects than writers—Jenner signed copies of Death and the Canoe for more than an hour. The line of readers seeking his signature, unlike with many other authors, was not limited to middle-aged women, but included fans ranging in age from twenty to sixty, and included as many men as women. The only common denominator was that they all were obviously in love with the author. Jenner had known for some time the effect he had on his readers, and encouraged it with various strategies. And he did so once again that afternoon in San Telmo’s bookstore, devoting time to every one of them, celebrating all their flattery with false humility.
Martín Jenner was, without a doubt, the most widely read author in the country, and the most translated. And, he was certain, he owed more to his readers than to the critics. Or to his colleagues, who were always evasive when commenting on his work, giving reserved praise without uttering anything negative. Jenner had never been selected as a finalist for any national or local awards, nor were his novels ever chosen as “The Year’s Best Fiction” at fairs or festivals or for year-end lists. Jenner would tell himself—and the few who dared ask—that he did not care: his award or prize was there, in front of him, lining up to get their book signed. That is why Jenner did not limit himself to a simple autograph. Rather, he would ask each one of his readers for their full name, and have them spell it out if necessary. He would chat with them awhile, and would pose for hundreds of cell phone photos, including selfies. Therein lay the reason, he was convinced, his readers were so loyal. And loyal not so much to what he wrote, but to him. Jenner made those people standing there waiting for his signature think they knew him; they were his family, there was a real bond. That was for Jenner the real engine of the author-reader contract. And although he did not care too much for that intimacy—it rather repulsed him—he kept it up because he had no doubt that it directly influenced, perhaps exponentially, his book sales. Today, as Martín Jenner had known since his first steps in the literary world, a writer does not get anywhere just by writing. And he had gotten far. Very far.
As soon as the last photo was taken, he stood up, went to the coat rack, and slipped his coat on, getting ready to go out into the misty, gray May day. Beyond the glazed door, on the cobbled street, a group of young people were kicking a bottle and shouting. It looked like they were arguing, but they were not.
Their manner of speaking, their thunderous handling of the language, thought Jenner, they’ll all go deaf very young in this neighborhood. He watched the group head down toward Alem Avenue, dodging cars headed in the opposite direction. He wondered if they were the squatters in the abandoned public building whom for years the government had not dared evict. He quickly abandoned the thought. After all, what did he care where those people lived?
Jenner put his pen in his pocket, and finally joined his editor, the publisher’s business manager, and the bookstore owner, who were waiting to take him to dinner. They would have waited as long as necessary. He was their superstar, the most successful author on the publisher’s roster, the one who made up for the losses incurred from publishing better literature.
And they were about to leave when the door was thrust open. A thin, rather untidy man maybe in his early thirties—difficult to tell with his hipster beard—approached them. He carried a backpack, from which he removed a copy of Death and the Canoe. The bookstore owner waylaid him.
“Excuse me, the signing’s over. If you like, you can leave your copy and pick it up in a few days.”
The man did not move. He looked Jenner in the eye without saying a word. The tense silence made Jenner uneasy and he felt the need to break it.
“Please,” Jenner protested. “Of course I’ll sign it, it’ll only take a minute.” He reached into his pocket and removed his pen.
The man handed him the book. As usual, Jenner opened it to the first page, ready to sign. But something confused him. Instead of the title page, he found a glued, lined piece of paper, torn from a notebook. He looked up at the man as if asking permission to remove it.
“Read,” the man told him.
Jenner obeyed, but what he read he did not say aloud. I wrote this book, Mr. Jenner, and you know it. Swine. Swindler.
Martín Jenner turned pale, his legs shook. At first he considered saying something, or even having the man thrown out by the security guard standing by the door. But almost immediately, as soon as he could control the shaking of his legs, he concluded the best thing to do was to pretend he had not read the message. So, without looking at the bearded hipster, he signed the book
and gave it back to him, barely touching the note. Although Jenner avoided eye contact, the man continued to stare at him as he put his copy back in his bag and left without a word.
“What a strange guy! There are such characters in this city,” said the editor, who had not noticed anything other than the rather snooty attitude of the man with the backpack.
“Yes, it’s true,” Jenner responded. He thought it best not to mention the note or the insult. At least for now.
As they walked to the restaurant, Jenner stumbled over San Telmo’s damp, cobbled streets, feeling a lingering discomfort in his chest. Only a few hours earlier, he had walked from his house on these same streets, with the same humidity and the same shoes, yet he did not remember having such difficulty. But it was darker now, and there was more garbage to dodge on the streets. San Telmo was always invaded by garbage at night.
They had made reservations at a classic, yet fashionable Basque restaurant not far from the bookstore that was considered one of the top ten restaurants in the city. At the entrance, after the hostess greeted them, the business manager informed Jenner that it had not been easy to get a table, but since they knew it was his favorite restaurant, they had moved heaven and earth.
Dinner was uneventful. But it was the calm before the storm, apparently, because as they walked back toward their car parked at Dorrego Square, they again encountered the man with the hipster beard. Martín Jenner recognized him immediately, dodged him, and quickened his step. Only because of this change of pace did the others notice what was happening. They all quickly got inside the editor’s car.
The bearded man approached the vehicle and stood next to the front windshield. He raised the windshield wiper, then lowered it, leaving under it a sheet of notebook paper, similar to the one inside the book Jenner had signed. Jenner guessed what was likely written on it. The man stood there awhile longer, looking him directly in the eye, the middle finger of his right hand pointing up, with the rest of his fingers in a tight fist. “Fuck you,” he snapped.
No one inside the car moved or said a word, until finally the man crossed the square diagonally and disappeared on Carlos Calvo, walking toward 9 de Julio Avenue. When he was definitely out of sight, the business manager got out of the car and removed the paper from under the windshield wiper. Jenner would have liked to stop him, but he knew it would have been in vain.
The business manager got back in the car and read the note: “I wrote Death and the Canoe. You’re an impostor, Mr. Jenner, a swine, a swindler.”
“For God’s sake!” said the editor.
“Unbelievable,” said the bookseller. The car was invaded by an uncomfortable silence.
“I wonder who that madman is. Did his face look familiar to anyone?” the business manager finally asked.
Jenner moved his hands in the air, looking for words he could not find, before saying he did not have the slightest idea who the man was. The bookstore was the first time he’d ever seen the man. And then he did tell them about the note in the book he’d signed.
“Why didn’t you say anything before?” the editor asked. “This man’s in very bad shape. It’s not the first time I’ve seen something like this. There are many people in this city who have the delusion that they’re writers, and that a famous author stole their masterpiece.”
“In this city, there are more people who write than people who read,” complained the business manager.
“But usually they just denounce you in a newspaper, or they sue you, and that’s that,” said the editor.
“In those cases we easily resolve it with our lawyers. But this type of harassment is dangerous. Don’t you think we should report it to the police?” suggested the business manager.
“I think so,” said the bookseller. “We can go now, there’s a precinct nearby.”
Jenner, still pale from the scare, tried to keep both himself and the group calm. “Let me think for a moment; let’s wait a little while longer. Nothing like this has ever happened to me before. But I’ve had people waiting for days to give me a book written by them, or to ask for an autograph, or even to give me a red rose. Oh well, there are always strange, intense people who get obsessed with you. But usually they get over it. It’ll happen to this guy too.”
“You want me to chase him away, say something to him? Just to scare him a little, so we don’t have to worry it’ll happen again?” asked the business manager.
“No, no, it’s not worth it. Besides, he must have already gotten on a bus or a subway by now,” replied Jenner. “Better not to pay him any attention. They all seek a little fame at someone else’s expense. And once they have their minute of glory, they’re all right.”
They took off, ending their exchange of ideas, but during the drive they continued talking about the man with the hipster beard. The business manager dropped off the bookstore owner at his house a few blocks away. He lived on Defensa, but in an area where this street in San Telmo begins to lose its charm and turns into the city’s business district, a place which at night, without the city’s hustle and bustle, frightens many. Then they continued to Puerto Madero to drop off Martín Jenner.
“Sure you’re all right?” the editor asked.
“Of course I am,” said Jenner. “All I need is to lose my cool over some deluded hipster who believes he wrote what I wrote. Don’t worry, it’s no more than an anecdote we’ll tell at a company toast until we get tired of it.” Jenner shook the business manager’s hand, kissed the editor on the cheek, and got out, but before heading into his apartment, he turned back and approached the car window to say one last thing. “Obviously, this is going to cost you a few extra dollars on the next contract; unhealthy work, friend,” he warned, and everyone laughed, although they knew that when it came to Jenner, this was not a joke.
The business manager waited before driving off because his best-selling writer was not going inside the building. Jenner searched his pockets for his keys, but before finding them, the building’s security guard approached and let him in. Jenner lifted his hand and waved goodbye. The others tooted the horn and drove away.
While Martín Jenner was walking toward the elevator, the security guard approached him again and gave him a pile of mail. He told Jenner that he himself had taken it out of the mailbox because there was no more room inside.
Jenner took it and thanked him for his trouble. “I’m hopeless when it comes to mailboxes,” he remarked as he stepped into the elevator.
Inside the apartment, he threw the envelopes on the coffee table, took off his shoes, and poured himself a glass of whiskey, aimlessly playing with the ice cubes in the glass while he relaxed into an armchair. He glanced over at the scattered envelopes on the coffee table, and one of them caught his attention. The address showed his name, but underneath, in parentheses, it read: SWINE, SWINDLER. He would have liked to simply relax, but this was too much. Trembling, he opened it and found what he’d suspected: a letter from the man with the hipster beard, who had finally identified himself as Antonio Borda. He reminded Jenner that he had mailed him three copies of his manuscript, Death and the Canoe, last year: one in March, one in August, and the last one in October.
As I told you in my last letter, they were the only three copies I had, and I sent them to you without reservation because I trusted you. You told me at the bookfair that you’d love to read what I wrote. Or don’t you remember? Or do you tell everybody that?
Of course I tell everybody that, Jenner thought, and continued to read. In the remainder of the letter, Borda thanked him for reading the manuscripts, and then went on in three long paragraphs about the virtue of his own text, which I realize now you also valued. Finally, he ended the letter with a paragraph Jenner felt to be threatening:
I won’t contact you again, but if you don’t declare publicly that I’m the author of Death and the Canoe in the next seventy-two hours, I will commit suicide, and you will carry that burden for the rest of your life.
Martín Jenner felt like he was going
to faint. He was very upset by this madman and needed to talk to someone. He dialed his editor’s number, but quickly hung up. It would be better to tell her about it the next day. Why make someone else lose a night’s sleep? Perhaps he would call his lawyer directly, he thought. In any case, he was not afraid the man would kill himself. They say that truly suicidal people do it without warning, he remembered. And Borda had said seventy-two hours. No one plans a suicide for three days later. Jenner was sure of that. The hipster must be looking for money, he concluded. If he knows anything else about me, the most successful writer in Argentina, he won’t get it. Enough, he told himself. And after a third whiskey, he took a sleeping pill.
Three days later, Antonio Borda’s body was found hanging in front of the Papiros bookstore. The Dorrego Square storekeepers surrounded the body, which hadn’t yet been authorized for removal. Borda had, in his pocket, a letter addressed to the bookstore, which had said more or less the same thing in the letter he sent to Martín Jenner.
The incident turned into a scandal that was covered by all the media. They spent weeks talking about the suicide, alternating between referring to Borda as a hipster, compulsive liar, or poet.
Martín Jenner testified before the courts, and soon after, an extensive story aired about him on one of the most popular prime-time news programs, where it was unusual to see a novelist appearing as a guest. “I didn’t consider how badly that young man was doing. I feel guilty. He needed help, and I didn’t see it. Sometimes it happens that someone has an idea that another writer actually develops, and he feels cheated. It happens all the time. Coincidences, topics that are in the air and take different literary forms in writers’ imaginations. Ah well, I think that in his delusion he must have been convinced that he sent me his manuscript and that I wrote something that belonged to him. Delusion has strange, indescribable paths, even for us writers. It’s too bad no one noticed what bad shape he was in.”
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