Hitman Anders and the Meaning of It All Read Online Free Page B

I think about it, I might as well have broken both his arms while he was wailing on the ground. I’ve noticed I can’t always think as quickly as I’d like. And when liquor and pills enter the picture, I don’t think at all. Not that I can recall.”
    The priest had gotten hung up on one particular detail in this story: “Did she really say that, your mom? That, deep down, you have a good heart?”
    Per Persson was wondering the same thing, but he stuck to his strategy of blending in with the lobby wall as best he could, while remaining as quiet as possible.
    â€œYes, she did,” said Hitman Anders. “But that was before Dad threatened to knock out all her teeth if she didn’t stop running her mouth. After that she didn’t dare say much until after Dad drank himself to death. Oh dear, oh dear.”
    The priest was in possession of a few suggestions for how a family could resolve its conflicts without knocking out each other’s teeth, but there is a time and place for everything. At that moment, she wanted to focus on summarizing the information Hitman Anders had given them, to see if she had understood it correctly. So, his most recent employer had demanded a fifty percent rebate, invoking the fact that Hitman Anders had broken one and the same arm twice rather than two different arms once each?
    Hitman Anders nodded. Yes, if by fifty percent she meant half price.
    Yes, that was what she’d meant. And she added that the count seemed to be a finicky sort. Nevertheless, both priest and receptionist were ready to help.
    Since the receptionist was unwilling to contradict her, the priest continued: “For a twenty-percent commission, we will seek out the count in question with the intention of changing his mind. But that’s a minor detail. Our cooperation will not become truly interesting before phase two !”
    Hitman Anders tried to digest what the priest had just said. There had been a lot of words, and a strange percentage. But before he got to his question about what “phase two” might be, the priest was already a step ahead of him:
    The second phase involved further developing Hitman Anders’s little operation under the guidance of the receptionist and the priest. A discreet PR job to broaden his customer base, a price list to avoid wasting time on people who couldn’t pay, and a clear-cut ethics policy.
    The priest noticed that the receptionist’s face had gone as white as the refrigerator beside the wall he was pressing himself against, and that Hitman Anders had lost track of what was going on. She decided to stop talking so that the former could take in fresh oxygen and so the latter wouldn’t get the bright idea of starting to fight instead of trying to understand.
    â€œIncidentally, I must say I admire Hitman Anders for his good heart,” she said. “Just think, that baby got away without a scratch! The kingdom of Heaven belongs to the children. We find testimony of this even back in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter nineteen.”
    â€œIt does? We do?” said Hitman Anders, forgetting that just thirty seconds before he had decided to give a good licking at least to the guy who wasn’t saying anything.
    The priest nodded piously and refrained from adding that, only a few lines later, the very same Gospel happened to say that you shall not murder, that you shall love your neighbor as yourself, and—apropos of the knocked-out teeth—you shall honor your mother, and, for that matter, your father.
    The rising rage in Hitman Anders’s face subsided. This was not lost on Per Persson, who finally dared to believe in a life after this (that is, he believed that both he and the priest would survive their current conversation with the guest in room seven). Not only did the receptionist start breathing again, he also regained the ability to speak and was able to contribute to the overall situation by managing