The Best Book in the World

CHAPTER 33

Country Life


Astra is in a meeting at the office. They are talking about the programme for the imminent book fair and going through all the signings and programmes that their authors will be attending. The Gothenburg Book Fair is unique because both professionals and the public are welcome. That creates a special atmosphere and gives the book industry a unique gauge of what readers actually value. But for the publishing houses the fair is a comprehensive apparatus that costs a frightful amount of money. Nothing can be left to chance. For example, all the authors must eat well and stay at the most expensive hotel – they can’t have different hotels for different authors, since officially they are all worth the same. Obviously, the bestsellers must have decent accommodation and that means all the ‘cultural’ authors automatically get the same treatment. So they must slim down the production and maximise every hour that an author is at the fair. Once there, every author will have a permanent companion from their publishing house to guide them around the fair floor between various signings, seminars and interviews. So they need lots of people from Winchester Publishing at the fair, but when it comes to their ‘staff’ accommodation a strict hierarchy applies: the bosses stay on the top floor of the fair hotel in the city centre while the plebs are spread out in rings around the city, according to their rank.

Winchester Publishing has a strong list this autumn, and the highlights will be presented at the book fair. Their competitors have lots of exciting things to present too. In addition, the fair will be hosting several interesting authors from abroad. There will be a delightful mix of high and low, from the lightest entertainment to unknown poets who write in dying languages – just what your average cultural consumer wants to read and hear the latest about. It is extremely likely that there will be (again) a record number of accredited journalists. Those who claim that literature is a dying medium have never been to the Gothenburg Book Fair.

Astra has got so far in her career that she has a fairly free programme at the fair. She is going to chair a couple of mini-seminars, host some dinners and help the agents at the international rights centre to present some really heavyweight titles.

She has put her phone next to the big planning calendar and sees when it starts to vibrate. Looks who is phoning. Titus, oh well. He can wait. The phone signals that the answering machine has recorded a message.

After a while, Evita looks in through the door.

‘Astra, can I borrow you a moment…? There’s something I need to ask you.’

‘Sure.’

Astra gets up and takes her phone with her. She is going to check what Titus wants before she goes back into the meeting again. They go into the corridor.

Evita looks around to make sure nobody can hear them.

‘Yes, well… this is the situation. The Bitch in Barcelona has just phoned. She wondered if we had booked the same suite as last year for Pablo Blando.’

Astra looks surprised.

‘She phoned you about that?’

Are there no limits for that control freak, Astra wonders. Must she double-check with my boss too?

Evita seems to almost understand what Astra is thinking.

‘Well, they have slightly different ways of going about things in the Latin countries. We’ll have to put up with it. But I promised her I’d check with you. Can you email her about it?’

‘I already have done… but okay, I can do it again,’ says Astra brightly.

‘And there’s one other thing. A bit sensitive, perhaps that’s why she phoned me. Pablo is beginning to get a bit old and evidently gets an awful lot of palpitations when he takes Viagra nowadays. So she has started to ration his dosage.’

‘Oh, I’m glad about that, because it isn’t so easy for me to get hold of…’

‘Yeah, but the catch is that…’ Evita interrupts her without completing her sentence. She looks down.

‘What is it?’

‘She wants us to get him some crushed reindeer horn instead.’

‘What?’

‘She says that it would be the best for his heart.’

‘You’re joking!’

‘He has evidently seen a documentary about the effects of reindeer horn. When he was on a book-signing tour in Japan.’

‘No, I can’t believe it!’

‘I agree, it is totally sick. But true. We’ll laugh at it someday.’

‘I really hope so,’ says Astra and looks slightly worried. She knows what is coming now.

‘So can you arrange it, do you think?’

‘I suppose I’ll have to.’

‘Yes, I’m afraid so,’ says Evita and tilts her head to one side. ‘You’re so incredibly competent.’



When Titus wakes up, he still can’t move. He tries to remember what has happened. Yeah, right, he was on his way to Winchester Publishing with the manuscript. And then he fell asleep.

It is dark, completely pitch dark. He opens his eyes wide to try to see anything at all. Nothing. He tries to open his mouth. He can’t. His lips are stuck together. It feels as if he has an iron band across his face on the level of his mouth.

He can tell that he is sitting and that he is stuck there. An iron band around his wrists and ankles too. Or is it tape? It is probably tape because he can’t feel any sharp edges when he tries to wriggle his way loose. Tape round his stomach too. Two hard poles against his back. A kitchen chair?

His nose is free. He takes a deep breath. Cold, damp air. Is he down in a cellar? Or up in an attic?

He snorts. Umpf. Ummppff!

Not the slightest sign of resonance or echo.

Total silence.

It is as silent as in a grave.

Uuuuuummmmmmpppppfffff!



Astra looks at her watch. Where has he got to? He said that he was on his way to Winchester’s. The message was recorded at 11.32 and now it is a quarter to five. He ought to have been here ages ago. She phones him once more, but his phone is still turned off. Weird. Perhaps she ought to call in at his place on her way home? Check if anything has happened. Perhaps he’s fallen ill? The thought of the manuscript makes her terribly curious. And just think – he stuck to the schedule! She would never have thought that possible when all this started. But it is thanks to her. She took an iron grip from the very first, just as Evita had said. The breathalyser lock was a stroke of genius, nothing less. But where the hell is he? Why doesn’t he answer his phone?



Many an hour seems to pass. Perhaps days. Titus can’t be sure. No, it can’t be a matter of days, he thinks. He hasn’t pissed his pants yet. But of course he hasn’t drunk anything since he ended up this darkness either.

How does it work? Do you only get the urge to piss if you drink? Or must you always piss? What do you piss out if you haven’t drunk anything? He only has a slight urge to go, so presumably it has been only a matter of hours. Yes, that must be the case.



Astra rings the doorbell for a long time. Titus doesn’t answer. She peeps in through the letterbox. Empty. No movement at all. She rings the neighbour’s doorbell to find out if he or she knows anything about Titus. Nobody answers there either. She peeps in through the neighbour’s letterbox too. There is a pile of advertising leaflets on the floor, the sort that comes with the post. Everyone gets it nowadays, it makes no difference if you have stuck up a sign: No advertising, please! The neighbour must be still at work, Astra thinks. If Titus got a similar pile of leaflets too, then it must mean that he left after the postman had been round. They usually come at about eleven, surely? So he must have left his flat just before lunch, which is round about the time he had phoned her on his mobile.

But where had he gone off to? Why doesn’t he answer?



Titus is worn out. None of his ideas lead him anywhere. Everything just goes round and round in his head. It is absolutely loathsome to sit tightly taped to a kitchen chair in the pitch dark. Now and then he falls asleep for a while, and it is almost a nice feeling when that happens. Body and brain must rest a while.

Titus dreams that Lenny tips his chair on to a trolley. He is wheeled out through a little door. It is dark, it is night. The place is surrounded by dark trees, an awful lot of trees. Forest. There is a dull rustling. He is in the countryside, what a nightmare.

Then Eddie comes up to him. He smiles at Titus. Puts his hands on Titus’ shoulders. Gives them a little pat.

And then he slaps Titus violently on his cheek.

Titus wakes with a start.

But he can still see Eddie before him wearing that friendly smile. What? Isn’t he dreaming? What is this? Uuuuummmmpf!

His cheek is stinging from the slap, and it doesn’t feel any better when Eddie rips off the silver tape from his mouth so that his beard stubble goes with it. Titus opens his mouth and takes some deep breaths.

They stare at each other.

Eddie looks almost as if tears are coming to his eyes when he starts to speak.

‘Hello, Titus.’

Titus stares at Eddie, and at Lenny, who is standing next to him. He lifts his head a little, as if to show that he still has a certain human dignity.

‘Titus, you have forced me into a difficult position,’ says Eddie with a strained voice.

‘What…?’

‘Yes, you have indeed. You can’t deny it.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I have read nearly the whole book.’

‘What? What is this?’


Titus gradually starts to realise his predicament. He has been kidnapped. He looks around him. He is in some sort of farmyard out in the country. There is some light coming from a window on a little cottage close to them. A typical old tithed cottage it looks like. Perhaps it’s red, you can’t really tell in the dark. It could be grey, too. It is surrounded by a solid mass of trees except for the yard in front of the house where they are now. He can see an earth cellar with the door open. His prison. He smells damp.

Eddie continues hoarsely.

‘You left the memory card on the coffee table at Astra’s to provoke me. That was how it started. You wanted to make me unbalanced. Show that I couldn’t produce anything any longer.’

‘I’ve no idea what you’re talking about,’ Titus mumbles, in despair.

Eddie paces back and forth in front of Titus.

‘I did what you wanted. I read the book. As much as you had written, that is. I read the manuscript the night after me and Astra had been out sailing. F*cking hell, Titus. I would never have believed this of you.’

‘What?’

Titus follows Eddie with his gaze as he paces back and forth in front of him. Lenny stands next to them to one side, completely still. He looks almost relaxed, not at all his usual self. He too follows Eddie with his gaze.

‘It’s such a dirty low trick, what you’ve done,’ Eddie goes on in a low voice. ‘To think of all those times I’ve given you a helping hand by arranging readings! Haven’t I given you love? Haven’t I? Answer me!’

‘Love? Do you call this love? Shutting me in a damned earth cellar?’ Titus protests.

‘I was forced to. There are limits to what even I can put up with!’

‘Oh really, so we should feel sorry for you now?’ Titus shouts in resignation.

Eddie comes to a halt in front of Titus and crosses his arms.

‘What you have done is a deadly sin. You have stolen my ideas and drained me of energy. I don’t know how it has happened but you have written almost word-for-word what I was going to write in my manuscript.’

‘You what…?’

Titus can’t believe his ears. This is simply too much, he can hardly take it in. Eddie is claiming that he has stolen his ideas! While in actual fact it is the opposite – that Eddie and Lenny all summer long have tried to spy on him. Just a few seconds ago, Eddie even admitted that he had nicked the memory card at Astra’s. And besides, they have kidnapped him and tied him to a f*cking kitchen chair in a pitch black earth cellar in the country!

‘I have read nearly all of it now, even the ending which you had with you today. Sentence for sentence, word for word, letter for letter, you have stolen my text. You have done it skilfully, I’ll give you that. It is an extremely good book, Titus. Incredibly good. You must be clear about one thing: I am the one who has written it. Not you. You have simply stolen everything. Like I said, don’t ask me how you’ve gone about it. But that is what you’ve done. We have to agree on that.’

‘Like hell we do! I’d rather die than go along with something like that! You’re crazy. You have completely lost your grip!’

Eddie puts his hands on Titus’ shoulders and smiles sadly.

‘We’re going to come to an agreement, Titus. We certainly are. That’s what we’re going to do. All in good time, all in good time.’

He strokes Titus’ shoulders.

Then he pushes lightly with his thumbs into the hollow between Titus’ shoulders and collar bone. Applies pressure. Harder and harder. As hard as he can, for a long time.

‘Owwww! Stop!’



As soon as Astra wakes up, she tries to phone Titus. No answer.

She phones the locksmith that she arranged when he had a break-in during the summer and had to get a new lock. Even though ‘things are pretty busy right now, you know’ she manages to get him to agree to a special turn-out charge and they arrange to meet at Titus’ flat in half an hour.

She only has to wait there ten minutes before he turns up. Although the guy is just a mountain of muscles, she can’t help wondering how he can carry such a big toolbox in just one hand.

‘Hi there, lady! Yeah, this is it. And this, this is a really good door. I installed this lock myself, I remember that distinctly, you know.’

‘Yeah, right,’ says Astra. ‘It was me who phoned from Greece if you remember. Then you sent a rather padded bill to Winchester Publishing. Perhaps you remember that?’

‘No, it’s not me who sends the bills, you know. Ellen does that, she’s married to the boss.’

Astra realises that she shouldn’t get involved in a discussion about prices at this juncture. That was stupid. He mustn’t start making difficulties now.

‘Okay. But I need to get in here.’

The locksmith puts his toolbox down. Crosses his arms.

‘Oh really? But it was a bloke what lived here, you know? It said Titus Jensen on the door then. And it still does. Can you see?’

‘Yes sure, the thing is he works for Winchester Publishing. And now he has disappeared. I’ve got to check whether there are any clues inside here.’

‘Yeah but… if I let you in here, you know, it’d be like a break-in. Can’t do that. Very risky, that sort of thing, you know. That’s not what we locksmiths get paid to do, you see. Crime and punishment, you know. Then you need a risk surcharge.’

Astra gets her wallet out of her bag and pulls out a thousand-kronor note.

‘Would this work?’

The locksmith grabs the banknote and then produces the largest keyring that Astra has ever seen. He rattles the keys in a demonstratively loud manner before finding the right one. Jangle and click. One, two, three and the door is open.

Astra goes through the flat with the guy shadowing her, his muscular arms crossed.

‘For goodness’ sake, leave me alone!’ Astra exclaims, irritated.

He slouches out and stands in the stairwell. Mutters something grumpy about how he perhaps ought to phone his trade union  . You know.

The flat looks like your average bachelor pad. Not exactly chaos, but nothing pedantic either. She looks inside the fridge. It doesn’t look as if Titus had planned a long absence. There are opened cartons of milk and some leftovers rather carelessly packed. The little airing window in the kitchen is open. Astra gets the feeling the Titus has left the place all of a sudden.

She goes up to the computer in the living room and blow-starts it, keeping an eye on the door while waiting for the pop-up. She hopes the enzyme program works as promised.

Hello, Astra! If you want a back-up, then you must stick the memory card in the socket on the right-hand side of the computer.

A good job she is one of those people who thinks of everything.



When Titus wakes up he is back in the dark. He isn’t tied up any longer. The last thing he remembers is Lenny putting a rag over his face and becoming incredibly tired. Now he is lying on a mattress, at least that’s what it feels like. With his hands he feels outside the mattress. A cold stone floor. He is back in the earth cellar.

He crawls along the floor to what he intuitively knows is the way out. He comes to a solid door and searches with his fingers for a doorknob which isn’t there. But a keyhole? Is there a keyhole? He touches a bit of metal which feels rough and rusty. He twists it aside. Light! Yes, the bit of metal hung over the keyhole. He bends down and puts his eye against the hole.

Out there it is daytime. He can see a lawn with a large oak tree in front of a little cottage painted red. A little gravel path in front of the cottage. A porch and a window. No sign of life.

He bangs on the door, which is so thick that his bangs make no impression. It feels like banging on a tree trunk out in the forest. Who is going to hear him?

He puts his mouth up against the keyhole and shouts:

‘Hello! Help! Is anyone there?’

He looks out again. A squirrel scuttles across the yard and up into the oak.

Everything is still.

Titus continues to bang on the door for quite a while. In the end he realises nobody can hear him. The cottage doesn’t even seem to have any neighbours. Are they going to let him die here?

Desperate and snuffling, he crawls back to the mattress.

He huddles up and puts his arms between his thighs and stomach and his forehead against his knees. All his energy and determination is lost. He cries and sobs.



Astra is becoming increasingly worried. After a couple of days with no sign of life from Titus, she has a very uncomfortable feeling about it. The book fair is rapidly approaching and she very much wants Titus there when The Best Book in the World is going to be marketed to the international agents and Sweden’s booksellers. Since Lenny is the last person she knows talked to Titus before he disappeared, she looks for him too. But he has vanished as well, and Eddie doesn’t answer the phone either. What’s happening with everybody? Can’t they answer the phone?



Eddie is sitting in the little kitchen in the cottage and staring at a half-full can of beer. An old cobbler’s lamp with a broken shade hangs above the kitchen table. The naked light bulb is transparent and the red glowing thread matches the whites of Eddie’s eyes, which are now pink. He has some beard stubble and the usually so shiny hair is un-brushed and matted. He inhales deeply on his cigarette. What has he done to deserve this? Hasn’t he always been so nice to people?


In front of him on the table are three mobile phones. When one stops ringing, another starts. And all the time it is Astra who is calling: first to Titus, then Lenny and then Eddie. Over and over again. It never stops. But he is unable to talk to her or even listen to her messages. Because what would he say? That she can’t be his publisher until Titus admits his theft? That all his love has come to an end?

Lenny comes into the kitchen.

‘He’s woken up now. He’s banging on the door.’

‘Mmmm.’

Eddie looks at Lenny with tired eyes. Is Lenny really on his side? Or does he just feel forced to help him? Does he even understand what Titus is guilty of? It really is a bit steep to have the whole world against you. There is just no gratitude!

‘Can I phone Malin?’ Lenny asks. ‘She’ll be wondering where I’ve got to.’

‘No, not now. Not one call is going to be made from here. They are hunting us. She is trying to find us. You can do it later. When he has admitted his guilt.’

‘But please. It won’t take a second.’

‘NO!’



Ought she to ring the police and report him missing? How credible is it to issue a description of a middle-aged single man who has only been gone a couple of days?

Perhaps she ought at least to discuss it with Evita? Evita is always interested to know everything about Titus. You’d almost think that he makes her feel a bit horny. Mind you, there’d be a hell of a fuss about jeopardising the success of the book fair and that she isn’t focusing on the right issues. No, she can’t talk to Evita, not yet.

But can it really be a coincidence that all three have disappeared? Could Titus have been right after all with his nutty ideas about Eddie and Lenny? Have those two cooked up some mischief?

She must get hold of them.

Who might know something?

Hang on a moment, isn’t Lenny with that pretty girl who works at the Moderna Museet café? What’s her name? Lena or Linda? Something like that. Lina… Malin…? Yep, Malin, that’s it! Definitely.

Astra calls directory enquiries and asks to be connected to the restaurant at Moderna Museet. There is a murmur from the guests in the background when they answer.

‘Hello, could I speak to Malin please?’

‘One moment.’

Astra takes a deep breath. Why the hell hadn’t she thought of Malin earlier?

‘Hello, Malin here!’

‘Hello, Malin. My name is Astra and I’m a friend of Eddie X and I know Lenny too a bit.’

‘Yeah, hi.’

‘I need to talk to them about something. Have you any idea where they could be?’

‘Yeah, I think they were going to the country to rehearse something.’

‘Ah, so that’s it! The country… whereabouts?’

‘Well, I haven’t a clue where it is. It’s sort of an abandoned cottage deep in the forest in S?rmland. It’s sort of always empty. In the middle of f*cking nowhere. Like for real. I haven’t the faintest where the place is!’

Astra tries to press her a bit more about where this abandoned cottage might be, or if she knows anything more about what they were going to do there, if Malin had heard that the author Titus Jensen was going to go with them. No, she hadn’t. She knows nothing about anything. Lenny had simply said they were going to take it easy and rehearse a few days. Then they went off. That’s all she knows.



Titus wakes out of his torpor when something that sounds like an old radio starts crackling.

‘Hello, are you awake Titus?’

It’s Eddie’s voice, on a speaker. Perhaps Eddie is sitting inside that cottage and talking to him from there? With a walkie-talkie or some such apparatus? Maybe its one of those baby monitors he’s seen on the TV ads.

‘Have you thought about my offer?’

Titus isn’t sure whether there is a microphone in the earth cellar. Can Eddie hear him if he swears? He’ll try speaking in a low voice:

‘What? Which offer?’

‘My offer to you. If you admit that it’s my book, then you’ll be free. You must sign the contract. I’m the one who wrote the book and you know that. You have stolen it. You have nicked every single idea from inside my head, and pretended to Astra and Winchester Publishing that you are the one who has written it. That’s what you must sign. Then you’ll be released.’

‘No f*cking way!’ Titus shouts for all he is worth. ‘It’s my book. I have written every single word in it! I have put my soul into it. You don’t know what you are talking about!’

‘Oh yes I most certainly do!’ Eddie yells back through the speaker. ‘I know very well what I myself have thought up! They are my ideas, straight off. I said all of that already during that evening at the festival. But you were so drunk you’ve chosen to forget!’

‘You didn’t at all! You’re lying!’

For a moment, silence reigns. Titus can hear Eddie breathing into the microphone. He seems upset.

‘Titus?’

‘Yes, what do you want?’

‘Do you confess?’

‘No, I’ve told you! Never!’

Silence again. A moment’s heavy breathing.

‘Then I’ll have to turn the lights on.’

‘What?’

‘If you don’t confess, then I’ll turn the lights on!’

‘Yeah, right.’

Is he joking? Is this candid camera? Will they come any moment and open the door and throw confetti and shout that it’s all over and laugh at him for falling for everything? No, hardly.

The only alternative is that Eddie is in the midst of a severe psychosis. Titus has never come across such extreme obsessive-compulsive behaviour in anybody else before. It is decidedly unpleasant.

‘Do you confess? Will you sign it?’

‘No. You can let me out anyway. Let’s forget all this. Perhaps you aren’t feeling very well, Eddie?’

‘Last chance: sign or I’ll turn the lights on.’

What a bizarre threat, thinks Titus. He would much rather be imprisoned in a lit-up earth cellar than in one that is pitch dark.

‘Eddie, I’d rather die than give up the copyright to that book!’

Eddie breathes into the microphone for quite a while. Then he says:

‘Okay. I’m turning the lights on.’

Quite a few seconds pass. Still dark. Then there is a buzzing sound in an electric cable. A fluorescent lamp up on the ceiling starts to crackle and blink. Titus puts his hand over his eyes, not having seen any light for a couple of days. When his eyes have acclimatised he looks around him.

He sees a portable loo with a large container in green plastic in one corner. In the other there is a little camping table and a folding chair. The walls have shelves fixed all around the earth cellar. From floor to ceiling.

But there aren’t any jam jars or sacks of potatoes on the shelves.

They are full of bottles and cartons.

Titus realises what he is looking at.

The shelves are packed with wine, spirits and beer. Several cartons of cigarettes. Lots of multi-packs of tobacco. Smoked sausage, crisps and cheese puffs.

The earth cellar is all kitted out for a party.