The Inspector hesitated, looking carefully at the man. “And what are you to me?” he asked.
“No one in particular,” said the man passively. He smiled to himself. “Just someone.”
The Inspector waited for him to continue, but he did not. “What are you saying?” he asked impatiently.
“I’m saying I want you to call me that,” said the man, and he turned back to the Inspector, standing close, his voice low and serious. “I’m saying that my name, for all intents and purposes, is Someone.”
First (Named) Appearance: Chapter 19
Our friendly and yet not-so-friendly man in the hat, unhatted at last! Turns out he is a major hottie with totally insane beautiful hair. Dang. I guess if you have to get felt up a lot by some condescending jerkass, he may as well be a major hottie with beautiful hair.
Despite his willingness at long last to show his face, he has not lost his flair for being cryptic and infuriating. He gives his name as Jemand (which is a totally beautiful German word, pronounced YEH-mahnd), which translates to “someone.” Imagine having to call someone Someone. Exactly. Meanwhile, we still don’t know what side he’s even on or why he’s going out of his way to help Herr Inspektor out so much. Sometimes he acts like a pretty decent guy, sometimes he can be very malicious indeed. So it’s all pretty up in the air still. So far Herr Inspektor seems to begrudgingly trust him, to the point of keeping Jemand’s entire existence secret from his colleagues.
All in all, still pretty weird.
Jemand is one of the oldest characters in the story, though he, too, went through several permutations. Since we planned for him to serve as sort of a foil for Herr Inspektor, we thought it only appropriate not to give him a name either, a decision that has now taken on much greater significance, as is momentarily discussed in Chapter 19. Originally we called him “the Schattenmann” (Shadowman), which is a pretty terrible word as German words go, and also it turns out there is totally a German miniseries called Der Schattenmann, so, that was a close save. We were pleased to think of Jemand, which remains an infuriating moniker while also being a lovely and sort of name-sounding word, at least for the non-German speaker. We also think it fits him a lot better.
