‘What’s new?’
‘There are several things. Above all is that business with the Nobel Prize.’
‘Oh no, not again!’ Evita exclaims and rolls her eyes.
‘Yep, she is quite bonkers. She demands that I write a report on the strategy we have to get him on the Academy’s shortlist this autumn.’
‘But that’s impossible! He’ll never get the Nobel Prize. Never ever. Not in this life, and not in the next. He writes quasi-philosophical soft porn chicklit. Boring rubbish. I don’t suppose they have ever even considered opening one of his books!’
‘I know, Evita, but I can’t say that to BB. Besides, I haven’t time to write reports for her. It doesn’t say anything about reports in the contract for the rights, does it?’
‘No, of course it doesn’t.’
‘The thing is that she’s got Pablo to believe that he is in the running for a prize already this year. So now he wants to come to the Gothenburg book fair in September to show his interest. He thinks that the more often he comes to Sweden, the more delighted the Swedish Academy will be with him.’
‘No, no, no! Absolutely not! The fair is in just a couple of months. No way. Everything is already planned. It isn’t possible to arrange a seminar or anything good now. No, he can’t come. He is not allowed to come.’
Pablo Blando has already visited the annual fair in Gothenburg several times. Although he is about seventy, he still has an exceptional ability to attract women. There is always a long queue when he signs his books, and he pays most attention to the very youngest women. During a four-day visit he usually invites at least as many young girls up to his hotel room to spend the night with special Latin treatment. And in addition, he doesn’t refrain from picking out the most beautiful one and taking her to the big banquets arranged by the fair and the publishing houses. ‘This evening you are my wife!’ he usually whispers chivalrously, and kisses her hand until she blushes. What he likes best of all is to feed her little bits of cheese on cocktail sticks – in public. Everybody there thinks it’s terribly embarrassing, but what won’t people do to rub shoulders with a bestselling author and his never-ending ability to make gold from gravel. Astra has seen it and can sometimes be disgusted with herself for being a part of the word-alchemist’s senile circus act.
‘The bitch knows there isn’t much time,’ she says. ‘That’s why she wants Pablo to come to Gothenburg incognito. It’s just sick. Like when a king travels abroad without it being a formal state visit. Secret, but nevertheless she wants lots of media coverage. Why not? She regards him as royalty. But you know what the worst thing is?’
‘No, what? Must there be some Viagra waiting in the room as usual?’
‘Listen to this. She wants to arrange a lunch for the Swedish Academy with Pablo as the host. He is a member of the Mexican Literary Academy and the social occasion would strengthen the ties between the two countries, she thinks. Pablo would be able to help introduce more Swedish authors in the Latin American market. She is very enthusiastic and thinks it’s a brilliant idea. You get it? You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours,…’
‘Is she out of her mind?’ exclaims Evita her hand on her forehead. ‘To ask to get the Nobel Prize is like pouring a bucket of shit over yourself in a public square. Nobody forgets such a faux pas, never ever.’
‘Actually, I don’t think she does get it,’ says Astra with a resigned sigh. ‘I’ve tried to tell her in a nice way, but it just doesn’t sink in. I’m going on holiday soon and must sort this out pretty quick. Have you any good ideas?’
‘Okay. Lets do it like this. I’ll write a very clear letter to Veronica and say that it would be a total disaster to even show yourself in Sweden if you ever want to get the Nobel Prize. I can ask the cultural attaché in Barcelona to deliver it to her in person. That ought to have an effect, I think. Then we’ll not run the risk of seeing Pablo at the book fair for at least the next two years…’
CHAPTER 17
A Worthwhile Art Round
It wasn’t the first time this week that Detective Chief Inspector Håkan Rink had stood in front of the large noticeboard in the incident room. It was almost entirely covered with little bits of paper in various colours. Each colour represented a different type of ‘note’ as it is called in police jargon: crime scenes, clues, testimony and so on.
It was late evening and the team had gathered together to listen to an art historian tell them more about Salvador Dali’s driving forces. The crime scenes contained increasingly obvious signs that the serial killer was inspired by the surrealist twentieth-century painter.
‘Thank you for not going home to your dear families just this evening,’ Håkan Rink started off. ‘When we capture Serial Salvador, not only your own families will thank you – the whole country will show its gratitude. Sweden is cowering in terror. We see how the fear acquires new and nastier ways, such as bomb threats against museums with avant-garde exhibitions and the persecution of experimental authors and contemporary artists. Indeed, people vent their anger at culture in general as if it was culture that was to blame for how society has become harder. But I am still convinced that culture is a mirror of society – not the other way round. Let me welcome Alf Linde, one of Sweden’s foremost experts on the surrealist movement.’
The ten or so police officers in Rink’s team gave Linde a short but friendly round of applause. Linde was very old and looked as if he himself could have been around when the Dadaists were transformed into surrealists under the fanatical command of the author André Breton in the early 1920s. When he spoke, there was a quiver under his chin like that of a turkey.
‘Thank you, Håkan. Yes, in this case it does rather look as if the murderer is busy creating a reality mirror of art. Very strange. To the best of my knowledge, this is the first time a murderer has copied an innocent artist. I am therefore also convinced that if you are ever to catch him you must become deeply familiar with Dali’s art. Understand it with your subconscious mind.’
The colleagues in the team nodded gravely at each other. That seemed sensible. They already know something about Dali, but definitely needed to learn more.
Now he must be concise, Titus thinks, and puts the brakes on his frenzy for a while. It would be a piece of cake to spew out thirty pages about Dali. His enormous waxed moustaches alone were worth a couple of pages. Did Serial Salvador have the same? No, that would be too simple.
Alf Linde handed out copies of a hand-written page and chuckled aloud to himself: ‘Here’s Dali in a nutshell; here’s Dali in a surrealist nutshell.’
Against the simple || For the compound
Against uniformity || For differentiation
Against equality || For rank
Against collectivism || For individualism
Against politics || For metaphysics
Against nature || For aesthetics
Against progress || For permanency
Against mechanisation || For dreams
Against youth || For mature Machiavellian fanaticism
Against spinach || For snails
Against film || For theatre
Against Buddha || For Marquis de Sade
Against the Orient || For the Occident
Against the sun || For the moon
Against revolution || For tradition
Against Michelangelo || For Raphael
Against Rembrandt || For Vermeer
Against primitive objects || For over-cultivated objects
Against philosophy || For religion