Draining another glass of punch, he turned to the nearest woman – Florian’s mother, it transpired – and invited her to join him. He had never had dancing lessons, but felt sure he could be doing no worse than the others. Florian’s mother was soon claimed by her son, smiling for once, and Anton was dancing with a stout patient who held him tight. The music changed to a polka, and he found himself being rushed up and down the hall between the flaming candles and swirling red of the holly berries and the orange flames where Hans fed more wood into the fire.

An instinct told him to leave the room. He pushed open the front doors and went outside, where he leaned against a pillar of the porch and took in lungfuls of the icy night. Hearing the music still, he saw that in his hurry he had left the door open behind him. He closed it carefully and began to walk, feeling the sweat dry cold at once on his forehead.

He went down the side of the house, leaving the stables on his left, up three stone steps, and stumbled onto a lawn. To his right was South Court; and upstairs were many lights in what he knew had originally been Thomas and Kitty’s rooms. He wondered if Kitty had been allowed to stay there tonight for sentimental reasons. How strange it must be for her, to return to somewhere she had thought finished when they moved to the Wilhelmskogel – like a false memory, or a slippage of time.

By now he was nearing the chestnut tree, with the main courtyard building to his right. He saw that the double gates were open into the cloister, above which, Daisy had told him, the young Katharina von A had once had her room, the infamous number twenty-three.

His hands were beginning to freeze, as he thrust them into his pockets and went through the gates into the colonnade.

The cold air had sobered him a little, but still he felt an urge to break, to make a stand. He wondered what had so unsettled him, what news, what change, as he strode ahead, seeing his shadow loom and overtake him on the wall. For a moment he asked himself what Friedrich would do. He seemed to hear his school friend’s footsteps beside his own, the usual half a pace ahead.

‘Are you all right?’ It was a woman’s voice, quiet in the darkness.

‘Yes, I’m very well.’

‘I was just coming back from checking on Harriet. Are you quite sure you’re all right?’

He could see it was Charlotte, as she stepped towards him, out of the darkness.

‘Would you like to see my room?’ he said.

‘No, thank you. I have to go back to the party. I have to dance with Franz and Peter.’

‘It’s a very nice room. It’s where I stayed while I was researching my article.’

‘Well, we should get a memorial plaque to stick on the wall. If it’s a friendly article.’