The Museum Of Doubt. James Meek

deerskin, roughly but well-stitched, branded with the legend A Present From Pinetops.

      Thank you very much, she said. Did you cut yourself shaving?

      Oh dear, said Jack, burnishing a steel teapot with the sleeve of his blazer and examining his face in it. There is a little blood.

      It’s all round your mouth, said Bettina.

      Don’t worry, said Jack. It’s not my own. I’m a messy eater. He took out a white handkerchief embroidered with the family tree of the Hohenzollerns, spat on it, dabbed the blood off, stuffed the handkerchief into the teapot and poured himself a cup.

      Bettina offered him bacon and eggs and porridge. He shook his head and pulled a sheaf of laminated menus from inside his jacket. Breakfast at Pinetops, they said on the front. Bettina skimmed through.

      Consumer Confidence Breakfast – £4.99 Ten Thick Rashers Of Prime Smoked Elgin Bacon Cooked To Your Order On A Sesame Seed Bun With Five Norfolk Turkey Eggs, Hash Browns, Onion Rings, Jumbo Aberdeen Angus Fried Slice, Traditional Scotch Donut Scones, Mashed Cyprus Tatties And A Choice Of Relishes – Finish One Adult Serving, Get Another One Free!

      Protestant Work Ethic Breakfast – £4.99 Sixteen Hand-Picked Ocean Fresh Atlantic Kippers In An Orgy Of Pre-Softened Irish Dairy Butter, Tormented By A Treble Serving Of Farm Pure Whipped Cream, On A Bed Of Two Toasted Whole French-Style Loaves, Garnished With Watercress, In A Crispy Deep Fried Eagle-Size Potato Nest – Too Much To Eat, Or Your Money Back!

      Wealth Of Nations Breakfast – £4.99 American Style Waffles With Maple Syrup, One Pound Prime Cut Alice Springs Kangaroo Steak, Airline Fresh Oriental Style Fruit Plate With Guava, Pineapple And Passion Fruit, Pinetops Special Chocolate Filled Croissants In Rich Orange Sauce, Whole Boiled Ostrich Egg With Whole Baguette Soldiers, Plus Your Choice Of Celebrity Malt Whisky Flavoured Porridges. Includes Vomitarium Voucher, Redeemable For Second Serving Once Stamped.

      I don’t have these things, said Bettina.

      Look in your chest freezers, said Jack.

      I don’t have a chest freezer, said Bettina.

      Look in your kitchen, said Jack.

      Bettina went into the kitchen. It had been rearranged to incorporate several chest freezers with transparent lids, piled with frozen pre-prepared breakfasts, shrinkwrapped on trays, complete with disposable plates, cups, napkins and cutlery. In one of the freezers Bettina found a severed deer’s head, complete with antlers. She took it out and dropped it into the pedal bin. The antlers stuck out and stopped the lid from closing. She went back into the breakfast room. Jack was gone.

      The snow, a couple of inches, was melting on the road as it got light and the car left sharp black tracks. The branches of the sycamores lining the road were outlined in sticky snow, notched with the thaw. Beyond the farm buildings at Mains of Steel there were no more trees. After the sign reading Museum of Doubt the road climbed into the hills, the temperature dropped and there were heavy drifts. Old Tullimandy came out of the farmhouse when Jack drove past. He shouted and waved his arms. Jack drove on. Tullimandy trotted across the yard to where there was a view of the road and saw a black square, the roof of Jack’s car, speeding through the four foot drifts. It reminded him of the doctor’s computer cartoon of how his blocked artery would be cleared and he felt a pain in his chest. He walked carefully back to the house. Just as well he’d signed up for Life.

      The Museum of Doubt was a low whitewashed cottage on the bare hillside with two sash windows and a slate roof. The roof was the same colour as the rocks and scree that stuck out of the snow further up the hill. There were no trees, no walls and no fences. The house had no television aerial. Coal smoke came from the chimney and one of the windows shone with electric light. Jack stopped the car so that the bonnet and the windscreen poked out of the last big snowdrift at the top of the road. He opened the sunroof and climbed out of it. The sun came round the ridge and Jack put on a pair of sunglasses. He went up and knocked on the blue-painted wooden door, under a plastic nameplate which said: The Museum Of Doubt.

      She was built like a boy who grows up by the river and has nothing else to do except swim in it. She was thin and fit without being powerful or muscular. Her white face and neck came up out of a Prussian blue sweater thick as a rug and she wore black jeans and old brown moccasins. She had straight copper-coloured hair, cut short neatly. Her eyes listened to what he said but her mouth was blind.

      I want to give you a demonstration, he said, sliding his foot over the threshold, stroking the bottom of the door with the tip of his shoe.

      Of what? she said, opening the door wide and standing with her hands resting on the doorframe.

      Of what you need, he said.

      I don’t know what I need.

      Then I’ve come to the right place.

      No no no, said the woman, shaking her head, keeping her hands against the doorframe, shifting her weight. I don’t mean: I know I need something but I don’t know what it is. I mean: I don’t know what I need, all the time. I’m incapable of knowing what I need, or whether I need anything. I’m not sure I do. It’s my condition.

      Eh? said Jack.

      My husband used to say that when I tried to explain. I used to ask him why he needed things. He’d say it wasn’t always a question of needing. He’d say, supposing the folk at the British Museum started saying Do we really need all these Egyptian mummies? And they’d say We may want them but I doubt we need them. So they’d throw them out. And then it’d be What do we want with these duelling pistols and snuffboxes and Etruscan vases? What’s the point? You could never be sure you needed any of it. And all you’d be left with would be empty galleries and you’d have to call it the Museum of Doubt.

      Jack stared at her for a while, took off his glasses and showed his teeth in a smile. Jack, he said. I’m Jack.

      You’re a salesman, said the woman.

      That’s an ugly word, said Jack. Let’s forget about selling for a while. I’ll tell you what I’ve come about. Here’s what troubles me. The world is out of harmony. The equilibrium of the cosmos is disturbed. Look at this, now.

      He took a set of bronze jeweller’s scales out of his jacket and dangled them in the air in front of the woman.

      This is the universe, he said.

      He burrowed in his trouser pocket. His fingers dropped two pieces of lead shot onto one scale and four pieces onto the other. The scales dipped.

      You see, one side has more than it needs. It’s burdened down with possessions. The spirit is heavy. It’s falling. But the other side has a lack of material things, the possessions it needs to embrace the world. It’s flying away. It’s vanishing. It’s hardly there at all, there’s so little to it. There’s something missing, something it needs. Now watch carefully.

      Jack lifted one of the pieces of shot and dropped it in the other pan. The snow deadened the chime. The scales teetered and levelled.

      There, said Jack. Harmony. Is that not good? Is that not desirable? There should always be harmony. The side that has too much should always be giving to the side that has too little. Is that not right? The harmony is for ever. And this – he quickly swapped pieces of shot between the pans and waggled his fingers – this is a detail, a process. It could be a revolution. It could be a gift. It could be a sale. It’s over quickly.

      I told you already, said the woman. I don’t need anything.

      I can show you what you need, said Jack. I can see it. What we have here, between your house and the boot of my car, is a classic disbalance. You don’t have enough, and I’ve got so much. You wouldn’t want to be reponsible for violating cosmic harmony, would you?

      No, said the woman. Here’s what I mean. She took the scales from him and tilted them so the shot fell into the snow at their feet. She held the scales up in front of