A Masterpiece of Revenge Read Online Free PDF

matter of these photographs. But I mistrusted the rest of the world. How can I confess to this? For a split second I even imagined my son was sending me these photos, as a ruse for extorting money.
    That thought proved I was losing my sanity. At that instant I decided to go to Berkeley as soon as possible — the next day — and visit Jean-Louis. I had planned to return to San Francisco at some point anyway; I had an open invitation from the Young Museum to authenticate a work attributed to Le Nain.
    I have said I was not a superstitious man. I was changing. That morning, on the way to the post office to mail in my article (entitled “The Play of Contrasts in Lorrain’s Landscapes”), a large cat with orange fur, a magnificent creature, stopped in front of me and stared unblinkingly with its phosphorescent green eyes. I couldn’t rid my mind of the image of those eyes the entire day.
    I must have looked the way I felt, for the secretary and the security guard at the College both inquired after my health. I told them I was feeling fine, thank you, though the truth was that I had had to stop twice on the way to the office because my heart was beating so hard and my head felt coated in ice. I had gone into a café and ordered sugared tea. Next to me two men were talking.
    One said to the other, “Anyway, I expected it. I had lived with the fear of it for so long I couldn’t breathe. Everything scared me. I knew I needed to prepare for the worst. But, you know, I just couldn’t face it. Every time I tried, I closed my eyes.”
    â€œThere’s your mistake,” the other replied. “If they’re threatening you, it’s because they’re the ones who feel threatened. Don’t you see?
They’re
afraid of
you.”
    I swallowed my tea and stopped in at the first travel agency I could find to buy my ticket.
    â€œI’m very sorry,” an officious young girl behind a desk told me, “but the next two Air France flights to San Francisco are fully booked.”
    â€œThese planes are never fully booked. Look again, please, miss. There must be a free seat somewhere. In the middle, toward the back, I don’t care —”
    â€œSir, I’m telling you. They’re full. Not one seat is open.” I left the travel agency feeling that the world was in league against me. I decided to take matters into my own hands. Early the next morning I packed and went to the airport, where I bought a standby ticket for the first flight to San Francisco.

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    O f course there were empty seats on the first flight. There always are, especially in first class. Getting on the flight settled my nerves a bit. I had lots of legroom, and was comforted by the idea that I would be with Jean-Louis in a dozen hours. I had called from the airport to tell him I was coming. He told me he would come meet me.
    The champagne was chilled, the flight attendants cordial. I dove into an article on seventeenth-century drawings and for a while lost track of time.
    Then two Americans sitting in the row behind me began talking about recent earthquakes in the San Francisco area.
    This brought back all my fear. I regretted that Jean-Louis had ever had the idea of getting his business degree at Berkeley. What was wrong with the University of Michigan, or Yale? Why did he have to choose a school located, as the whole world is well aware, equidistant between the San Andreas and Hayward Faults? I knew that only one quake in ten thousand was dangerous, and that there was a million times smaller chance of being killed in an earthquake than of winning the lottery. Reminding myself of this did little good.
    I recalled one California guidebook cheerfully informing me that California was particularly susceptible to earthquakes in the autumn. Here it was, the beginning of autumn. How delightful.
    Where my son was involved I had always imagined the worst. I would never forget the day when he said the words