At the Villa of Reduced Circumstances by Alexander McCall Smith Page B

good.
    Eight days after the Librarian’s announcement, the letter arrived. It was postmarked Bogotá, and von Igelfeld stared at it for a full ten minutes before he slit it open with his letter-knife and unfolded the heavy sheet of cotton-weave paper within. It was written in Spanish, a language of which he had a near perfect command, and it began by addressing him in that rather flowery way of South American institutions. The President of the Colombian Academy of Letters presented his compliments to the most distinguished Professor Dr von Igelfeld. From time to time, it went on, the Academy recognised the contribution of a foreign scholar, to whom it extended the privilege of Distinguished Corresponding Fellowship. This award was the highest honour which they could bestow and this year, ‘in anticipation and in the strongest hope of a favourable response from your distinguished self’, the Academy had decided to bestow this honour on von Igelfeld. There would be a ceremony in Bogotá, which they hoped he would be able to attend.

    He read the letter through twice, and then he stood up at his desk. He walked around the room, twice, allowing his elation to settle. Colombia! This was no mere Belgian honour, handed out indiscriminately to virtually anybody who bothered to visit Belgium; this came from the Academy of an influential South American state. He looked at his watch. Coffee time was at least an hour away and he had to tell somebody. He would write to Zimmermann, of course, but in the meantime he could start by telling the Librarian, who had played such an important role in all this. He found him alone in the Library, a sheaf of old-fashioned catalogue cards before him. After he had broken the news, he informed the Librarian that he was the first person to know of what had happened.
    ‘Do you mean you haven’t told the others?’ asked the Librarian. ‘You haven’t even told Professor Dr Dr Prinzel yet?’
    ‘No,’ said von Igelfeld. ‘I am telling you first.’
    For a moment the Librarian said nothing. He stood there, at his card catalogue, looking down at the floor. There were few moments in his daily life which achieved any salience, but this, most surely, was one. Nobody told him anything. Nobody ever wrote to him or made him party to any confidence. Even his wife had not bothered to tell him that she was running away; if the building were to go on fire, he was sure that nobody would bother to advise him to leave. And now here was Professor Dr von Igelfeld, author of
Portuguese
Irregular Verbs
, telling him, and telling him first, of a private letter he had received from the Colombian Academy of Letters.
    ‘I am so proud, Herr von Igelfeld,’ he said. ‘I am so . . . ’ He did not finish; there were no words strong enough to express his emotion.
    ‘It is a joint triumph,’ said von Igelfeld kindly. ‘I would not have achieved this, Herr Huber, were it not for the constant support which I have received in my work from yourself. I am sure of that fact. I really am.’
    ‘You are too kind, Herr von Igelfeld,’ stuttered the Librarian. ‘You are too kind to me.’
    ‘It is no more than you deserve,’ said von Igelfeld. A Corresponding Fellow of the Colombian Academy of Letters can always afford to be generous, and von Igelfeld was.
    Not surprisingly, the arrangements for the bestowal of the honour proved to be immensely complicated. The cultural attaché was extremely helpful, but even with his help, the formalities were time-consuming. At last, after several months during which letters were exchanged on an almost weekly basis, the date of the ceremony was settled, and von Igelfeld’s flight to Bogotá was booked. Señor Gabriel Marcales de Cinco Fermentaciones, the cultural attaché, proposed to travel out with von Igelfeld, as he was being recalled to Bogotá anyway, and he thought that it would be convenient to accompany him and ensure a smooth reception at the other end.
    Von Igelfeld was