2666 by Roberto Bolaño

her. Norton
asked whether he'd rather meet in
London
or
Madrid
. Espinoza said it
was up to her. Norton chose
Madrid
.
Espinoza felt like the happiest man in the world. Norton arrived Saturday
evening and left Sunday night. Espinoza drove her to El Escorial and then they
went to a flamenco show. He thought she seemed happy, and he was glad. Saturday
night they made love for three hours, after which Norton, instead of starting
to talk as she had before, said that she was exhausted and went to sleep. The
next day, after they showered, they made love again and left for El Escorial.
On the way back Espinoza asked her whether she'd seen Pelletier. Norton said
she had, that Jean-Claude had been in
London
.
    "How is he?" asked Espinoza.
    "Fine," said Norton. "I
told him about us."
    Espinoza got nervous and concentrated on
the road.
    "So what did he think?" he asked.
    "That it's my business," said
Norton, "but sooner or later I'll have to choose."
    Though he made no comment, Espinoza
admired Pelletier's attitude. There's a man who knows how to play fair, he
thought. Then Norton asked him how he felt about it.
    "More or less the same," lied
Espinoza, without taking his eyes off the road.
    For a while they were silent and then
Norton started to talk about her husband. This time the horror stories she told
didn't affect Espinoza in the slightest.
    Pelletier called Espinoza that Sunday
night, just after Espinoza had dropped Norton off at the airport. He got
straight to the point. He said he knew Espinoza knew what was going on.
Espinoza said he appreciated the call, and whether Pelletier believed it or
not, he'd been planning to call him that very night and the only reason he
hadn't was because Pelletier had beaten him to it. Pelletier said he believed
him.
    "So what do we do now?" asked
Espinoza.
    "Leave it all in the hands of
fate," answered Pelletier.
    Then they started to talk—and laughed
quite a bit—about a strange conference that had just been held in
Salonika
, to which only Morini had been invited.
    In
Salonika
,
Morini had a mild attack. One morning he woke up in his hotel room and couldn't
see anything. He had gone blind. He panicked at first, but after a while he
managed to regain control. He lay in bed without moving, trying to go back to
sleep. He thought of pleasant things, trying out childhood scenes, a few films,
still shots of faces, but nothing worked. He sat up in bed and felt around for
his wheelchair. He unfolded it and swung into it with less effort than he had
expected. Then, very slowly, he tried to turn himself toward the room's only
window, a French door that opened onto a balcony with a view of bare, yellowish-brown
hills and an office building topped with a neon sign for a real estate company
advertising chalets in an area presumably near Salonika.
    The development (which had yet to be
built) boasted the name Apollo Residences, and the night before, Morini had been
watching the sign from his balcony, a glass of whiskey in his hand, as it
blinked on and off. When he reached the window at last and managed to open it,
he felt dizzy, as if he were about to faint. First he thought about trying to
find the door to the hallway and maybe calling for help or letting himself fall
in the middle of the corridor. Then he decided that it would be best to go back
to bed. An hour later he was woken by the light coming in the open window and
by his own perspiration. He called the reception desk and asked whether there
were any messages for him. He was told there were none. He undressed in bed and
got back in the wheelchair sitting ready beside him. It took him half an hour
to shower and dress himself in clean clothes. Then he closed the window,
without looking out, and left the room for the conference.
    The four of them met again at the
contemporary German literature symposium held in
Salzburg
in 1996. Espinoza and Pelletier
seemed very happy. Norton, on the other hand, was like an ice queen,
indifferent to the city's