about a fraud case, their table was covered in glass bottles and plastic cups. Beer, wine, bourbon.
Meredith's eyes drifted to the glossy hotel brochure on the plastic table, even though she'd read it through plenty of times already.
L'HOTEL DOMAINE DE LA CADE RENNES-LES-BAINS III90
Set in delightful wooded parkland above the picturesque town of Rennesles-Bains in the beautiful Languedoc, the Hotel Domaine de la Cade is the epitome of nineteenth-century grandeur and elegance, but with all the comfort and leisure facilities expected by the discriminating twenty-first-century visitor. The hotel is situated on the location of the original maison de maitre, which was partially destroyed by fire in 1897. Run as a hotel since the 1950s, it reopened after a major refurbishment under new management in 2004 and is now recognised as one of the premier hotels in south-west France.
For full tariff and detailed facilities, see opposite.
The same information was repeated over in French.
It sounded great. Come Monday she'd be there. It was her treat to herself, a couple of days of five-star luxury after all the budget flights and cheap motels. She pushed the brochure back into her transparent plastic travel file with the receipt confirming her reservation and put the whole thing back in her purse.
She stretched her long, slim arms above her head, then rolled her neck. She couldn't remember when she'd last been so tired.
Meredith had checked out of her hotel in London at noon, had lunch at a cafe close by the Wigmore Hall before taking in an afternoon concert - seriously dull - then grabbed a sandwich at Waterloo station before boarding the train, hot and exhausted.
After all that, they'd been late leaving. When they finally got going, she spent most of the first part of the journey in a daze, staring out the window watching the green English countryside flash by, rather than typing up her notes. Then the train plunged beneath the Channel and was swallowed up in the concrete of the tunnel. The atmosphere became oppressive, but at least it killed the cell phone chatter. Thirty minutes later, they emerged the other side to the flat, brown landscape of northern France.
Chalet-style farmhouses, the flash of small towns, and long straight farm tracks looking like they led to nowhere. One or two larger towns, the slag heaps grassed over by time. Then Charles de Gaulle airport and the suburbs, la banlieue, the drab and depressing rent-controlled high-rises that stood mute on the outskirts of the French capital.
Meredith leant back in her seat and let her thoughts wander. She was part way through a four-week research trip to France and the UK, writing a biography of the nineteenth-century French composer Achille-Claude Debussy and the women in his life. After a couple of years of researching and planning - but getting nowhere - she'd caught a break. Six months ago, a small start-up academic press made a modest offer for the book. The advance wasn't great but, given that she didn't have a reputation in the field of music criticism, it was pretty good. Enough to make her dream of coming to Europe a reality. She was determined to write not just another Debussy memoir, but the book, the biography.
Her second piece of luck had been getting a part-time teaching post at a private college outside Raleigh Durham, starting the spring semester. It had the advantage of being close to where her adoptive parents now lived - which saved on laundry, phone bills and groceries and not far from her Alma Mater, the University of North Carolina.
After ten years of paying her way through college, Meredith had racked up a lot of debt and money was tight. But with the money she made from teaching piano, combined with the advance from the publishing company and now the promise of a regular salary, she summoned up the courage to go ahead and book the tickets to Europe.
The typescript was due with her publisher at the end of April. Right now, she was on track.
Meredith's eyes drifted to the glossy hotel brochure on the plastic table, even though she'd read it through plenty of times already.
L'HOTEL DOMAINE DE LA CADE RENNES-LES-BAINS III90
Set in delightful wooded parkland above the picturesque town of Rennesles-Bains in the beautiful Languedoc, the Hotel Domaine de la Cade is the epitome of nineteenth-century grandeur and elegance, but with all the comfort and leisure facilities expected by the discriminating twenty-first-century visitor. The hotel is situated on the location of the original maison de maitre, which was partially destroyed by fire in 1897. Run as a hotel since the 1950s, it reopened after a major refurbishment under new management in 2004 and is now recognised as one of the premier hotels in south-west France.
For full tariff and detailed facilities, see opposite.
The same information was repeated over in French.
It sounded great. Come Monday she'd be there. It was her treat to herself, a couple of days of five-star luxury after all the budget flights and cheap motels. She pushed the brochure back into her transparent plastic travel file with the receipt confirming her reservation and put the whole thing back in her purse.
She stretched her long, slim arms above her head, then rolled her neck. She couldn't remember when she'd last been so tired.
Meredith had checked out of her hotel in London at noon, had lunch at a cafe close by the Wigmore Hall before taking in an afternoon concert - seriously dull - then grabbed a sandwich at Waterloo station before boarding the train, hot and exhausted.
After all that, they'd been late leaving. When they finally got going, she spent most of the first part of the journey in a daze, staring out the window watching the green English countryside flash by, rather than typing up her notes. Then the train plunged beneath the Channel and was swallowed up in the concrete of the tunnel. The atmosphere became oppressive, but at least it killed the cell phone chatter. Thirty minutes later, they emerged the other side to the flat, brown landscape of northern France.
Chalet-style farmhouses, the flash of small towns, and long straight farm tracks looking like they led to nowhere. One or two larger towns, the slag heaps grassed over by time. Then Charles de Gaulle airport and the suburbs, la banlieue, the drab and depressing rent-controlled high-rises that stood mute on the outskirts of the French capital.
Meredith leant back in her seat and let her thoughts wander. She was part way through a four-week research trip to France and the UK, writing a biography of the nineteenth-century French composer Achille-Claude Debussy and the women in his life. After a couple of years of researching and planning - but getting nowhere - she'd caught a break. Six months ago, a small start-up academic press made a modest offer for the book. The advance wasn't great but, given that she didn't have a reputation in the field of music criticism, it was pretty good. Enough to make her dream of coming to Europe a reality. She was determined to write not just another Debussy memoir, but the book, the biography.
Her second piece of luck had been getting a part-time teaching post at a private college outside Raleigh Durham, starting the spring semester. It had the advantage of being close to where her adoptive parents now lived - which saved on laundry, phone bills and groceries and not far from her Alma Mater, the University of North Carolina.
After ten years of paying her way through college, Meredith had racked up a lot of debt and money was tight. But with the money she made from teaching piano, combined with the advance from the publishing company and now the promise of a regular salary, she summoned up the courage to go ahead and book the tickets to Europe.
The typescript was due with her publisher at the end of April. Right now, she was on track.
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