The Girl Behind The Curtain (Hidden Women) by Stella Knightley Read Free Book Online Page A

Wall itself was surprising and chilling. There was a thick layer of sand, designed to make it impossible for an escapee to cross at speed or to do so without leaving a trace. There would have been dogs too and acres of barbed wire.
    We walked from the Wall monument to the Mauerpark flea market, which was like a slightly more orderly version of Camden. There, Harry insisted on introducing me to the delights of various heavy German sausages. Suffice to say, we needed several beers to wash them down.
    As we sat in a busy beer garden near the Kollwitzplatz, I told Clare and Harry about my upcoming research project. They both felt sure they could help me find interesting subjects for interview. I told them about my travels too.
    ‘You’ve been all over the place this year,’ said Clare with a hint of wistful envy. ‘What was Paris like? What was Venice like?’
    I gave her the official line. They were both great cities and I’d had a great time. I’d got plenty of work done. She didn’t need to know any more than that. I didn’t mention Marco.
    ‘Any man in your life?’ Clare asked. ‘I was surprised when you broke up with Steven. I always thought you guys were perfectly matched.’
    ‘On the surface perhaps. You can never tell what’s going on beneath.’
    ‘A bit like Berlin,’ said Harry. ‘On the surface, everything’s organised and orderly. Underneath, there’s a raging heart. I tell you, Sarah. You are going to love being here. This city is totally crazy.’
    At the end of the afternoon, we made plans to meet again later in the week, for a proper night out when Clare would take me to her favourite club. Harry made similar promises.
    I went back to my new apartment alone. Passing Herr Schmidt’s door, I heard the sound of a Chopin prelude drifting out to greet me. I’d seen the piano in Herr Schmidt’s living room while we shared the cake but I’d had no idea he was such an accomplished player. The beautiful sound made my heart sting just a little. I hurried up the stairs before a wave of sadness could catch me.
     
    I made myself a cup of tea and sat on the windowsill of my new bedroom, which had the best view of all the rooms I now lived in. I watched the wind in the tall trees of the Volkspark but my mind was elsewhere again.
    What was Marco doing right now? Was life for him continuing as it had done for so long? A silent existence in a hidden room. Seeing only Silvio from day to day. Controlling his business interests from afar. Controlling himself, allowing no emotion to seep through and ruffle the calm of his orderly existence. Definitely no untidy love.
    How had I fallen so deeply for someone I knew only at a distance? In real life, we had touched just once, when I reached out to take his hand as we sat in his study and he told me, at length and with more passion than I had imagined he had in his body, exactly why we could not and should not be together. Yet I felt as though we had been indulging in a wild, physical affair. When I thought about him, I could feel his hands all over me. I could almost smell him.
    Alone in my room in Berlin, I fantasised about how it might have been, if Marco had not been so determined to hold me at arm’s length.
    From the brief episodes of cybersex we’d shared, I’d got the impression that he liked to be in command. He liked to tell me what to do. There was a huge part of me that responded to that commanding aspect of him. I wanted to hand over the control of my fulfilment to him. I found responding to his instructions so exciting.
    ‘What are you wearing?’ was how it began that day in the library. But as my thoughts drifted, I remembered the Dior dress that he had given me to wear to the Martedì Grasso ball. It was so tasteful and elegant. If I had ever imagined myself as a princess, it would have been in a dress like that, beautiful yet understated. He had chosen so well. Not only had he got my measurements right, he had tuned in to my most girlish