He smiled drily. ‘What’s love after a decade? A dried-up old thing. I have no use for it.’ A tongue darted out; he licked his lips. I felt he was buying time. Eyes back to the painting again, as if trying to chase something down. ‘Jenö came to see me last week.’

‘Oh.’

In all the multiplicities of this conversation, I hadn’t imagined Jenö had got here first. ‘Was that nice? To see him again?’

‘It was.’

‘I saw him at Irmi’s Christmas party. It was quite awkward.’

‘He said.’

‘Well, it looks like Jenö has pipped me to the post again!’

‘He wanted help actually.’

‘Help? Help with what?’

Walter’s face was tight, his expression hard.

‘Walter. What did Jenö want help with?’ I said, feeling that inexpressible vertigo, as I had done at the Obersee lake, that everything was about to invert and veer.

‘Don’t be angry.’

‘Just say it.’

‘He asked if I could help him.’

‘Yes, yes, help him how?’

‘He wants to leave Germany. I’ve arranged a job for him at my uncle’s gallery in London.’ His uncle; the one who would pay valuta. He ballooned his cheeks and let them go. ‘Jenö wants Charlotte to go with him.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘He wants Charlotte to leave Germany.’

‘What? Why?’

‘It’s too dangerous for her here.’

I laughed; this was absurd. ‘We’re fine.’

‘Paul,’ he said, ‘you must listen.’

A key turned in the door. Walter looked up, frightened. ‘Please, come away from the window.’ He pulled me behind the Japanese screen as we heard the maid’s footsteps, and I wondered what I would say if I saw Ernst again in the flesh. But it was women’s voices which filled the corridor: Mrs Steiner had come home; the Kaiserhof woman with her pressed curls.

Behind the screen was Ernst’s desk: on top of it were papers and pens. A blueprint from an office building caught my eye, with unreadable words in blue ink.

I had no desire to be here; to hear what could only have been confected by a man as mad as Walter König. To have visited in the first place had been a mistake. ‘This is stupid. I’m sorry. It’s my fault. I should go. I shouldn’t have come.’

He laid a hand on my arm, waiting for Mrs Steiner to leave the hall.

‘What do you want?’ I asked, shrugging off his touch.

‘Listen, won’t you. Charlotte won’t go.’

‘Of course she won’t. Look, this is ridiculous. This is the maddest thing you’ve made up so far!’

‘No. Ernst has made it perfectly clear. Foreigners. Artists. Jews. They won’t belong in Germany soon. And neither will the Bauhaus. You do know she’s working at the Bauhaus?’