One night, we were going to the Spätenbrau Restaurant on Kneiphöfsche Langgasse, near Cathedral Island. But en route we went to see the ruins of the cathedral and Immanuel Kant’s grave, which was largely undamaged, mostly to give ourselves an appetite for life. Irmela knew a lot about Kant but was always kind enough not to tell me too much at once since I was an intelligence officer more by default than by aptitude. What I knew about Kant you could write on a spinning gas nebula. The cathedral itself was like a huge, empty skull found in the embers of a fire after some medieval execution. It was hard to know exactly what the RAF had been aiming their bombs at, since the nearest military target was more than a kilometer away. Or was it that they figured the only way to beat Germany was to be as bad as Germany? If so, then it certainly looked as if they had a good chance of winning.

“I always thought I’d get married in here,” said Irmela as we wandered hand in hand around the ruins.

“Anyone in particular?”

“There was someone, but he was killed at Stalingrad.”

“One of the lucky ones, probably.”

“You think so?”

“We won’t see most of those boys again. From what we know in the FHO, they’re most of them working in Soviet slave-labor camps. If you ask me, your boyfriend was spared.” I nodded. “So, let’s you and I get married instead. In here. Right now. Come on. Why not?”

“Well, for one thing, you’re already married,” she said, “in case you’d forgotten.”

“What’s that got to do with anything? Besides, my wife is back in Berlin and I’ll probably never see her again. Oh, and there’s this for good measure: You say you love me and I certainly love you and I just happen to have a ring on my finger that will do for a ceremony until I can buy another. Besides, you’ll probably be a widow before very long. And the blasphemy and bigamy certainly doesn’t matter either since I’m going to hell already. If it makes you feel any better I’ll take full responsibility for this when I get down there. I’ll say, ‘Look, it wasn’t Irmela’s fault, I persuaded her.’”

“You promise?”

“I can include that in the vows we make, if you like.”

“We don’t even have a priest.”

“Who needs a priest in a Lutheran cathedral? I thought that was the whole idea of the German Reformation. To abolish priestly intercession. Besides, I can remember all the damn words. I’ve been married enough times already to know them by heart.”

“You’re serious, aren’t you?”