A Castle in the Clouds

by Kerstin Gier

  “It’s fine. He was right, really. I had no business being there.”

  “It was my fault. I practically forced you to come with me.” Ben fell into a gloomy silence as we climbed the steps.

  “Where are we going, anyway?”

  “No idea. Just somewhere far away from my dad.” Ben gave me a lopsided grin. “But perhaps we could … have you ever been up to the roof?”

  “Right to the top?” I shook my head. I’d been meaning to go up there for a long time, but I’d never gotten around to it.

  You could get to the roof via the men’s staff quarters, but instead of going that way, Ben led me along the corridor to his uncle’s apartment. Beside the apartment door there was a hidden door that looked like a built-in cupboard but actually concealed a steep wooden staircase. The steps ended in another door, which Ben opened for me. Fresh, cool air enveloped me as I stepped out onto the roof. I marveled as I looked around. We were standing on a kind of terrace above the skylight to the main staircase, which from up here looked even more like an antique greenhouse. The soft light of the chandeliers shone through the panes of glass between the metal beams, bathing everything around us in an ethereal glow.

  “Careful, it might be slippery,” said Ben.

  During the day, the view from here must be spectacular. I leaned cautiously over the railing and looked out over the edge. Far below, beside the ice rink, lay our snow dragon. It looked as if it were sleeping. “We’re so high up,” I said, skating across to the other side of the terrace, but the roof of the south wing blocked my view of the ground. I leaned with my back against the railing and tipped my head up. The sky was starless and full of clouds.

  Ben came to stand beside me. “I’m so sorry for—for everything,” he said.

  I looked at him in astonishment. “What do you mean?”

  “That you had such a stressful day. That I said such horrible things. And then my dad winning the prize for the world’s worst human being. And on Christmas Eve as well. Your first Christmas away from home.”

  “Hmm,” I said. By this time on a normal Christmas Eve I’d be helping my mum tidy the kitchen while my dad drove my grandparents home, and my little brothers, instead of going to bed like they were supposed to, would be busy stuffing their mouths from the candy bowl until my mum noticed, and by then it was usually too late. Either Finn or Leon or both would throw up, and I’d have to finish cleaning the kitchen on my own, and afterward my parents would argue about whose fault it all was. I couldn’t say I was terribly sorry to be missing out on it.

  Ben misinterpreted my silence and gently patted my arm.

  Downstairs, the commotion caused by the falling chandelier seemed to have died down. The sound of piano music drifted up to us through the open window of the bar. And somewhere nearby I could smell tobacco smoke.

  In my mind, I went back over the events of the day, from feeding the seven Hugos, to playing with the children in the snow, to my shock at finding Tristan in the Panorama Suite, to the wonderful moment when Mr. Ludwig had slipped the ring back onto Mrs. Ludwig’s finger. And then Pavel’s and Old Stucky’s singing in the laundry room. It was hard to believe it had all happened in the space of one day. Admittedly, the argument with Ben hadn’t been very nice, nor had my encounter with Gordon Montfort just now, nor Ella’s and Gretchen’s scornful looks. If I thought about it long enough, I was sure to remember quite a few other moments that hadn’t been completely perfect—but that didn’t really matter. A day didn’t have to be perfect to be memorable.

  “It’s definitely been the most exciting Christmas Eve I’ve ever had.” I looked around. “Can you smell that?”

  Ben nodded. “It’s Fräulein Müller. She’s smoking a cigar.”

  “What?” Not Fräulein Müller!

  “Shh.” Ben laughed. “No one’s allowed to know. It’s her secret vice. And I think it’s her only vice. Every evening, Monsieur Rocher gives her a fine Havana out of the humidor. She insists on paying for it, of course.”

  “Of course.” I felt almost sad to imagine Fräulein Müller standing at the open window of her bedroom after work every evening, smoking alone and in secret. “It actually smells quite nice from a distance. Almost makes me want a cigar myself. And I’ve already sampled some pear brandy today.”

  “If your parents only knew what you’ve been getting up to,” said Ben. “We’re corrupting you.”

  For a while, we just stood there listening to the music from downstairs. The pianist had run out of international Christmas songs by this time and had switched to pop songs. I was starting to get cold out here without my coat. But I didn’t want to go in yet.

  After a few minutes, we both broke the silence at the same time.

  “Are we friends again?” asked Ben, and I said, “Do you even know how to waltz?” Then we both answered “Yes!” and started laughing.

  “Shall I prove it?” asked Ben, offering me his hand. The pianist had just started playing a slow song.

  Dancing wasn’t exactly my favorite thing. Delia and I had been thrown out of the dance class we’d signed up for last winter after just five lessons, allegedly because we kept disturbing the class with our giggling fits, but actually because there were a lot more girls than boys.

  The sound of the piano drifted through the air, and not until Ben placed his right hand below my shoulder blade and started to spin me around did I realize that “When I Need You,” the song the pianist was currently playing, was a slow waltz. In three-four time.

  At the dance lessons, I’d never understood what was so great about waltzing, but with Ben it was different. I felt myself standing taller and straighter in his arms. It was a wonderful feeling, gliding around the roof in time with the music without having to think about which foot was supposed to go where. It was completely effortless, almost weightless.

  In my head, I sang along. When I need you, I just close my eyes and I’m with you …

  “Right on cue,” Ben whispered, pulling me a little closer to him.

  I felt something wet land on the end of my nose, then on my hand and my cheek. It was snowing—fat snowflakes that swirled around us as if they wanted to join in the waltz, too.

  This was just too much.

  We stopped dancing and started giggling.

  “Oh my God, this is cheesy,” said Ben. “Plus I’m freezing my butt off out here.”

  “And I hate this song,” I said, feeling like I might burst with laughter. “I don’t even know where I know it from. It’s terrible.”

  “Yep, it’s horrendous.” Ben propelled me toward the door, and we slipped inside, into the warmth. “And the worst thing is: This is going to be our song from now on.”

  16

  Delia, as I’d predicted, had decided not to drown herself in the toilet and was absolutely delighted to hear that I’d danced a waltz on the roof. With the hotelier’s son. In the falling snow.

  For days afterward, she kept sending me smileys with hearts for eyes.

  “It’s just a shame you didn’t lose your glass slipper, Snow White,” she wrote.

  “Snow White is the one with the poisoned apple, you Rumpelstiltskin,” I wrote back. I wasn’t all that keen on the idea of me and Ben as Cinderella and Prince Charming (aka the intern and the heir to the hotel). But it did chime with Gordon Montfort’s comment that I needed reminding of my place. And in his mind, presumably, my place was by the hearth, sweeping out the grate.

  Either way, Gordon Montfort was (to stick with the metaphor) a good fit for the wicked stepmother, and Monsieur Rocher was the perfect fairy godmother. The bossy stepsisters could either be Hortensia and those other idiots from Lausanne or—even better—Gretchen and Ella Barnbrooke. And the Hugos were ideal substitutes for the helpful doves; you just had to imagine them with white feathers instead of black. Perhaps I could teach them to caw: “You shall go to the ball!” That would be awesome.

  But every time I ran into Ben over the next few days, I realized I’d gotten a little ah
ead of myself in my fairy-tale fantasy. (Thanks, Delia!) Sure, Ben and I had waltzed together on the roof, but it hadn’t gone any further than that. Internella and the Hotel Prince (who would soon have no hotel to inherit) were just friends. Friends who were so overworked that whenever they met during the day, all they had time to do was exchange a harried smile.

  The snow that had set in on Christmas Eve went on for days, and the day after Christmas a thick fog descended on the mountainside. For the staff, this meant even more stress and overtime than usual because the guests wanted to stay inside in the warmth all day. On the odd occasions when we managed to take our dinner breaks at the same time, I’d see Ben for half an hour in the evenings, and we’d sometimes meet for a quick chat with Monsieur Rocher in the concierge’s lodge or with Pavel in the laundry. But the rest of the time we had to be content with smiling and waving.

  I would have been quite happy with this state of affairs if it hadn’t been for Delia WhatsApping me every few hours to ask me whether I’d kissed Ben yet. After the third message—“Cinderella can make the first move and kiss the Prince herself if she wants, you know. She’s a liberated modern woman”—I started thinking with alarming regularity about what it would be like to kiss Ben. Whenever we met, I had to force myself not to look at his lips. A liberated modern woman I might be, but I definitely didn’t want him to know what was going on in my head.

  But despite all these annoying thoughts about kissing and my heavy workload, I spent the next three days on cloud nine. Everything seemed to have turned out for the best: My argument with Ben was water under the bridge, old Mrs. Ludwig had her ring back, and Stella Yegorov was laid up in the Panorama Suite—allegedly with a migraine, though I hoped what she was actually doing was wondering how the ring had found its way from her nightstand back onto Mrs. Ludwig’s finger and feeling thoroughly ashamed of herself.

  And Tristan and I had also thought of a good solution to the problem of telling the Ludwigs about the ring’s true value. Or rather, Tristan had thought of it. He’d come to find me outside the playroom on Christmas morning to talk to me about it. The conversation was remarkably civilized by our standards—no hiding behind curtains, no silly jokes about secret agents or hotel thieves, no climbing up walls. The embarrassing end to our last meeting was probably still too fresh in both of our minds.

  We agreed that we wouldn’t mention the ring to the Ludwigs for a few days. Then we’d break it to them gently that their flea-market find was actually worth a fortune. We were going to delegate this task to Tristan’s grandpa—he was an expert gemologist, so the Ludwigs were bound to believe him. I thought it wasn’t a bad plan, especially when Tristan explained that he’d already told his grandpa the whole story. His grandfather had been angry with him for climbing the wall and trespassing in someone else’s room, but he’d also realized we had to help the Ludwigs.

  “Did you tell Ben Montfort how much the ring is really worth?” Tristan had asked me, and he’d smiled with relief when I shook my head. “Good. My grandpa says the fewer people who know about this the better.”

  I had no time to ask why because at that moment the first few children turned up at the playroom, but I was glad Tristan had put his grandpa in the picture. The Ludwigs would leave the hotel as very wealthy, probably extremely confused, but happy people. And the fact that Tristan, under his grandpa’s watchful eye, wouldn’t be able to climb the walls anymore was also a welcome development. That was one less thing to worry about. I did feel almost sorry for Tristan, though, when I saw him gazing wistfully up at Jaromir perched at a great height on a metal beam below the skylight. Despite all appearances, this was not a circus act; Jaromir was just inspecting the brackets of the chandelier. He and Old Stucky had been told to check all the chandeliers in the building, because Gordon Montfort wanted to make sure no more of the heavy antique things were about to fall down (possibly burying one of the guests beneath them next time).

  I found myself thinking about kissing when I was with Tristan, too. Even if it was only for a few seconds as I stared at his curved lips, which he didn’t notice because he was too busy looking at my lips. What on earth was going on? It was as if Delia had opened the door to some kind of psychological torment where the only thing anyone could think about was kissing. (Plus, there was only one Prince Charming in “Cinderella.”)

  Luckily, I was so busy with work for the next few days that I hardly saw Tristan. I was either looking after the children or busy in the spa, which was also a hive of activity. But I saw him several times, from afar, hanging out with Ella and Gretchen. Perhaps he needed them to compensate for all the adrenaline he was missing out on, or perhaps, out of sheer boredom, he’d finally succumbed to the gleam of their golden hair. Gracie and Madison told me Ella had let everyone know Tristan was going to be her partner for the first waltz. You had to hand it to the pair of them—they’d certainly managed to land themselves the best-looking boys in the place for the New Year’s Ball.

  The ball was a big deal for all the Barnbrooke girls. Even Gracie and Madison had ball gowns to wear for the occasion—pink ones, with lots of tulle.

  Amy, on the other hand, had insisted on a simple black dress with a high neck. The way she described it, it sounded like a cross between my chambermaid’s uniform and a nun’s habit. But Amy wasn’t planning to do anything at the ball other than stand by the wall glaring at everyone. (And maybe not even that—she was of two minds about going to the ball at all.) On Christmas Eve she’d plucked up her courage and asked Aiden whether he wanted to be her dance partner. Aiden had replied that she’d be better off finding a boy who could actually hear the music he was dancing to. Amy was so mortified by this rejection that she’d wanted the ground to open up and swallow her. She said she’d never be able to look Aiden in the eye again, and over the next few days, she went to great lengths to avoid him. But it wasn’t easy.

  Since all the normal scheduled activities—walks in the snow, sleigh rides, trips to ski resorts or nearby towns—had been canceled because of the heavy snow, Amy’s usual haunts were now occupied twenty-four seven. People played cards in the library, held darts and billiards tournaments in the billiards room, and attended whisky tastings in the bar (even before lunch). Mara Matthäus organized an impromptu tango class in the ballroom, and the Swiss politician from Room 206 commandeered the music room for a reading from her autobiography, Politics is Not for the Fainthearted, which she happened to have brought with her. Amy couldn’t even hide in supposedly secret places like the vestibule on the second floor without finding Mrs. Von Dietrichstein there conducting a celebrity interview or Mr. Von Dietrichstein looking for a picturesque spot for a photo shoot.

  So every morning after breakfast, Amy came along to the playroom with her two little sisters and stayed all day. Carolyn the kindergarten teacher kindly turned a blind eye. She was a friendly, maternal person who understood that the lovesick Amy needed a safe haven. And someone to comfort her.

  “If we don’t help her, the poor thing will end up being visited by the Lady in White,” she said.

  “I thought the Lady in White only came at night.”

  Carolyn shook her head. “No, no! My mother met her once in the middle of the day. Right here in this very room. She was tidying up some toys when she felt a breath of icy cold air on the back of her neck. And when she turned around, there was the Lady in White standing in the doorway smiling sadly at her. My mother said that in that moment she felt an overwhelming urge to open the window and jump out.”

  I gulped. “But why did the Lady in White visit her?”

  “My mother was in love with man named Claudio. But unfortunately he didn’t love her back.”

  “And what happened then?” As always when someone told me a spooky story, I had goose bumps.

  “The light flickered,” said Carolyn. “And then the Lady in White disappeared. My mother drove home as fast as she could and accepted my dad’s marriage proposal. And she’s never looked back.”

  I s
ighed with relief. This Lady in White didn’t seem to be all that bad after all. “What did she look like?” I asked. Just to be on the safe side.

  Carolyn shrugged. “My mother says she looked a bit like a chambermaid.”

  Okay, that was my fault. I did ask.

  Carolyn was a lovely person, but she had an unfortunate penchant for ambitious arts and crafts. If she’d had her way, we would all have sat there from morning till night making unicorns, New Year’s crackers, and paper snowflakes—using plenty of glitter, which Carolyn loved and bought by the bucketload. In the evenings, I’d find it everywhere: in my pockets, between my teeth, even in my ears.

  Apparently it was nontoxic and biodegradable glitter, which was a good thing, too, because Elias, the thriller writer’s younger son, had once eaten about half a pound of the stuff mixed into some of Madame Cléo’s marzipan balls. It turned out Don had talked little Elias into this “dare,” as he called it. I warned Elias’s parents not to be alarmed if their toilet was a bit glittery for the next few days, but other than that there wasn’t really much I could do about it. Don didn’t tend to get rough with the other children—the little delinquent preferred to wreak havoc using words alone. It was astonishing, the way he managed to identify the other children’s weak spots and use them against them. Only the Americans—Amy, Gracie, and Madison—were safe from his machinations, simply because they didn’t have a clue what he was talking about. They only knew one word of German, and that was danke. Whatever Don said to them, it rolled off them like water off a duck’s back, and his primary school English was no match for their South Carolina accents.

  On the twenty-seventh of December, the weather was so bad that we had to call off our usual trip outdoors with the children. We’d spent half an hour bundling them into their snowsuits, ski pants, and parkas and putting on their snow boots, hats, scarves, and gloves, only to unwrap them all ten minutes later. It was pointless trying to play outside. The icy wind whipped the snowflakes straight into our faces, and our eyelashes, eyebrows, and hair were immediately coated with a layer of snow crystals. You could hardly see your hand in front of your face. We hadn’t even gotten as far as the ice rink when we decided to turn back before one of the children got blown away or lost in a snowdrift. The snowflakes were pricking our skin like hundreds of tiny arrows.