Daniel Kehlmann - F

“What do you mean?” asks Kluessen.

“Excuse me?”

“What testimony? Where?”

He looks at me, I look at him. It can’t be that I spoke out loud, it must be a misunderstanding. So I make a dismissive gesture and keep talking: about derivatives and secondary derivatives, undervalued real estate funds, dispersed risk, and statistical arbitrage. I quote the professional magazine Econometrica , of which I possess a single copy, mention game theory and the Nash equilibrium, and don’t omit a hint that I have connections to people in key positions who give me inside information — borderline illegal, but extremely profitable.

Finally I stop. One must always give one’s opponent the chance to collect his thoughts. He has to come to his senses and be able to grasp that he’s lost. I fold my hands, bend forward, and look him in the eye. He pulls out a handkerchief and does a thorough job of cleaning his nose.

“Handshake, Adolf!” I hold out my hand. “A man and his word. We’ll carry on together. Yes?”

He says he’s confused.

“Handshake!”

He says he’s confused.

With my left arm I reach for his right arm and try to take his hand in mine. He resists. I pull, he keeps on resisting, and he’s surprisingly strong.

He needs to think, he says. He will talk to his son, and write me a letter.

“Just think about it!” I say hoarsely. “As long as you want! Thinking is always important.”

Now we do actually shake hands, but not to seal our professional partnership, just to say goodbye. I squeeze so hard that all the suntan fades from his wrinkled face. I know I’ve lost. He will demand his money back. And he knows that I know. What he doesn’t know is that I no longer have his money.

For a moment I fantasize about killing him quickly. I could strangle him or break his skull with something hard. But then what? How do I get rid of the body? Besides which it’s likely that there’s a camera in here. Wearily I collapse into my chair and prop my head in my hands.

When I look up, Kluessen has left. In his place there is a tall man standing in the room. He’s leaning against the wall and watching me. I close my eyes, then open them again. He’s still there. He has a hideous gap in his front teeth.

Not good, I think.

“No,” says the man. “Not good at all.”

I close my eyes.

“Won’t help,” says the man.

And yes, I can still see him.

“Don’t get mixed up in it,” says the man. “Just walk right past. When you see them, don’t get mixed up in it. Leave it be. Don’t speak to the three of them, keep on going.”

I feel dizzy. Mixed up in it? Keep on going? I can’t ask him what he’s talking about, right now I have to deal with Kluessen. I can drag things out for a week or two, tangle him up in some complicated exchange of letters, be unreachable, and generally bring things to a standstill with a series of excuses and questions. But at some point he’ll press charges, then the prosecutors will weigh in with their interrogations, but the time will tick by and until then I can stay living in my house and drive to work every morning. Autumn will come, the leaves will fall, and with any luck I won’t be arrested before the first snowstorm.

The man is no longer there. I hold up my hand in front of my eyes. The sunlight in the window is so harsh that it seems to destroy the tint of the glass. I pick up the receiver and ask Elsa for a glass of water. It’s already here and I drink it. As I set it down, I see a priest I know. He’s even fatter than he was the last time. When did my brother come in? And the glass in my hand, who brought it so quickly?

“Can I do something for you?” I ask cautiously. Perfectly possible I’m just imagining him. I mustn’t give myself away.

He hems and haws, murmurs something, obviously doesn’t want to say anything specific.

I take a sheet of paper and pretend to read. My hands are shaking. The thing with Kluessen really got to me.

He asks something.

So — it’s not a fantasy. Ghosts never ask questions. But his black outfit unsettles me, it makes me think of exorcisms. Then he says something about a cube and at first I think he’s talking about some dice game, but then it becomes clear that he means his hobby, and in order to avoid having to listen to the whole nonsense, I ask if he’s already eaten, get up, and leave the office. Outside I stop by Elsa’s desk, bend over, smell her perfume, force myself not to lay hands on her, and ask what in the world my brother’s doing here.

That was her task, she says. To call my brother! And ask him to come at once. That’s what I told her.

“Oh,” I say. “Right. Got it. I know.” I have no idea what she’s talking about. Why should I have set this up?

I walk quickly to the elevator. The phone vibrates in my pocket. I extract it. So now what, do you want to come or not?

Now? I write back. I wait. My brother is nowhere to be seen. Why is everyone always so ponderous? Wretched, life-sapping inertia! And why isn’t she answering?

Here he comes. The elevator doors open, we step in, and once again I’m thinking of The Exorcist . You mustn’t underestimate priests. I ask about horoscopes. I’ve always wanted to know: it has to be possible to test them statistically. All you need is a hundred people who’ve died on the same day, either there will be significant similarities in their horoscopes or there won’t! Why doesn’t somebody do it?

He gapes at me like an idiot. Evidently I’ve offended him. Turning wine into blood is perfectly fine, but horoscopes are beneath his dignity. I pull out my phone. No answer. We’ve already reached the main floor.

We go through the lobby, the glass doors open. Dear God, it’s hot. My phone vibrates. Can you do it at five?

Why not now??? I text. A car horn blasts next to me, I realize I’m in the middle of the street — the restaurant is right over there, I go there every day. The décor is horrible, the waiters are arrogant, and I don’t like the food. But so what — I’m rarely hungry anyway, because of the medication I’m on.

The waiter pushes the table aside so that my fat brother can force his way onto the banquette. I order for the two of us, what I always order, spaghetti with shellfish. I don’t like mussels, but it’s an appropriate dish, not too much, not too heavy, not too few calories, not too cheap. My phone vibrates. Good, that’s fine. Now .

Martin asks me about the economy and my forecasts. I answer something or other. Why are we sitting here, what does he want? I can’t right now , I text. How does she think I live, does she believe I can just drop everything from one minute to the next, just because she feels lonely? Late afternoon, okay?

I wait. No answer. My brother asks things, I answer without even listening to myself. I look at the phone, put it aside, pick it up again, put it aside, pick it up. Why isn’t she answering?

“When you send someone a message,” I ask, “and he answers, and you answer back and ask for a quick answer and none comes, would you assume he didn’t get the message or that he’s simply not answering?”

“He or she?”

“What?”

He looks at me slyly. “You said ‘he’ and then you said ‘she.’ ”

Nuts. I know what I said. A laughably obvious trick. “And?”

“Nothing,” he says furtively.

What is he trying to get out of me, how has he managed to get me to talk about personal things? These priests are slick. “What do you want to know?”

“Nothing!”

His mouth is smeared with sauce. There are plates between us, his is almost empty, mine is untouched. When were they brought? “It doesn’t matter what kind of message,” I say. “It’s irrelevant.”