The plan was to watch what the wife did for a couple of days, see if she went anywhere while her husband was at work, or if she had any visitors. Not that I was interested in finding out who her lover was. My aim was simply to work out the best, least risky time to strike, when she was on her own at home and wasn’t likely to be disturbed. The room turned out to be the perfect vantage point not only to watch Corina Hoffmann coming and going, but also to see what she got up to inside the apartment. Evidently they never bothered to close the curtains. Most people don’t, in a city where there’s no sun to shut out, and people outside are more interested in getting into the warm somewhere than they are in standing and staring. For the first few hours I didn’t see anyone in there. Just a living room bathed in light. The Hoffmanns weren’t exactly sparing with the electricity. The furniture wasn’t English; it looked more French, especially the strange sofa in the middle of the room that only had a back at one end.
