Fatal Lies

50

Wolf was sitting in the lost room, alone, smoking his way through a packet of gold-tipped cigarettes. He had acquired them from Bose, a plump and effete baron from Deutsch-Westungarn, whose arm he had twisted until the boy had squealed like a stuck pig. Resting on Wolf's lap was a large book, the cover of which was made of soft green leather and embossed with gold lettering. The endpapers were marbled. Wolf licked his finger and began to turn the pages. The movement of his hand across the spine became faster and faster-each transition was accompanied by a double syllable of friction and release. The sound was not unlike a person gasping for breath. Although he was not reading the text, Wolf's expression was attentive.

The monotony of the task created a void in his mind, which soon filled with recent memories.

Earlier that day Wolf had been summoned to the headmaster's office. The old man had rambled on in his usual way about values, honor, and reputation, but in due course his well-practiced oratory had stalled. He had become somewhat incoherent. Eventually, the headmaster had made an oblique reference to the matter discussed on the occasion of their last meeting.

“It appears that Perger has absconded.”

“Yes,” Wolf had replied.

“This sort of behavior cannot be countenanced. When he is found, I will have no other option but to expel him. Whatever plea is made on his behalf-and I'm sure that at least one well-meaning but misguided advocate will come forward-nothing, and I mean nothing, can possibly excuse such appalling misconduct.”

“No, sir,” Wolf had agreed. “It is quite disgraceful.”

The headmaster had risen and, as was his habit, had gone to the window.

Wolf recalled the nervous catch in his voice: “I take it we have understood the situation correctly. Eh, Wolf? I mean… Perger has absconded, hasn't he?”

“Why, yes,” Wolf had replied. “There can be no other explanation for his disappearance, surely?”

“Good,” the headmaster had muttered, evidently reassured by the boy's steady confidence.

Wolf now turned the final page. None of them had been annotated. He had observed a few inky marks here and there but nothing of any obvious significance. Wolf closed the book and opened it again at the frontispiece, an antique etching of a bearded scholar in a library. At the foot of the title page, in small lettering, he read “Hartel and Jacobsen,” beneath which was the publisher's address in Leipzig, and the year of publication: 1900.

As far as Wolf could determine, there was nothing remarkable about the dictionary at all-except, perhaps, its quality. He traced the tooled indentations with his finger.

Why on earth did Herr Sommer want it so badly? He had been desperate, that night in the locker room.

Wolf inspected the inside covers in order to determine if anything incriminating had been slipped beneath the endpapers, but it was obvious that no one had tampered with them. The space between the spine and the binding was also empty.

It was a mystery.

Suddenly irritated by his failure to discover anything there that he could use to his advantage, he threw the dictionary aside and picked up a thinner volume that he had previously laid at his feet. He reverently removed the bookmark and turned the blotchy print toward the paraffin lamp. Just as the clouds tell us the direction of the wind high above our heads, so the lightest and freest spirits are in their tendencies foretellers of the weather that is coming. The wind in the valley and the opinions of the market place of today indicate nothing of that which is coming but only of that which has been.

The great philosopher's words were like a prophecy-but not just any prophecy. This was a prophecy meant especially for him. Wolf smiled, and a thrill of almost erotic intensity passed through his entire body. He was the future. Tomorrow belonged to him.