Amélie Nothomb: Fear and Trembling

“Your report is excellent and you drafted it with extraordinary speed. In the meeting, would you like me to indicate who its author is?”

This was a man of rare generosity. He would have been committing a professional error had I asked him to.

“Definitely not, Mister Tenshi. That would do you as much harm as it would me.”

“You’re right. Even so, I could suggest to Mister Saito and Mister Omochi in a forthcoming meeting that you would be useful to me. Do you think Mister Saito would take offense?”

“Quite the opposite. Look at the piles of unnecessary photocopying that he has me doing just to get me out of his office. It’s obvious he’s looking for ways of getting rid of me. He’d be delighted if you offered him an opportunity.”

“Then you won’t be offended if I attribute your report to myself?”

I was astonished. It was simply not done to show such consideration to an underling.

“Oh, Mister Tenshi, I would be honored if you took credit for it.”

We parted in a state of mutual high esteem. I looked forward to the future with confidence. Soon I would be done with Mister Saito’s harassment, with the photocopier, and with the absurd ban on speaking my second language.

EVERYTHING ERUPTED SEVERAL days later. I was summoned to Mister Omochi’s office. I went into the vice-president’s lair without the least apprehension, not knowing why he wanted to see me.

Mister Tenshi was there. He turned toward me and gave me a smile filled with more humanity than I had ever seen. What it said was, “We’re going to endure a terrible ordeal, but we will endure it together.”

I thought I knew what it meant to be bawled out. What we underwent there in Mister Omochi’s office revealed how ignorant I was. Mister Tenshi and I were subjected to demented screaming. I still wonder which was worse: the content or the delivery.

The content was incredibly insulting. My companion in misfortune and I were called traitors, incompetents, snakes, deceitful, and—the height of injury—individualists.

The delivery explained much about Japanese history. I would have been capable of anything to stop the hideous screaming—invade Manchuria, persecute millions of Chinese, commit suicide for the Emperor, hurl my airplane into an American battleship, perhaps even work for two Yumimoto Corporations.

The most unbearable part was seeing my benefactor humiliated because of me. Mister Tenshi was an intelligent and conscientious man; he had taken a considerable risk for me, and with full knowledge of the facts. He had acted out of pure altruism. As a reward for his kindness, he was being dragged through the mud.

His head was lowered and his shoulders hunched. I tried to follow his example. His face expressed submission and shame. I imitated him. Then the Obese One offered up his most outrageous accusation.

“You’ve never had any other goal than sabotaging the company!”

Thoughts whirred around inside my head. I could not permit this incident to ruin my guardian angel’s chances for advancement. I threw myself into the raging torrent of Mister Omochi’s invective.

“Mister Tenshi didn’t want to sabotage the company. I begged him to let me work on the report. I alone am responsible.”

I just had time to see my companion in misfortune turn to me with a look of alarm. “Don’t say anything, for pity’s sake!” his eyes were pleading. Alas, too late.

Mister Omochi stood open-mouthed for a moment before coming up to me and bellowing right into my face.

“Do you dare to defend yourself?”

“No, I’m blaming myself. I’m claiming all the wrong for myself. I alone should be punished.”

“You dare to defend this snake!”

“Mister Tenshi does not need to be defended. Your accusations against him are misplaced.”

I saw my benefactor close his eyes and realized that I had uttered something irreparable.

“You dare to imply that something I say is false? Your bad manners are beyond belief!”

“I wouldn’t dare to imply such a thing. I just think that Mister Tenshi has misled you in the hope of absolving me.”

With an expression that said that—in our present position—there was nothing further to fear, Mister Tenshi spoke next, all the mortification in the world in his voice.

“I beg you, don’t hold it against her. She doesn’t know what she’s saying. She is a Westerner, she’s young, and she has no experience. I have made an indefensible mistake. I am terribly ashamed.”

“So you should be! There’s no excuse for you! ” yelled the Obese One.

“However much wrong I have done, I must all the same emphasize the excellence of Amélie-san’s report, and the remarkable speed with which she compiled it.”

“That is not the point! Mister Saitama should have done this work!”

“He was away on business.”

“You should have waited for him to get back.”

“This new fat-reduced butter must be the envy of other companies. By the time Mister Saitama had returned from his trip and compiled his report we could have been beaten to it.”

“Would you by any chance be calling into question the quality of Mister Saitama’s work?”

“Absolutely not. But Mister Saitama doesn’t speak French and doesn’t know Belgium. He would have found it far more difficult than Amélie-san.”

“Be quiet. That disgusting sort of pragmatism is worthy of a Westerner.”

I found the Obese One’s saying this right in front of me too much to take.

“Forgive my Western indignity. We did something wrong, yes. That doesn’t mean there isn’t some gain to be made from our mistake.…”

Mister Omochi approached me. The expression in his eyes was so terrifying that it stopped me in midsentence.

“I’m warning you. This was your first and last report. Get out! I don’t want to see you anymore!”

I didn’t wait to be told a second time. In the corridor, I could still hear screams from the mountain of flesh and contrite silence from his victim. Then the door opened and Mister Tenshi joined me. We went to the kitchen together in silence, stunned by the insults that had been heaped on us.

“I’m so sorry for dragging you into this,” he said eventually.

“Please, Mister Tenshi, don’t apologize. I will be grateful to you my whole life. You’re the only person here who’s given me a chance. It was courageous and generous of you. I knew that at the beginning, and I know it even more clearly now that I’ve seen what it has brought upon you. You shouldn’t have told them that I wrote the report.”

He stared at me.

“I didn’t. Don’t you remember our conversation? I wanted to talk about this discreetly at the very top, to Mister Haneda. That was my only hope of achieving anything. By telling Mister Omochi we were only heading for disaster.”

“So it was Mister Saito who told the vice-president? What a bastard. He could have made me very happy by getting rid of me—but no, he had to go and…”

“Keep what you think about Mister Saito to yourself. It’s better that way. And in any case, he wasn’t the one who denounced us. I saw the note on Mister Omochi’s desk, and I saw who wrote it.”

“Mister Saitama?”

“No. Do I really have to tell you?”

“You do.”

He sighed.

“The note was signed by Miss Mori.”

I felt as if I’d been hit with a club.

“Fubuki? It can’t have been.”

Mr. Tenshi remained silent.

“I don’t believe it!” I cried. “That coward Mister Saito must have told her to write the note. He isn’t even brave enough to do his denouncing for himself, so he delegates someone else to do it!”

“You’re wrong about Mister Saito. He might be fussy and a bit obtuse, but he’s not cruel. He would never have condemned us to the vice-president’s anger.”