The Devil's Sanctuary Read Free Page B

he wanted in life.
    But while their behavior grew more and more different with every year, they became more and more alike in their appearance. Max, who to start with had been both shorter and skinnier than his brother, soon caught up, and from the age of three the boys’ height and weight matched down to the last inch and ounce. Their facial similarities also emerged more clearly when Daniel’s features were no longer concealed by pink puppy fat, and Max’s voice, which in his early years had been shrill and piercing, sank around the age of five to the same pleasant, soft tone as Daniel’s. When the boys met on their seventh birthday, they felt a mixture of delight and horror when they realized they were staring at their own mirror image.
    Birthdays were the only time each year when the two camps met, Max-father-Anna and Daniel-mother-grandparents, and all sorts of feelings were stirred up. The grandparents regarded the father as an adulterer and marriage wrecker. The mother criticized the way Anna was raising her son. Anna, who regarded herself as an expert in the field, wasn’t prepared to take advice from an amateur. And the boys’ father felt confused at suddenly seeing his son in duplicate.
    While the adults talked and argued the two boys would run out into the garden, down into the cellar, or somewhere else exciting. They were drawn to each other, curious and full of anticipation. They would fall out, keep their distance, then converge again. They fought, laughed, cried, and comforted each other. During that one single intense day the boys were subjected to such a tumult of emotions that they were left utterly drained for a week afterward and often suffered bad bouts of fever.
    Although the adults disagreed about almost everything else, they were in complete agreement about one thing: One meeting a year was enough.

5
    DANIEL FOUND himself in what looked more like the lobby of a fashionable old hotel than the entrance to a health clinic.
    He was met by a young woman wearing a well-cut light-blue dress and shoes with a slight heel. The way she was dressed, her straight posture, and her smile made him think of a stewardess. She introduced herself as a “hostess.”
    She appeared to know who Daniel was straightaway, and whom he was there to visit. She asked him to write his name in a green ledger, then showed him to some armchairs grouped in front of a magnificent open fireplace in the art nouveau style. The wall above was adorned with a crossed pair of old skis, with stuffed animal heads on either side: an ibex with enormous ridged horns and a beard, and a fox with its top lip pulled back, baring its teeth.
    “Your brother will be here shortly; I’ll go and tell him you’ve arrived. My colleague will take your luggage up to the guest room.”
    Daniel was just about to sit down when a blond man in a short-sleeved steward’s shirt and tie appeared and took Daniel’s suitcase away.
    “But I’m not staying. I’m going on to a hotel later,” Daniel protested. “Can’t I just leave my bag down here for a couple of hours?”
    The man stopped and turned round.
    “Which hotel are you going to?”
    “I don’t really know. The closest one, I suppose. Can you recommend one?”
    The woman and man exchanged an anxious glance.
    “You’ll probably have to go a fair distance,” the woman said. “Most of the hotels up here in the mountains are health resorts. They have their regular guests and are usually booked up months in advance.”
    “But there’s that village down in the valley. Isn’t there anyone there who has a room to let?” Daniel wondered.
    “We don’t recommend that our visitors stay in the village,” the woman said. “Has anyone offered you a place to stay there?”
    She was still smiling, but her expression had hardened slightly.
    “No,” Daniel said. “It was just a thought.”
    The man cleared his throat and said calmly, “If anyone does offer you a room in the village, just say no.