The Investigation

IX

THE RUSKS TASTED LIKE HUMUS. As for the black coffee, it was beyond the shadow of a doubt the bitterest the Investigator had ever drunk in his life, and not even the copious amount of sugar he added succeeded in sweetening it. His three neighbors were devouring cheese omelets, cold cuts, smoked fish, large pickles marinated in vinegar, apple-and-cinnamon pastries, small, soft rolls of bread stuffed with raisins and almonds, and fresh fruit. They were drinking grapefruit juice, pineapple juice, and black tea whose delicious fragrance, full-bodied and smoky, entered the Investigator’s nostrils.

His table companions kept up a lively conversation, but the Investigator was unable to understand a single word. None of the others paid any attention to him.

He forced himself to drink his coffee, figuring that the hot liquid would do him good. He felt feverish and couldn’t stop blowing his nose. From time to time, he raised his eyes and looked around, trying to spot the Giantess, but she was nowhere in sight. There were only four or five Servers working in the big room, men who looked so much alike — short, somewhat round, balding — that they could have been taken for brothers. The Tourists, as he’d decided to call them, were making an unbelievable racket. They were all simply dressed men and women of around forty, and they were eating grossly, flinging themselves upon the abundant repast set before them. The Investigator determined that he was the only Guest who’d been served the rudimentary breakfast he was forcing himself to swallow, so when a Server passed near him, he asked whether he, too, could have an omelet and some fruit juice.

“Are you part of the group?”

“No, I’m—”

“Are you in room 14?”

“Yes.”

“I’m very sorry, but it’s not possible.”

“Come on, that’s ridiculous! Can’t you at least give me a little jam, or just some butter? If it’s only a matter of money, I’ll pay the additional charge.…”

“Don’t insist. In here, money doesn’t solve all problems.”

When the Investigator recovered from his shock and surprise, the Server was already far away. In his head, the Investigator reviewed all the articles contained in the Hotel Rules; he’d read them twice upon his arrival, and he didn’t remember a single one that made any reference at all to any sort of discrimination in regard to breakfast. He promised himself to point this out to someone in the Management as soon as he came across such a person.

Time was passing. The Investigator was reminded of this by an enormous wall clock, which punctuated every movement of its second hand with a resounding crack, like a hammer striking an anvil. He shouldn’t drag his heels. People must be waiting for him and growing impatient. He picked up his cup to finish his coffee, but just as he was bringing the cup to his mouth, his neighbor hit his elbow. The coffee spilled on him, on his coat and trousers. The Investigator cursed as he watched two dark-brown stains spreading over the light fabric. The man who had caused this disaster didn’t apologize. He kept eating and talking to the two others, who likewise acted as though the Investigator didn’t exist.

The Investigator rose from the table and walked rapidly toward a door under a sign that read TOILETS. He was beside himself. He’d had enough and more than enough, he thought, and he wondered whether he shouldn’t take the next train home. But what could he say to his Head of Section? How would he explain his premature return before the Investigation had taken place, before it had even begun? Would he say that he’d wandered around the City for hours in filthy weather? That he’d found the Hotel strange? That the breakfast he’d been served hadn’t suited him? That the coffee was dreadful? That the conduct of the Hotel staff was unacceptable? That his table companions hadn’t spoken to him?

No, it was a better idea to be patient.

The corridor he’d entered from the breakfast room dead-ended some ten yards away. There were two doors in the wall on his left. On the first one, a pictogram showed a female silhouette; he went on to the second, but it was adorned with the same image. He retraced his steps, thinking he was mistaken. No. He’d seen right. Both doors indicated that they led to ladies’ rooms. The Investigator felt his heart shift gears. The joke was still on him.

He shot a glance to left and right and even above his head. Nobody. Without hesitating a second longer, he went in. The restroom was deserted. He went over to a sink, turned on the hot water, and dug in his pocket for his handkerchief, which wasn’t there. Or in his other pocket, either.

A continuous cloth towel was hanging from a roller. The Investigator tried to pull the towel down gently, but without success. He pulled on the cloth again, then harder, then harder still. The towel tore, the screw fixing the roller to the plaster wall came loose, and a mesh of fine cracks appeared on the plaster. He wet the towel and applied it energetically to the two coffee stains. After a few minutes, it seemed to him that their dark color was fading a little; however, though the stains were lighter, they now covered a larger area. The Investigator threw the towel into a trash can, pushing the wet, torn cloth down to the bottom of the can and covering it with paper. Then he left the restroom.

When he pushed open the door to the breakfast room, the hubbub had completely ceased, and the Tourists, without exception, had disappeared. All the tables had been cleared and tidied up; not a speck of refuse remained. How was this possible, when he’d been gone for four minutes at the most?

The chairs had been resituated and carefully aligned. He looked at his place. The coffee cup was still there, as well as the second rusk, which he hadn’t finished eating. On the chair, which was slightly askew with respect to the table, he saw his raincoat. It was the only table in the room that showed any sign of the recent breakfast.

The Servers themselves had become invisible.

The Investigator hurried over to his place. He wanted to get out of that room as soon as possible, and out of the Hotel, too; he wanted to go outside and take a few deep breaths of fresh air and feel its coolness on his temples, on the back of his neck, in his lungs, in his brain, as it were, his brain, which was being tried and tested, so severely that the Investigator wondered whether it might not simply explode. But just as he was putting on his raincoat, feeling once again its extremely unpleasant dampness, he heard a powerful voice at his back, calling to him from rather far away.

“You’re not going to finish your breakfast?”