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He also prayed that they would not find the remains of his TV dinner on the table. Most of all, he prayed that no one would open the door of the wardrobe. If they did, he would say that he had gone inside to measure its dimensions, and that he hadn’t noticed time passing. He took a wooden Ikea pencil and a meter-long Ikea paper ruler from his trouser pocket and remained motionless in the dark, expecting to be discovered from one second to the next. Inside his chest, the football supporters were smashing up their seats. Outside, the voices drew closer, and seemed to surround him. But in the end, no one discovered he was there. Perhaps it would have been better if they had.

Julio Sympa and Michou Lapaire, the manager of Ikea Paris Sud Thiais and his chief designer, climbed the stairs that led to the showcase rooms, followed by a herd of men and women in yellow T-shirts and navy cargo trousers.
    They were working late because they had to install a new collection.
    Julio Sympa, who was six foot six and had climbed Mont Blanc four times, stopping at the top each time to read
Why I Am So Cold
by Josette Camus before going back down eight hundred and fifty-three pages later, paused in front of the “American Teenager” bedroom and pointed in several directions before continuing on his way.
    Michou Lapaire, who always wished he had been born a woman, wrote down, in a pink notebook, the furniture pointed out by his bombastic boss.
    While this was happening, the members of the technical team, most of whom had undoubtedlynever heard of
Why I Am So Cold
by Josette Camus or wished they had been born a different sex, put on their gloves, unrolled the bubble wrap, and moved the crates that would be used to protect the furniture during transportation. Due to a shortage of time, the manager had given instructions not to disassemble the furniture (at Ikea! Can you believe it?) but to pack it as it was in the large wooden crates. This way, they would avoid the physically and mentally exhausting process of disassembly and reassembly.
    While the technical workers busied themselves lifting up the blue metal wardrobe and putting it inside a much larger wooden crate, a gentle splashing sound could be heard, like water trickling from a tap. If one of them had opened the wardrobe, they would have seen Ajatashatru in a very unfortunate position, standing up, huddled into a corner, concentrating on giving free rein to his bladder’s imagination while he was carried, rather shakily, an inch or two above the ground. It is as difficult to piss in a wardrobe as it is in an airplane, observed the Indian, who never would have believed that he would one day be in a position to make such an observation.
    Anyway, no one opened the wardrobe door.
    “When you’ve finished doing that, I wantsomeone to fix that leak,” said Julio Sympa, who had excellent hearing.
    Then he pointed at a bunk bed, a few yards away, as if he were sentencing it to death. Which was more or less the case.

At that very moment—in other words, at the precise instant that Julio Sympa was pointing at the bunk bed as if he were sentencing it to death, which occurred at 11 p.m. on the dot—Gustave Palourde parked his taxi by the side of the road, checked that his windows and doors were locked, and, rubbing his hands, prepared to count the day’s takings.
    This was his little post-shift ritual, a satisfying conclusion to a day of hard work. Ever since his wife, Mercedes-Shayana, had one day caught him, in their house (which was what they called their trailer), counting his money after a day’s work, and, having found his hiding place, stolen quite a lot of the money to buy herself a crocodile calfskin bag, Gustave had got into the habit of doing it this way. Best not to tempt fate, as he told his colleagues after this incident, though what he really meant was best not to tempt Mercedes-Shayana.
    Having counted his takings, the old gypsyglanced at his notebook and noticed that the