Chapter 8 The Secret Meeting
The Secret Meeting
Mitch spent all his free time over the next week preparing the secret room, which meant working longer hours than usual and getting very little sleep, and yet he didn’t feel tired.
Quite the opposite, in fact: he woke each morning in high spirits, more energized than he’d been the day before.
As soon as he closed the shop he went down to the cellar, moving coffee tables around, arranging sofas, chairs, and armchairs in front of the imaginary stage Mathilde and Madame Ateltow would soon occupy.
And then, when there was nothing left to move around, he categorized the books on the shelves or wrote up reading notes.
Mathilde came to lend a hand on the third evening, and every evening after that.
She showed up unannounced, refused to listen to any instructions (Mitch quickly gave up trying), and threw herself into decorating.
She’d dug up a bunch of old concert posters at a flea market – bands she admitted she’d never listened to.
Pink Floyd, the Rolling Stones, Supertramp, ABBA, Guns N’ Roses, Nirvana, REM, Weezer…
The highlight of her collection was a giant portrait of Freddie Mercury, dressed all in white, a microphone pressed so close to his lips that it looked like he might swallow it. That one, she hung behind the bar.
Mitch didn’t ask what the posters were supposed to add to evenings devoted to literature; she seemed to think they were, and her cheerful enthusiasm was enough to put him at ease.
As they worked, she’d tell him about her day at the university, describing the classes she’d loved and the ones that had bored her, explaining the chemistry behind anti-inflammatory drugs and the side effects of aspirin, her excitement over a promising new molecule in cancer treatment.
When she ran out of things to say she’d curl up in an armchair with a book, whistling softly to herself.
Occasionally she would disappear for two hours and return as nonchalantly as if she’d only been gone a few minutes.
Over time, Mitch learned two new things about her.
One was that she needed to be constantly busy, and the other was that she was terrified of silence.
To make a statement, or maybe just to annoy her, he taped up a picture of the original cover of 1984 next to the poster of Freddie Mercury.
* * *
The following Sunday, they slept late. Mitch took Mathilde for a walk along the river.
As they were crossing a bridge, he suddenly stopped.
Mathilde noticed and turned to face him, so close now that there were only a few inches between them.
She narrowed her eyes, bracing herself for whatever excuse he was about to offer for having to leave her for the day.
Well, she wouldn’t give him the pleasure, she decided; she’d tell him she had things of her own to do, that she had coursework to catch up on, which she’d been neglecting to spend her evenings with him.
All of this flashed through her mind in an instant, while Mitch simply looked at her.
And as it turned out, he had no intention of giving her the slip.
All he said was that she looked even more beautiful than usual this morning.
Blushing, Mathilde slipped an arm through his.
Her studies could wait a little longer, after all.
“You’re nervous, aren’t you,” she said. “Everything’s going to be fine, believe me. Your aging Don Juan will fill any awkward silences with his guitar. And the friends I invited will have plenty to say, I promise.”
“How many do you think will show?” Mitch asked anxiously.
“Well, I invited at least twenty.” Mathilde made a show of totting up the numbers in her head.
“Maybe twenty-five. And I asked them to spread the word. I really played up the secrecy angle – none of them will be able to resist the idea of an exclusive, invite-only club. You’re not the only one being censored, you know.
It’s forbidden to discuss politics on campus now.
But I can assure you, nobody coming on Wednesday is going to hold back. ”
“If everyone you invited brings a friend, we might get to fifty,” Mitch mused aloud, “and if Verner pulls in as many, we’ll have a full house.”
“We’ll find out soon enough.”
* * *
As it turned out, only sixty people showed up that Wednesday.
Thirty-two from Team Mathilde, twenty-six from Verner, and only one from Madame Ateltow, who’d talked her own neighbourhood bookseller into coming to a meeting she might find informational – and finally Madame Bergol, who wouldn’t have missed it for in the world.
Fewer guests than Mitch had hoped for, but not bad for their first night.
Madame Ateltow hadn’t lost her touch. Masterfully, she described the repercussions of HB 1467, particularly the effect it would have on collective thought.
She explained its true motives – which were political, not moral – and contrasted them with the intentions of the banned authors.
Though from different cultures, countries, eras, styles and genres, they had all sought to understand what it means to be human, reject cruelty and inequality, and promote tolerance, justice and freedom.
She was full of fire and eloquence, and Mitch tried to remember if she’d been this passionate when he was her student.
She cited authors and passages that demonstrated nuance.
After a theatrical pause, she turned to the bookshelves, directing attention to the rows and rows of banned titles.
Madame Ateltow’s local bookshop owner sat dumbstruck, wondering how a fellow bookseller had not only amassed but hidden such a collection of prohibited works.
She didn’t have long to reflect on the point, though, since it was at that moment that Mathilde made her entrance, amid a silence that bordered on awe.
Mitch exchanged a knowing smile with Monsieur Verner, confirming what he’d suspected – that the two women had rehearsed, to be sure of achieving perfect synchronicity.
Indeed, they’d left nothing to chance. Mathilde moved through the rows with nonchalance and a deliberate sway of her hips, distributing a list of books she and Madame Ateltow had chosen for the next meeting.
The assignment: consider, over the coming week, the questions raised by these texts that made them threatening.
The list included Stefan Zweig’s Confusion, Albert Camus’s The Stranger, Marguerite Duras’s The Lover, Michael Cunningham’s By Nightfall, Edgar Allan Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher, and Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.
When the last handouts had been distributed, Mathilde perched herself on the back of an armchair, facing the group from her makeshift stage.
Then she crossed her legs, and motioned for silence.
After a dramatic pause of her own, she proceeded to captivate her audience with a speech on the liberating power of banned literature.
Verner was dazzled. Mathilde’s whole presentation had been expertly choreographed, he thought. And there was also the musical quality of her voice, the rhythm of her speech. She had the vocal control of a professional musician.
After a while, Mathilde opened the floor to discussion. A dozen or so students spoke in turn – though none with the drive or conviction of the two women at the centre of it all.
At around ten o’clock it was Verner’s turn to take the stage. He picked up his guitar, and surprised Mitch from the very first chords.
“And just wait till he really gets going,” Madame Ateltow whispered in Mitch’s ear.
The evening concluded shortly before eleven.
The students departed full of enthusiastic chatter, Mitch having given each of them a book of their choice.
Monsieur Verner went for a short stroll with Madame Bergol, Madame Ateltow having caught a ride home with the bookshop owner from her neighbourhood.
The first evening had been a success. The students had all signed up for the next meeting, set for the following Monday, promising to bring more recruits.
And yet, on the way home, Mitch and Mathilde hardly spoke.
* * *
A few days later, Mitch received an unexpected visit from the antique dealer who had sold him the shop.
The man wore a coat with a faux-fur collar that made him look like a broke mafioso trying to look like a big-shot, and his slicked hair, carefully combed over his bald spot, didn’t help matters.
His normally impassive face twisted into a strange grimace when he greeted Mitch.
He drifted around the shop slowly, whistling, occasionally shrugging or raising his eyebrows. Mitch wondered if it was a tic.
“Looking for anything in particular?” he asked at last.
“No, just browsing. The place is looking good. Clean. Very clean. Felt a lot smaller back when it was mine. You got yourself a good deal.”
“Books take up less room than antiques,” Mitch said, wondering uneasily what the point of this visit was.
The antique dealer leaned over a table, picked up a book, put it back down.
“So,” he went on, “have you taken a closer look at it?”
“At what?”
“The room. Behind the brick wall.”
“Oh right,” Mitch said. “That old story about the previous tenant, wasn’t it?”
“That story, yes. Exactly.”
“No,” Mitch replied. “Haven’t had the time, and you said it was just a legend, anyway.”
“Now, isn’t that strange.” The tic had reached his mouth now, his upper lip twitching toward the tip of his nose. “Because I thought I saw you spending quite a bit of time down the coal hatch back there. Heard what sounded like hammering, too.”
“You’ve been spying on me?”
“No, just happened to be passing through.”
“Through the courtyard?”
“I still put my garbage back there,” the man said. “I live in the building just behind here.”
“I didn’t realize that.”
“So, were you hammering?”
“I believe I’ve already answered that.”
“Well, that’s even stranger, then.” The man sighed. “Too bad.”