"I don't look upon you as a woman."

"Then why should you mind if I go to a party?"

"I do mind."

She remembered that she had come because he seemed in distress; she had come to help him and not to hurt him.

"I'll stay with you, then."

They sat in the courtyard, alone.

If the city we choose, thought Lillian, represents our inner landscape, then Michael has selected a magnificent tomb, to live among the ruins of his past loves. The beauty of his house, his clothes, his paintings, his books, seem like precious jewels, urns, perfumes, gold ornaments such as were placed in the tombs of Egyptian kings.

"A long time ago," said Michael, "I decided never to fall in love again. I have made of desire an anonymous activity."

"But not to feel...not to love...is like dying within life, Michael."

The burial of emotion caused a kind of death, and it was this cadaver of his feelings he carried within him that gave him, in spite of his elegance, and the fairness of his coloring, a static quality, like that of the ancient city itself.

"Soon the rains will come," he said. "The house will grow cold and damp. The roads will become impassable. I had hoped your engagement at the hotel would last until then."

"Why don't you come back to Golconda then?"

"This place suits my present mood," said Michael. "The gaiety and liveliness of Golconda hurts me, like too much light in my eyes."

"What a strange conversation, Michael, in this patio that reminds me of the illustrations for the Thousand and One Nights—the fountain, the palm tree, the flowers, the mosaic floor, the unbelievable moon, the smell of roses. And here we sit talking like a brother and sister stricken by some mysterious malady. All the dancing and pleasure are taking place next door, nearby, and we are exiled from it...and by our own hand."

At night her room looked like a nun's cell, with its whitewashed walls, dark furniture, and the barred windows. She knew she would not stay, that what Michael wanted to share with her was a withdrawal from the world.

In the darkness she heard whisperings. Michael was talking vehemently, and someone was saying: "No, no." Then she heard a chair being pushed. Was it Michael courting one of the young students? Michael who had said lightly: "All I ask, since I can't keep you here, is that in your next incarnation you be born a boy, and then I will love you."

One day in Golconda she saw a bus passing by that bore the name of San Luis, the town near Hatcher's place and she climbed on it.

It was brimming full, not only with people, but with sacks of corn, chickens tied together, turkeys in baskets, church chairs in red velvet, a mail sack, babies in arms.