A Heart Bent Out of Shape Read Online Free Page B

Not so very Swiss of you.’
    ‘How did you know it was my first night?’
    ‘Second, then. Third at the most. But I’d put money on the first. You’ve got that look about you.’
    ‘I didn’t choose it,’ she said, ignoring his last remark, ‘the people I was with did.’
    ‘You need to find some better people to show you around.’
    ‘Or,’ she said, ‘I’ll just enjoy discovering it by myself. Anyway, why were you in there, then? If it was so bad? Maybe it’s your first night too?’
    ‘Maybe,’ he smiled.
    ‘I should go,’ she said. ‘Bye.’
    She began to walk away.
    ‘Take it easy.’
    ‘What’s that?’ She turned back to him.
    ‘I said “take it easy”.’
    ‘Okay, thanks. I will. You too.’
    ‘That’s very polite.’
    ‘Well, what do people usually say? I’ve never been told “take it easy” before.’
    ‘What, never?’
    Hadley shrugged. ‘Not that I can remember. It’s not very British.’
    ‘Well, I’m honoured to induct you.’
    ‘We should be speaking French, really.’
    ‘ Au revoir, mademoiselle ,’ he said, his smile crinkling.
    ‘ Au revoir, monsieur ,’ she replied.
    She walked away from him then, because it felt like the next thing to do. When she glanced behind her he was gone. Folded back into the dark city’s fabric.
    In the early hours of the following morning, Hadley was startled into wakefulness. She lay for a moment, twisted in her bedclothes, listening. Her room was almost entirely dark, with just thin slits of light where the blinds didn’t meet. The noise came again. A rattling of a handle, the clacking of a key in a lock, and a soft but audible string of curses in a language she didn’t recognise. Hadley raised herself up on one elbow and listened. Perhaps it was Kristina Hartmann, taking the last unoccupied room on the corridor. She got out of bed and padded to her door.
    Turning the handle, she poked her head out. Hadley’s hair was a sleep-fuddled knot, and she wore striped pyjamas that gave her a childish air. The girl in the corridor didn’t hear the opening of her neighbour’s door, and continued to fumble at her own. Hadley took in her four dark leather cases that were strewn across the hall, and her coat, a mackintosh like the ones she’d admired earlier, thrown down on the floor. The girl had golden hair that fell all the way to the middle of her back. An extravagantly patterned scarf was slipping from her shoulders. She ran an exasperated hand through her hair, whipping back a swathe of it, and Hadley noticed her nails, painted in black cherry, and the smudge of a fading love bite on her neck. The girl turned suddenly, and saw Hadley watching.
    ‘Oh, did I wake you?’
    Hadley wondered how she knew to speak to her in English. Her voice had a vague American lilt, and she looked the part with her tall, athletic build, and bright looks, but there was another inflection that she couldn’t quite identify.
    ‘It’s okay. Can’t you get into your room?’ asked Hadley.
    ‘The bloody key they gave me won’t do anything,’ she said, rattling it again in the lock. ‘It’s useless. I guess I’ll have to wake the porter. But he’s probably awake already, wondering who’s making all this ridiculous noise. Like you.’
    Hadley folded her arms across her chest, aware suddenly of her baggy trousers and ill-fitting top.
    ‘I’m sorry,’ the girl said. ‘I feel terrible. I just want to get in my bloody room, I’ve been travelling all night.’
    The way she said bloody tickled Hadley. There was a whiff of the Home Counties about it. But despite her perfect language and accent, she was so far from English. Her cheekbones were high and slanted, giving her a powerful, feline look, while a mass of pale freckles dressed her down again and made her friendly. Everything about her seemed sophisticated: the linked gold chain at her neck, the shine of her smile, the perfume that Hadley caught the scent of even as she stood three feet from her. It