As September passed into October, however, I went on meeting Velázquez. I told myself this was because I still had some hope of disarming him again, and because the strain of war on one’s nerves required some carnal release, which nobody understood better than Velázquez. Sometimes he would join me at the Scribe in Paris, when he could get a few hours’ leave from his duties at the airfield, which were largely administrative; sometimes I would travel out to Orly and meet him there. In the beginning, the terms of our association were clear and simple. Since we had the good fortune to share an electric physical attraction and libidos of roughly equal strength, we should screw each other silly, as often as we could arrange to meet.

But as the weeks went on, we began to spend time together that was not entirely devoted to sex. We would go on walks or drive a Jeep into some village and look at the local cathedral, if it still stood; after making love, instead of getting dressed or falling asleep, we would have these conversations about art and politics and ethics. I was surprised to find that despite his cynicism Velázquez was an idealist, a believer in fate but also a devout Catholic, even though the Republicans in Spain had hated the church; he did not understand how I, a nonbeliever, could adhere to any moral code at all, and he was deeply worried for my immortal soul. Velázquez spoke in precise, beautiful language, and our discussions had this transparent quality, this clarity of expression, so that you could perceive each thought in the same way you could observe an object with your eyes. I remember I would watch his mouth as he spoke, or the bridge of his nose, or the wisp of smoke from his cigarette. He used to trail his other hand along my skin, to draw some diagram with his fingers to illustrate a point. Often he would turn on his side to fix me with a serious expression and ask me some question that stopped me in my tracks, that required me to walk back all the way along some path of logic and start again, in a new direction I hadn’t imagined, while he listened intently. Then we would make love again, and the texture of him was somehow different, and the texture of me.