They landed at Vigo just after daybreak and secured a room in a small hotel on a rise above the harbor. It was the sort of place that Gray had always imagined they would find in Spain: a white room with tiled floor, a view of the sea through blue-shuttered windows. Below were hanging gardens and a patio with terra cotta urns. They lunched on soup, bread, and wine. It was a brisk day, and the wind had brought out the color in her cheeks. Her eyes, too, were clear again.

After lunch she left him on a terrace for a couple of hours to browse, she said, through the local shops. Then they returned to their room and dozed together on the narrow bed. What had begun as a drab day with yellow mist along the shore ended magnificently with contrasting shades of pink and green.

"You know, we could always just stay here," he told her. "We could stay here for a month."

There was a bottle of Burgundy at her elbow, a plate of dried fish and grapes. Since her return from the shops, however, she had apparently lost her appetite.

"What would we do when the money runs out?"

He reached for her hand. "I’ll paint, and you’ll dance. Well become a famous couple.

"I'm tired of fame, Nicky. If that's what it is."

He moved behind her, put his hand on her bare shoulder, then let it fall away. "Are you also tired of me, Margaretha. Is that really what's happening now?"

She grabbed his wrist with something in her eyes that he'd never seen before. Quite apart from the tears, there was definitely something that he had never seen before.

"No, I'm not tired of you. I never will be."

Her other hand clamped to his arm and drew him closer. "Do you understand that, Nicky? I will never grow tired of you."

"Darling, what's wrong?"

"Just tell me that you understand it. Tell me."

"All right. I understand."

The kiss, too, was like nothing before it. A painful, almost desperate kiss that tasted of Burgundy and salt. Then she couldn't seem to get rid of her clothing fast enough, and actually tore her dress before moving into his arms. She had to feel his hands all over her body, lips to her breast, heart to her heart.

An hour later she was unusually quiet, lying on her belly and toying with a trinket she had picked up along the quay. She kept gazing through a bit of polished glass, sighting the moon above the palms. It was a white disk of a moon, perfect as any in Paris. When his hand finally slipped back across the sheets to her thigh, she stirred but still said nothing.

Then from the very heart of her silence: "Nicky, I lied to you. I didn't go to the shops this afternoon. I went to see the French consul, Martial Cazeaux."