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I became conscious of ed e people by the way they treat waiters and assistants By this measure, Peter Van Houten was possibly the world’s douchiest douche "So you like ustus after another sip

"Yeah," I said, speaking up on Augustus’s behalf "And yes, ell, Augustus, heyou his Wish so that we could come here, so that you could tell us what happens after the end of An I, just took a long pull on his drink

After athat brought us together"

"But you aren’t together," he observed without looking at ether," I said

Now he turned to me "Did you dress like her on purpose?"

"Anna?" I asked

He just kept staring at ri problem," he announced, his voice needlessly loud "I have a Churchillian relationship with alcohol: I can crack jokes and govern England and do anything I want to do Except not drink" He glanced over at Lidewij and nodded toward his glass She took it, then walked back to the bar "Just the idea of water, Lidewij," he instructed

"Yah, got it," she said, the accent almost American

The second drink arrived Van Houten’s spine stiffened again out of respect He kicked off his slippers He had really ugly feet He was rather ruining the whole business of authorial genius for me But he had the answers

"Well, um," I said, "first, we do want to say thank you for dinner last night and--"

"We bought theht?" Van Houten asked Lidewij

"Yes, at Oranjee"

"Ah, yes Well, believe me when I say that you do not have me to thank but rather Lideho is exceptionally talented in the field of spending my money"

"It was our pleasure," Lidewij said

"Well, thanks, at any rate," Augustus said I could hear annoyance in his voice

"So here I am," Van Houten said after a ustus said

"He seearding Augustus "Perhaps the cancer has established a beachhead in his brain"

"Peter," Lidewij said, duly horrified

I was horrified, too, but there was souy so despicable that he wouldn’t treat us deferentially "We do have some questions, actually," I said "I talked about them in my email I don’t know if you remember"

"I do not"

"His memory is compromised," Lidewij said

"If only my memory would compromise," Van Houten responded

"So, our questions," I repeated

"She uses the royal we," Peter said to no one in particular Another sip I didn’t knohat Scotch tasted like, but if it tasted anything like chaine how he could drink so"Are you familiar with Zeno’s tortoise paradox?" he asked me

"We have questions about what happens to the characters after the end of the book, specifically Anna’s--"

"You wrongly assume that I need to hear your question in order to answer it You are fauely "Alas Zeno was a pre-Socratic philosopher who is said to have discovered forty paradoxes within the worldview put forth by Parmenides--surely you know Parmenides," he said, and I nodded that I knew Parh I did not "Thank God," he said "Zeno professionally specialized in revealing the inaccuracies and oversimplifications of Parmenides, which wasn’t difficult, since Par everywhere and always Parmenides is valuable in precisely the way that it is valuable to have an acquaintance who reliably picks the wrong horse each and every time you take hiive me a sense of your familiarity with Swedish hip-hop"

I could not tell if Peter Van Houten was kidding After a ustus answered for me "Limited," he said

"Okay, but presumably you know Afasi och Filthy’s seminal album Fläcken"

"We do not," I said for the both of us

"Lidewij, play ‘Bomfalleralla’ immediately" Lidealked over to an MP3 player, spun the wheel a bit, then hit a button A rap song booular rap song, except the words were in Swedish

After it was over, Peter Van Houten looked at us expectantly, his little eyes as wide as they could get "Yeah?" he asked "Yeah?"

I said, "I’m sorry, sir, but we don’t speak Swedish"

"Well, of course you don’t Neither do I Who the hell speaks Swedish? The i, but what the voices are feeling Surely you know that there are only two eate between them with the kind of facility that one simply does not find in hip-hop ain?"