The Tenant and The Motive Read Online Free PDF

secretary’s discourse. Then, with the impression that he was about to formulate a question that would remain unanswered, he added, ‘I’m in a bit of a hurry. Could you be so kind as to explain what Professor Berkowickz is doing in my office?’
    Joyce seemed disappointed: her eyes dulled. Shesounded almost irritated. ‘Oh that,’ she said, turning away to sit down behind her desk. ‘Professor Scanlan wants to talk to you. He’ll probably explain it. I just follow orders,’ she concluded while smiling in a way Mario thought either stupid or worrying.
    He knocked on Scanlan’s office door.
    â€˜Come in,’ he heard.
    He opened the door. Scanlan stood up and came over to shake his hand. He asked about the state of his ankle and how the accident had happened. Then he asked him to sit down in one of the leather chairs facing his desk and said, ‘Just let me finish signing these papers and then we’ll talk.’
    Scanlan had been running the department with a firm hand for several years, combining demonstrable administrative capability with academic prestige cleverly carved out over the years not so much with intellectual tools as with political ones. He was getting on in years, a tall man, exaggeratedly slim, with complex, polite, almost cloying gestures. His hair, white and plastered down at the base of his skull and at his temples, lengthened, greying into a pointed goatee beard. Like fish swimming in a fishbowl, his eyes worried the lenses of his glasses. He dressed immaculately with a calculated touch of extravagance.
    â€˜Joyce told me you wanted to speak to me,’ Mario said when Scanlan set aside the papers he’d been signing.
    â€˜Well, there’s no rush,’ said Scanlan, smiling with all his teeth. ‘Really, it’s not so important. We can talk about it some other time more calmly.’
    â€˜Whatever it is,’ said Mario, ‘I’d rather do it now.’
    Scanlan lowered his eyes, shifted in his chair, changed position, pensively straightened the papers he’d just signed and stroked his beard. When he raised his gaze, the fish flashed anxiously behind the lenses of his glasses.
    â€˜You’re right, it’s better to do it now,’ he agreed. His tone of voice had changed. ‘It can’t wait till later. Allow me to get straight to the point.’
    â€˜I’d appreciate it,’ said Mario.

IX
    â€˜As I believe you know,’ Scanlan began in a neutral voice, ‘the department is going through a difficult time economically. Actually it’s not just the department: the whole university is over a barrel. The state teaching subsidy has been reduced by five per cent compared to last year and, this past month, we have been obliged to bear a series of expenditures and anticipate others that have put us in the firing line. I’ll spare you the details: the circumstances don’t differ fundamentally from those I described at the last meeting we held in June; if they have changed, it’s for the worse. I don’t know if the elections are going to improve the outlook; what I do know is that at this moment it’s disheartening. I’m left with no option but to battle with it and, believe me, it’s no easy task: the main thing is to protect the general interests of the department, even if this adversely affects one individual. Well.’ He paused, ran his right hand over his hair, stroked his beard, went on in the same tone of voice. ‘On the other hand, as you must undoubtedly know as well, we have managed to attract a professor as prestigious as Daniel Berkowickz. Imust admit it wasn’t easy. Between you and me, up to the last minute I didn’t believe we’d be able to achieve it: the conditions he demanded were virtually prohibitive. Nor will I hide from you that I’ve spared no effort to secure what I had set out to achieve. As you’ll understand, it’s