Your Perfect Year(15)
On the other hand, Renate Krug was not far from retirement age, and she probably considered herself lucky to be spending her last years of employment . . . dusting rubber trees. And, of course, enjoying the wonderful view out over the Elbe.
Which was what Jonathan now did as he waited for his CEO to arrive. He looked out through the large lattice window to the river, where a huge container ship was gliding by. A few squawking seagulls accompanied the barge downstream toward the estuary, and Jonathan wondered briefly where the ship was headed. And—if only for a moment—believed he caught a glimpse of a pair of swans by the bank.
Looking more closely, however, he discovered that the birds were two flapping plastic bags. With a shrug, Jonathan turned away and went across the room to sit in one of the chairs to the side of his desk that he used for meetings.
“Knock, knock!” Markus Bode stood in the doorway, a briefcase tucked under his arm, and rapped his knuckles on the frame.
Jonathan got back to his feet and went to greet him.
“A happy New Year to you!” Bode said as they exchanged a hearty handshake.
“You too,” Jonathan said, noting that his CEO looked somewhat worn out. He was usually meticulously attired, his well-tailored suit and neatly side-parted blond hair giving an impression of exaggerated attention to detail, but Jonathan was struck by today’s five-o’clock shadow, dark rings under his eyes, and creased shirt, which aged him beyond his nearly forty years. He did not look good. Not at all.
“Well, now.” No sooner were they seated than Bode came straight to the point. “We have a problem.”
“Go on.”
Bode opened a briefcase, took out a stack of papers, and placed them on the table. “During the holidays, I went through the provisional figures for the quarter and spent some time considering our plans for the next few months.”
“Why would you do something like that?”
Bode looked at him, uncomprehending. “What do you mean?”
“Bothering yourself with work during the holidays. You should have been resting and spending time with your family.” Jonathan knew his CEO had a gorgeous wife and two small children.
“Ah,” Markus Bode replied, his expression, if anything, even more bewildered. “I’m the CEO of Grief & Son Books—my working hours are different from most people’s. Comes with the job.”
“Sure,” Jonathan conceded. “But you have to think of your health. Even a CEO has to relax sometimes.”
“Not when he’s aware that we had a thirty percent shortfall on our forecast income over the last quarter.” He coughed, lowered his eyes, and added in a slightly quieter voice, “And when his wife and children have just left him, he doesn’t need much free time.”
“Oh.” Now it was Jonathan’s turn to look bewildered.
“Yes, well.”
“That’s not good.” Even to Jonathan’s own ears the remark sounded hopelessly inadequate. But he had no idea what else to say. Markus Bode and he got along well, but theirs was a purely business relationship, and this personal revelation was too much for him.
“So. That’s how it is.” Bode slumped into himself a little more.
“Should we . . .” Jonathan paused and wondered where to go from there. What could he say in such a situation? What had his friends said to him when he told them his marriage to Tina was at an end?
Nothing, he recalled. He hadn’t told anyone and had come to terms with the situation by himself. He hadn’t felt close enough to anyone to share his private catastrophe with them. Apart from Thomas. But for obvious reasons, his shoulder was ruled out as one to cry on.
It wasn’t until later, once the divorce had gone through, that a few acquaintances had asked how things were going, and by then it was mainly a matter of the financial arrangements between him and Tina—which had been totally unproblematic.
Markus Bode was looking at him, obviously waiting for his boss to finish his “Should we” question.
“Should we . . .” Jonathan repeated, feverishly searching for the right words, “should we go for a beer, perhaps?”
“A beer?”
“Yes, a beer!” Although Jonathan rarely drank alcohol, apart from the occasional glass of good red wine, it seemed like an appropriate suggestion. Men whose wives had just left them went for a beer, didn’t they?
“It’s only midday!”
“That’s true.” Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea.
“I think we’d be better off discussing the figures.” Bode seemed as though he was mentally squaring his shoulders. Suddenly he didn’t look so disheveled.
“Fine.” Even figures were a more attractive prospect than a heart-to-heart.
“As I said, we failed to reach our targets by thirty percent.” Bode tapped the documents on the table with the index finger of his right hand. “You could call it a disaster.”
“Have you analyzed the reasons?”
“To an extent,” the CEO replied. “As you know, the whole sector is having to cope with falling turnover. Add to that the fact that the sales of our most important author, Hubertus Krull, are slowly falling off, and his serious illness means he won’t be delivering a new title to us in the foreseeable future.” He paused. “We can’t profit from his backlist unless we have a new novel to draw readers in.” Jonathan nodded pensively. It was his grandmother Emilie who had acquired Krull, recognizing him as the standard bearer of postwar German literature. She had gone on to establish him as an international bestseller.