Chestnut trees, gregarious with white blossoms, lined the avenue, and there was the perfume of a dozen flower stalls and the stink of mud and yeast and horse. At the steps of the Colonne de Juillet, a newspaper kiosk thrummed with people. On the Rue de Rivoli, a gleam of wealth I couldn’t quite comprehend. The cream-white facades of the buildings, decorated with rosettes and vines and other ornate carvings I didn’t have the language to describe, and the heads of gods and saints propped these buildings up, under mansard roofs of storm-grey slate. The northern sky beyond was almost the same colour as the slate, though darker, richer, and to the east the sky was a washed-out blue.

We eventually turned into a warren of smaller streets barely wide enough to accommodate two passing carriages, where there was less light and the noise was more acute. The whipping and snorting of horses and the creak of wooden wheels, the frustrations of a baby, the clattering of dishes. Boots on cobbles and someone with a wet, chesty cough. I lost all sense of direction as we turned several tight corners and finally stopped in front of the gated entrance to a courtyard, the courtyard hemmed by blocks of apartments six storeys high. Flower boxes hung off balconies; gas lights perched on flourished iron brackets, waiting for the dark. No dung in the road and a narrow, paved walk on one side.

Without dismounting, my cocher called out, ‘Le cordon, s’il vous plaît,’ and after a moment, by some unseen hand, the heavy bolt that had lain across the gate to the courtyard was lifted by cord and pulley. The cocher hopped down from his platform and pushed the gate open, then climbed back up and we advanced through the porte cochère. The courtyard was just big enough for him to turn his carriage, which he did before helping me out with my bag. Without a word, he climbed back up on his cab and was gone.

I stood unmoving, unsure at first what to do. The only other person in the courtyard was a young boy, dressed in thin but well-maintained clothes, filling a bucket with water from a communal tap.

At ground level, the buildings housed spaces of commerce: a wool carder, a milliner and a stationer. Clerical offices and an atelier for leatherworks. Next to the porte cochère, the office of the concierge. I approached the door and rang the bell. The man who answered reminded me of something fungal, mushroomy: grey skin that looked like it might darken and take the impression of your fingers if you applied pressure for too long. He was very short, and had a conical, bald head and the attitude of one who would prefer the dark and damp. Under a log, say. He motioned me inside, and returned to his position behind a tall wooden counter with nothing on it but a brass bell and heavy ledger.

I handed him my letter from Madame Debord and he looked down his stubby nose at it, took his time reading. Behind him, a wooden rack on the wall with several numbered slots stacked with letters. From the ceiling there draped an iron chain on a pulley and this, I assumed, was the mechanism for opening the gate.