They went into the foyer of the hotel and approached reception.
‘Can you do it?’ Bernadette said. ‘I know I’ll go bright red.’
‘Of course … you’re sure you want to do this? I mean, just book one room?’
‘Yes. I’ve crept along the occasional corridor in my time and I don’t like it. You feel like a thief.’
‘OK.’
‘O-K?’
‘American expression. I meant, fine.’
‘Right. Well, off you go then.’
Stanton was surprised to discover as he approached reception that he felt quite nervous too, even a little embarrassed. It was a strange sensation. He was after all a mature man, a soldier. He had carried out clandestine operations in numerous countries and, even more impressively, in two separate dimensions of space and time. He was heavily armed, extremely wealthy and an impressive and commanding figure by any standards. James Bond himself would have been hard put to notch up any more cool points. So why was it that walking towards that reception desk he felt seventeen years old again?
Perhaps it was the man behind it. Tall, thin, grey-haired with a neat goatee beard. Like one of those old cartoons of Uncle Sam but without the benign twinkle. He looked like a schoolmaster who was about to tell Stanton off for having dirty pictures in his bag.
And it was a slightly sensitive situation, after all. Stanton knew enough about the period to be aware that no respectable hotel would allow an unmarried couple to share a room, and also that for foreign guests they would probably require some form of official identification on check-in. On the other hand, people must have had affairs in those days, as they have always done, and they must have had them somewhere.
‘Good evening,’ Stanton said loudly. ‘Do you speak English? If not, perhaps you’d be kind enough to find me someone who does.’
He’d decided not to admit that he spoke German. If they wanted to try and argue with him, he’d make it as difficult for them as possible.
‘I speak English, sir, of course,’ Uncle Sam replied. ‘Do you wish to secure a room?’
‘Yes, my wife and I are just off the Zagreb train. Would have wired ahead but nobody at the Zagreb station telegraph office spoke English, if you can credit it. We want your best room, a bottle of hock, make sure it’s good and chilled and something to eat. Cheese and cold cuts will be fine.’
‘Of course, sir. If I might just see your papers.’
‘Here’s mine but my wife’s are right at the bottom of her bag. I’m sure one will be sufficient …’ He laid his Foreign Office letter down on the reception desk with its GR lion and unicorn stamp uppermost, placing underneath it a ten-krone note for good measure. ‘Look here, somebody has left this money. You take it. Perhaps it won’t be claimed.’
The receptionist took the money and Stanton took the key.
As he and Bernadette were escorted to the lift by the bellboy she whispered, ‘I feel like I’m seventeen.’
‘I was just thinking the same thing,’ Stanton replied.
‘Did you really bribe him?’
‘Yes, and if that hadn’t worked I was going to shoot him.’
Their room had a balcony and while the porter set out their bags they went and stood on it and looked out over the city, just as Stanton had done in Istanbul. Except that this time he was no longer alone. There was a near full moon and the whole of the venerable town was washed with silver.
Bernadette leant her shoulder against his.
‘Is this the first time you’ve been alone with a woman,’ she said, ‘I mean, since …’ She didn’t finish her sentence.
‘Yes, as a matter of fact it is,’ Stanton admitted. ‘If you mean, as in alone alone. I did spend a lot of this year as the guest of my old professor at Cambridge but she was very large and old and we only talked about history.’
‘You had a female professor? At Cambridge? How did you manage that?’
‘His wife, I mean. An old professor’s wife. Took pity on me because … well, because I was on my own.’
Bernadette moved a little closer still.
‘Well, it’s very nice. For me, I mean – flattering. In a way. Or does that sound wrong?’
‘No, it sounds fine.’
There was a knock at the door and their supper arrived. The waiter wanted to make a fuss of laying out the table with crisp cloth and silver service, but Stanton stuck a tip in his pocket and ushered him out of the room.
‘Shall we have it on the balcony?’ he said picking up the tray. ‘It’s a warm night.’
They settled themselves in the chairs and Bernadette smoked a cheroot.
‘I took them up because my father said he couldn’t bear to see a woman smoke. Now I can’t do without them. Care for one?’
‘No. I gave them up.’
‘Goodness gracious. Why ever did you do that? I love it!’
‘You should give up too,’ he said. ‘They’re carcinogenic.’
‘What?’
‘They cause cancer, of the lungs.’
‘Oh, that’s all rot. My doctor says smoking actually wards off some infections. As does a nice glass of wine by the way.’
Stanton realized that he’d neglected to pour the wine and now found that in his eagerness to get rid of the waiter he hadn’t allowed him to draw the cork.
‘Be prepared’s my motto,’ he said, getting a multi-tool knife from his bag. ‘Once a boy scout always a boy scout, eh?’
‘Boy scout? What? Did you join when you were thirty? They only started six or seven years ago. My youngest brother was one of the first.’
‘I just meant … oh, I don’t know what I meant.’
‘Useful bit of kit,’ Bernadette remarked, eyeing his multi-tool.
‘Yes … Australian. Cheers.’
He handed her a glass and they drank their wine in silence for a moment.
‘Good hock,’ Stanton said.
‘Yes. I love German wine. Always sweeter than French.’
Stanton breathed in her smoke. It smelt delicious.
‘And you?’ he enquired. ‘Any adventures since Budapest? I rather got the impression that you had a … thing in Budapest.’
‘Yes, I did. I had a … a thing. And no. I haven’t had a “thing” since. But then it has only been three months.’
‘Did he break your heart?’
She looked thoughtful for a moment.
‘Well, shall we say I got my heart broken …’
‘Thought so.’
‘But …’
‘But?’
‘All right,’ she said, looking him in the eye. ‘How about this? She wasn’t a he.’
‘Oh … right. So it was a woman who broke your heart.’
‘Are you terribly shocked and disgusted?’
‘Christ no! I mean, no. Why would I be?’
‘Why would you be?’ Bernadette was very surprised. ‘Because that sort of thing is generally thought to be pretty shocking and disgusting, I should say.’
‘Do you want me to be shocked and disgusted?’
‘No. Certainly not.’
‘Well, good. Because I’m not.’
‘Really?’
Stanton wondered where to begin.
‘Look, I know that society currently entertains a lot of prejudice when it comes to gay sex but—’
‘Gay? What’s the fact that it was gay got to do with it, and anyway it wasn’t gay. It was desperate and strange and intense and … well, it certainly wasn’t gay. In fact, it was really quite miserable, but I suppose that’s what you get for developing a crush on an extremely serious Hungarian feminist.’
‘Sorry, I didn’t mean “gay” obviously. Wrong word entirely. Can’t think why I said it. I was just saying that obviously I understand that same-sex love is frowned on at the moment …’
‘Frowned on! At the moment!’