The Paris Enigma by Pablo De Santis Page B

of new ideas, people, and settings. Sleep refused to come, because there were too many things to dream about. I thought about what was said at the meeting: the detectives’ statements, the assistants’ covert remarks. Time and time again I imagined myself escaping the outer circle of the satellites, and walking with sure steps toward center stage. I was immensely lucky to be an acolyte, to have gotten to meet The Twelve Detectives, and that was enough for me during the day. But at night I wanted more.
    I finally slept for several hours, although I had the feeling that I had barely shut my eyes. I was awoken by noises outside the room: people running, and then doors slamming and voices. I washed up, shaved off my shadow of a beard, and dressed. I went out into the hallway still adjusting the knot in my tie. Linker, Tobias Hatter’s assistant, bumped into me and kept running without saying a word, as if he had collided with one of those room service carts. Benito came charging up behind him.
    â€œThey’ve killed Louis Darbon,” gasped Benito as he passed me.
    I thought I must still be dreaming, nobody could have killed one of the detectives. Weren’t they immortal? Weren’t they immune tosilent swords, to ice darts shot through locks, and perfect roses with poisoned thorns?
    I followed them down the stairs and then through the street. The morning was cool. I had taken the precaution of bringing my vicuña poncho. I secretly regretted having missed breakfast; it’s the only thing I like about staying in hotels. The assistants had all left Madame Nécart’s hotel at almost the same time and were running toward the entrance to the fair. We would bunch up together, looking like a group of long distance runners, and then we would spread out again, separated by the obstacles posed by the future World’s Fair: carts that carried materials to the tower, an iron cage that held a rhinoceros, fifty Chinese soldiers as still as statues awaiting the orders of an absent captain.
    It took us a full twenty minutes to reach the foot of the forged iron tower. Journalists and photographers pushed each other, jockeying for position, in some sort of collective dance. The morgue ambulance waited to one side, pulled by stolid, pensive horses.
    I wanted to see the corpse, but the crowd was impenetrable. Arzaky made his way over to me, shouting.
    â€œYou, the Argentine, come here.”
    I elbowed my way over to an area that was accessible only to a chosen few. I wouldn’t have been able to break through the crowd if Arzaky’s voice hadn’t cleared the way, pulling me toward him like a rope. The photographers’ flashbulbs exploded over the dead man’s face and the air was filled with the bitter smell of magnesium.
    â€œNow I have a case, but I don’t have an assistant. I am the only detective without one. That may be a custom in your savage country, but in my city it is an oddity. I want you to work with me. Observe everything carefully. Any comment that occurs to you, make it: there is no greater inspiration for a detective than the frivolous words of the hoi polloi.”
    â€œWhat happened?”
    â€œDarbon was investigating the tower’s opponents, who had recently sent hundreds of anonymous letters and caused some minor incidents. He came here last night, alone, following a clue; he fell from the second platform. We don’t know anything more. Do you accept?”
    â€œDo I accept what?”
    â€œWorking as my assistant.”
    â€œOf course I accept!” I exclaimed, surprised. Without meaning to I had shouted my reply and, in spite of the racket, everyone turned to look at me. I had become an acolyte thanks to Craig, who had sent me to Paris; thanks to Alarcón, who gave his life; and thanks to Arzaky, who accepted me—but also thanks to Darbon, who was now being lifted off the ground by the morgue employees (gray uniforms, flannel hats) with a