The Extraordinary Journey of the Fakir Who Got Trapped in an Ikea Wardrobe (21 page)

He put his hand on the Indian’s ribs. Even without a cooler in his hand, Gustave Palourde remained a threatening presence.

“But don’t forget our agreement,
gorgio
. If you hadn’t promised to amuse the kids with your magic tricks, even this handsome €500 note wouldn’t have stopped me turning you into an Indian sieve, you know …”

As Marie was watching them from a few feet away, happy and tipsy and utterly carefree, Ajatashatru felt obliged to smile. He looked around until he found the children, took a deep breath and pushed his way through the crowd.

Not long after Miranda-Jessica and Tom Cruise-Jesús’s wedding, Ajatashatru proposed to his beloved after a romantic meal at
Métamorphose
, an old barge moored on the Seine that had been transformed into a restaurant and cabaret with a magic show. With the aid of the local illusionist—a man who had mixed with the most famous people on Earth and whose face smiled out from posters all over the boat—he made an engagement ring appear on a little Indian silk handkerchief, which was carried by a mechanical butterfly with yellow-and-blue wings and dropped delicately onto Marie’s shoulder. The Indian remake of an 1845 trick by magician and watchmaker Robert-Houdin.

During the meal, and before the Frenchwoman discovered to her amazement the beautiful ring hidden inside the handkerchief, the two lovers had shared a little of their intimacy—at least in their thoughts—with their family and friends.

Ajatashatru’s four favorite cousins (in order of preference: Parthasarathy, Ghanashyam, Nysatkharee and Pakmaan) and Adishree, with whom the couple regularly kept in touch, were planning to come and visit them soon in their little Montmartre apartment. Perhaps they would stay and become estate agents in Paris. The Eiffel Tower was still for sale, after all.

The global success of Ajatashatru’s book had enabled Assefa to track down the Indian exile and write him a letter to congratulate him and thank him once again for his generosity. With the money, they had built a school in Assefa’s village and rescued several families from poverty and hunger. The flies remained, however: there was nothing to be done about them.

Now that Sophie Morceaux had discovered the truth behind Ajatashatru’s actions, she was no longer angry with her friend for running off with a briefcase full of cash and not even a word of goodbye. The two of them now shared the same manager, Hervé, whose hands were as clammy as always.

Ajatashatru was no longer just a man who wrote stories. Having quickly developed a taste for helping others—addicted as he was to the cloud of pleasure that lifted him high into the sky whenever he performed good deeds—he had,
with the aid of Marie and the huge royalties he had earned from his book, set up an association that welcomed and helped those most in need.

Ikea’s designers, moved by what Ajatashatru had been through in the truck that took him to England, had started work on a brand-new model of wardrobe complete with a toilet and a survival kit. It would undoubtedly prove to be their best-selling item in the coming months on the Greek-Turkish border.

Finally, the lovers talked about the latest shipwreck: the boat that had disappeared with seventy-six migrants on board, somewhere between Libya and Italy. At that moment, several Guárdia di Finanza helicopters were flying over the Mediterranean in search of the ship. Despite the best efforts of the rescuers, they would never find it, nor would they find the lifeless body of a young Somalian—a seventeen-year-old boy called Ismael—who had boarded the ship one morning, full of hope, after Allah had given him a sign by dropping a €500 note at his feet, enabling him to pay for his crossing.

During that candlelit dinner, 854 migrants would attempt to illegally cross the borders into the “good countries” so that they too could enjoy that wonderful box of chocolates. Only thirty-one of them would make it, with fear in
their guts when the truck slowed down but did not stop.

To this day, Officer Simpson has not discovered a single other illegal alien hidden inside an Ikea wardrobe. This is perhaps because his boss, having read Ajatashatru Oghash Rathod’s novel and discovered his innocence, had promoted Rajha Simpson to a position as crossing-keeper at the docks in Dover. The police officer’s most notable activity is now throwing dried bread to the seagulls, which he hopes will soon become an Olympic discipline.

Marie said yes, of course.

Kneeling in front of her, Ajatashatru slipped the pretty engagement ring onto her finger. Then he stood up and gave her a long, passionate kiss as everyone smiled and applauded. A few days later, a famous Indian dressmaker in the Passage Brady in Paris took Marie’s measurements so he could create a sumptuous red-and-gold sari for her.

The car that will take her from Montmartre to the Hindu temple has already been reserved. It is an old red Mercedes, slightly dented, with a bunch of Ikea saucepans tied to its bumper. Their clinking and clanking will be heard all the way to the distant starlit dunes of the Tharthar Desert.

Romain Puértolas was born in Montpellier and has lived in France, Spain and the United Kingdom, where he has been a DJ, singer-songwriter, language teacher, translator-interpreter and steward. He most recently worked as a police inspector with the French border service, specializing in document fraud.
The Extraordinary Journey of the Fakir Who Got Trapped in an Ikea Wardrobe
was a number one best seller in France.