The Comfort of Strangers by Ian McEwan

should have gone to the hotel.’
    ‘We should turn our faces,’ Mary said, but they continued to watch as he came closer, compelled by the novelty of recognizing someone in a foreign town, by the fascination of seeing without being seen.
    ‘He’s missed us,’ Colin whispered, but, as though cued, Robert stopped, took off his glasses, spread his arms wide and called, ‘My friends!’ and came quickly towards them. ‘My friends!’ He shook Colin’s hand and raised Mary’s to his lips.
    They sat back and smiled at him weakly. He had found a chair and was sitting between them, grinning broadly as if several years, rather than a few hours, had passed since they had parted. He was sprawling in his chair, resting his ankle on his knee, revealing soft leather boots of pale cream. The faint scent of his cologne, so different from his perfume of the night before, spread about the table. Mary began to scratch her leg. When they explained that they had not yet been back to the hotel, that they had slept in the street, Robert gasped in horror and sat up straight. Across the square, the first waltz had merged imperceptibly with a second; nearby, the second orchestra launched into a stiff-jointed tango, ‘Hernando’s Hideaway’.
    ‘This is my fault,’ Robert cried. ‘I kept you late with wine, and my stupid stories.’
    ‘Stop scratching,’ Colin said to Mary; and to Robert: ‘Not at all. We should have brought our street maps.’
    But already Robert was on his feet, one hand resting on Colin’s forearm, the other reaching for Mary’s hand. ‘Yes, it is my responsibility. I shall make up for everything. You will accept my hospitality.’
    ‘Oh, we couldn’t,’ Colin said vaguely. ‘We’re staying at a hotel.’
    ‘When you are so tired, a hotel is not such a good place. I will make you so comfortable you’ll forget your terrible night.’ Robert pushed his chair in to allow Mary to pass.
    Colin tugged at her skirt. ‘Wait a minute though …’ The brief tango jerked to its finale and became, by clever modulation, a Rossini overture; the waltz had become a gallop. Colin stood too, frowning with the effort of concentration. ‘Wait …’
    But Robert was handing Mary through the space between the tables. Her movements had the slow automation of a sleep-walker. Robert turned and called impatiently to Colin. ‘We’ll take a taxi.’
    They walked past the orchestra, past the clock tower, whose shadow now was no more than a stump, and on to the busy waterfront, the focal point of the teeming lagoon, where the boatmen appeared to recognize Robert immediately and competed ferociously for his custom.

5
    T HROUGH THE half-open shutters the setting sun cast a rhomboid of orange bars against the bedroom wall. It was, presumably, the movement of wisps of cloud that caused the bars to fade and blur, and then brighten into focus. Mary had been watching them a full half-minute before she was fully awake. The room was high-ceilinged, white-walled, uncluttered; between her bed and Colin’s stood a frail bamboo table which supported a stone pitcher and two glasses; against the adjacent wall was a carved chest and on it an earthenware vase in which was arranged, surprisingly, a sprig of honesty. The dry, silver leaves stirred and rustled in the warm draughts of air that engulfed the room through the half-open window. The floor appeared to be constructed of one unbroken slab of marble of mottled green and brown. Mary sat up effortlessly and rested her bare feet on its icy surface. A louvred door, which stood ajar, led into a white tiled bathroom. Another door, the one through which they had entered, was closed, and hanging from a brass hook was a white dressing-gown. Mary poured herself a glass of water, as she had done several times before falling asleep; this time she sipped rather than gulped, and sat up very straight, stretching her spine to its limit, and looked at Colin.
    Like her he was naked and lay above the sheets,