LAST TANGO IN PARIS
Chapter Ten

"Hey, sugar," Maxie said. "Long time no see."

She was as commanding and vibrant a presence as ever, her hair marcelled into a chic new Josephine Baker bob, her dress spangled with a swingy layer of fringe. Hermione sank weakly into one of the parlor chairs, noting as she did so that Ol’ No-Name’s string bass had seen some polish, and that Lester was sporting a new beret.

"I can't believe it," she said. "I haven't seen you since ... since the wedding reception. How on earth did Dumbledore talk you into moving to Paris?"

Maxie tossed her sleek head.

"Wouldn't say he talked us into it, exactly," she said. "Can't anybody talk you into something you're determined to do in the first place. We came to keep you company, sugar."

"Oh."

Hermione frowned. "I'm glad," she said finally. "Really glad. But ... don't you think you'll get a bit bored here? That's why you didn't come along with us when we bought the house, if I remember correctly."

"We didn't come with you then," Maxie corrected, "because you newlyweds needed your space. Had nothing to do with us being bored." She raised one eyebrow in an expressive, wry salute. "And there was no way in hell we were going to let you trundle off to Paris on your own, not after we got the news. Bad enough the poor girl's lost her man, I said to Dave, and they expect her to go traipsing off to the City of Lights with no more to keep her company than that ill-tempered wildebeest of a cat? Unbelievable."

She shrugged. "Besides, I've always liked the accordion. And I needed some new shoes."

Dave, the pianist, looked up from his newspaper.

"We were sure sorry to hear about Bill," he said to Hermione, and directed a repressive glare at his lead singer. "And just as glad to find out you were all right. Don't mind Maxie – she talks too much."

It was the longest speech she’d ever heard him make.

"No, she doesn't," Hermione said, her eyes wet. "Not at all; you’ve no idea what a relief it is. No one's just come out and said it like that, almost since it happened."

She managed a watery smile. "I'm so glad to see you. All of you."

"Well, it's mutual, sugar," Maxie said, and reached out to clasp Hermione's cold hands briskly with both of hers. The contact was reassuring and motherly – Maxie didn't look that much older than she did, Hermione thought, but she certainly had the big-sister shtick down pat.

"Now, you run out and get yourself something to eat – something fattening," she appended now, looking Hermione critically up and down. "You look like you could stand a crêpe or two ... or ten, if it came to it. And the boys and I have some rehearsing to do. It's going to take that mountain lion of yours an hour or so to stop being offended and come out from under the bed, anyway, so you'd might as well get out and have yourself a little stroll."

Hermione felt like protesting – glad to see her or not, Maxie could be distressingly peremptory – but she knew when she'd been had. "Yes, ma'am," she said meekly, and headed for the door, not pausing even when Maxie shouted after her.

"And put some lipstick on! You're in Paris!"

**

And just like that, Hermione found herself out the door, at the corner of the Arènes de Lutèce and the Rue de St.-Hilaire, and staring blankly at the intersection in front of her, as if the decision to turn right or left was the hardest choice she'd ever make. To turn right would take her back the way she'd come, to the great botanical park of the Jardin des Plantes, whereas left would lead her onto the Rue St.-Germain, into the heart of the busy lively Latin Quartier itself, and eventually to the Seine.

Not a particularly dangerous decision. But it seemed, at the moment anyway, impossible.

She thought back to her summer in Rome – how she'd spurred Giulia’s little Vespa into one ill-considered turn after another just for the sheer joy of the ride, caring little for her eventual destination – and sighed. It shouldn't have been possible for a split-second's-worth of tragedy to turn that fearless adventurer she’d been as a girl into a woman trembling over the choice between right and left.

But apparently that was Fate's joke of the month.

It was the sight of a tiny bookstore on the corner that made her mind up for her. Lunch from a crêpe-stand, then, and a sunny afternoon with a book, back in that little tucked-away corner of the park that had so thoughtfully concealed her Apparation.

And if she was retracing her steps, rather than going forward ... well, then, what of it?

The St.-Germain could just wait.

**

The bookstore was small and jumbled with books in no particular order and sandwiched in between a tiny brasserie on one side and a fruit-and-vegetable stand on the other. After some consideration, Hermione bought a softcover espionage novel – she’d read it already, in English, but reading it in French would be good for her language skills – and a small bag of clementines, stopped in at the café for a stuffed baguette and a bottle of Perrier, and headed for the parc, mildly amazed at her own accomplishment.

It surprised her even more to reach the park entrance, at the corner of Cuvier and St.-Hilaire, and realise she didn't want to stop walking – despite the sticky warmth of the afternoon, the meandering tree-shaded path leading into the heart of the jardin was cooler than the street and fanned by a light breeze.

Nice that this was so close to the apartment. Hermione awarded Dumbledore a couple of mental brownie points for Perspicacity in Real Estate, switched the shopping bag containing her picnic to the opposite hand, and kept going – past her little alcove, past a knot of pre-teenaged rollerbladers, past a couple of senior citizens sunning themselves serenely on a bench and throwing baguette crumbs to the birds, despite a posted notice asking them not to.

Straight ahead of her was a scrubbed-stone building – seemingly too shiny and new, despite its nineteenth-century architecture, to belong with its surroundings – proclaiming itself to be the Grande Galerie de l'Evolution. Thanks, but no thanks, Hermione thought, with a glance at the queue of tourists by the main entrance, and kept walking – there were some older, dustier buildings a little further on, surrounded by magnificent flowerbeds, that didn't look nearly so crowded.

"Museum Nationale d'Histoire Naturelle,"she read from a placard as she got a little closer, and saw from the fine print that she had her choice of four different disciplines – paleontology, mineralogy, entomology or paleobotany – each housed in its own building. Small wonder that the tourists were passing this one by; all the same, it was bound to be more interesting than puzzling through the French translation of a spy novel she'd already read in English – and besides, those hothouses behind the Botany building looked like a Potions-researcher's wet dream. Hadn't this whole park been originally devoted to the cultivation of medicinal herbs, back in the day?

She was sure she'd read that somewhere.

Well, lunch first, anyway. She found a likely patch of shade-dappled grass underneath an ancient chestnut tree and unwrapped her baguette jambon with a little sigh of pleasurable anticipation – the casual eat-it-standing-or-take-it-with-you Paris café food was one of the things she remembered most vividly from her first schoolgirl visit all those years ago. Hard to believe that just cold ham and buttered bread could taste so good.

I should have gotten wine instead of fizzy water, she thought, biting off a crusty, chewy mouthful and closing her eyes in pleasure as the flavours married on her tongue.

And then, the inevitable one-two sucker-punch – grief and guilt – that seemed to follow her every genuinely happy thought these days: Oh, Bill. I wish you were here.

Lost in sudden melancholia, she didn't see the young man approaching her tree until he was right next to her.

"Excusez-moi, madame," he said politely, and Hermione jumped.

"What is it?" she snapped, startled and annoyed, speaking in English out of habit before she'd had a chance even to think of the French words – and was surprised to see his face clear.

"You're English," he said with apparent pleasure. "I thought I knew you! I just can't think of why."

His tone was mild, almost diffident, his face open and slightly bewildered. "I'm sorry if I'm wrong, miss," he said. "But haven't I met you somewhere before?"

He was wearing gardening gloves, Hermione noticed, and khaki trousers with slightly sprung knees, as if he'd been kneeling in the dirt. And something about him did look familiar, though she couldn't quite put her finger on what exactly it was.

As she didn't answer, but continued merely to stare at him, he flushed and gave her a funny one-shouldered shrug – a gesture she'd seen so many times during her school days that it had passed out of mere character recognition and into the realm of parody. Only one person she knew had that particular nervous tic; now that she’d tagged him, she thought, it was amazing that she hadn't seen him, right away, for who he was.

Stammering, he got up to go, and she grabbed his hand.

"Neville," she said, and grinned when his eyes shot back to hers. "Neville Longbottom. My goodness, you've changed ... no one's heard from you in years. You look terrific."

He blushed again.

"Thanks," he said. "And you're right, of course – I'm Neville, true enough." He frowned. "We must have met at school. Sorry – I'm hopeless with names, always was. I don't remember yours at all, much as I keep thinking I should."

It must be the Fidelius, Hermione thought, and smiled at him again.

"Don't beat yourself up," she said. "It's not you, it's me. You can trust me on this one."

**