Excerpt from Room on the Sea by Andre Aciman, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

"I wonder if the ladies play gin rummy after napping in the afternoon," said Margot, one of the Americans, who worked in an art gallery and was seldom reluctant to crack a snarky remark about people she didn't know. Everyone laughed. "Yes, but do you know what happens to their husbands?" asked Oscar, who was a Chilean schooled in the United States and had a savage sense of humor. He waited awhile for someone to hazard an answer, and seeing no one did, he couldn't help but elicit the old joke about why such husbands invariably died first. "Why do they die first?" asked Margot, yanking off his sailor's cap and dropping it on her head. "Because they want to die," he answered.

The group burst out laughing again. Margot stared at the two eldest ladies, who had been discussing knitting stitches, and smiled a vague, long-distance smile at them. "Just promise to shoot me if I end up knitting in a hotel drinking overheated chamomile when I am eighty." And with this she gave Oscar his sailor's cap again but, to tease him, tilted the visor to his left. He readjusted the cap, but she struggled to turn its visor to his right this time. "Old people live way too long," she said, letting go of the hat.

The two pensioners didn't know they were the butt of so much humor, and, catching smiles on the young Americans from across the dining area, exchanged subdued nods that could easily pass for an unspoken greeting. "They're waking up," said Margot. "Mustn't rouse the old ducks." "You're being mean again," said Mark, who was the voice of reason in the group.

Margot caught herself, was quiet at first, then, staring straight back at him, said, "I know." But seeing no one had said anything, she added, "I was just thinking of my grandmother who was lucky enough to die in her sleep. I want to be spared getting old."

"Still," Mark continued, "you shouldn't say things like that. I lost my grandma a few weeks ago, and I loved her." Mark always wore one piece of tennis gear or another even when he wasn't playing. Now, because of a recent injury, he was continually rubbing his shoulder.

The well-dressed gentleman, however, stood out from everyone else in the hotel and seemed perfectly content to be left alone. Paul, who worked in DC for a congressman, had run into the man in the airy hotel lobby and, without knowing why, had greeted him with a noncommittal smile that he couldn't retract in time. The gentleman had made a perfunctory nod but hadn't smiled. "He just hates us," said Mark.

"Could be a hired assassin type living off the fat of his Swiss bank account," said Margot.

"No, an assassin on his last job."

"Who is he killing?"

"Maybe one of us," said Paul.

"I see him as a painter," said Angelica, who always came to the dining area already wearing a bathing suit and a translucent wraparound.

"Maybe."

"He's too old-school to be an artist."

"Gives me the heebie-jeebies," said Margot.

After breakfast the gentleman would leave as quietly as he had entered. "Probably meeting his mole."

"Mossad."

"Why Mossad?"

"Looks Jewish and far too slick for someone born into wealth. There's something fishy about him."

"You're being mean again, Margot."

After dinner the gentleman liked to sit on the veranda by himself and smoke a cigarette, sometimes two.

On their third night they watched him do something totally unusual. He had gone back inside, changed into his bathing suit, and walked down the stairs leading to the beach, where he started swimming all alone in the dark. The Americans never saw him come back up the stairs.

"I can just see it in the papers: Ex-assassin takes his own life."

"Stop it already."

"I wonder what his deal is."

They agreed that none of them understood him. But then they never gave him much thought and inevitably forgot about him. All they seemed to care about was enjoying the hotel and the surrounding beach. By daylight they liked to go swimming and boating; they spent long hours at breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and in the evening, after a stint at the hotel bar, they liked to go partying at one of the various nightclubs around the hills.

* * *

At first, no one could tell why he had walked over to their table or why he was aiming straight for Mark. But before anyone knew what was happening, he had placed his palm on Mark's right shoulder; he did not apologize for intruding, did not ask permission, didn't even hesitate to make what was clearly an invasive gesture. Instead, he spoke his few words with the effortless ease and authority of someone who'd done it many times before. "Perhaps this might help," he said.

Excerpted from Room on the Sea by Andre Aciman. Copyright © 2025 by Andre Aciman. Excerpted by permission of Farrar, Straus & Giroux. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.