Free The Two Hotel Francforts: A Novel by David Leavitt

Iris—“that you wondered how anyone could muster the courage. Well, he did.”
    As if she was suddenly cold, Julia rubbed her bare arms.
    “I’m sure it says a lot about a person, the way he’d choose to kill himself,” Edward said. “If it was up to me, I’d put a pistol in my mouth. Spectacular yet painless. How about you, Pete?”
    “Me? I wouldn’t. I’ve never even thought about it.”
    “Oh, come on. You must have. Everyone has.”
    I shook my head.
    “It’s true,” Julia said. “He is hopelessly committed to life.” Her tone was almost bitter.
    I turned toward the river. Even though it had been years since I left the Midwest, coasts still humbled and appalled me. The first time I saw the Atlantic, I was twenty. I wanted to run screaming. I’m told people from the Northeast feel the same thing when they step off a train in Kansas or Nebraska for the first time. The endlessness of the plains, the vastness of the sky—it’s a kind of horror to them.
    Then something strange happened. Pigeons began circling the Elevator. Without warning, one of them dove at Edward’s head. He ducked, and Daisy suddenly leaped up, barking and lunging. “Whoa, steady girl,” Edward said, scooping her up into his arms. Yet she didn’t stop barking. She didn’t stop lunging.
    “What on earth has got into her?” Iris said.
    “It’s these pigeons,” Edward said. “I told you, they’re infernal.”
    “But it’s not like her. She’s a terrier. She’s always been oblivious to birds.”
    “Hadn’t we better go down?” I said. “It’s getting dark.”
    “Isn’t it amazing,” Julia said, “how in the summer the sun takes forever to start setting, but then when it does, it sets so fast?”
    It was true. In minutes the sky had gone from yellow to blue to purple, like a bruise. “Pete’s right,” Edward said. “If we don’t go soon, we’ll have to lick the steps, like Daisy.”
    For some reason we descended in reverse order—me first, then the women, then Edward taking up the rear. From the platform, an ironwork bridge thrust out into the shadows. We crossed it, Iris clutching my arm, defiantly not looking at the pedestrians making their way along Rua do Carmo, 150 feet below.
    “I remember someone telling me once that when you fling yourself off a roof, you should make sure to dive, not jump,” she said. “That way your head hits the ground first and you die instantly.” She laughed. “My, what a grim turn the conversation has taken! We were all so lighthearted earlier.”
    “I know,” Edward said. “You’d think the world was ending or something.”

Chapter 7
    With a self-assurance that was beginning to seem predictable, Edward led us through a warren of cobbled streets so narrow that the old women leaning out of their windows could almost kiss. How he had discovered Farta Brutos in the first place was what I wanted to know. It had no sign. Nor did the streets at the corner of which it was situated appear to have names. Each sloped upward at such a precipitous angle that the restaurant itself was sunk a few feet below the sidewalk. The door was so low that I had to bend down to get through it. In a sort of antechamber, a raucous group of young men was eating at a circular table. “That’s something else that you don’t see in Paris anymore,” Iris said to me. “Young men.”
    Soon the owner—elderly and pot-bellied, with suspiciously luxuriant black hair—stepped over to greet us. Seeing Edward, he cried out with joy. They shook all four hands. They embraced. They kissed each other on the cheek.
    “Look at him,” Iris said, nudging me in the ribs. “You’d think hewas a regular. Yet we’ve only ever been here once. And it’s like this everywhere we go.”
    The owner ushered us down a few more steps into the dining room proper. It was only slightly bigger than the antechamber. It had five tables, all but one occupied by Portuguese men, smoking and shouting. “Lucky I reserved,”