The Best Book in the World (15 page)

Titus starts by going through the bookshelves. A bookshelf tells you everything about a person, partly by showing you which books are in it but above all by how they are arranged. The books in the collection don’t actually tell you what the
book-owner
has really read – the selection is more about the picture the person wants to present of himself. But the way they are ordered, you can’t hide that, it reveals everything. The people who have read the most start by arranging their books according to genre, with biographies and fiction in separate sections, likewise cookery books and photo books, and so on. The more genres, the greater the interest in literature, and after that of course there is strict alphabetical order according to the author’s surname in each category. The least literary person arranges his books according to size. It is dreadfully ugly and almost impossible to find anything. On the other hand, nobody ever takes a book out of that type of bookshelf. Some maniacs even try to arrange their books in colour groupings, but they are few. Eddie belongs to the first category, excluding the many books stacked in heaps due to shortage of space. But within every letter of the alphabet there is complete chaos: Dostoevsky comes before Dahlström. Kosinski before Kafka. He is a combination of a structure fascist, someone who goes by size, and a common-or-garden nutter. Strange indeed, thinks Titus. He looks in J, where his own books ought to be, but there is just a big gap.

Titus finds the Jensen-books in a heap on the floor next to the desk. Oh my God! Some sort of espionage is clearly going on. He thumbs through the books but can’t find any notes or comments inside them. In fact the paper feels stiff, almost as if they haven’t been opened before. What sort of spy can’t be bothered to do proper research? Titus feels angry that Eddie hasn’t even read his books, despite having buttered him up and flattered him so many times.

Titus looks out of the window to check if anybody is watching him. There doesn’t seem to be. He turns the computer on and sits down on the desk chair waiting for the program to start up.

Ha! You don’t need a password to get in! He starts frantically to search among folders and files. The hard disk is mainly music, pictures and films. Titus bypasses these and soon finds a folder called ‘MANUSCRIPTS’. He opens it, and one of the sub-folders immediately catches his eye.

The hair on Titus’ arms stands up when he reads the name:
The Best Book in the World.

Out on the Fjäderholm islands, calm has descended. The day-trippers who come with the ferry have long since gone home. The guests at the inn on the other side of the island are either in the restaurant or out on the jetty drinking whisky in peace and quiet. The taxi boats won’t be coming for another hour or two.

In the little bay where
Come aboard amour
is moored, it is calm too. The cockpit is empty and both the crew and the oil lamps have moved into the cabin. Eddie X and Astra are lying among the warm eiderdowns, flirting. A bit of kissing, and switching between nonsense and serious subjects of conversation. Eddie wants to know what it is like at Winchester’s. How do they look after their authors? What sort of contracts do they have? How much do the editors interfere with the texts? When it comes to Winchester’s, Astra is super-professional. She is a like a catalogue and only reveals carefully balanced information. She is more interested in how things are at Eddie’s publishing house, Babelfish. Does he think they market him properly? What would make him change to another publisher? What does he think of Winchester’s? Does he want her to arrange a meeting with Evita Winchester, completely informally?

Titus starts reverentially poking around in the folder called
The Best Book in the World.
There is a Word file called ‘synopsis’. He opens it and reads a short list of bullet points:

Is that it? Titus thinks about his own way of making a synopsis. He can easily fill an entire pad with handwritten notes before he even starts on the book. But this? What on earth is it? Either Eddie is trying to make a fool of him, or he has got writer’s block. Creative paralysis.

Slowly but surely a lofty calm spreads through Titus’ body. Perhaps Eddie quite simply isn’t capable of doing battle with him. He has obviously tried, but without success. Eddie has sat down and started to note the contents of the book and the only things he has been able to think up are a weird T-shirt print and an aphorism, albeit a fairly clever one. But that is hardly a sustainable start for a bestselling non-fictional novel of decisive importance that is going to change the world. Such an idiot! Titus shakes his head.

The next file is called
Comeaboardamour_bestpoemintheworld.
An expectant smile spreads across Titus’ face. Of course, he clicks that file to open it too.

Titus’s eyes are like saucers. What is this? Never in all his life has he seen such rubbish. Surely this couldn’t have been written by the brilliant romantic poet Eddie X? Titus reads it again and gets stuck on ‘The varnish shines all shiny, the tiller bucks like a colt…’ Shines all shiny? this must be the worst ever combination of a verb and an adverb, Titus says quietly to himself, and lets out a laugh.

He starts thinking. Either the poem is meant as a joke, or Eddie has lost his marbles. Or his ability to express himself with words, at any rate.

Suddenly, the meaning of the poem becomes clear to Titus.

Eddie is going to seduce Astra! Evidently, there are no limits to how far that man is prepared to go. His creativity has become completely blocked somehow. He has lost the ability to write and is becoming a desperado. Frustrated artists can become furious, as Titus is well aware. Who knows what mad plans Eddie has to regain control?

I must stop him, Titus thinks.

I must warn Astra!

Out by the Fjäderholm islands, Eddie is starting to become slightly drunk. He has drunk so much punch that his lips and mouth are sticky from all the sugar, and he has to tense his jaw muscles when he speaks so as not to slur his words. And like all tipsy boys he can’t manage to kiss and do the small talk for more than a short while. Suddenly he frees himself from the eiderdowns and opens his arms wide.

‘Come on, now, Astra. We’re going swimming!’

He opens the cabin hatch and jumps up into the cockpit. There, he hastily tears off all his clothes with sweeping gestures and sets off round the deck in a wild Indian dance. He stops on the
foredeck in front of the mast, thrusts a little with his hips and swings his dick a few rounds in the air before diving down into the black and glistening water.

Astra is not quite as drunk as Eddie, but is just as exhilarated. When she comes up on deck and sees Eddie already in the water, she too undresses quick as a flash. She holds her nose and her bosom when she jumps into the water.

‘Lovely, isn’t it?’ Eddie shouts, and with a toss of his head clears his long fringe from his eyes. He swims a few metres in the bay and waves to Astra to follow. She swims after him. They stop and tread water a while without talking, just looking at each other.

‘This is heavenly! How can it still be so warm in the water?’

‘I love August! Look over there towards Lidingö, Astra. Can you see?’

‘What?’

‘Look at the water! Look how it’s shining all shiny! I love it when it shines all shiny!’

‘Yes, it is beautiful when it shines all shiny. I like it.’

‘Hello, you have reached Astra Larsson at Winchester Publishing. Leave your name and your telephone number, and I shall phone you as soon as I can. Thanks for the call.’

Damn, damn, damn! Titus shakes his mobile phone in the air as if it were to blame for Astra not answering. What the hell should I do now? Phone her again and leave a message? Text her?

And in that case, what would he say? In the long run it is usually best to tell the truth. At the same time, he knows that Astra has fallen for Eddie. It would be hard to convince her over the phone that Eddie is a maniac. It would only rebound on Titus himself. He would look like a jealous nutter with a conspiracy theory. So what should he do? He must act, otherwise Astra might be tricked into something unpleasant. And, most important of all, Eddie might ferret out lots of secrets about
The Best Book in the World.

Titus comes to the conclusion that a white lie is the only proper solution at this stage. Whitish, at least. Off-white, he thinks, and sends off a text message.

Then he simply turns off his phone.

Time will tell, he thinks.

The night bathers are back in the cabin. The swim and the charged atmosphere have already done for a large part of the alcohol. Astra and Eddie sit wrapped up in each other’s towels and eiderdowns, kissing for all they are worth. They caress each other’s hair. Their emotions are on fire. The oil lamps flicker sensually in time with their wide-open mouths. The dampness has started to leave their bodies and now settle as a mist on the small windows. They aaaah and ummmm as they kiss each other, sometimes with closed eyes that allow their hands to discover new wonders,
sometimes
with wide-open eyes that ladle in even larger portions of pleasure. Their legs are entwined. The towels and covers fall off. There is a great deal that is shining all shiny on the boat just now.

Suddenly, the text alert on Astra’s telephone cuts like a machete right through the cabin. Robot-like, she stretches out for the telephone and opens the message before she has time to think – a message from the outer world can destroy a sexy moment easy as pie. But Astra isn’t thinking clearly, it is her muscles and nerves that decide. Her eyes and hands leave Eddie’s body and concentrate on the telephone display. Answering the phone is evidently a reflex that has a higher position in Astra’s needs-pyramid than the impulse to mate with the best man in the flock.

RELAPSE. HELP ME. NOW. TITUS.

‘Oh no, what the hell…’ whispers Astra.

Not many seconds pass before the erotic atmosphere leaves the cabin. Astra’s pupils whirl around in her eyes, as if trying to help her brain find something to cling on to.

Eddie sits up a little and pulls the covers over his navel.

‘What’s happening?’

‘I don’t know. Something has happened to Titus. He seems to have gone on a binge again. He wants help.’

‘Oh dear. Has he tried to become sober? I thought he personified the everlasting party,’ says Eddie quietly, caressing Astra’s arm.

Astra mutters some curses to herself and tries to phone Titus.
But he has turned his phone off, and he hasn’t got an answerphone function turned on either. All she can hear is the telephone company’s automatic message which speaks in staccato.

‘I must go home,’ says Astra and looks desperate.

‘Really? Are you sure?’

‘I must. Anything at all could have happened. Can we do that, can we go home now?’

‘Yes, of course. I’ll start the engine and we’ll be back in the harbour in fifteen, twenty minutes.’

‘Great,’ says Astra with a slightly sad smile. ‘Eddie, this is just crazy. I really don’t want to break off this evening. You have been absolutely fantastic. You
are
absolutely fantastic. You make me horny as hell, and I think that I am actually a little in love with you. Really, really magical, all of it. I’m terribly sorry.’

‘It’s all right, Astra. Nobody can destroy what we two have here. Now let’s be on our way. We must save Titus Jensen for posterity.’

Eddie gets dressed quickly and starts doing things with the boat so that they can sail home. He connects the petrol hose to the outboard motor, squeezes the petrol pump a few times, pulls out the choke and starts the engine at the first pull. It chugs quietly while he loosens the mooring ropes and pulls the boat out with the anchor rope. Astra untangles the mess of sheets and towels, and tidies the bunk which fills half the cabin. She curses Titus for being so hopelessly immature. Who knows when she’ll get to see this lovely bunk again?

Eddie hangs up an oil lamp in the mast as a lantern. The old Neptun cruiser chugs slowly back to its home harbour through the calm waters. A few other boats can be seen here and there. The evening is not over yet. The summer is not over yet. The sky above Stockholm is lit up by street lights, flats and lots of lively pubs and restaurants.

Eddie holds the tiller with his right hand, putting his other arm around Astra’s shoulders when she comes and sits beside him.

‘Has he tried to be sober for a long time?’ he wonders.

‘Yes, indeed. He has been totally dry since the beginning of summer. He has even stopped smoking.’

‘Oh, goodness…’

‘The thing is, he is working on a new book. Or rather, it is almost finished. I think it is going to be really, really good, but not if he starts boozing again. That would be the end of it. Evita’s going to be absolutely livid.’

‘Wow, have you been able to read any of it then? What’s it about?’ Eddie wonders.