As he hit their skulls with a mallet, the children began to sing, percussive chimes that turned into the sound of someone banging on Nina’s door. Nina flew out of bed and opened the door before she’d had time to wonder why anyone would be knocking. In another hotel she might have assumed it was the maid, come to clean. Reassuringly, the man at her door was carrying a tray. “Bonjour, Madame,” he said. The man wore a houndstooth jacket, a slicked-back shelf of dyed red hair, and the smile of a friendly iguana. Had he been downstairs when she checked in? Nina would have remembered—if she could remember checking in. But now she did remember, though mostly what she recalled was how different it had been this time, checking in without Leo. Together they used to generate a faint sexual commotion, showing off and leaning close together over the swift exchanges of credit cards and keys. Alone, Nine thought it best to keep the lowest possible profile, to occupy no space at all and at last become invisible as the nun’s cell of an elevator came to spirit her off to her room.
