How many such overtures had there been, over the years? It was true that, earlier on, I had mostly overlooked them. And more recently? I could think only of the dinner invitation with the guest lecturer, a much more complicated situation than it had initially seemed, not to mention one I had gravely misinterpreted.

I felt the erratic beating of my heart slow a little, and I drew in a gasping breath. And what would life be like if I were the sort of person who waved casually at colleagues, who dispensed greetings like the enthusiastic Matthew? Quite probably I would also be a person who could say, without missing a beat, And where is Tübingen? I haven’t heard of it. Is it in the south?

Why not rest for a minute? I thought. I settled myself more comfortably in my seat. I could hear the geriatric ventilation system as it pushed feeble currents of air around the room, and the placid tick of the clock on the wall. A warm, drowsy feeling spread over me, and I had let my eyes close—just for a moment—when I became aware of another sound, someone speaking at a volume just lower than intelligible.

“Excuse me,” the person said again, this time more loudly, and I opened my eyes to see a woman of late middle age standing over me. She wore a black felt hat with a narrow brim and clutched to her side a shabby and commodious handbag that overflowed with papers.

“Yes?” I said, taken aback. I had not seen, or heard, her come in.

“Someone sitting there?” she asked unpleasantly, jabbing a long finger at the seat next to mine.

“No,” I said. “No, of course not.”

My response seemed not to please her at all. If anything, she now looked more aggrieved.

“Then may-be,” she hissed, “you’d be so kind as to move your…”

She gestured to the seat beside me.

“Paperweight,” I said, and then, more quietly: “Yes, of course.”

I endured her perfumed advances as she settled with unhappy noises into the seat beside me. She managed to contain her bulging handbag on the floor before her and then turned her attention toward the front of the room, where I saw that, to my astonishment, a man was now standing at the lectern. A distinguished-looking, silver-haired man who looked familiar, though I could not quite place him. And his arrival—how had I missed it?—was not the only new development. With the exception of a few empty seats here and there, the room was now full of people, apparently waiting for whatever would be happening onstage to begin.

“Thank you all for coming,” said the silver-haired man. His voice was quiet but had an air of authority that was impossible to overlook.