I said, 'Send him my regards.'
'You are mad at me, William.'
I shrugged.
'No, I’m not mad. I was, but I’m not now.' I got to my feet. 'Take care of yourself, Sylvie.'
She took a last drag and looked at me. For a second I thought she might ask me to stay, but instead she stubbed her cigarette out in the makeshift ashtray and gave me her special smile, the one that could have had them cheering all the way to the gods.
'You too, William.'
I closed the door of the dressing-room and walked out of the club, into the late-afternoon bustle of Soho.
Sheila Montgomery once said that if her sister turned up alive and well she would be tempted to kill her for all the pain she had caused. I knew now that wasn’t true. The revelation of Sylvie’s betrayal hurt, but it didn’t hurt as much as when I thought I’d killed her. I’d entered the club a murderer and left it absolved. That had to be worth a celebratory drink.
There was a decent pub close by that kept the racing on TV all afternoon. I turned the corner and started to walk towards it, the memory of Sylvie’s smile shining sweet and sad in my head.
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Berlin
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Table of Contents
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Glasgow
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Berlin
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Berlin
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