by Claude Izner
‘No, thank you. I have some book purchases to make.’
‘Don’t forget my literary column.’
‘I’ll think about it. Oh … I promised to lend a book to your illustrator, Sacha …’
‘Tasha Kherson?’
‘Yes. I wanted my assistant to deliver it to her, but I’ve mislaid her address.’
‘Sixty, Rue Notre-Dame-de-Lorette. Watch out for the owner, a German woman in spectacles, and worse than any guard dog!’
Victor hastened to take his leave. He felt a lightness of spirit, just like a schoolboy who’s managed to get off school. What flowers could he give her? Roses? Lilies? He jumped into a cab on Rue de Rivoli and closed his eyes, better to ponder the question.
A cab drew up on Rue des Saints-Pères, in front of the Hôpital de la Charité. A middle-aged man alighted in a dark frock coat and a top hat. He crossed the road, stopped for a few moments outside Debauve and Gallais, manufacturers of ‘fine and hygienic’ products, salivated over an advertisement singing the praises of carminative chocolate with angelica. He passed Rue Jacob, the breeding ground of such celebrated publishing houses as Firmin-Didot and Hetzel, and arrived at number 18, home to the Elzévir bookshop. In the shop windows, which were set in wood panelling of a greeny-bronze colour, novels by Maupassant, Huysmans, Paul Bourget and Jules Verne (whose latest title, Two Years’ Vacation, was prominently displayed) were all arranged alongside antique bound editions.
Shading his eyes, the man scanned the inside of the shop, which seemed to be empty. In one corner he made out Kenji Mori, sitting at a small desk, writing. Surrounded by shelves covered in books, and piles of works that were waiting for a place to be found for them, he was copying out record cards with all the application of a schoolboy writing out lines. Occasionally he stopped to gaze at a bust of Molière, centrally positioned on a black marble mantelpiece. He then put his head back down and dipped his pen in an inkwell.
The man smiled, smoothed his pointed beard and pushed the door open. The sound of the door chime made Kenji Mori look up and an assistant appeared in grey overalls.
‘Monsieur France!’ they exclaimed together.
The man greeted them, and went up to a rectangular table with a green tablecloth on it. ‘Where have the chairs gone?’ he asked, with a look of amusement.
‘I had them put away again,’ grumbled Kenji Mori. ‘Victor doesn’t understand. People who just come here for a chat clutter up the place and annoy the real customers.’
‘Does that include me?’
‘You’re quite a different matter. Joseph, get Monsieur France a chair from the back room!’
‘Right away!’ shouted the assistant.
Once the two men were seated side by side at the desk and Kenji had pushed his paperwork aside to lay out a selection of illustrated books for the benefit of his illustrious visitor, Joseph Pignot — known as Jojo — went back to his stool behind the counter. Every day after lunch he allowed himself a short break to do some reading. He was grateful to Monsieur Mori for letting him have this respite, because straight afterwards he would be busy until evening with the classification of books purchased on preceding days by Monsieur Legris, either at auction or from private vendors. He also had to serve customers, parcel up books, and sometimes deliver them to people’s homes. When he had a large number of jobs to do, Monsieur Mori would talk about getting a second assistant, but Joseph insisted that he could handle everything, not wanting a rival in this kingdom of paper, which was his own private paradise.
The product of an illicit love between a fruit and vegetable vendor and a second-hand bookseller on Quai Voltaire, Joseph was a sickly child with a slightly hunched back, and his mother had given him an isolated upbringing, so that until well past the age of fifteen he had grown up on a diet of apples and novels. On an autumn day four years before, Madame Euphrosine Pignot had been delivering pears and figs to the Elzévir bookshop when Ernest Labarthe, the previous assistant, had collapsed over the table, felled by a stroke. Madame Pignot had helped the bookseller, Victor Legris (who had turned very pale), to lay out the dead man on the floor and took the liberty of slipping in a reference to her son’s area of knowledge. The following week, Joseph was taken on.
The young man was an invaluable appointment. He had read everything, remembered everything, and could never be caught out with regard to the content of books and their date of publication, the size of their print run, the number of special editions and even the name of the printer. Beneath a mass of straw-coloured hair, which no amount of rain could turn curly, his huge, round, good-natured head was a vast repository of information. Moreover, he liked to say, his widely spaced rabbit-like front teeth brought him luck. Victor also recognised that since Jojo had been at the bookshop, sales figures had improved. Initially hostile to the boy, Kenji could not do without him now and, whilst always treating him a little harshly, actually adored him, and had only one criticism of him, which was that he did not always knot the string around the book parcels carefully enough.
Joseph returned to the book he was currently reading, On the River by Maupassant. But he could not concentrate on a word because he was too busy staring at the visitor sitting with Kenji. He burned to tell him how much he admired his novels and literary criticism, but he did not dare. To calm himself he unfolded L’Eclair. A huge headline filled the top half of the front page:
THE DRAMA ON THE TOWER CASE REMAINS A TOTAL MYSTERY
Yesterday afternoon, an enigmatic message arrived in the post at our editorial offices. It concerned the woman who died in the middle of the day on the first platform of the three-hundred-metre Tower at the Universal Exposition. We reproduce it here in its entirety:
I won’t spell it out
But poor Eugénie Patinot
Knew more than she ought.
Joseph gave a little whistle. ‘Monsieur Legris will like that.’
A majestic, aristocratic lady with greying hair entered the bookshop. Joseph folded up his paper and stood up. ‘Madame la Comtesse …’
She gestured impatiently. ‘Don’t let me disturb you. I am going to rummage a little. I’m looking for some reading for my silly goose of a niece. Where do you keep Georges Ohnet?’
‘Oh. Are you sure that’s a good choice? His books are full of errors. A writer who can give a child born under the First Empire a level-crossing guard for a father …’
The Comtesse stared at Joseph through her lorgnette. ‘Really? So what would you advise?’
‘Do you know The Crime of Sylvester Bonnard?’ he whispered, with a glance towards the desk.
‘A crime? Oh, no, I will not yield to this new fashion. The newspapers are sufficiently full of appalling events. Did you hear about this business yesterday on the Eiffel Tower?’
‘Yes, I was just …’
He stopped to admire the prettiest little redhead he had ever seen. She was inspecting the shop from the kerb, with a perplexed expression. The man in the topper said goodbye to Kenji and made for the door with a friendly wave to Joseph. Just as he was going out, the young red-headed woman decided to come in. He gallantly let her pass. The Comtesse immediately turned away from the assistant and made a beeline for Kenji, who, having spotted her, was attempting to take refuge in the rear of the shop.
‘Monsieur Mori, what a pleasure to see you. I wanted to ask …’
Tasha approached the strange blond boy, who was devouring her with his eyes. He could almost be a mujik, she thought to herself. ‘Tell me, that man who just left, wasn’t it … ?’
‘Monsieur Anatole France himself! How may I help?’
‘I would like to speak to Monsieur Victor Legris.’
‘I’m very sorry, he is not here. Can I be of assistance?’
‘Monsieur Legris told me to come by, he has a book to show me. But never mind, I’ll come back another day.’
‘Wait, don’t leave! I know this bookshop inside out. I’ll find that book for you.’
‘I’ve forgotten the ti
tle. They’re Goya aquatints, bound in a volume.’
‘Goya? Consider it done!’
Joseph slid a ladder on runners to the shelf containing art books and scuttled up it.
‘I remember now. It’s Los Caprichos,’ said Tasha.
‘There’s no point turning everything upside-down, Joseph. We don’t have them.’
Tasha turned to Kenji Mori, who was eyeing her coldly, having just seen the Comtesse out.
‘Hello, how are you? Your business associate told me about this book yesterday. That’s why …’
Kenji stood quite still, staring at her with a slightly quizzical look, as though he had forgotten their meeting the day before. The assistant was still noisily searching through the art books.
‘Joseph, I’d rather you started wrapping up the books chosen by Monsieur France. They will need to go to him at five o‘clock. On the way, you could leave The Ironmaster at the Comtesse de Salignac’s home.’
‘I know what. I’ll go and look in the storeroom,’ cried the boy.
‘As I’ve told you, we do not …’
But Joseph had already dashed down to the basement. Kenji went back to his desk to go on compiling his catalogue. Tasha decided to wait for the assistant to return and went into the room where the Comtesse had joined Kenji a few moments earlier.
Also lined with books, this room was devoted to foreign travel. Tasha quickly looked along a row of Baedeker guides with their red spines, hardly paid any attention to the numerous volumes of the Journal of Voyages, Discoveries and Modern Navigations, but was stopped in her tracks by a locked display cabinet, which contained some marvels: the Second Voyage of Father Tachard to the Kingdom of Siam, dated 1689, was open at a section showing an engraving of some strange bulbous plants. And very close to it gleamed the carefully waxed morocco binding of An Account of the Pelew Islands, which had come out in 1788, preceding the four quartos of Cook’s Third Voyage. Other collections centred on Asia, notably the narration of an expedition into Tartary, Tibet and China in 1845, sat alongside geographical maps traced on vellum with coloured inks, and ethnographic curiosities, reminding Tasha of those she had recently admired at the Colonial Exhibition on the Esplanade des Invalides. Shell and agate bracelets framed quivers and blowpipes, themselves displayed above a series of small steel combs and metal rods with sharp points. Tasha took a step back to admire two long wooden shields decorated with etched designs. Someone coughed gently behind her.
‘Um, Mademoiselle, I’m very sorry, Monsieur Mori was right, we do not have your Caprichos.’
‘You mean Goya’s,’ Tasha remarked with a smile. ‘Talking about caprice, would you indulge my whim to take a closer look at this work?’ She indicated Damberger’s Voyage into the African Interior.
Pink with embarrassment, Joseph pulled a key out of his pocket.
‘As a rule I only open this for regular customers, but as you are so nice …’ he whispered. It was the first time he had dared to compliment a young woman in this way: his hands were trembling. He put the book on a round table, and stepped back to let Tasha leaf through it.
‘I can see that you’re used to doing this, you don’t bend the pages.’
‘Joseph!’
‘The boss is calling me. Yes, Boss?’
‘Where have you hidden the order book?’
‘I’m coming, Boss. Excuse me, Mademoiselle, I’ll just be a moment.’
When he returned noiselessly, he stopped to look at the young woman leaning over the book. She straightened up and smiled at him.
‘It is superb,’ she said as she closed the volume. ‘Tell me, what are these shields called?’
‘Talawangs. They are from Borneo. Mr Mori attaches great value to them, as he brought them back himself.’
Tasha nibbled her thumbnail.
‘You know,’ Joseph said, lowering his voice and turning the key in the lock, ‘he’s not usually so disagreeable. I don’t know what’s wrong with him. Something must be worrying him.’
Tasha wanted to reply that she had come across Kenji’s morose moods before, but she kept quiet. Back in the main bookshop, she shook hands with the boy, who turned puce, and thanked him profusely for his kindness.
‘Monsieur,’ she mumbled to Kenji’s back. He turned in his chair and, without getting up, gave her a quick nod. Joseph hurried to open the door for Tasha and watched her as she walked off towards the Seine.
‘Joseph, I’m going upstairs,’ said Kenji.
He started up a narrow spiral staircase. On the first floor he turned right; on the left was Victor Legris’s accommodation.
Kenji Mori’s apartment was made up of two rooms and a bathroom laid out in a row. He worked in the first room and slept in the second. They had an odd mixture of Louis XIII-style and Japanese furnishings, separated as they were by a fusuma, a sliding partition, which consisted of a wooden frame containing a grid of slats with opaque paper glued in the spaces between them.
The sitting room was dominated by a walnut dresser with diamond marquetry, an oak table with turned legs, and a straight-backed armchair upholstered in floral tapestry material. The bedroom had a recess with a slightly raised floor covered with a mat on which lay a thick cotton blanket and a wooden pillow. The few items of decoration were all Japanese: Noh theatre masks, kakemonos, red lacquer dishes, and porcelain bowls for use in tea ceremonies.
Kenji was furious. Victor had seen that woman again after leaving her at the bottom of the Tower! Even worse, he had managed to interest her in the bookshop. And she had actually had the audacity to come!
He removed his jacket and slipped on a silk kimono. He sat down at the table, and his gaze fell upon Le Figaro de la Tour, which had been placed in front of the row of inkwells. Perplexed, he studied the newspaper: he did not recall putting it there. He shrugged his shoulders. He opened a drawer, and took out the timetable for the London and Dover Railway via Calais. He hesitated: did he want a daytime or overnight train? Eventually he marked the evening service with a red pen. Getting up again, he went to the dresser and opened it to reveal a collection of books. He picked up a quarto edition and read the title with a smile: Colección de estampas de asuntos caprichosos, inventadas y grabadas al aguafuerte por don Francisco de Goya y Lucientes, Madrid 1799.
He went round the fusuma and kneeled down next to the recess, pulled back the mat and blanket, and after removing one of the slats from the base, wrapped Los Caprichos in some printed fabric and slid it to the end of the hiding place where he kept some personal papers. He put everything back in its place and returned to the sitting room. He selected three bound volumes, hesitated for a moment and then took two Utamaro prints down from the wall. He made up two parcels, one containing the books, the other the framed items, and then placed them in a dark wood Japanese trunk with ornamental hinges, which stood opposite his bed.
He went into the bathroom. The building that housed the Elzévir bookshop and Victor and Kenji’s apartments had had running water and water closets for only two years. Kenji appreciated this luxury even more than gaslight and the hot-air heaters because he liked to plunge into a bath every day and sometimes spent so long in it that Victor would ask him jokingly if he wasn’t concerned that he might melt away.
‘In which case,’ he added, alluding to Kenji’s thin body, ‘there really would not be much left of you at all!’
Whilst the copper bathtub filled up with steaming water despite the summer heat, Kenji undressed and examined himself in the mirror. With his daily ju-jitsu practice he had managed to retain a youthful and sinewy body. In spite of the grey threads in his hair and some expression lines, his face had not been very marked by age. He looked at a photo in an elaborate frame, which was on a marble shelf. A young woman with brown hair was holding close a twelve-year-old boy, who looked very much like her. They gazed out at Kenji with tender smiles. ‘Daphne and Victor, London, 1872’ was written at the bottom of the photograph in small spiky handwriting.
Kenji lowered himself slowly
into the water, adopting a semi-reclined position and stretching his legs out with contentment. He was relaxed, free of the anguish he had felt earlier when he had seen the little redhead.
He stared at the photo. Daphne was still looking at him. Did she know that all these years since her death he had never forgotten the promise he had made to her? ‘My dear, please make sure that he is happy. Don’t let him marry someone who is unworthy of him.’ Until now, none of Victor’s mistresses had seemed worthy of him in Kenji’s eyes. The most recent, Odette de Valois, a featherbrain who insisted on thinking he was Chinese and treated him like a servant, was without doubt the worst of all. But at least Victor respected a tacit agreement with Kenji that neither of them would allow their private lives to interfere with their own relationship. To the outside world they presented an odd couple, a relationship from which women were excluded. In any case, they cared little for what others thought of them. They respected each other too much to allow gossip to damage their mutual affection.
And now this impudent girl threatened to spoil everything! This thought filled Kenji with anger. He recalled a Baudelaire poem, ‘To a Red-Haired Beggarwoman’: ‘“You slyly ogle twenty-nine-sou trinkets,”’ he recited to himself. Would he need to pay to get rid of her? It did not matter. He was ready to do anything.
Kenji will be pleased, I made the deal for a good price, Victor Legris was saying to himself on Quai Malaquais, greeting, as he passed, the second-hand booksellers he knew. On his shoulder he was carrying a heavy green canvas bundle full of rare books, of which Caesar’s Commentaries annotated by Napoleon was the jewel.
Tired but happy, he greeted the assistant with a ‘Good day to you, Jojo! Where is Monsieur Mori?’ and hauled his canvas up onto the counter.