Fima curled up inside the blanket. He meant to ask to be waked up the moment Yael got home. He was so tired that what came out was:

“Don’t wake Yael.”

He slept for about twenty minutes, and when the phone rang in the next room, he reached out and knocked over one of Dimi’s Lego towers. He tried to fold the blanket, but gave up because he was in a hurry to find Ted. He still had to explain what it was that had brought him here this evening. Instead of going to the study, he strayed into the bedroom, which was lit by a warm red night-light. He saw that the wide bed was ready for the night: two identical pillows, two dark-blue blankets encased in silky sheets, two bedside tables, each with an open book lying face down on it, and he buried his face and his whole head in Yael’s nightdress. At once he pulled himself together and rushed out to look for his coat. He searched every room in the flat with a sleepwalker’s thoroughness, but he found neither Ted nor his coat, even though he doggedly checked every lighted place. Finally he sank down onto a stool in the kitchen and looked around for the knives that he hadn’t been able to find a place for earlier.

Ted Tobias emerged from the darkness with a slide rule in his hand, and announced slowly and emphatically, like a soldier transmitting a message by shortwave radio:

“You fell asleep for a while. Shows you were tired. I can warm your coffee in the microwave.”

“No need, thanks,” said Fima. “I’ve got to run; I’m late.”

“Oh. Late. What for?”

“A date,” said Fima, to his own surprise, in a man-to-man voice. “I completely forgot I have a date tonight.” And he went to the front door and started wrestling with the latch until Ted took pity on him and handed him his overcoat, opened the door, and said softly and, Fima thought, rather wistfully:

“Look, Fima, it’s none of my business, but I think you could do with a break. You’re looking a little run down. What’ll I tell Yael?”

Fima inserted his left arm into the torn lining of his coat sleeve and wondered why the sleeve had turned into a cul-de-sac. He lost his temper, as though Ted was responsible for upsetting the insides of his coat.

“Don’t say anything to Yael,” he hissed. “There’s nothing to say. I didn’t come to see her, anyway. I came to talk to you, Teddy, but you’re such a numbskull.”

Ted Tobias did not take offense. It is likely he didn’t understand the last word. He answered carefully, in English:

“Wouldn’t it be better if I called you a taxi?”

Fima immediately felt profound shame and regret.