Free The Extraordinary Journey of the Fakir Who Got Trapped in an Ikea Wardrobe by Romain Puértolas

for. As he had promised himself, the fakir had been with them when they crossed the finish line. But this was not the happy ending he had imagined for them when locked up in his wardrobe, before his new friends had kindly freed him from his metal and bubble-wrap prison, then given him food and water. Someone must have mixed up Buddha’s files. This could not be the destiny of these brave men! Heaven must have made a mistake: it had sent them the wrong welcoming committee.
    Ajatashatru’s eyes met Assefa’s, which were sad. Sitting on a concrete bench between two imposing North Africans, he appeared to have shrunk. His eyes seemed to say: “Don’t feel bad for us, Aja.”
    While the fakir wove between the detainees—who made a charming mosaic of colors, accents and odors, all in tracksuits and sandals—heading toward his traveling companion so he could offer him words of comfort, the Indian policeman who had arrested him one hour earlier, whose name was Officer Simpson, opened the Plexiglas door behind which all the prisoners were held like fish in a waterless aquarium, and told Ajatashatru to accompany him to his office.
    “Get ready for a rough fifteen minutes!” said the Albanian, for whom this was his tenth attempt to enter Great Britain.
    But, confident that his good faith and the policeman’s understanding nature—he had the same blood as the fakir, after all—would clear up this terrible mix-up for good, Ajatashatru cheerfully followed in his compatriot’s footsteps.
    “Let’s be clear about this: I am not your compatriot,” said Simpson, in English this time, as if he had read the fakir’s mind.
    He told him to sit down.
    “I am a British citizen and a governmentemployee. I am not your friend,” he added, just in case there was any further doubt. “And I am certainly not your brother or your cousin.”
    He’s more royalist than the king, this one, thought Ajatashatru, coming to the realization that his good faith and the policeman’s understanding nature would certainly not be enough to clear up this terrible mix-up. You are only here today because your parents took a trip in the trailer of a truck one day, between crates of Spanish strawberries and Belgian cauliflowers, thought the Indian, deciding not to share these feelings with the man in question. Your parents undoubtedly experienced the fear that attacks the gut every time the truck slows down and stops.
    Impervious to these thoughts, the policeman typed a few words on his keyboard, then raised his head.
    “So we’re going to start again at the beginning, and you’re going to explain the whole thing to me.”
    Officer Simpson asked for his name, his parents’ names, his place and date of birth, and his occupation. The response to the last question prompted open disbelief.
    “Fakir? That still exists, does it?” he said, his face creased with skepticism and contempt.Then he pointed to the sealed transparent packet that lay on the desk.
    The Indian immediately recognized his personal effects.
    “This is what we found on you. Take a good look and sign here.”
    With these words, the policeman handed him a sheet of paper on which each object was listed:
    • 1 Gypsy Taxis business card from Paris, France
    • 1 chewing-gum wrapper with
Marie
and a French mobile phone number written on it
    • 1 genuine Indian passport with a genuine short-term visa for the Schengen Area provided by the French Embassy in New Delhi. Entry stamp dated 4 August at Roissy Charles de Gaulle Airport, France
    • 1 page from the Ikea catalog advertising the Hertsyörbåk model of bed of nails
    • 1 imitation leather belt
    • 1 pair of Police sunglasses, in six pieces
    • 1 poor-quality counterfeit €100 note, printed on one side only, attached to a 20cm length of invisible thread
    • 1 legal €20 note
    • 1 wooden pencil and 1 one-meter paper ruler, both marked
Ikea
    • 1 half-dollar coin with two identical faces
    “Why did you take my belt?” asked the