Douglas Kennedy - Woman in the Fifth

‘You can think what you like.’

‘It is not my affair.’

‘That’s right, it’s not your affair — as there is no affair here.’

‘ Monsieur , there is no need to reassure me. I am not your priest — or your wife.’

That’s when I threw the orange juice at him. Without a pause for reflection, I made a grab for the glass and hurled the contents at him. It scored a direct hit on his face. There was a moment of stunned silence — as the juice dripped down his cheeks and pulpish bits lodged in his eyebrows. But then his shock turned into cold rage.

‘Get out,’ he said.

‘Fine,’ I said, jumping out of the bed.

‘I’m calling the police,’ he said.

‘For what? Baptism by fruit juice?’

‘Believe me, I’ll think of something unpleasant and damaging.’

‘You do that, I’ll tell them about all the illegal workers you have here — and how you’re paying them slave wages.’

That stopped him cold. He pulled out a handkerchief and started mopping his face.

‘Maybe I’ll just fire Adnan.’

‘Then I’ll make an anonymous call to the cops and tell them how you use illegal—’

‘This conversation is finished. I’ll call your “ petit ami “, Adnan, and tell him to take you off to his place.’

‘You are a sick little bastard.’

But he didn’t hear the final three words of the sentence, as he was already out the door. When it slammed behind him, I slumped against a wall, stunned by what had just taken place and the crazed fury of it all.

But he started it, right?

I got dressed. I started packing. I fell into a guilty fugue, thinking how unnecessarily kind Adnan had been to me, and how I’d now put him in a difficult situation with his asshole boss. I wanted to leave him one hundred euros as a thank-you, but sensed that Brasseur would pocket it. Once I found another hotel, I’d come back here one evening and give it to him.

The phone rang. I answered it. It was Brasseur.

‘I have spoken with Adnan at his other job. He will be here in half an hour.’

Click.

I dialed reception right back. Brasseur answered.

‘Please tell Adnan that I’ll find a place on my own, that—’

‘Too late,’ Brasseur said. ‘He’s already en route.’

‘Then call him on his portable .’

‘He doesn’t have one.’

Click.

I thought, Grab your bag and leave now. Adnan might have been all nice and attentive while you were infirm (a little too attentive, if truth be told), but who knows what ulterior motive underscores his offer of a chambre de bonne down the corridor from his own. As soon as he gets you there, probably four of his friends will jump you, grab all your traveler’s checks and what few valuables you have (your computer, your fountain pen, your dad’s old Rolex), then cut your throat and dump your body in some large poubelle where it will end up being incinerated along with half of Paris’s rubbish. And yeah, this scenario might just sound a little paranoid. But why believe that this guy has any decent motives at all? If the last few months had taught me anything, it was that hardly anyone does anything out of sheer, simple decency .

I finished packing. I hoisted my bag and went downstairs. As I approached the reception desk, I noticed that Brasseur had changed into a fresh shirt, but that his tie was still dappled with juice stains. He said, ‘I’ve decided I’m keeping the twenty euros to cover my dry-cleaning costs.’

I said nothing. I just headed to the door.

‘Aren’t you waiting for Adnan?’ he asked.

‘Tell him I’ll be in touch.’

‘Lover’s tiff?’

That stopped me in my tracks. I wheeled around, my right hand raised. Brasseur took a step backwards. But then, like any bully who realized that his provocation wouldn’t result in instant retaliation, he looked at me with contempt.

‘With any luck, I will never see you again,’ I said.

‘ Et moi non plus ,’ he replied. The same to you.

I showed him my back and hit the street, where I ran straight into Adnan. It was hard to hide my surprise — and discomfort — in meeting him.

‘Didn’t Brasseur tell you I was coming?’ he asked.

‘I just decided to wait outside,’ I lied. ‘I couldn’t stand being in there anymore.’

Then I told him what had transpired in the room — after Brasseur had made his charming insinuations.

‘He thinks all Turks are pedes ,’ he said, using French slang for homosexuals.

‘That doesn’t surprise me,’ I said, also mentioning what he’d said about catching the homme a tout faire with the chef.

‘I know the chef — Omar. He lives in the same building as me. He is bad.’

And he quickly changed the subject, saying that Sezer — the manager of the building where he lived — would be expecting us within the hour. Then, taking the handle of my roll-bag (and refusing my protestations that I could wheel it along myself ), he guided us a sharp right up the rue Ribera.

‘Brasseur said he called you at your other job,’ I said as we headed toward the metro .

‘Yes, I do a six-hour shift every day at a clothes importer near to where I live.’

‘Six hours on top of the eight at the hotel? That’s insane.’

‘And necessary. All the money from the hotel job goes home to Turkey. The morning job …’

‘What time does it start?’

‘Seven thirty.’

‘But you only get off work here at one a.m. By the time you get home …’

‘It’s about a half-hour by bicycle. All the metros stop just before one. Anyway, I don’t need much sleep, so …’

He let the sentence die, hinting he didn’t want to keep talking about all this. Rue Ribera had a slight incline — and though it was one-lane wide and lined with apartment buildings, the morning sun still found a way of beaming down on this narrow thoroughfare. In the near distance, a father — fortyish, well dressed, well heeled — walked out of some venerable building with his teenage daughter. Unlike most adolescent girls she wasn’t in the midst of a vast, perpetual sulk. Rather, she laughed at something her dad said to her, and then made a comment which caused him to smile. The rapport between them was evident — and I could not help but feel a crippling sadness.

I stopped momentarily. Adnan glanced at the family scene, then back at me.

‘Are you all right?’

I shook my head.

We moved on to the avenue Mozart and the Jasmin metro station. We took the line headed toward Boulogne. When the train arrived, I saw Adnan quickly scanning the carriage — making certain it was free of officialdom — before guiding us on to it.

‘We change at Michel-Ange Molitor,’ Adnan said, ‘then again at Odeon. Our stop is Chateau d’Eau.’

It was just two stops to our first change point. We left the metro and followed the signs for Line 10, heading toward Gare d’Austerlitz. As we walked down a flight of stairs, I insisted on taking my bag from Adnan. We reached the bottom of the stairs, then followed a long corridor. At the end of it were two flics , checking papers. Adnan froze for a moment, then hissed, ‘Turn around.’

We executed a fast about-face. But as we headed back along the corridor, another two flics appeared. They couldn’t have been more than thirty yards in front of us. We both froze again. Did they see that?

‘Walk ahead of me,’ Adnan whispered. ‘And when they stop me, keep walking. You go to Chateau d’Eau, then to 38 rue de Paradis — that’s the address. You ask for Sezer …’

‘Stay alongside me,’ I whispered back, ‘and they probably won’t stop you.’