Chapter 8 The Secret Meeting #2
He went back to pacing between tables, whistling louder each time he paused, feigning interest in a book cover. If he’d been auditioning for the part of a low-level crook in an old B-movie, he’d have got the job hands-down.
“What do you want?” Mitch demanded. He’d never known anyone so irritating.
“Oh, just to make a little deal of my own. Seems only fair. You see, I need a place to store some things I’m quite attached to, and it would be very convenient to have them right below my apartment. I could rent that room from you, for a tidy little sum.”
“Rent a room that doesn’t exist? Now that’s strange,” Mitch retorted.
“Look, let’s stop beating around the bush. Who were all those people who came in here the other night, and where did they go after you closed up?”
“So, you are spying on me. Fine. Those people, as you call them, were students who came to attend a reading I held here. I moved the tables to make room.”
“They must have been packed in like sardines. How exciting those readings must be. Maybe I’ll come along next time – you know, as your neighbour.” His arrogance was starting to grate on Mitch’s nerves.
“If you’re a student, sure.”
“Watch your tone. I might start to think you don’t actually want to help me.”
“What is it you need to store, exactly?”
“Oh… just some old bits and pieces. At my age, you get sentimental. I’ve accumulated a lot of things over the years, and I’m not ready to get rid of them just yet.”
“I thought we were going to stop beating around the bush,” Mitch snarled.
“You know perfectly well that room exists, because you used it yourself. I’m guessing that wherever you’ve been storing your ‘merchandise’ recently isn’t working for you anymore – I don’t want to know why – and you thought the cellar of my shop would make the perfect hideout. Sorry, but my answer is no.”
“You’re going to regret this, make no mistake. If you change your mind – like I said, my windows look right out onto the courtyard – just give me a whistle.”
The antique dealer winked – another tic, perhaps – and sauntered out the door.
Mitch was left feeling unsettled. The discomfort lasted all afternoon. He considered telling Mathilde about it, but in the end thought it might be better to talk to Verner.
* * *
The music teacher was surprised to find Mitch waiting for him outside the conservatory at the end of the day. They walked to a nearby café and sat on the terrace where, over a beer, Mitch told Verner about the visit he’d had that morning.
“And he said you’d regret it?”
“Those were his exact words.” Mitch nodded, studying his palms like a solution might be found between his life line and his fate line.
Verner drained his glass. “He’s bluffing,” he decided, dabbing foam from his lips. “He doesn’t know a thing – other than that a meeting took place, which, last I checked, isn’t illegal. I don’t think you have any real reason to worry. What does Mathilde think?”
“I haven’t told her.”
“I see,” said Verner dryly, baffling Mitch, who didn’t see at all. “She was wonderful the other night, you know. Really impressive. She and Madame Ateltow made one hell of a team, didn’t they? It was quite something.” He paused. “Is everything alright between you two?”
“I think so,” Mitch answered, though he wasn’t entirely sure.
Verner let him pick up the tab and stood. He was looking forward to playing his guitar at the bookshop again.
* * *
Mathilde and Mitch saw each other two or three times a week.
After the meetings, which were growing ever more popular, they’d end up at her place.
Mitch always slipped out in the morning while she was still asleep, or pretending to be.
There were no more intimate dinners, no more nights at the jazz club or romantic moments snatched in the secret cellar.
Ever since she was a teenager, Mathilde had had a taste for unpredictable men.
Men with a vision. Men who were intense, passionate, obsessive – often about anything but her.
This penchant had led her to date loser after loser: a divorced car enthusiast who’d known more about engines than he did about the woman he’d spent six years married to; a musician who couldn’t hold his liquor; and, during her brief attempt at embracing a healthy lifestyle, a perfectly chiselled yoga instructor who only ever used his body to meditate.
There were a lot of things Mathilde liked about Mitch.
He wasn’t like the other men she’d dated.
He never bored her, and his humour and kindness had turned life into an unexpectedly smooth journey lately.
Oddly enough, he reminded her of the books she praised to her audience, the kind you grow attached to after only a few pages and can’t wait to pick up again at the end of the day.
She’d known from the start that whatever they had wasn’t going to last. Which of course only made her cling to him more tightly whenever they found themselves in bed together.
* * *