By my watch, midnight passes. The absence of creaks indicates a sleeping household. I’m singing a tune in my head to stay alert when a shadow stretches over the cobblestones to my right. I lean forward as a figure emerges. Bridling my hopes, I use my telescope to home in.

It’s the back of a suited man. His hair is light, trimmed short.

My breath holds while I seek his face. I glimpse a woman behind him, clutching his hand. They slow alongside the bell tower, a stone’s throw before me, and peer up toward the guard. Could a romance be the reason Arie strayed from his sworn duties?

But then I examine the man’s build. Narrow-shouldered and long-limbed. Not at all like Arie. Disappointment and relief wash over me in equal waves.

The fellow extends his head around the tower, perhaps assessing the length of Domplein. As if by a starter’s pistol, the couple dashes off in unison. They cut across the square’s width, leaving the cover of one tree to gain that of another. Past the cathedral, they disappear.

The hands of my watch soon mark one. I shift in my seat.

At last another figure appears. My spine straightens as I use my lens. From the far-left corner, the person rounds the bronze statue near the University Hall building and strides my way along the perimeter. I needn’t so much as squint to make out a German helmet. Although…for the chance Arie could be in disguise, I look closer, only to verify the structure of a stranger’s face.

The minutes go on ticking. I shake my head recurrently to sustain my focus. Even so, at some point, my mind drifts. I check my watch. It’s a smidge past two. From a glance to my right, I discover a new silhouette at the base of the bell tower, nearing the square. I scramble to raise my telescope.

Again it’s a man, alone, but a civilian based on his overcoat and trousers. A fedora obscures his head, yet his form and gait are staggeringly familiar. Or do I just want them to be?

Look this way, look this way. At the coolness on my palm, I find my free hand splayed on a glass pane. Recalling my plan to slide open the window and call out—in a stage whisper, of course—I stand to release the lock on the sill. Maddeningly, it won’t budge.

How could I have not tested it? Evidently I hadn’t had faith the actual need would arise.

At the corner of Dom Tower, same as the couple, the man peers around the edge. I’m terrified he’ll race away before I can see his face, before I know.

He looks up toward the belfry, then swivels to retract against the wall. Now toward me, he reveals his features from the nose down, all of them familiar.