A Night on the Orient Express Read Free Page B

themselves reluctantly back and forth. It was going to be a long winter.
    The country-house sale was about ten miles away, in Wiltshire: it was a rather small, insignificant house and there was nothing of any great value or note in the catalogue. Adele enjoyed buying things at auction – she always preferred to buy antiques, and she loved the drama and competitiveness. It was much more satisfying than going to a department store, for you never knew quite what you might find.
    Today, it didn’t take her long to assess the lots. There was a great deal of ugly furniture of an indeterminate age – all the good stuff must have gone to family – but amidst the cumbersome wardrobes and endless sets of china she spotted a painting. It was a seascape, rather wild and abandoned, and she loved the colours: the bruised purple and silver. It was sombre and foreboding, but she felt that it suited her mood, somehow. She could feel its brooding quality roll off the canvas. And she knew that the most important thing about a painting was that it should make you feel something. She loved it. She was pretty sure it would go for next to nothing so she decided to bid for it.
    The auction itself was in a tent in the garden, as none of the rooms in the house was quite large enough. It was cold and windy and she was starting to think perhaps she wouldn’t bother at all, but it started to pour with rain again and she decided she would get wetter going back to the car, which was parked in an adjoining field, than going into the tent. She held the auction catalogue over her head and ran in.
    The chairs were terribly uncomfortable, not helped by the fact that the floor, covered in coconut matting, was uneven. She huddled inside her coat, clutching the now-sodden auction catalogue. She’d marked the picture she was interested in, and written the price she was prepared to go to beside it – not a great deal. After all, it would need cleaning, and reframing. She had mentally hung it over the desk in the morning room where she wrote her letters. She would be able to look at it and imagine herself breathing in the salt of sea air.
    Her eyes wandered over the bidders while she waited for her lot. A man walked in, his expression a mixture of exasperation and annoyance with himself for being late. He scanned the room to see if he recognised any competitors. His eyes settled on Adele and he held her gaze for a moment.
    A ripple of something ran through her. It was as if she recognised him, although she knew absolutely she’d never seen him before. She shivered, but not from the cold. His gaze slid away and she felt momentarily bereft. He sat down in a spare seat and studied the catalogue intently as the auctioneer raced through the lots. Nothing was achieving any great price.
    Adele felt tense, poised, as still as a hare just before it takes flight. She was intrigued. The man stood out amidst the rest of the tweedy, shabby audience, who were mostly ruddy-cheeked and covered in dog hair. It wasn’t a large enough sale to attract London buyers, but his was a singularly metropolitan presence. The cut of his coat with its fur collar, the cravat at his neck, the curl of his hair all marked him out as a city dweller. He was tall, his face rather severe, with dark eyebrows. You couldn’t fail to notice him. He had presence.
    Adele breathed in, imagining his scent. It would be sharp, manly, exotic – something fluttered inside her. She put her hand up to her curls – the rain would have done nothing to help them. She hadn’t put a full face on when she left this morning, only the lipstick, and now she wished she had. At least her mac, which was relatively new, covered up the rather dull blue dress she was wearing: she hadn’t bothered to change, not even her shoes – she had on the rather clumpy lace-ups she had put on to walk to the butcher earlier. She thought longingly of the emerald boat-neck sweater hanging in her wardrobe that brought out the green in