Chapter 7 The English Teacher
The English Teacher
Verner considered his own career to have been mediocre.
He was as hard on himself as he was on his students, among whom he’d never found a true prodigy.
Just one genius would have been enough for him to justify a whole life dedicated to teaching.
Now, with ten years left until retirement, Verner figured there was little left for him to discover about himself.
Thus, it made sense that he had become deeply invested in the tango school competition, whose qualifying rounds had been taking place every Thursday evening for the past few weeks.
So after dinner, he turned on his stereo, laid a vinyl record on the turntable, and rehearsed his steps to the tune of ‘La Cumparsita’.
He danced alone, keeping his back straight, knees slightly bent.
It would all come down to his control of the movements, their sensuality, the emotions they would arouse.
With years of practice under his belt, Verner thought he might finally have a chance at victory.
But ever since his exchange with Mitch the previous weekend, he had been as distracted by the bookseller’s secret as he was by the dance competition.
* * *
The next Thursday, Verner showed up at the bookshop in the late afternoon, dragging a suitcase so heavy that it made him look like a miniature Leaning Tower of Pisa in an old raincoat and a pair of battered loafers.
“Going on vacation?” Mitch enquired.
“Don’t be ridiculous. Just give me a minute to catch my breath,” the music teacher panted.
With great effort, he heaved his suitcase onto the counter. His hand trembled as he opened it. His eyes welled up, and he gripped the counter as if to keep himself from falling.
“Here’s something worth discussing over a drink,” he said, gesturing towards the fifty or so books packed inside. “For your collection. I’ve gone through my whole library – they’re all on the list.”
Mitch went to lock the front door, shutting them in with Madame Bergol, who was absorbed in her erotic novel and seemed utterly oblivious.
Out of politeness, Mitch called to her across the room, asking her to keep an eye on the shop.
He had business to take care of with a customer and promised not to be long.
Madame Bergol licked her finger, turned a page and continued to read, giving no indication that she’d heard him.
Verner, who had watched the whole thing, shrugged as Mitch returned to his place behind the counter, picked up the suitcase, and invited the music teacher to follow him.
In the back room, Mitch shoved the rug aside and lifted the trapdoor. Verner didn’t even look surprised anymore. He gripped the rope railing lining the wall and descended the staircase.
While the coal hatch ladder dropped down into the cellar, Mitch’s newly built stairs led straight into the secret bookshop.
At the bottom of the stairs, Mitch turned on the ceiling lights, and Verner let his gaze sweep the place, letting out a low whistle. Mitch put the suitcase down on a low table and began shelving the books while Verner watched in silence.
“I’ve been thinking a lot about the question you asked me,” the music teacher said after a moment.
“What question?”
“I’m afraid your project lacks a certain… ambition.”
“You too?”
“Er, who else, if you don’t mind me asking?”
“A friend,” Mitch said, turning toward Verner.
“What kind of friend? Ah, never mind, it’s none of my business.
But I agree with them. You’re taking too many risks for very little reward.
At the rate you’re going, the number of people you share these precious books with will be very small indeed.
A privileged few. And that goes against what I believe the meaning and purpose of literature to be.
You need to think bigger – much bigger. If you’re going to resist, Resist with a capital R. ”
Mitch fell silent, lost in thought.
“I could start a book club,” he said at last. “People could gather here, in this room – it could easily hold fifty – once or twice a week. We could have debates, think together about ways of getting around the law, take action so that banned books can still be read. We could even set up some sort of mailing system.”
“You’re a terrible liar. It was this friend of yours who came up with these ideas, wasn’t it?”
Mitch nodded, then poured two glasses of whiskey. Verner raised his glass in a toast, and downed it in one.
They both drank another, then a third. There was nothing to add; it had all been said. Verner glanced at his watch and sighed.
“I’ve got an hour to get sober. In the meantime, I can’t say I’d mind a little help getting back up those stairs. They look steeper than they felt coming down.”
Mitch helped him and then walked him to the door.
“Keep the suitcase,” Verner said. “A gift from me to you. I don’t travel anymore, except to go an hour from here by train.”
Madame Bergol took advantage of Verner’s departure to slip out as well, throwing Mitch a dark look as she went.
* * *
Verner was wrong to assume that the book club had been Mathilde’s idea.
The idea had been all Mitch’s, or nearly so.
Mathilde had convictions, outrage and ideals – but seldom a concrete plan to put them into action.
She had been right about one thing, though: sowing further distrust in the population was exactly what the government wanted.
That morning, Mitch had slipped out of Mathilde’s bed, gathered his things and left her studio as quietly as a mouse.
Needing to clear his head, he’d gone for a walk along the riverbank, where he’d come across his English teacher from school.
Madame Ateltow had immediately recognized her former student sitting on a bench, looking contemplative.
“You’ve hardly changed,” she said, sitting down next to him. “And don’t say I haven’t either. Twenty years is a long time.”
She was eager to hear about what he’d done with his life, so Mitch filled her in.
She wasn’t surprised; being a bookseller suited him perfectly, she thought.
She remembered Mitch as a hard worker with his head in the clouds, a rare combination, as most teenagers were either one or the other.
Mitch hardly remembered that, nor the stories about him that Madame Ateltow clearly delighted in recounting.
She was a little too chatty for Mitch in his sleep-deprived state, but her company was pleasant anyway, her eyes sharper than he remembered, and her voice soothing.
She lived all the way on the other side of town, she confided; in fact, she didn’t go out much and was unfailingly loyal to her own neighbourhood bookshop.
And even when Mitch remarked that it was getting late, and he should get back, Madame Ateltow kept talking.
“Is it a woman or your business that’s put you in such a mood?”
“Neither,” Mitch replied.
“You’re a handsome young man. You’re in good shape, and you have a wonderful profession – and yet you seem to have the weight of the world on your shoulders.”
“Let’s just say… it’s a complicated time to be a bookseller.”
“People are reading less, I’ll grant you that. The woman who runs the shop near me is always complaining about it, too, but business still seems to be going pretty well for her. Maybe you need to be doing things differently?”
Mitch shook his head. “My shop is doing as well as anyone else’s – except that now the government is deciding what I’m allowed to sell. No – it’s worse than that. They’re deciding what I’m not allowed to sell.”
She patted his hand in sympathy, gazing absently at the river.
“I’ve heard about that bill,” she said. “It’s absurd, and what’s even more absurd is how many people think it’s justified. But there are so many books published every year, surely it can’t be that bad?”
“Oh, but it is. Anything with sexual content, an explicitly LGBTQ character, language judged to be ‘offensive’, or an allusion to suicide, has all been banned. That also goes for books that discuss racism or xenophobia, question religion, anything disturbing or shocking, or deviate in any way from what the government considers to be morally acceptable. All blacklisted. Madame Ateltow, half the authors you introduced us to in school are banned from the curriculum now. You wouldn’t even be allowed to mention their name in the classroom, let alone read a passage of their work. ”
That was how, on a morning softened by a warm breeze and lit by sunlight sparkling off the surface of the river, a retired teacher sitting on a bench beside one of her former students came to a painful realization.
It hit her like a blow to the chest. She had complained bitterly when the lawmakers had passed HB 1467.
She’d also complained about the rising price of bacon, and had something to say about having to wait for five hours in the emergency room for her dislocated shoulder to be reset after a fall.
Yes, Madame Ateltow had done her fair share of complaining in recent years, but now her own passivity horrified her.
She turned to Mitch now, wearing the same apologetic look she’d worn when she’d surprise the class with a pop quiz.
“And you, my dear Mitch – what are you doing with all this outrage you’re feeling?”
All the authority had gone from her voice.
Mitch could hear compassion in it now, the kind that makes you lower your guard, that turns friends into allies.
And so he told her, with a spark of excitement, that he had built up a collection of several hundred banned books.
That he was seriously considering breaking the law, was just looking for the best way to do it.
“I’d welcome any suggestions you might have,” he finished.