The Mind-Murders by Janwillem van de Wetering Read Free Book Online Page A

extended a hand and pushed the pack of cigarettes away. "How is your leg, Mr. Fortune?"
    Fortune laughed. He had good teeth. His face was good too. De Gier thought of a hero he had seen in an old war movie that ended well when the bad enemies surrendered and the good flag was raised.
    "My leg? My leg is fine. There's nothing ever wrong with me, really, I only have weak nerves. Or I'm crazy, like most of us. Whenever I have a bad fright, a part of my body goes wrong, but only for a while. Some time ago I was nearly run down by a car and I fainted on the sidewalk. The specialists played snooker with me. I hit every hospital and clinic in town. The doctors agreed in the end that I might have a bad heart and that the next severe shock would knock me down again. But they were wrong, as you can see. When the constables hit me and lost me in the canal, I didn't even faint. The shock repaired the effect of a previous unpleasant experience, when I came home to find nothing." He sat up. "By the way, those little constables are dangerous, they should be restrained. The same goes for that fool sergeant Jurriaans who disciplined me this morning. And to think that I've known Mm for years and respect him in a way. Another Aunt Coba, appearances mean nothing, a black soul in respectable dress. Arrrgh!" He lay down again.
    "Aunt Coba?"
    "She has been living on the Emperorscanal for several centuries now. As a child I used to spend time in her house; with her and Uncle Henry. A dignified-looking couple but their valor is lopsided. Only Uncle Henry will go to heaven."
    "You stayed with them? You're not Amsterdam born?"
    "Of course I am, but my parents lived on the other side of the river and my mother was sickly. I would be sent to Aunt Coba. Aunt Coba would interfere with my mind. Would you like to have coffee?"
    They went to the kitchen, finding Grijpstra observing an empty shelf. On the stone sink stood a hot plate and a box filled with groceries.
    Fortune talked while he made the coffee. "Never thought Rea could be that thorough. She even took the toilet paper, very bothersome if you notice its absence too late. Had to use the paper in my pocket diary, too thin and too slippery.
    "Not that the experience isn't two-sided. Without obstructions one can see far. When the dizziness wore off I went shopping. It happened to be Thursday evening and the stores were open. I could even buy a mattress and lie down and think it out. I used to think in a circle, about the business, about money. More of this to get that, more of that to get this."
    "You publish books, we were told."
    "I certainly do, or did maybe. A good selection, if I say so myself, nothing but what the public wants. Books on how to grow tomatoes in water, and what the gurus say about coitus and meditation, illustrated. Today's subject today, for those who want to live free in the security of togetherness. The oozy seekers, Holland's hope."
    De Gier looked for a match. Grijpstra frowned.
    "Coitus?" Grijpstra asked. "Meditation? Separate or simultaneous?" He sipped his coffee, didn't like the taste, and continued to frown, studying miniature swells in his plastic cup.
    "Both, the book is in two parts, but I don't know too much about the quality of what I sell. A publisher believes in sales and calculates in profit. There's no choice. Expenses increase and profit diminishes. Only more of this gives more of that, as I explained just now."
    Grijpstra's frown dissolved.
    Fortune smiled. "The endless circle, but not quite, as I found out on the mattress in the other room. To think that I quarreled with Rea because I refused to sell the circle. To consider that someone, a colleague who lives on the next canal, would buy my garbage on behalf of his company—a hundred times the size of mine, he doesn't own it but he's a director—would offer to free me, and I actually refused." He shook his head.
    "At the right price?"
    "A little more."
    "Your wife wanted you to sell?"
    "She did and I wouldn't