From Chapter 1: If I hadn’t met Elizabeth near that inlet, among the pine trees along the African ocean, I never would have heard of Jerome Strozzi, never would have met him. He wouldn’t have taken over my novel. But Strozzi’s name was constantly on Elizabeth’s lips. To hear her talk, he was the alpha and the omega, the key and the source. I used to wonder about Elizabeth. Was she a little crazy, someone who had visions?
Strozzi stole my novel from me. To be honest, he’s paying me back a hundredfold since he’s giving me his very soul. What’s good about the soul is that, without splitting it up, you can give it away to a crowd, and still possess it. But Strozzi doesn’t like to use the word soul any more.
“It all began like this,” he said. I can imagine the whole scene at the exit from the Gare Saint-Michel the clock, Notre Dame, and Strozzi, seen from the back. He has just passed under the clock, he follows along the quay, and disappears into the distance. It’s the good season for the booksellers with their open stalls. He hears hurried steps. It was also a time when women wore wooden-soled shoes. He turns his head; his face is caught for a second in the evening sun that is setting the cathedral on fire. And there’s the young woman, her eyes bold and timid, swinging her handbag round and round. It all began there.