The Book of Salt Read Online Free PDF Page A

respite, where I am the village elder, sage and revered. Every kitchen is a familiar story that I can embellish with saffron, cardamom, bay laurel, and lavender. In their heat and in their steam, I allow myself to believe that it is the sheer speed of my hands, the flawless measurement of my eyes, the science of my tongue, that is rewarded. During these restorative intervals, I am no longer the mute who begs at this city's steps. Three times a day, I orchestrate, and they sit with slackened jaws, silenced. Mouths preoccupied with the taste of foods so familiar and yet with every bite even the most parochial of palates detects redolent notes of something that they have no words to describe. They are, by the end, overwhelmed by an emotion that they have never felt, a nostalgia for places they have never been.
    I do not willingly depart these havens. I am content to grow old in them, calling the stove my lover, calling the copper pans my children. But collectors are never satiated by my cooking. They are ravenous. The honey that they covet lies inside my scars. They are subtle, though, in their tactics: a question slipped in with the money for the weekly food budget, a follow-up twisted inside a compliment for last night's dessert, three others disguised as curiosity about the recipe for yesterday's soup. In the end, they are indistinguishable from the type twos except for the defining core of their obsession. They have no true interest in where I have been or what I have seen. They crave the fruits of exile, the bitter juices, and the heavy hearts. They yearn for a taste of the pure, sea-salt sadness of the outcast whom they have brought into their homes. And I am but one within a long line of others. The Algerian orphaned by a famine, the Moroccan violated by his uncle, the Madagascan driven out of his village because his shriveled left hand was a sign of his mother's misdeeds, these are the wounded trophies who have preceded me.
    It is not that I am unwilling. I have sold myself in exchange for less. Under their gentle guidance, their velvet questions, even I can disgorge enough pathos and cheap souvenir tragedies to sustain them. They are never gluttonous in their desires, rather the opposite. They are methodical. A measured, controlled dosage is part of the thrill. No, I am driven out by my own willful hands. It is only a matter of time. After so many weeks of having that soft, steady light shined at me, I begin to forget the barbed-wire rules of such engagements. I forget that there will be days when it is I who will have the craving, the red, raw need to expose all my neglected, unkempt days. And I forget that I will wait, like a supplicant at the temple's gate, because all the rooms of the house are somber and silent. When I am abandoned by their sweet-voiced catechism, I forget how long to braise the ribs of beef, whether chicken is best steamed over wine or broth, where to buy the sweetest trout. I neglect the pinch of cumin, the sprinkling of lovage, the scent of lime. And in these ways, I compulsively write, page by page, the letters of my resignation.
    ***
    "Yes, yes, they're still looking for a cook," confirms the concierge. "You'll have to come back in an hour or so when they've returned from their drive. Just knock on that door to your left. It leads to the studio. What did you say your name was?"
    "Bình," I answer.
    "What?"
    "Bình."
    "Beene? Beene, now that's easy enough on the tongue. You seem like a nice boy. Let me give you a bit of advice—don't blink an eye."
    "What?"
    "Don't blink an eye," repeats the concierge, raising his brows and his voice for added emphasis. "Do you understand?"
    "No."
    "The two Americans are a bit, umm, unusual. But you'll see that for yourself as soon as the door to the studio is opened."
    "Studio? Painters?"
    "No, no, a writer and, umm, a companion. But that's not the point! They are nice, very nice."
    "And?"
    "Well, no point really. Except. Except, you should call her by