Stevie arrived at the alpine hotel at noon. A room had been booked in his name and she checked in, expecting him around three. She accepted the manager’s invitation for them to dine formally in the
Panoramahalle
.
By seven he still hadn’t showed. Joss was never on time, but he was by now very late and no word had been sent. And his telephone was off.
Poor Joss! Had something awful happened?
Just to be sure she went down to the reception to ask if he had arrived. It would be an awful shame to get all worked up about a simple misunderstanding. But no,
Herr
Carey had yet to show. And
es tut mir
leid, Fräulein
, so sorry, but he could confirm there had been no disastrous plane crashes or derailed mountain trains that day.
Stevie spun through the revolving doors and into the freezing night, her worry building bricks in her stomach. She tried his number again.
Still no answer.
The concierge came running out. ‘
Fräulein
Duveen, a message for you.’ He handed her a card:
Herr Carey called with apologies. A pressing engagement kept him in
London. He will call you later.
‘Joss called here? Why didn’t you come and get me?’
‘I suggested this possibility to him but . . .’
The pity in Hans-Peterli Fruhl’s eyes—Stevie automatically read his name tag—said it all.
Stevie was confused. Joss didn’t have pressing engagements . . .
Dignity. Maintain at all costs. Turn, heel, lift is behind you, up to the
fourth floor. Smile at the chambermaid—
Guten Abend
—no crying, what a
funny day, lalala—and I like what they’ve done with the new carpet—
Safely inside her room Stevie trembled but shed no tears. The evidence for abandonment was accumulating as fast as the snow outside.
She thought about leaving, running away, making an excuse. But then she decided no, that she would stay and enjoy her weekend in the Alps to its fullest. She would not let Joss, or anyone, know she was upset. She would carry on exactly as she was.
Unfortunately, this brave new resolution meant that the fifteen-course dinner in the
Panoramahalle
would have to be attended. She refused to hide in her room as if she had done something shameful. She phoned down:
Fräulein
Duveen would be dining alone,
danke
.
Of course, she dressed in black from head to toe: a black cashmere rollneck, her pearls worn on the outside, Chanel ballet slippers. Her hair had been longer then, and she had piled it up to show off her jaw, her large pearl earrings. Most important thing was to line the lower eyelids thickly in kohl, ensuring that she wouldn’t be able to shed a tear without making the most terrible mess.
At her table, she sat composed and still. She brought no novel, no newspaper, no magazine, no notebook and pencil to distract herself from the feeling that eyes were on her. They were.
Older couples wondered where her husband was and had she disgraced herself; the
maitre d
’ was more merciful and wondered what tragedy had befallen her, what darkness. He offered a few words of conversation with each course. Stevie appreciated his kindness but wished he wouldn’t.
Concentration was required.
She practised stoicism and elegance and impenetrability. She would not even allow herself to become invisible. It was good training, she thought, only she was not sure what for. She had mastered the glass of wine alone in a bar a long time ago—not easy but there was a certain masochistic satisfaction in it. But a glass of wine was one thing; a fifteen-course formal dinner in a silent ballroom, quite another.
‘The trick to it,’ her grandmother had explained in one of her many sessions revealing the magic arts of existence to young Stevie, ‘is to not appear as if you are waiting for someone. You must look as if you had always intended to find yourself in exactly this situation.’
A tall man got up from his table and strode in her direction. He was wearing navy woollen trousers and a cashmere jumper covered in a cream
fleur de lys
pattern.
Stevie had noticed him notice her. Possibly, if there had been room in her tormented mind for such thoughts, she would have found him attractive. But tonight, she hoped very much that he would not think it necessary to stop and talk to her. He was very tall.
She concentrated on the untouched quail on her plate. She felt too much kinship with tiny birds to eat anything smaller than a fully grown chicken. She covered the fragile body respectfully with a cabbage leaf.
‘If I may.’
Oh dear
.
Stevie looked up. ‘Yes?’
‘I think you’re waiting for the wrong man.’ He had an unusual accent, almost English but unplaceable. His eyes glinted, daring her to take up her end of the conversation.
‘I’m not waiting for anyone.’
‘I can tell by your little feet that you are. They’re very expressive.’
Damn
.
She hadn’t even realised she had kicked her shoes off. Her stocking toes were crunched into fists.
‘Well, he’s an artist. He’s not good with time.’ Stevie could hardly convince herself.
‘Will you join us in the meanwhile?’ He smiled and gestured towards a table behind him. He seemed so at ease in his skin and Stevie envied him. ‘Just a dentist and his wife from Zurich, clients of mine.’
Stevie glanced over at his table. An elegant couple sat talking. He was immaculately dressed in a tweed blazer and a salmon-coloured polo neck jumper that would have been disastrous without the perfect winter tan; she wore white cashmere over her slim shoulders and had the glowing skin and well-placed gold jewellery of a Swiss heiress. They did not look like a dentist and his wife. Stevie wondered if the tall man was telling the truth.
‘I think I would prefer to let the solitude sink in. But thank you.’
‘A life unexamined and all that . . . I understand.’ He smiled again and left her.
He’s kind, thought Stevie. And he had left her with elegance.
The thirteenth course was presented with an exaggerated flourish under a silver dome. The subject was quite unworthy of the attention: a pale beige mousse, like a dead mouse.
Three grand old battleaxes rose from the corner table, their meal vanquished, and steamed across the room. They had lacquered helmets of hair, pastel twinsets, pearls, and very large crocodile bags. They could only have been described as formidable.
Stevie looked down at her own bag. It was identical. The man had noticed the similarity, too. It seemed to amuse him.
Stevie prayed the fourteenth course would hurry up and come. If he cornered her on the way out, she would have no choice but to feign nausea. No one ever argued with that.
But the man didn’t move from his table.
Stevie finished her interminable dinner, having left most of it untouched, and rose. Without glancing at the man, with a nod to the
maitre d
’, she slipped out.
There were no messages under her door. Joss hadn’t called. What sort of engagement could Joss possibly have to keep him in London?
And so vague . . . Joss didn’t use words like ‘engagement’—especially not words like ‘engagement’. Why hadn’t he wanted to talk to her?
Again Stevie debated calling and decided against it. Joss knew where she was. He would call if he wanted to.
Had her luminosity faded in his eyes . . . was that what was driving Joss incrementally away from her?
Thirty thousand feet above the
scene, Stevie accepted a refill of her champagne glass. Somewhere in her crocodile bag, she still had the message that had arrived at her door the next morning, accompanied by a pretty bunch of primroses:
Herr Carey called to say he is devastated he
can’t make it.
Primroses. Like that first one which, held in his palm, had ensnared her heart.
Stevie had opened the curtains and looked out at the mountain. It was so beautiful in the early light. Teardrops crawled like flies from her eyes, pausing a moment on the ridge of her jaw before leaping down and disappearing into the towelling of her robe.
This would not do. The mountain was there and the snow was excellent. If there was ever a time to carry on and enjoy herself tremendously, this was probably it. Crying was ridiculous; she would go to breakfast instead.
The Swiss ski breakfast is a triumph of human achievement: the Bircher müsli, that glorious mess of oats, grated apple and yoghurt; the mountain breads—the
Walliserbrot
, the potato bread, the rye loaves; the displays of mountain cheeses and air-dried meats; the strangely coloured vegetable juices that tasted worse the better they were for you, culminating in a bright green sludge that tasted like old socks and bitter cucumber. No doubt the elixir of life itself. How could anyone feel down when faced with this?
Stevie took a small table by the window overlooking the soft white valley and ordered a pot of black coffee. Then she sauntered blithely to the buffet and chose a slice of thick black bread, an enormous slice of fresh, unsalted butter and a piece of Emmenthal cheese. She felt better already.
The thermometer outside the lobby read –10 degrees Celsius. Stevie thought she had better take the necessary precautions: her biggest fur hat, her fullest goggles, with mirrored lenses and a bright red frame, her warmest ski gear—which happened to be an all-in-one by Jean-Claude Killy in canary yellow. She looked like a cockatoo.
Busy with her boots in the ski room, she suddenly heard a voice over her shoulder.
‘So you decided to stay?’ The tall man from the dining hall was standing behind her, skis in hand.
Stevie turned back to her boot buckles.
‘Shouldn’t I have?’
‘I’m sorry. I thought maybe . . . but you look much more cheery this morning.’
Stevie saw that his eyes were on her sunshine ski suit.
‘Well, just because circumstances have changed, it doesn’t mean my wardrobe has to.’
‘The colour is perfect. And my name is Henning.’
‘Stevie.’ They shook hands, then Stevie hurried off for the Weisshorn, the highest peak, determined to escape the advances of everyone in the hotel.
And that was how Stevie had met Henning. They became co-conspirators that weekend, if not friends. He had cheered her admirably and without imposing on her and for that Stevie had been grateful.
When everything had fallen apart not long after, Stevie found herself with a broken heart, puffy eyes, lunching in Zurich at the
Kro-nenhalle
and telling Henning everything over cucumber salad and
Zürcher Geschnetzeltes mit Rösti
. This gushing was most unlike her and she immediately regretted it. She apologised and explained that it was the first time she had been out since the abandonment. That’s what she called it, even though others might have used a different word.
But Henning didn’t seem to mind and Stevie satisfied herself that Henning had no plans of seduction, at least not in the short term, and that he was probably a decent human being, one who travelled even more than she did and who made a habit of random acquaintances. Stevie was happy to be one of them for now.
Still, flying to Moscow to see him on some secret mission was almost certainly unwise. If Charlie hadn’t unsettled her so with his talk of Joss proposing to Norah Wolfe, if she hadn’t seen his face on every bus stop posing next to the fashion star, she may not have gone at all.
But she wasn’t ready to face the memories all over again—not yet. So, feeling like a coward for the second time that day, she had fled.
A few days in Moscow would be enough for her to gather her courage and return to her responsibilities. She would do the assessment for Henning as a favour then she would go home to her flat in Zurich, surrounded by thick woods, where she could safely hide from the world until David Rice called her back to London.
______________
Thank heavens Henning came to
collect her himself from Sherme-tyevo. Moscow’s airport was a battleground, predictably grim at passport control, with interminable forms asking in-coming passengers to list any electronic goods, cash, recording devices and so on in their possession. An accumulation of previous visits had taught Stevie to just answer
Nyet
to everything. The forms were relics from the time of the Iron Curtain; no one at customs was interested anymore. Nor do they smile, ever.
The arrivals hall was filled with jostling men in leather jackets, fur hats and cheap shoes—touts, thugs, taxi drivers, impossible to tell apart. Henning was waiting near the automatic doors, ready to seize her before anybody else could.
‘
Dobri vyecher
, stranger.’
‘Henning!’ She kissed him hello on his freshly shaven cheeks. He swooped on her bag, put a protective arm around her shoulders—it might have gone around twice had she not been wearing her coat—and bustled her through the crowd of men.
Sensibly he had chosen a dirty black Lada—a crappy Soviet-made car that was as indistinguishable as it was unreliable. No one would steal it, follow it, or even bother to notice it. When Stevie stepped out into the car park, the icy brown slush rose above her tiny booted ankle. The air had the faintly sour smell of Russia.
‘Welcome to Moscow.’
‘I didn’t think I would be back so soon.’
The car windows were filthy from the dirty snow mist sprayed up by the traffic. Night had settled and a fog was creeping in. Only the tail-lights of the other cars, glowing red, and the fuzzy neon of the casino at Pushkinskaya were bright in the gloom.
They crept down Tverskaya Yamskaya, one of the main boulevards of Moscow. Wide and straight, they seemed to go on forever.
‘I’ve booked you into the Metropole. It’s not far from the Kozkov’s flat—I’m staying with them.’
‘Oh. Thank you very much. That’s kind of you.’ Stevie was always formal when she was feeling shy. She noticed Henning hide a smile— something was amusing him.
Stevie considered his profile. It was quite handsome, if you liked the tall and slightly scary type: strong nose—well, big actually, but it suited him—a square jaw, narrow eyes of a piercing glacier-ice blue. They made Stevie think of a chink of mountain sky. He should stop smirking at her, though.