was a metaphysical question, best considered on a full stomach after all the desserts were cleared and the final plate of jasmine caramels was being passed, because—really looking at the end of it, at the end of the night, closing your eyes and waving goodbye to Earth—what would you actually choose? Some comforting reminder of the past? Plain chicken dinner from some lost Sunday in boyhood? Or—last grasp at luxury, the far end of the horizon—pheasant and cloudberries, white truffles from Alba? As for me: I hadn’t even known I was hungry until I’d stepped into the hallway, but at that moment, standing there with a rough stomach and a bad taste in my mouth and the prospect of what would be my last freely chosen meal, it seemed to me that I’d never smelled anything quite so delicious as that sugary warmth: coffee and cinnamon, plain buttered rolls from the Continental breakfast. Funny, I thought, going back into the room and picking up the room service menu: to want something so easy, to feel such appetite for appetite itself.
Vrolijk Kerstfeest! said the kitchen boy half an hour later—a stout, disheveled teenager straight from Jan Steen with a wreath of tinsel on his head and a sprig of holly behind one ear.
Lifting the silver tops of the trays with a flourish. “Special Dutch Christmas bread,” he said, pointing it out ironically. “Just for today.” I’d ordered the “Festive Champagne Breakfast” which included a split of champagne, truffled eggs and caviar, a fruit salad, a plate of smoked salmon, a slab of pâté, and half a dozen dishes of sauce, cornichons, capers, condiments, and pickled onions.
He had popped the champagne and left (after I’d tipped him with most of my remaining euros) and I’d just poured myself some coffee and was tasting it carefully, wondering if I could stomach it (I was still queasy and it smelled not quite so delicious, up close), when the telephone rang.
It was the desk clerk. “Merry Christmas Mr. Decker,” he said rapidly. “I’m sorry but I’m afraid you’ve got someone on the way up. We tried to stop them at the desk—”
“What?” Frozen. Cup halfway to mouth.
“On the way up. Now. I tried to stop them. I asked them to wait but they wouldn’t. That is—my colleague asked him to wait. He started up before I could telephone—”
“Ah.” Looking around the room. All my resolve gone in an instant.
“My colleague—” muffled aside—“my colleague just started up the stairs after him—it was all very sudden, I thought I should—”
“Did he give a name?” I asked, walking to the window and wondering if I could break it with a chair. I wasn’t on a high floor and it was a short jump, maybe twelve feet.
“No he didn’t sir.” Speaking very fast. “We couldn’t—that is to say he was very determined—he slipped right by the desk before—”
Commotion in the hall. Some shouted Dutch.
“—we’re short-staffed this morning, as I’m sure you understand—”
Determined pounding at the door—coarse nervous jolt, like the never-ending burst spraying out of Martin’s forehead, that sent my coffee flying. Fuck, I thought, looking at my suit and shirt: wrecked. Couldn’t they have waited until after breakfast? Then again, I thought—dabbing my shirt with a napkin, starting grimly to the door: Maybe it was Martin’s guys. Maybe it would be quicker than I thought.
But instead, when I threw open the door—I could scarcely believe it—there stood Boris. Rumpled, red-eyed, battered-looking. Snow in his hair, snow on the shoulders of his coat. I was too startled to be relieved. “What,” I said, as he embraced me, and then to the determined-looking clerk in the hallway, striding rapidly toward us: “No, it’s okay.”
“You see? Why should I wait? Why should I wait?” he said angrily, flinging out an arm at the clerk, who had stopped dead to stare. “Didn’t I say? I told you I knew where his room was! How would I know, if not my friend?” Then, to me: “I don’t know why this big production. Ridiculous! I was standing there forever and no one at desk. No one! Sahara Desert!” (glaring at clerk). “Waiting, waiting. Rang the bell! Then, the second I start up—‘wait wait sir—’ ” whiny baby voice—“ ‘come back’—here he comes chasing me—”
“Thank you,” I said to the clerk, or his back rather, since after several moments of looking between us in surprise and annoyance he had quietly turned to walk away. “Thanks a lot. I mean it,” I called down the hall