AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She’ll say, “Please, I’ve heard this story four times already,” and we’ll go out for a drink at some German Bierkeller.
I didn’t make this journey in order to find the words missing from my life but to be the king of my own world again. And it’s here that I’m back in touch with myself and with the magical universe all around me.
Yes, I could have reached the same conclusions without ever leaving Brazil, but just like Santiago, the shepherd boy in one of my books, sometimes you have to travel a long way to find what is near. When the rain returns to earth, it brings with it the things of the air. The magical and the extraordinary are with me and with everyone in the Universe all the time, but sometimes we forget and need to be reminded, even if we have to cross the largest continent in the world from one side to the other. We return laden with treasures that might end up getting buried again, and then we will have to set off once more in search of them. That’s what makes life interesting—believing in treasures and in miracles.
“Let’s celebrate. Is there any vodka on the boat?”
No, there isn’t, and Hilal fixes me with angry eyes.
“Celebrate what? The fact that I’m going to be stuck here alone until I get the train all the way back and spend endless days and nights thinking about everything we’ve been through together?”
“No, I need to celebrate what I’ve just experienced, to raise a glass to myself. And you need to toast your courage. You set off in search of adventure, and you found it. You might be sad for a while, but someone is sure to light a fire on a nearby mountain. You’ll see the light, go toward it, and find the man you’ve been looking for all your life. You’re young, and, you know, I sensed last night that it wasn’t your hands playing the violin but the hands of God. Let God use your hands. You will be happy, even if right now you feel only despair.”
“You have absolutely no idea what I’m feeling. You’re just an egotist who thinks the world owes you something. I gave myself to you entirely, and yet here I am again, being left high and dry.”
There’s no point in arguing, but I know she’s right. That’s how it will be. I’m fifty-nine and she’s twenty-one.
WE GO BACK TO THE PLACE where we’re staying. Not a hotel this time but a vast house built in 1974 for a summit on disarmament between Leonid Brezhnev, then general-secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, and the American president at the time, Gerald Ford. It is made all of white marble, with a vast hall in the middle and a series of rooms leading off it. These must once have been intended for political delegations but are now used for occasional guests.
We intend to take a shower, change our clothes, and go straight out to supper in the city, far from that chilly atmosphere. However, a man is standing right in the middle of the hall. My publishers go over to him. Yao and I keep a prudent distance.
The man takes out his cell phone and dials a number. Now my publisher is speaking respectfully into the phone, his eyes bright with happiness. My editor is smiling, too. My publisher’s voice echoes around the marble walls.
“What’s going on?” I ask.
“You’ll find out in a minute,” answers Yao.
My publisher turns off the phone and comes toward me, beaming.
“We’re going back to Moscow tomorrow,” he says. “We have to be there by five in the afternoon.”
“Weren’t we going to stay here for a couple of days? I haven’t even had time for a wander around the city. Besides, it’s a nine-hour flight to Moscow. How could we possibly be there by five o’clock?”
“There’s a seven-hour time difference. If we leave here at midday, we’ll be there by two. That’s plenty of time. I’m going to cancel the restaurant booking this evening and ask them to serve supper here. I’ve got a lot of arranging to do.”
“But why the urgency? My plane for Germany leaves on—”
He interrupts me, saying, “It seems that President Vladimir Putin has read all about your journey and would like to meet you.”
The Soul of Turkey
“AND WHAT ABOUT ME?”
My publisher turns to Hilal.
“It was your decision to come with us, and you can go back how and when you want. It’s nothing to do with us.”
The man with the cell phone has vanished. My publishers leave, and Yao goes with them. Hilal and I are alone in the middle of that vast, oppressive marble hallway.
Everything happened so fast that we still haven’t recovered from the shock. I had no idea President Putin even knew about my journey. Hilal cannot believe that things are going to end so abruptly, so suddenly, without her having another opportunity to talk to me of love, to explain how important everything we’ve experienced is for our lives and that we should carry on, even if I am married. That, at least, is what I imagine is going through her mind.
You can’t do this to me! You can’t just leave me here! You killed me once because you didn’t have the guts to say “no,” and now you’re going to kill me again!
She runs to her room, and I fear the worst. If she’s serious, anything is possible. I want to phone my publisher and ask him to buy a ticket for her; otherwise, we could be faced by a terrible tragedy, and then there will be no meeting with Putin, no kingdom, no redemption, no conquest, and my big adventure will end in suicide and death. I run to her room, which is on the second floor, but she has already opened the windows.
“Stop! You won’t kill yourself if you jump from this height—you’ll just be crippled for the rest of your life.”
She isn’t listening. I have to stay calm and in control of the situation. I have to be as authoritative as she was in Baikal when she ordered me not to turn around and see her naked. A thousand thoughts go through my mind, and I take the easiest route.
