Tours of the Black Clock

56

I SELL YOU TO them. As though I’ve put chains around your feet and led you by a rope down the Kärntnerstrasse, I sell you, for the usual amount. I guess Petyr’s finally convinced Kronehelm not to come along to the rendezvous; the translator waits at the appointed time and place alone. They don’t know what they have in you. You’re worth more than any of them can pay; at the next appointment Petyr even complains. “Herr Kronehelm,” he announces coolly, “says to tell you your last chapter won’t do. It’s much too …” he looking for the word, “… elusive.”

“If it isn’t satisfactory,” I answer, “then you should find yourself another partner.” I take my money and leave.

The other day I went to find your street again. There on the edge of the Ring not far from the street where I lived seven weeks. I walked up one road and down the other, looking for the candleshop. I scoured maps, I questioned residents of the neighborhood. I mean, it’s not such a big neighborhood. It doesn’t have so many streets, and there are only so many candleshops. But I couldn’t find the candleshop, and I didn’t find your street. And I wonder if I’m really leading you by a rope, chained and enslaved, or if I’m the gateway through which you’ve escaped to other places, as though through a shadow’s door.

But you come back to me every night. Wherever else it is you go, you come to me and when we’re through with the night I sell it. By the high price they pay me, I know I love you.