But he was in there already, and Lydia looked through the smoked glass partition to see him being served a shot of vodka on the rocks.
Shaking her head, she pressed the lift button.
Trouble ahead.
The central European plain was bathed in spring sunshine as the tour coach bowled through Austria with its cargo of talent.
Lydia, next to Mary-Ann and in front of Milan, found that she couldn’t relax or really listen to her companion’s chatter about the sights and delights of Prague. Across the gangway from Milan, Evgeny snored drunkenly, contributing to the slightly hysterical high spirits of the orchestra members. There was an air of dread expectancy. Something was going to happen.
They crossed the border into the Czech Republic, and Lydia heard Milan say, loudly and pointedly, “Ma vlást,” as soon as the coach wheels rolled over Bohemian tarmac. She pretended to engross herself in her book, but she couldn’t help listening to Milan’s running commentary to the violinist beside him on the subjects of Czech history and politics. Although she was still a little annoyed with him over his treatment of Evgeny at the sex party, the passion and knowledge with which he spoke drew her back into his alluring orbit, glossing over the cracks their Austrian adventure had put in place.
Lush green countryside eventually gave way to the industrial outskirts of the city. A stretch of modern glass offices turned into vast swathes of Soviet-style housing blocks, tatty and graffiti-covered. Lydia found herself wondering if Milan had grown up in one of these, though it seemed unlikely. She had always pictured him in an elegant town house, practicing the violin in a gabled bedroom so that the music spilled out into the picturesque cobbled street below. But perhaps the reality was different—she couldn’t know, as he’d never spoken of his earlier life.
Her heart leapt as the coach crossed the Vltava river, and she couldn’t help looking behind her to see Milan’s face. He had stopped talking for a moment, and now stared through the window as if looking for something that wasn’t there. The tune they were due to play at tomorrow’s concert flowed into Lydia’s mind, accompanying the rest of the journey along the river bank and into the heart of the city. She ate up the surroundings with her eyes, hoping that the trams and the crumbling old buildings along the side of the road, which housed bars and casinos, might give her some key to Milan’s psyche. Faded grandeur soon became beauty and elegance; then they were at the hotel, alighting from the coach in the shadows of the castle and cathedral at the top of the hill.
“Meet me at that bar on the corner in half an hour. I’ll take you on a tour,” muttered Milan as they piled into the hotel reception area.
Lydia hugged herself happily. She had been looking forward to this for such a long time.
“I suppose you’re off with Milan this afternoon,” said Vanessa sourly, hanging her concert dress in the wardrobe of their shared room.
“I suppose I am.”
“Well, have fun. Maybe he’ll be different in his home town. Maybe he’ll give you some clue about who he is.”
Lydia bit her lip and confessed to having the same idea.
Vanessa gazed at her for a long moment.
“If
he doesn’t, what then?”
“Then perhaps I’ll have to accept that you’re right. That this is meaningless and can’t last. But I’m giving him this chance, Vanessa. I have to.”
“I know.”
Lydia’s good spirits faded a little when she arrived at the corner bar to find Evgeny installed at one of the pavement tables.
She sat down opposite him and ordered a coffee.
“You’re waiting for Milan?”
“Of course.” Evgeny, slightly soberer than he had been for the journey, was nonetheless still a little red-eyed and rumpled.
“So you’re friends again, then?”
“Sorry to disappoint you.”
“I’m not disappointed.” But she was, and there was no way of disguising it.
“Nobody gets Milan all to themselves, Lydia, you know that.”
“But do you?”
“What do you mean?”
“You were so jealous at the party. Why, if you know all about Milan’s philandering, faithless ways?”