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Back The Double Save as PDF
Chapters (63)
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  63. Acknowledgements

Annoyed at being driven from his chosen spot, he gathered his things. In spite of being held here against his will, he’d grown fond of this corner of the Zen garden. So charming and harmonious in its carefully wrought perfection, it might have been airlifted straight from Kyoto. As he made his escape, she called out. ‘Excusez-moi, jeune homme.’ Her tone was imperious.

‘I beg your pardon, madam.’ He suppressed a sigh. ‘Do you wish to speak to me?’

She cast him an odd look. ‘Well, I’m not addressing the elves now, am I?’ She perched on a nearby bench and patted the space beside her. ‘You interest me.’ She glanced at the ring on his left hand. ‘Does your wife know you’ve got a roving eye? I’ve seen the way you look at that pretty young doctor. Passes herself off as Swedish, but take it from me, she’s a Swiss girl, born and bred. The youngest daughter of an excellent family.’ She lowered her voice to a whisper. ‘Though, entre nous, I happen to know she was once a patient here.’

Vidor took a step backwards, anxious to put some distance between himself and the woman he’d seen before from afar, but never spoken to. With a distinctively mad look in her eyes, she might just qualify as the looniest of the patients so far. For a brief moment, he wondered how she would fare as a test subject in his lab. Did she perceive the world in the same way as a normal person? Was her idea of green and purple identical to his? In those lacquered and heavily bejewelled fingers, did a rose petal feel rough or smooth? If only he could pop her into a functional MRI machine and get a peek at her brain.

‘I’m afraid I have an urgent appointment,’ he said, ‘so I’ll wish you a bonne journée, madam.’

‘Wait.’ Her hand snaked out and grabbed his wrist. ‘I’ve been longing to have a conversation with you. You seem halfway intelligent, unlike most of the feeble-minded fools who end up here.’ She snorted. ‘Top-notch accommodation, five-star ambience. That’s what it says in the brochure, doesn’t it? But this place doesn’t hold a candle to the Beau Rivage. At least, not how it was in my day.’

‘I’m afraid I don’t know it.’ He tried to extricate his arm, but she had a grip like a raptor.

‘The Imperial Suite.’ She winked. ‘That’s where my husband, Maximillian, and I would spend our summers until his health failed.’ She placed a hand on her breastbone and sighed. ‘May he rest in peace.’