Apart from Mr. Friday and a guy in Japan who says he will have me killed if I go there most of my friends are dead. I do not have lots of people I can ask for advice and if I did I could not tell them about this.

I go out and see the little guy in the cigar store and once again we do not talk but this time he hangs a note on the door and we go and not talk in a café and it is a really great coffee place you can tell these guys are serious but impossibly the coffee is bad.

I see in the little guy’s face that he is embarrassed but does not wish to say so to the team here. This is a legit thing they are his people but also it is a legit thing for a great coffee place to fuck up no one needs to be ashamed. I go and nudge the guy behind the laminated wood bar top and I say that the beans have gone over and he says that cannot possibly be true and I put my hand in the jar of the grinder and lift out one bean and rest it on the tip of my finger. Guy smells the bean and looks at me and just nods and a little while later we get amazing coffee and we sit. I kind of figured we would play chess or something but the little guy evidently does not like chess so we play backgammon. We play for wafers and for about twenty minutes I owe him something like 140 wafers and then the game shifts a bit and by the end we agree without speaking that we can eat the difference and we do.

TEN

RING RING “HI HELLO IS THAT THE COMMODORE HOTEL? I need to speak to the concierge please—yes hi yes—yes it is Banjo Telemark—very well I am fine I am totally alive and I have not been assassinated in your establishment at all no sir all forgotten of course—yes I need some things put on my bill—yes—no no I would be delighted for the manager to send wine but for the rest well you will see. Yes. Yes thank you yes. Yes you have a pen? Okay. I will need a chair like a throne plus a rug plus also some balik and fine white wine I will tell you where. Also ten gallons of aniseed oil and a bunch of schoolkids for a—what is it that you say a Geh-mineshaft-pro-yuckt?—for one of those—o you have children in the local—that is ideal how—a boy and a girl that is a full set I suppose—yes yes indeed I am sure they are lovely. Please yes I have a credit card here—”