Where Dead Men Meet by Mark Mills

Author:Mark Mills
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
Published: 2017-04-20T14:01:49+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Three

The Palace Hotel in Luzern lived up to its name. Filling a long stretch of the lakeside promenade, it was six or seven floors of high Victorian pomp, with an elaborately carved facade and an entrance lobby that was a feast of swirling marble.

Pippi was set on staying there, and although Luke offered a few token words of caution about the cost, he was thinking of a hot bath and a cold beer, preferably taken together. There were no twin rooms with a lake view available, but there was a suite. The rate was staggering.

“Hang the expense,” Pippi said to the concierge. “We could die tomorrow.” A line intended for Luke’s ears.

“Not before settling your bill, I hope,” the concierge replied, his face so stony straight that they couldn’t be sure he was joking.

Upstairs, they found themselves in a drawing room large enough to swallow two sofas, a dining table, and a satinwood grand piano with no trouble. The two spacious bedrooms came with en suite bathrooms done out in pale gray marble. The view from the balcony was spectacular. Across the lake, beyond the soft swell of the hills, the humped and jagged profile of a lone mountain stood out against the blue sweep of sky.

“That’s Pilatus,” said Pippi. “I’ve been up there.”

“Really?”

“There’s a special train that goes to the top.” She had been ten years old at the time, on holiday with her parents and her brothers. “We stayed here at the Palace Hotel.”

“Under happier circumstances.”

“Not by much,” she replied enigmatically.

She could have elaborated, and he could have pressed her to. That neither did was an indication of their current level of rapport. The drive from Interlaken had passed in strained silence, punctuated by an occasional polite exchange about the striking beauty of the scenery they were passing through. No mention had been made of their earlier argument, no apology offered, no quarter given. Each waited for the other to make the first overture, and that showed no sign of happening anytime soon.

They arranged to meet in the drawing room at seven thirty, dressed for dinner. Then they went their separate ways, Luke to a steaming bath and a cold glass of pilsner ordered from room service. The heat and the alcohol did for him, driving him to his big bed. When the alarm clock dragged him back to wakefulness an hour later, he found a note under his door. Pippi had gone for a stroll and would meet him downstairs.

He found her seated at a table in the bar, although his eyes passed over her twice before he realized it was her.

“You look magnificent.”

She smiled up at him. “Thank you.”

He hadn’t been there when she tried on the evening gown at the boutique, and it was immediately clear to him why she had bought it. The sapphire-blue silk was cut daringly low in front, rising to a halter neck that exposed her pale, delicate shoulders.

“What was that?” he asked, pointing to an empty glass on the table in front of her.

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