“But why is it,” I ask them one night as we sit lingering over the remnants of another delicious meal, “that you’re painting like this, writing like this, now?”

There’s a pause as they consider the question.

“I suppose it’s partly because of the war,” Ben says, swirling his drink around in his glass, staring into it with a frown as though there’s an answer there. “Afterwards there was what they called the ‘return to order’, a sort of need for familiarity after all that trauma, all that…” He trails off uncomfortably. We’re all too young to remember much of the war, but still it hangs over us, over everyone.

“Return to order,” I repeat thoughtfully.

Ben nods. “So, more familiar, you know.” He places his glass down on the table and his hands move animatedly as he talks. “More objective, I suppose. Safer to keep things at a distance.”

“But now” – Klaus picks up the thread of Ben’s conversation – “artists like Matisse and Picasso are embracing the abstract again. It’s as though there’s been a falling away of tradition, making space for something new and different, something vital, completely of this moment…”

“Yes, yes,” Ben agrees. “Focussing on today, not shackled to the past.”

“It’s like the metamorphosis of the mayfly,” I say thoughtfully. “They spend their whole lives in the water preparing for a single day of dancing in the sun.” Everyone looks at me with interest, so I expand. “The Latin name is Ephemeroptera,” I say. “It’s from the Greek, epi and hemera, meaning to live for a day.”

“Ephemeral,” Ursula’s smoky voice joins in. “Something fleeting.”

“Exactly,” I say.

I have always dismissed painting and writing as being quite frivolous compared to the thrill of scientific discovery, which could change lives. But somehow, listening to these people talk with passion and excitement, I wonder whether I have been missing out on something after all.

“I never expected that I could find art so interesting,” I say.

“There’s not much in this world that is more of interest if you ask me.” Ben lounges back in his chair with an air of satisfied certainty.

“Well, science,” I point out.

“Science?” Ben’s eyes glitter in the candlelight. “Cold, impersonal, fact gathering.” His tone is dismissive.

“Biology is the study of life.” I lean forward, gripping the arms of my chair. “It’s about finding our place in the universe, unravelling the mysteries of nature. How could something so intricate and beautiful possibly be cold?” I ask. “Science examines what it means to be alive.”

For a moment my words hang in the air, and Ursula exhales a slow stream of cigarette smoke, a glimmer of something that looks like respect in her eyes.