‘We’ll go then. You’ll understand why I’d rather she go with me later than with you now.’

‘Nothing will happen. I promise. It will only be until you get to London.’

I forced myself to meet his eye. ‘It’s up to her.’

‘She’s scared,’ he said. ‘You have to persuade her to go.’

I didn’t want to hear Walter’s words that so tormented me at night. ‘She can make up her own mind. She said she doesn’t want to go.’

‘She’s a foreigner,’ he said. ‘A woman who dresses as a man! Even at the Bauhaus, she’s avant-garde. Don’t you see what that makes her, to them? Persona non grata. A foreign agitator. An enemy of the state. No better than a Kozi. She’s in danger.’

Outside, rain began. We turned to watch it.

He finished his drink.

‘For God’s sake,’ he said, ‘I swear nothing will happen. And if I had all the money in the world there’d be a seat on that flight for you too. But I don’t. We’ll fly to London. I have a job with Uncle König. You can join us as soon as you can afford it.’

‘When I saw you at the Christmas party I never expected this to be your approach,’ I said, though I knew it sounded petty. ‘I thought it would be more direct.’

‘What approach?’ he said. His hands were on his lap. I wished he’d use them. I wished he’d hit me instead of this mild, dragging diplomacy. ‘This isn’t a strategy; this isn’t an approach. Don’t you see? Everything has changed. Since Hitler, nothing can be the same.’

I went to the window. I wanted shot of him: his galling innocence, his earnest goodness. As if we were eighteen again in a Weimar attic, I thought how much I’d like to do Jenö some violence. ‘You’ll live together? In London?’ There was bitterness in my voice now. ‘Is that how it will be? A cosy flat near Buckingham Palace?’

‘Only by necessity, Paul!’

‘Don’t you see why I can’t do that?’ I said to the glass. ‘How can you be so blind? How can you force me to make this choice?’

‘I am not the one who is blind! Why do you have such wilful disregard for her safety?’

I turned to face him. ‘Because it is our life! Because it is the only thing I have ever wanted! Because I have never wanted anything as much as I have wanted this, and I will not give it up! Not for anything, Jenö, not for anything!’

Then there was silence between us. Jenö looked around the room. He picked up the Klee book, and looked at the bookmarked painting. ‘You’ve seen her new work?’

‘Yes.’

‘Magnificent, isn’t it?’ he said, his voice a little resigned. ‘All that yellow.’