At the approach of ten o’clock I made my way to Saint-Eustache, quite sure that, if I’d been followed by the man in black, I had by now long since lost him. The mid-morning heat was becoming oppressive. It would soon rain. I stepped into the church as into a great cool grotto. Its interior was more somber than usual. The recesses of the stained-glass windows had been filled in with sandbags to guard against a bombardment that had never come. Flickering candles were the only light, and it took a few moments to adjust. I approached the altar. Every little sound, every footfall, echoed in the silence. Finally I spotted the widow, dressed in black weeds, her face veiled, kneeling in prayer in the front pew. I slumped into the pew behind her, overcome by exhaustion. A headache was sprouting behind my eyes. After a few moments, the widow stood and left the church. As I stepped outside, the sunlight blinded me. I took my suitcase and followed her from a discreet distance toward the slums of Beaubourg. She turned into Rue Quincampoix and then into an antiquaire on the corner. The shop’s shutters were drawn almost completely shut. The jiggle of a bell above the door announced my entrance. In the shadows at the back of the shop, I saw an open doorway and a stairwell behind it. I climbed it to the first floor into a room as full of antiques as the shop below. There was no sign of the widow. I thought I’d been left alone until I heard the rustle of a body beside mine. I turned and there was the widow, lifting her veil to reveal the face it had hidden, the face of Madeleine. She approached me without saying a word, curled her arms around my neck and kissed me with trembling lips.

“I’d given up on ever seeing you again,” she said.

“Why did you leave?” I said, kissing her neck, drinking in the scent of sandalwood.

“Because you didn’t believe me.”

“Do I need to believe you to love you?”

“Yes,” she said. “Yes, darling. You must.”

We spent several hours lying side by side on an antique divan in the upper room of that little antique store, among Savonnerie carpets, Louis XV clocks, Pompeiian lamps, armchairs resting on feet of bronze sphinxes, porcelain japonaiseries encased behind pearwood vitrines, and candelabras that on closer inspection turned out to be coiled snakes.

“I want to try again,” I said.

“What?”

“Crossing.”

Madeleine hesitated. “You want certainty. You want to be free of doubt. But even if we cross, it won’t be enough. You’ll never be certain. It’s in your nature to doubt.”

“I need to try. I need to be sure.”

“Not yet. You need to rest. Your mind is racing. You’ll get distracted.”

“How can I sleep when you are here beside me?”