Chapter 6 chapter Five

I think it was courageous of me because instead of going back to the office right away after the two detectives left, I continued to work out in the gym, take a shower, and take a steam bath before I left.In the car, the only thing that bothered me was the tragic end of my ex-partner Bustrow.Did he actually discover documents about the precious manuscript?Even worse thoughts appeared in my mind: the other party tortured Buszzhuo in order to obtain information; what information did Buszzhuo give the other party under torture to extract a confession?Did he tell the other party that he delivered the manuscript to me?I don't really know Bustrow, but I don't think he could have been tortured enough to keep his secrets about the whereabouts of that thick envelope.

Back in the office, after my secretary, Miss Macdonald, left her place, I took the key of the safe deposit box from where she kept the key, took out Bustrow's envelope and went back to the office.When I returned the key, Miss MacDonald eyed me suspiciously, but I didn't try to explain, and she didn't ask.All I said was, don't bother me if you have nothing else to do, and locked the office door. I'm no expert, but the paper in the envelope looks really old, and of course it could be a fake, but assuming Buszjo revealed the whereabouts of the documents under torture, it's clear that someone believed in the authenticity of the documents.The paper was divided into two separate sections, clearly all in English, but it was really hard for me to understand the script. I could only recognize a few short words. There were marks on one stack of paper, which looked like they were written with a soft pencil.

I put the papers in a new brown envelope, shred the old ones, put them back in the drop box, and get back to work in the afternoon.According to the blotter, the next day I and Mickey.Hass had lunch.We used to get together about once a month, usually he called me, and this time was no exception.He suggested going to Sorrentino's near where I lived, and I said I'd send Omar to pick him up, which was a custom every time he came into town.Sorrentino is an Italian restaurant chain with a large number of locations in East Manhattan that serves customers like me at very expensive prices.Manhattan's elite office workers all have their favorite Sorrentino branch, where dining is as comfortable as eating at home, but without the pressure of eating at home.Restaurants all smell the same, have a maitre d who knows you, what you like to eat and drink, and at least two beautiful women at the next table at lunch to keep middle-aged diners eating alone The man's eyes ate the ice cream, immersed in his imagination.

The restaurant manager took me to the right back seat where I often go, and while I was waiting, brought a bottle of Italian Monteciano red wine from private collection, a bottle of San Pegnano mineral water, and a plate of anchovy as a side dish .After about half a glass of wine, Mitch walked into the restaurant. He had a build like mine, which had grown considerably in recent years, but all he had gained was fat.His chin has clearly doubled in size, while mine still maintains the same line, but his hair is still thick and has a confident demeanor that I've lost a lot to him.During this meeting, he looked unexpectedly haggard. Perhaps it would be more appropriate to say that he was haunted by evil spirits. The skin under his eyes was bruised, and his eyes were bloodshot and sunken. Although he didn't really twitch, I knew something must happen.Having known each other for so many years, I could tell there was something wrong with him.

We shook hands and he sat down and downed a big glass of wine, half of it at a time, and I asked him what was the matter and he just looked at me.What happened?My colleague had just been murdered, he said, asking if I had heard about it.I replied, I have heard the news. Now let me recreate the situation in a conversational way, because it is such a pain to paraphrase what someone else said, the guy who invented the quotation marks is not an idiot, if he has filed for intellectual property rights, it will be terrible!My conversation with Mitch is as follows: Me: When did you hear that? Him: I'm in Austin, and my secretary called, because I was on the agenda this morning to publish a paper, so I turned off my phone.As soon as the agenda was over, I heard Karen's message as soon as I turned on my mobile phone, and I took the first flight back.He drank it down and poured another, can I have a nice drink?After this tragedy, I was on the verge of becoming an alcoholic.

I motioned to the waiter, who was coming right away, and Mickey ordered a cocktail. When I got back to school, it was a mess, the whole university was in chaos.The jerk of the department head implied that all this was my fault, which caused the school to appoint such a person who might be morally flawed. Is he really such a person? Mitch blushed immediately when he heard my question, and replied sharply: The point is, he is one of the most outstanding Shakespeare scholars of our time, and his only crime is that he has been taken in by a liar.Now those who condemn him, everyone may encounter this kind of liar, including my bastard dean.do you know about this

I said that I read relevant information on the Internet. Yep, bloody hell, but the cops don't care about that, they dare to imply that he's living what they say?Quite an unusual life.They wanted to say he was gay and that's why he died.He drank the rest of the cocktail, and the waiter was still standing there, asking if he wanted a refill, and handing him a menu the size of a bulletin board, which he glanced at, seemingly lacking in interest.This action also confirmed my guess that he is indeed very upset now, because Mickey has always loved food, he likes to eat, talk about food, cook dishes, and think about it again and again.

What do you order?he ask me. What dish did I order?I asked the waiter, I hadn't ordered from the menu in years. Artichokes cooked in oil, gnocchi in red sauce, veal bonbon.Today's osso bucco was delicious. Mickey handed back the menu, so I'll do the same. After the waiter left, Mickey went on: The idea of ​​the cops was that he was involved in some trouble, the imagination of these cops!Don't you think it's outrageous?Seeing the British add gays, I speculated that he must be playing a bondage game with male prostitutes, and it turned out to be too much. Is it impossible?

Ha, of course every conjecture is possible, but I know about the relationship between Bustrow and an Oxford researcher, and they have been in a low-key relationship for a long time.His taste was not as vulgar as the police thought. Maybe he has changed, after all, knowing people and faces but not heart. I can guarantee this man, I have known him for more than 20 years.He drank his second cocktail: I mean, it's like I found out you're after men. Maybe it's you.I said, and after a while we both laughed. He said: My God, we shouldn't laugh, that poor man!The only thing I'm thankful for is that I was thousands of miles away when it happened.The police are very interested in me, it's uncomfortable, they want to sniff me for any signs of abnormality and corruption.

You mean detectives Murray and Frandez? He stared at me and the smile disappeared.Yes, how do you know? They approached me and tried to see if I would leak the secret. Why are they doing this? Because Booth Zhuo is my client.He came to me and said he found some manuscripts, and I thought you sent him. Mickey was dumbfounded.The waiter put the artichokes on our table, and Mitch waited until the waiter had left before leaning over to me and saying in a low voice, "I didn't ask him to come to you, but wait, he did ask me if I knew an intellectual property attorney, and I Tell him my best friend is a lawyer and mention your name in passing.I asked him why he was interested in intellectual property rights, and he told me that there are some manuscripts that may be published, and he wants to know the legal ownership of these manuscripts.So he really went to find you?

Yes, I started to narrate the situation of my meeting with Buszrow: He said he had a manuscript that recorded the whereabouts of an unknown work of Shakespeare Hearing this, Mickey began to cough violently, and he had to drink some mineral water to smooth his throat to Speak up. No, no, he had a manuscript, but it only mentioned Shakespeare, or so he said.I've never seen that thing myself, and he's become terribly paranoid because that Basco guy lied to him.Probably last summer, he went back to England, and when he came back, hey, how should I put it, he seemed to be a different person, very nervous and irritable, and refused to talk about this document, only saying that it was the same document as Shakespeare. There are never-before-seen manuscripts from the era that record things about Shakespeare.He didn't tell me where he found it.I dare say that there must be a lot of articles in it! You mean that the manuscript is only worth a lot because it mentions Shakespeare? He stopped spreading the butter on the bread, gaped again, and laughed in disbelief. Extraordinary value?Please, of course it is!It's extremely important.I thought I'd explained it so many times, but apparently it wasn't enough. Then please enlighten me again. Mickey cleared his throat and held the knife and fork high up like teaching aids in class. Well, Shakespeare's works are the greatest literary achievement in human history by a single man, but apart from his works, he has left almost no physical trace in the world.Everything we know about him can be written on a card the size of a wallet: he was born, baptized, married, had three children, wrote a suicide note, signed some legal papers, wrote his own epitaph, died.Apart from these records, the only physical evidence of his existence is a somewhat dubious script script that looks like he wrote it himself, called Thomas.The Book of Moore.Other than that, his name never appears in a letter, a line of narrative, or a single book.Well, this man has been a shining star in the London theater for nearly twenty years. Naturally, there are many records mentioning him, but they are all sporadic and trivial.The first one to show up was some jerk named Robert.Green, who wrote an article attacking a person named Shalao; another man named Cheto wrote a revelation, apologizing for publishing this attacking article.Francis.Mill wrote a book called "The Mistress's Housekeeper", which may have been forgotten by everyone, except that it said that Shakespeare was the most outstanding playwright in England.Westminster School principal William.Camden mentions Shakespeare; Webster's preface to The White Devil, and Portman's Knight of the Burning Ax; , lawsuits, leases, theatrical memoirs, gist of first folios, etc.Shakespeare's friends were very considerate. After his death, all his plays were collected and published in one book, and his name was listed in the author column.These twenty or so important contemporary records are all we know about Shakespeare.Scholars have conducted quite a lot of research based on these materials. The entire school is huge. In order to understand this person, everyone desperately digs scripts and poems, looking for possible clues, but of course these are all guesses, because we have no way of knowing Well, this guy leaves no trace like smoke and is driving us nuts, I mean, no clue at all. That, after all, happened a long time ago. Yes, but for example, for Leonardo.We know a lot about Da Vinci's deeds. He was a century earlier than Shakespeare.Let me give a few more examples from the literary or art world for comparison: We have a letter from Edmund .Spencer wrote to Walt.Lowry's autograph letter explaining some of the symbolic meanings in his work "The Faerie Queene";Johnson & Johnson also knew a lot.Or Michelangelo, who had five hundred letters, notebooks, and damn menus handed down.But what about Shakespeare?Our greatest writer in history, an important pioneer of the theater, left no letters.This information vacuum has led many to forge fakes.As early as the 18th and 19th centuries, a large number of Shakespeare counterfeit industries had developed, and there are even modern ones, and Bustrall also stumbled because of this.Not to mention that Shakespeare wrote behind closed doors, and his writing process was unknown to outsiders, so there is the so-called authorship problem: we know nothing about this person other than the works, so maybe the author was someone else, It may be the Duke of Southampton, Bacon, or aliens.I mean, how eager are scholars to find out about this old bastard, you wouldn't believe it.If Bustraud had indeed discovered a contemporary manuscript that mentioned Shakespeare, and that it contained significant content, he could have made a comeback in the field. When Mitch mentioned Shakespeare, he seemed twenty years younger, just like the young man I met in my dirty apartment on 113rd Street.I have to admit, this kind of thing doesn't happen to me: talking about work so eagerly, say, about the subtleties of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.He loves what he does, and I respect him for it, and I think a little jealously.But now when he mentioned Booth Zhuo, his eyes were clouded.Are your eyes wet?It's hard to see clearly in this nicely lit, dimly lit restaurant. He spoke again, though: apparently he would never get up again.But I'd pay dearly for a peek at the papers, and now only God knows what happened to the manuscripts. Speaking of which, I think the way he looks at me is a bit artificial. All good lawyers are very tight-lipped when they refer to their clients, even if the client is dead.But compared with us intellectual property lawyers, even the most tight-lipped lawyers seem like gossips.Even if he wants to lure me into the bait now, I don't want to take this, just ask: Is there anything wrong? He said: Do you mean other than the killing of Booth?Isn't that choking enough? You seem to have more things on your mind, friend, I said: I have noticed you like this several times just now, you are not sick or what is wrong? It's okay, except I'm fat like a pig and I don't exercise, I'm pretty fit.The doctor said my arteries were as strong as a shotgun, and it was only because of the latest stock market. I said: Speaking of which, do you know if the deceased professor has any heirs?My profile says he has no children. He had a niece, Madeleine or something, and there was a picture of her on the desk, the child of his late sister, and he doted on her.I imagine she will inherit all his legacy, or else that longtime companion. Did your niece get the notification? Got it, she'll be here this week. Are you from England? No, from Toronto.His sister emigrated years ago, married a Canadian, and had a child.Our gnocchi arrived, and you know what, I think my appetite is back. The gnocchi were soft as if they were about to melt, and as we ate them, I said: Doesn't that manuscript hold any clues?I mean about bigger secrets? Mitch replied while chewing the gnocchi: What else is more important than finding references to Shakespeare in Shakespeare's time?I can't figure it out.Did he tell you? He said the document referred to another manuscript written by Shakespeare himself. At best, I see him as a fantasy.Didn’t I say that Buszrow’s eagerness to return to academia and gain a place does have his reasons.After his will is exposed and the lady who doesn't know what name gets the inheritance, we can take a good look at the manuscript and see what secrets are hidden.But Bustrow is so desperate to save his career that I really don't think that manuscript is really going to be of any value. We didn't talk about Bootstrapp or his mysterious manuscripts or his more mysterious will afterward. (Mickey's Bon Appetit is indeed back, joking about crappy Texas food.) That's about all I remember, except that Mickey was a little unhappy that day, and that it was the first time I learned that Bustrow had a young niece, and that her name was actually Miranda, not Madeleine.Other than that, everything is uncertain because, honestly, humans don't have solid memories at all, we're all making up stories.Proust compiled "Remembrance of Time Gone", Boswell fabricated "Johnson's Biography", in the seventeenth century Samuel.Not all of Pibus's famous diaries are true.Nowadays, it is more and more common to see some high-ranking and influential people being caught lying and making up stories. I have infinite sympathy: what?You mean, I never went to Harvard Medical School?I didn't have sex with that girl at all!This situation may not be a moral failure, but a victory for intellectual property rights, because I don't think there was ever such a thing as a real memory.Reality is invented by humans: fake lives, retouched photos, ghost-written novels, lip-syncing rock bands, scripted reality TV, American foreign policy.Our daily lives are shaped by these things.Everyone from the president to the common man is a novelist. I think we can certainly blame Shakespeare, because he is the source of all this, because the characters he invented are far more real than the human beings we know.Brace Ward knows this, which is why he wants to destroy Shakespeare and his works.I took history at Columbia University, Mitch.Haas should remember too, because he told me to fix it.His teacher’s name was Charlton in the history of the Middle Ages in England. Although I had forgotten the population and topographical work “Doomsday Book” compiled in the Middle Ages, and the names of all the kings and queens, I still remembered the professor’s basic views on history.He said that history is divided into three categories. The first category is what really happened and has been lost forever; the second category is what people think happened, and we can try to find it; Believe it, that is 90% of the content in the history books. (Anyway, I reread that restaurant conversation I just wrote with absurd pleasure. Yes, that probably was the scene of the conversation, because that dialogue is so full of Mickey's personality that I want to get to know him That's what people think after reading the above paragraph. I also found that there is fact in this suspected fictional dialogue. I'm sure if Mitch read it, he would say, yeah, that's what I remember .So, I write a second kind of history, like Brace Godou, but he's an honest guy and I'm not.) After lunch, I walk Mitch back to Lincoln.He drank most of the wine, and with a few cocktails, he looked slick.Whenever Mitch gets this drunk, he's bound to talk about his three wives.The first wife was his college sweetheart, Louise, a tall, lean, blond beauty from a respectable old New England family who would flirt with us from the bottom of the balcony under the shade of ivy when she lived in the dorms. Yeah, that's how everyone was at the time, and then the more intimate behavior happened in the apartment.In my senior year, Mickey proposed to her and they had sex, another nice tradition of the era.I think of that weekend morning in the apartment, Mitch in a maroon velvet bathrobe (he prefers to call it a fancy dressing gown), making coffee, Louise walks into the kitchen, embarrassed to see me , but still serve the coffee gracefully.At times like this, she usually wears black leggings over a Mickey Oxford-style shirt, which I've found to be very sultry ever since. (Tight pants in those days were considered underwear. Now I am not used to seeing girls walking around the city wearing them and showing off their bodies. I always feel a sudden tightness in my lower body.) Louise appeared She wasn't bra-free at the time, she was a pioneer in that regard, and she had a pair of rather lovely, round, jiggly boobs. Back to Mickey and his wives.As I said, Louise was married to him for seven years.It was the height of the sexual revolution, and Mickey wanted to be a part of it.For a professor, it is not difficult to find someone to choose, so there is Marilyn.Kaplan, typical graduate student.Mitch was living in the big house in Scarsdale at the time, with two children and a dog, so if he wanted to satisfy his desire for Marilyn, he would have to pay a price.Among the three wives, Marilyn is the most classically beautiful, with big black eyes, chestnut-colored smooth long hair, and American girls' standard long legs, thin waist, and round chest. She lived in the 1970s , received higher education, made her a full-fledged feminist, extremely contemptuous of male gazes, even so, the gazes resting on her have never stopped, and she has benefited a lot from it.She gave birth to a child for Mickey, but she ran away with someone else three years later.I remember the guy like he went to Berkeley and was a effeminate bisexual with perfect political ideas, at least that's what I heard.Mitch explained that the issues between them were actually very intellectual. When it came to literary theory, he was no match for Marilyn, which was almost as important to her as sex; Let her lead because she has boundless energy and creativity. The third is his current wife, Di Cui, who is his editor in "Putnam" magazine. Otherwise it's as tight as a piano string.On the way I drove Mitch home after lunch that day, Mitch kept complaining about her, because Di Cui wanted to pursue the ultimate fashion in everything.She's terrified of buying the wrong refrigerator, going to the wrong party, going to the wrong club or resort, or buying the wrong mansion in the Hamptons, and turning into some kind of social cancer, and still trying to make the perfect kid.Mitch was hesitant because he already had three kids and he told me a long story Ah, I forgot what he said to me, floor tiles?German imports?Or what conceptual strategy?Who cares about him, the point is that she spent a lot of money on him.The first wife and the first two children, as well as Marilyn's little boy named Jason, are also burning money. Special education schools and psychotherapists cost him a lot of money.The market was sluggish, and the family fastener business had too many heirs, and he was drained. (I said I could lend him the money, and he laughed and said, haha, it's not that bad.) When I met Mickey, I used to complain about my wife complaining, even though I only have one wife, he has listened to me complaining enough.It's weird, I happen to have slept with every one of Mitch's wives, but definitely not before Mitch divorced them, because I would never bully a friend's wife. Two weeks before Louise and Mitch got married, I slept with Louise and we spent a long afternoon together.She said she loved Mickey and wanted to have his kids, but couldn't bear the fact that she never slept with anyone else.She said she'd been stalking me, and she really meant it, and she wanted to experience what it was like before she got tied up in marriage.She's a little nervous about sex, and Mitch clearly hasn't taught her an introductory lesson yet.Just that one time, she never mentioned it again after that, and never asked me anything.Even though Mitch later had an affair with Marilyn, I don't think she ever told Mitch about me and her. As for Mitch's second wife, Marilyn, I was invited to a literary cocktail party once, and I met Marilyn there.It took six months for Mickey to hook her up.At that cocktail party, she criticized some people in the English literary system as fascists.I gently reminded her that the word fascism has a specific reference, that the metaphor she just made was too broad to sound very wise, and that if the term is abused in this way, if fascism makes a comeback, we can say that there is nothing wrong with it. Unprepared; this kind of thing is very likely to happen, after all, some people obviously still worship fascism.She laughed at me because to her fascist was just anyone she hated.These people must also deny that no one except some stupid pigs from the country will admit that they really believe in fascism.Of course, you all want to know that I have carefully studied the ins and outs of this doctrine and related expositions, and I was a little drunk at the time, so I taught her a lesson on the spot.She may never have heard of someone who thinks quite differently from her before, and she may not have heard that sexual and racial oppression is normal, that it is absurd to attempt to suppress it, and that to do so would be to express Sex is shameful; also, having absolute power to crush an enemy is something to be pleased about, not something to be ashamed of; democracy is pathetic, obedience to the will of the leader is a joy, war is a blessing to the nation, etc. . After hearing my big reasoning, she insisted that it is impossible for anyone to believe my bullshit theory.I then pointed out that these theories were very popular just a few centuries ago, and that many people as smart as her believed in them throughout history, including the great philosopher Martin.Heidegger and my grandfather.When I told her that my grandfather was a member of the Waffen-SS, she thought I was joking, but I assured her it was no joke and invited her to my house to see the Nazi relics I had inherited.She did come, too, and I showed her the stuff and told her my family secrets, and she got horny after hearing that.I think this phenomenon may prove the famous saying of the poetess Plath: Every woman loves a fascist.But of course not every woman loves me, and I'm not actually a fascist.In fact, she actually asked me to be rough in bed, I don't really care about that, I just think it should be a gentleman in bed.There's another reason I don't like her that much, and that's because she swears when she orgasms, so I haven't sought her out or seen her again.We pretended not to know each other until she reappeared. Di Cui once published a book for my author client. The two of us met in the office. The reason for the meeting seems to be that the characters written in the client’s book had appeared in the previous books he co-authored with others.We looked at each other, she was wearing a shiny top and tight trousers, and when I stood up to flip through her briefcase, I was amazed by the beautiful buttocks and long thin thighs, not to mention the outline between her legs Clear, where it's about as wide as a deck of cards.She turned around and gave me a look, and I have to admit it was like Sex and the City.I called her afterward and they dated like normal people.I later found out that she likes a man to fuck herself after she's fucked deep, because she's so skinny that I got a painful bruise on my pubic bone, but other than that, I rather like her like a nightingale Pleasant cry, a series of beautiful sounds will be made during several orgasms.We went on a couple of dates, about five years ago, then I contacted her, she was busy, I called again, same thing, so our relationship ended like that.I don't regret breaking up with her, I think she thinks I'm a little stuffy and I think she's a little superficial.We met again a few months before her wedding to Mickey, and she also pretended not to know me, maybe she really didn't remember our formulaic affair. Looking back on these events, I feel a little depressed for some reason.The reason why I want to talk about these past affairs is to give you a sense of how sad it is that I am in this state of lust and thirst, and then you can understand this story.Di Cui is sexy but not sexual because she has no connotation; Ingrid is a little cold but indulgent, and we always feel a little distance when we are together, and I guess that is why I came to her.I find that a lot of artists are like that because they put their passion into creating.My estranged wife, Emmarie, is the most provocative woman I've ever met, with a passion for life burning inside her, making everything she touches beautiful except me. Is there an antonym for lust?Maybe it's the desire to die, is there such a saying?But it's true, and don't we all get a little excited to see death?Especially the kind of tragic death suffered by violence, what a glorious death!Don't we treat these things as stories and tell our children countless times in detail?However, this longing for death can only be realized on the racing track, and in this respect we still know what is true and what is false.Death is the least embarrassing thing in the world, and it also has a set of corresponding aesthetics: the vibrant scenes of the Impressionists and the plump nudes in Boucher's works are exactly the opposite end of death.I believe that this aesthetic of death was at its peak when my grandfather died.As the anti-Miesian in architecture emphasizes, the appearance of something has nothing to do with its function.For example, the American P︱47 Thunder fighter jet is an effective and terrifying weapon, arguably the most outstanding fighter jet, but this aircraft looks like it flew out of a Disney cartoon, round like a ball , as if there would be a smiling face behind the propeller; but the German Stuka dive bomber looks like what a bomber should be, like a terrifying nightmare appearing in the sky.On the other hand, the Sherman chariot of the United States during World War II looked like a toy, which could be pulled by a toddler to run on the ground; as for the Nazi heavy tank, it was like an exquisitely designed killing machine ; not to mention those awesome military uniforms, which are gorgeous gowns at all, and of course this thing I'm holding in my hand right now. The Germans called this thing a sheller or a P08, but it was more commonly known as a Ruger.In fact, this gun is what my mother pulled out to scare my father when my parents met.That's right, it was my mother who lied, and the evidence is here.When my grandfather was awarded the Knight of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaf of Swords, he also got this special pistol.God knows how much it's worth, maybe hundreds of thousands to some geek collector.A walnut grip with a red and white lozenge on the left and black letters in the center: II ⚡⚡ Pz. On the right, a small model of a silver badge is inlaid as decoration, engraved with the name, rank and date of the recipient.Himmler, the SS commander, must have held this gun in his fat white palm.My mother doesn't know why my grandfather was awarded the medal, but he once led an armored regiment in the late summer of 1943 and killed a lot of Russians on the Eastern Front. The number is really amazing. I think it has something to do with it About it.Looking at this gun and holding this gun still makes me sweat a little.It's not a good thing at all, but for some reason, I never sold the gun or threw it in the river.The gun is loaded, with the original Parabellum 9cm rounds, and I know it works, maybe I should find a canister later and try it out.I'm actually a good shooter, and that's what my brother Paul taught me when I was on vacation after he came back from his first military service.That time I went to the Fort Bragg base to look for him, and we took a military Colt 45 pistol together, and a Soviet-made Makorov 9cm (he brought back the spoils in Vietnam), the two of them Gun practice in the woods.He taught me the combat shooting technique of aiming/shooting, speed being the most important thing since the average pistol shoots within seven feet of the target. Back when I was having dinner with Mitch, I dropped Mitch off at Columbia University.When he got out of the car, he said: If that niece calls, remember to tell me, if she finds the manuscript, I want to see it. I said I would, and continued south, thinking about me and Mitch on the way home.Haas' long-standing relationship, especially regarding the sexual aspect.I have to admit that I am somewhat dissatisfied with him, and I think that as long as it is a really close and long-term friendship, it is inevitable to encounter this kind of knot.My brother Paul would say that this kind of feeling is part of the fall of human nature, that we just can't give unreserved love, we think we give a lot, but we don't, at least in some part withhold.It hurts to say it, but I guess it's a good thing, we all adore ourselves to some degree, and the main function of a good friend is to make you feel good about yourself.I know Mitch thinks I'm just a boring old dog, far less intelligent than he is, and that's probably true, and I'm nowhere near his reputation.我沒寫過受歡迎的暢銷書，沒有成群的學生崇拜我，更不是國家文藝學會的重要成員，也沒得過普立茲獎；他也一定覺得我在愛情方面是個傻瓜，至少在性這一方面不怎樣。米奇當然知道我那些風流韻事，除了我剛剛提過的那三個女人之外。我和艾瑪麗分手的時候他非常傷感，那時候他說，她是你的完美另一半，還列舉出她的種種美德。他是對的，她對現在的我來說太完美了，可是這種感覺很難形容讓別人了解。 根據我的筆記本，好幾天後，麥唐那多小姐請我接聽電話。電話那頭的聲音很年輕悅耳，有點喉音：你知道我為何打電話來吧？加拿大特有的用字遣詞，還有最後疑問詞的音調，顯示她是加拿大人。以前的廣告都說加拿大是最近的異國。我馬上就受到她的吸引，邀請她來辦公室，但是她拒絕了。那要約在哪裡呢？她說她正在紐約公共圖書館裡工作，就在布魯克．亞斯特圖書室裡面的善本書室。我還有一些工作要做，於是約了四點鐘跟她碰面。她說很期待這場會面。 接著我又繼續當天的工作，幫一家大公司控告某個貧窮的藝術家，這就是智財權律師的基本業務：那位藝術家改造了某家全國連鎖公司的商標，批判時下消費社會的瘋狂，原本的商標因為被加上了淫穢的露點圖形而顯得猥褻，而且他還把作品放在隨處可見的海報和Ｔ恤上頭，那家公司就不高興了。像這種發佈警告禁止令的案件，我閉著眼睛都能處理，或者像今天的情況，我可以一邊做事，一邊想著即將要和布斯卓神秘的姪女會面，現在我知道她的名字叫做米蘭達．凱洛格。 三點四十五分，歐馬把我送到第五大道。圖書館門口聳立著古典裝飾風格的大柱子，站著兩隻石獅子，分別叫耐心和勇氣，平時沉默不作聲，但根據紐約的傳說，如果有處女踏上台階，獅子就會吼叫。我搭電梯到三樓，登記進入有鎖的亞斯特圖書室，就在大圖書室的外面。這裡有好多回憶，中學的時候我經常坐在這裡的長木桌旁邊，我會從布魯克林坐地鐵過來，在這待一整天，名義上是為了報告做研究，當然，是因為那時候還沒網路，不過事實上我在享受那種匿名的感覺，一群陌生人的陪伴，還有那地方完全沒有米希金家的氣息，是我的第一個大人體驗。 我馬上就看到她了，在角落的一張長桌子旁邊。圖書室裡有很多書架，但裡頭除了一位坐在服務人員櫃台的先生以外，就只有她一個人。她將一頭金髮在耳後綰成兩個髻，以前我和艾瑪麗交往的時候，她也是梳這種頭，雖然聽起來很荒謬，但是我一直都很喜歡這種髮型。她露出頸子，看起來優美而脆弱。我覺得在我們的文化裡，女人的頸子是最受忽略的第二性徵，而且永遠會讓我想入非非。我在那兒坐了幾分鐘，看著她翻動書頁，然後她意識到我在注意她，突然轉過頭來。這件事我現在回想起來，還是覺得很神奇。我們的視線交會，我向她點點頭，她露出燦爛的微笑，起身走向我這邊。她其實長得不像年輕的艾瑪麗，外表的特徵並不相像，但是她有艾瑪麗那種獅子般的優雅。她穿著稍短的灰色裙子，漂亮的粉紅絲質上衣還閃著光芒，深色的長襪包覆著優雅的腳踝。她伸出手，我握住了，她眼睛的顏色就像綠色的葡萄，跟艾瑪麗一樣。你一定是米希金先生，她說，我叫米蘭達．凱洛格。在這一瞬間我簡直無法言語，電流在我手臂裡竄升，這次握手我可能握得有一點太久了。還記得當時我心裡想著，這實在太不可能了。 布瑞斯葛斗的第五封信 那天晚上我回到家裡，還沒進家門就聽見女人哭喊的叫聲。走進家裡，我看見我父親拿著棍子狠狠毆打我可憐的母親，我以前從沒見過這般景象，也沒想過會看見這種情形。事情是這樣的：家裡新來的女僕瑪格麗特在我母親的皮包裡，發現羅馬天主教的十字架和念珠，就直接交給我父親，他就以為這麼多年來，和自己同桌吃飯、同床共枕的妻子，居然秘密信奉天主教，怒不可遏。我母親急忙解釋說，那些東西是她母親留給她的遺物，她只是想留作紀念，但我父親完全聽不進去。雖然我也知道我父親這麼生氣是有理由的，但還是忍不住過去阻止他，求他發發好心，繞過他的妻子吧。可是他大吼著說：她再也不是我的妻子了。跟著連我也一起挨打，我下意識把他推開，他就重重摔到地上。我們兩個，我是說我和我母親，彎腰想去扶他起來，可是他不肯，事實是他的傷勢並不嚴重，但卻覺得面子受損，於是他吼叫著說：瘟神快把你們兩個帶走吧，我不准你們兩個在我的房子裡多待一晚，我沒有你們這樣的妻子和兒子。 於是我和母親兩人帶著幾樣私人物品，滿懷悲苦流著淚離開了，我買了一台手推車載運行李，我母親則是羞愧得想死。正好，砲兵團買了我運去的火槍，總共有六十八英鎊又十二先令，所以我們還不致於去行乞，還可以在旅店訂間房間過夜，旅店的名字叫鐵人，就在哈特路上，從那條舊十字修士路路口數來第三間。我們不但在那裡休息一晚，也暫時住下來。隔天早上，我留了一點錢給我母親，自己搭著船循著來時的路程，先到葛文賽得，然後回到提克斐爾。我的老闆很高興火槍賣了好價錢，可是當我告訴他在我父親家裡發生的事，他就皺起眉頭，而等我告訴他，我用那些錢跟我母親在旅店住了幾天，他的眉頭皺得更緊了。我向他保證會還錢，一分不差，求他通融這次的急需，可是他卻說我在說謊，說我一定是去賭博了，要不就是喝酒把錢喝光了，然後就發明出這套羅馬天主教的故事來矇騙他，所以我們打了一架。我很害怕這樣是違反基督徒忍耐的美德，也擔心這樣是對老闆不敬的行為，但是我真的忍受不了他的偽善，因為他其實是個大騙子，身邊還養了個情婦，於是我把這件事大聲說出來，讓屋子裡的每個人都聽見，包括他的妻子在內，然後眾人在屋裡就吵得不可開交。隔天老闆把我趕了出去，我除了身上的衣物什麼也沒有，就連要離開的船票也沒有。 提克斐爾離倫敦有六十五英里，我走回去花了不少時間，期間只能睡在草叢底下，偷人家的水果和雞蛋吃，願上帝繞恕我的罪。走了很久總算到了鐵人旅店，我發現我母親身邊多了一位漂亮的年輕女孩在照顧她，她是旅店老闆的女兒，那就是妳了，愛妻小南，我們都知道，從我們初見面的那時候起，兩人的命運就牽連在一起，我們之後也墜入愛河。但或許上天仁慈，讓我們的兒子可以長到懂事的年紀，或許他不知道這段故事，所以我在這裡還是要講。 現在我得賺錢求溫飽，可是我還是個不滿十六歲的小伙子，我想到自己曾經去過倫敦塔，還有在那裡遇見的軍官說願意給我工作，於是我就直接趕到那裡，求見哈斯丁先生。他一來我就把我們可悲的遭遇全都說給他聽，就是我剛剛告訴妳的那些事，他露出謹慎的神情盯著我說：小子，我們倫敦塔這裡，可容不下羅馬天主教徒或是清教徒，一來我可能會人頭落地，二來我也受不了身邊有那種人，我一個禮拜只會去聽一次佈道，那就是星期天的時候，其他日子就不想聽到什麼禱詞跟說教的。於是我順著他的話說，我也受不了這些。然後基恩先生聽到我們的談話，過來說：哈斯丁，我們得像試槍那樣試試他，咱們到南華克區去。所以我們就走過倫敦橋，喝了很多酒，我以前從來沒喝過這麼多酒，還看了犬熊相鬥、猥褻的表演等等，接著他們把我帶到妓院，幫我買了個妓女，但是感謝上帝，我吐了出來，覺得很不舒服，所以雖然我壓上那個女人，可是根本沒做什麼罪惡的事。他們大笑一場，說些下流的話來嘲笑我，不過基恩先生認定了我不是清教徒之流，只不過像是把兩磅重的鷹嘴銃，開幾槍還小有威力，但沒辦法像大砲那樣連珠開火，茲可證明。