The Same Name Twice

— I warn you, said Mehdi, I'm going to say what everybody is going to say to you, and then we can get to work.

It was one in the morning. They had spread out on a table in the lounge the twenty-two names copied out neatly, the list of dates, and two coffees.

— Go ahead.

— One room, one night a year, always the same date, paid in cash, under names that do not correspond to anybody who comes. Madame Delcourt, for twenty-three years your father was keeping himself a place to see somebody.