What We Become Read Online Free PDF Page B

eyebrows on her smooth forehead, above long eyelashes. She had a soft smell, a perfume he couldn’t quite identify, for it seemed to blend with her youthful skin: possibly Arpège. Max looked at her husband, who was watching them from the table, apparently paying little attention, as he raised his champagne glass to his lips, and then glanced again at the necklace, whose pearls of exceptional quality glowed faintly in the light of the electric chandeliers. Thanks to his own experience and a few unorthodox acquaintances, the twenty-six-year-old Max knew enough about pearls to distinguish between the button, round, teardrop, and baroque varieties, including their official or unofficial value. These were round pearls of the highest quality: almost certainly Indian or Persian. And worth at least five thousand pounds sterling: more than half a million French francs. That could pay for several weeks with a beautiful woman in the best hotel in Paris or on the Riviera. But, carefully administered, it could also keep him in relative idleness for a year or more.
    â€œYou really dance very well, Madam,” he repeated.
    Almost reluctantly, her eyes focused on him once more.
    â€œIn spite of my age?” she said.
    It did not seem like a question. She had clearly been watching him before dinner, when he was dancing with the young Brazilian girls. Max looked suitably shocked.
    â€œOld? For heaven’s sake. How can you say such a thing?”
    She continued studying him quizzically. Or perhaps with amusement.
    â€œWhat’s your name?”
    â€œMax.”
    â€œVery well, Max. Go ahead, guess my age.”
    â€œI wouldn’t dream of it.”
    â€œPlease.”
    He had quickly collected himself, for he never lost his composure in front of a woman. She had a broad, dazzling smile, which he contemplated with feigned concentration.
    â€œFifteen.”
    She gave a loud, vivacious laugh. A healthy laugh.
    â€œCorrect,” she nodded, playing along good-naturedly. “However did you guess?”
    â€œI have a talent for that sort of thing.”
    She nodded, her expression half-mocking, half-pleased, or perhaps she was admiring the way he continued to lead her around the floor, amid the other couples, without their conversation distracting him from the music and the dance steps.
    â€œAnd not just that,” she said, rather mysteriously.
    Max searched her eyes for any added nuance in her comment, but once again they were staring blankly over his right shoulder. At that moment, the bolero came to an end. They separated, still facing each other as the orchestra prepared to launch into the next number. Max glanced again at the splendid pearls. For a moment he thought she had caught him in the act.
    â€œThat’s sufficient,” she said suddenly. “Thank you.”

    The periodicals archive is on the upper floor of an old building, at the top of a marble staircase surmounted by a vaulted ceiling decorated with flaking paintings. The hardwood floor creaks when Max Costa, carrying three bound volumes of the magazine Scacco Matto , goes to sit down in a well-lit part of the room, beside a window overlooking half a dozen palm trees and the white-and-gray façade of the Basilica di San Antonino. On the desk he places a spectacle case, a notepad, a ballpoint pen, and several newspapers purchased at a kiosk on Vía de Maio.
    An hour and a half later, Max stops taking notes, removes his reading glasses, rubs his tired eyes, and looks out at the square, where the evening sun is casting long shadows from the palm trees. By now, Dr. Hugentobler’s chauffeur has read almost everything published about Jorge Keller, the player who over the next four weeks will be challenging the world chess champion, Mikhail Sokolov, in Sorrento. There are several photographs of Keller in magazines, invariably sitting in front of a chessboard, and in some of them he looks very young: a mere boy tackling opponents