by Joël Dicker
“You’re a cynical man, Roy,” I said.
“No, I’m just a realist. You’re a romantic dreamer, an idealist who would travel the world in search of inspiration. But you could write me a masterpiece on Sudan, and I wouldn’t publish it. Because no one gives a shit about Sudan! People couldn’t care less. So, sure, you can label me a bastard if you like, but all I’m doing is responding to public demand. Everyone is washing their hands of Sudan—that’s just how it is. All people care about right now is Harry Quebert and Nola Kellergan, and we have to take advantage of that. Two months from now they’ll all be talking about the next president, and your book will no longer exist. But we’ll have sold so many copies that you won’t care because you’ll be chilling out in your new house in the Bahamas.”
There was no point arguing with him. Barnaski had a gift for commanding the media spotlight. Everyone was talking about my book already, and the more they talked, the more he made them talk by intensifying the advertising campaign. The Harry Quebert Affair: the three-million-dollar book, as the press was calling it. Because I now realized that the astronomical sum he had offered me, which had been widely publicized, was in fact an advertising investment: Instead of spending that money on conventional promotion, he had used it to attract public interest. He didn’t even attempt to deny this when I asked him about it: According to him, all rules had been overturned by the new dominance of the Internet and social networks.
“Think how much it costs, Marcus, to buy advertising space in a New York subway car. A fortune. You pay a lot of money for a poster with a limited lifespan that will be seen by a limited number of people; in order to see it, people have to be in New York and take that particular subway line within a given time frame. Whereas now all you have to do is get people interested, one way or another, to create a buzz, to get them talking about you, and you can rely on those people to talk about you on social networks. In that way you access an advertising space that is free and limitless. People all over the world take responsibility, without even being aware of it, for advertising your product on a global scale. Isn’t that incredible? Facebook users are just people wearing sandwich boards for free. It would be stupid not to use them.”
“So that’s what you’ve done?”
“By paying you three million dollars? Yes. Pay a guy an NBA or NHL salary to write a book, and you can be sure that everyone will be talking about him.”
• • •
At Schmid and Hanson’s headquarters in New York, tension was at its height. Entire teams had been mobilized to ensure the book’s timely publication. A teleconference machine was sent to me via FedEx so I could participate from my hotel in all sorts of meetings that were taking place in Manhattan: meetings with the marketing team in charge of the book’s promotion; with the design team in charge of creating the book’s jacket; with the legal team in charge of studying all possible libel issues; and, last, with a team of ghostwriters, which Barnaski desperately wanted to palm off on me.
Conference Call Number Two: With the Ghostwriters
“The book has to be done in three weeks, Marcus,” Barnaski told me for the umpteenth time. “After that we’ll have two weeks to edit it, get it in type, and correct proofs, and then one week for printing. Which means we hit the bookstores in mid-September. Are you going to make that deadline?”
“Yes, Roy.”
“We can come right away if you need us,” shouted the head of the ghostwriting team, a man named Frank Lancaster. “We can be there in a matter of hours.”
I heard all the others saying yes, they’d be there as soon as possible and it would be fantastic.
“What would be fantastic is if you’d let me do some work,” I replied. “I’m writing this book on my own.”
“But they’re very good,” Barnaski insisted. “Even you won’t notice the difference!”
“Yup, even you won’t notice the difference,” Frank repeated. “Why would you choose to work when you don’t have to?”
“Don’t worry—I’ll meet the deadline.”
Conference Call Number Four: With the Marketing Team
“Mr. Goldman,” said Sandra from marketing, “we’re going to need photos—of you during the writing of the book, of Harry, of Somerset. And the notes you took while you were writing the book.”
“Yes, all your notes!” Barnaski said.
“Yes . . . All right . . . Why?”
“We want to publish a book about your book,” Sandra explained. “Like a diary, with lots of illustrations. It’ll be big: Everyone who buys your book will want the diary, and vice versa. You’ll see.”
I sighed. “Don’t you think I have enough on my plate right now, without having to prepare a book on the book that I haven’t even finished writing yet?”
“Not finished writing?” Barnaski yelled. “I’m sending you the ghostwriters now!”
“Don’t send anyone! For God’s sake just leave me alone so I can finish my book.”
Conference Call Number Six: With the Ghostwriters
“We’ve written that Caleb cries when he buries the kid,” Frank Lancaster told me.
“What do you mean, ‘we’ve written’?”
“Yes, he buries the kid and he cries. The tears fall onto her grave, and the soil turns to mud. It’s a really nice scene—you’ll see.”
“Jesus Christ! Did I ask you to write a nice scene about Caleb burying Nola?”
“Well, . . . no . . . but Mr. Barnaski said . . .”
“Barnaski? Hello? Roy, are you there? Hello?”
“Um, . . . yes, Marcus, I’m here . . .”
“What is all this bullshit?”
“Don’t get annoyed. I can’t take the risk that the book won’t be finished in time. So I asked them to go ahead, just in case. It’s simply a precaution. If you don’t like it, we won’t use it. But just think—if you don’t have time to finish it, this will be our lifeline.”
Conference Call Number Ten: With the Legal Team
“Hello, Mr. Goldman, this is Richardson, from the legal department. So we’ve been through everything here, and we feel you can use people’s real names in your book. Stern, Pratt, Caleb. Everything you’ve written is in the DA’s report, which has been widely reported in the media. We’re bulletproof—there’s no risk at all. There is no invention, no defamation, only the facts.”
“They say you can also add sex scenes and orgies in the form of fantasies or dreams,” Barnaski added. “Isn’t that so, Richardson?”
“Absolutely. I told you that before. As long as it’s in a dream, you can put the sex into your book without risking a lawsuit.”
“We need a bit more sex, Marcus,” Barnaski said. “Frank was saying the other day that your book is very good, but she’s fifteen years old, and Quebert was thirty-something at the time. Let’s heat things up a little! Caliente, as they say in Mexico.”
“You’re nuts,” I told Barnaski.
“You’re spoiling everything, Goldman,” he said with a sigh. “No one likes stories about goody-goodies.”
Conference Call Number Thirteen: With the Design Team
They were engaged in a brainstorming session to create a jacket for the book.
“It could be a photograph of you,” said Steven, the head designer.
“Or a photo of Nola,” another designer suggested.
“A picture of Caleb would work, wouldn’t it?” said a third person, to no one in particular.
“What about a photo of the forest?” another voice said.
“Yes, something dark and frightening might work well,” said Barnaski.
“How about something more understated?” I suggested. “A view of Somerset, with two shadows in the foreground that are not identifiable but that might be Harry and Nola, walking together along Shore Road.”
“You have to be careful with understatement,” Steven said.
“Understatement is boring. And boring doesn’t sell.”
Conference Call Number Twenty-one: With the Legal, Design, and Marketing Teams
I heard the voice of Richardson, from the legal department.
“Do you want doughnuts?”
“Huh?” I replied. “Me? No, thanks.”
“He wasn’t talking to you,” said Steven, the head designer. “He was talking to Sandra from marketing.”
Barnaski grew irritated. “Can you please stop eating and interrupting the discussion with offers of coffee and doughnuts? Are we having a party or making a bestseller?”
While my book was progressing, the investigation into Chief Pratt’s murder was at a standstill. Gahalowood had commandeered several detectives from the criminal division, but they were getting nowhere. Not a clue, not a single usable lead. We had a long discussion about this in a bar on the edge of town where Gahalowood sometimes came to play pool.
“It’s my hideaway,” he told me as he handed me a cue stick so I could begin the next game. “I’ve been coming here quite often recently.”
“It’s not been easy, huh?”
“It’s okay now. At least we’ve solved the Kellergan case—that’s the most important thing. Even if it caused a bigger shitstorm than I’d anticipated. It’s the DA who’s taken the brunt of it, as always. Because he’s elected.”
“What about you?”
“The governor is happy, the chief of police is happy, so everyone is happy. Actually my bosses are thinking about starting a unit for cold cases, and they want me to lead it.”
“Cold cases? But wouldn’t that be frustrating? When it comes down to it, you’re just talking about a bunch of dead people.”
“No, you’re talking about a bunch of living people. In the case of Nola Kellergan, the father has the right to know what happened to his daughter, and Quebert was almost wrongfully put through a criminal trial. Justice has to be done, even if it happens years later.”
“What about Caleb?” I asked.
“I think he’s just a guy who lost control. You know, in this kind of case it’s usually either a moment of madness or a serial killer—and there weren’t any similar cases to Nola’s in the region in the two years that preceded her disappearance.”
I nodded.
“The only thing that bothers me,” Gahalowood said, “is Pratt. Who killed him? And why? That’s still a big question mark, and I’m afraid we might never figure it out.”
“You still think it might have been Stern?”
“All I have are suspicions. I told you my theory, but there are gray areas there in terms of his relationship with Luther. What was the link between them? And why didn’t Stern mention that his car had disappeared? There’s something strange there. Could he have been mixed up in this somehow? It’s possible.”
“Didn’t you ask him?”
“Of course I did. He received me twice, and was perfectly nice. He said he felt better now that I knew about the painting. He told me he sometimes let Luther take the Monte Carlo for his own private use because the blue Mustang had a steering problem. I don’t know whether that’s true or not, but it’s a plausible explanation. It’s all perfectly plausible. I’ve been investigating Stern for a while now, and I haven’t found anything. I also talked to Sylla Mitchell again, and asked her what had happened to her brother’s blue Mustang. She said she had no idea; that car just disappeared. But I have nothing on Stern, nothing that might suggest he was involved in this.”
“Why would a man like Stern let himself be at the whim of his chauffeur? Giving in to his wishes, letting him borrow a car . . . There’s something here I don’t understand.”
“Yeah, I have the same feeling.”
I arranged the pool balls inside the triangle.
“My book should be finished in two weeks,” I said.
“Already? You’ve written it quickly.”
“Not really. You might hear people saying that it was written in two months, but it really took me two years.”
He smiled.
I finished writing The Harry Quebert Affair toward the end of August. So it was time for me to return to New York, where Barnaski was getting ready to launch the book with a big media splash. I left Concord on the penultimate day of August. I made a stop that morning in Somerset so I could see Harry. As usual he was sitting in front of the door to his motel room.
“I’m going back to New York,” I told him.
“So this is farewell.”
“Don’t make it sound so final. I’ll be back soon. I’m going to restore your reputation, Harry. Give me a few months and you’ll be the most respected writer in the country again.”
“Why are you doing this, Marcus?”
“Because you made me what I am.”
“So what? You feel you owe me? I made you a writer, but since I seem to no longer be one myself, as far as public opinion is concerned, you’re trying to give me back what I gave you?”
“No, I’m defending you because I always believed in you. Always.”
I handed him a package.
“What is it?” he asked.
“My book.”
“I won’t read it.”
“I want your approval before I publish it. This book is your book.”
“No, Marcus, it’s yours. And that’s the problem.”
“What’s the problem?”
“I’m sure it’s a wonderful book.”
“Why is that a problem?”
“It’s complicated, Marcus. You’ll understand one day.”
There was a long silence.
“What are you going to do now?” I finally asked.
“I’m not going to stay here.”
“What do you mean by here? This motel? New Hampshire?”
“I want to go to writer’s heaven.”
“Writer’s heaven? What’s that?”
“Writer’s heaven is the place where you decide to rewrite your life the way you wish you had lived it. Because a writer’s power, Marcus, is that he gets to decide the ending of the book. He has power over life and death; he has the power to change everything. Writers have more power in their fingertips than they imagine. All they have to do is close their eyes and they can change an entire lifetime. What might have happened on August 30, 1975, if—”
“You can’t change the past, Harry. Don’t go there.”
“How can I not go there?”
I placed the package on the chair next to his and pretended to leave.
“Is it a good story?” he said.
“It’s the story of a man who loved a young woman. She had so many dreams for them. She wanted them to live together, for him to become a great writer and a college professor, she wanted them to have a dog the color of the sun. But one day the young woman disappeared. She was never found. The man went back to the house to wait for her. He became a great writer, he became a college professor, and he had a dog the color of the sun. He did everything she had ever asked him to do, and he waited for her. He never loved anyone else. He waited faithfully for her return. But she never returned.”
“Because she’s dead!”
“Yes. But now this man can grieve.”
“No, it’s too late! He’s sixty-seven years old!”
“It’s never too late to love again.”
I waved.
“I’ll call you when I get to New York.”
“Don’t call me,” Harry said. “It’s better that way.”
I went down the outside stairs to the parking lot. As I was about to get in my car, I heard him call out from the second-floor railing.
“Marcus, what’s today’s date?”
“August 30, Harry.”
“And what time is it?”
“Nearly eleven”
“Only eight hours!�
��
“Eight hours until what?”
“Until seven o’clock.”
I didn’t grasp his meaning at first. “What happens at seven?”
“We’re supposed to meet then, me and her—you know that. She’ll come. Look, Marcus! Look where we are. We’re in writer’s heaven. All we have to do is write it, and everything could change.”
August 30, 1975, in Writer’s Heaven
She decided not to take Shore Road but to walk along the ocean. It was safer. Holding the manuscript tightly, she ran over shells and sand. She had almost passed Goose Cove. Another two miles to walk and she would reach the motel. She looked at her watch. It was just after six. Forty-five minutes from now, she would be there. At 7 p.m., as they had agreed. She kept walking and then reached the edge of Side Creek Forest. She climbed from the beach to the woods over a series of rocks, then cautiously walked through the rows of trees, taking care not to tear her red dress in the undergrowth. Through the trees she saw a house in the distance. In the kitchen a woman was making an apple pie.
She reached Shore Road. Just before she exited the woods, a car sped past. It was Luther Caleb, returning to Concord. She continued walking, and soon arrived at the motel. It was exactly 7 p.m. She crossed the parking lot and climbed the outside stairs. Room 8 was on the second floor. She ran up the steps two by two and then drummed triumphantly on the door.
• • •
Someone was knocking at the door. He quickly got up from the bed and opened it.
“Harry! Darling Harry!” she shouted when she saw him.
She jumped up and hugged him, covering his face with kisses. He lifted her up.
“Nola . . . you’re here. You came! You came!”
She gave him a puzzled look. “Of course I came. What did you think I was going to do?”
“I must have nodded off, and I had a nightmare. I was in this room, and I was waiting for you. I waited for you, and you didn’t come. I waited so long. And you never came.”
She held him tightly.
“What a terrible dream! But I’m here now. I’m here, and I’ll always be here.”