His thumb had found a soft spot on an apple. He looked down at it.

“Nine hours,” he said. “And we’re free. Movie tonight, right?”

She pushed her hair behind her ear to one side. It was the Berlin art student cut, he’d joked at first. When would the severe glasses show up?

“You talked,” she said. “All night, it felt like.”

“I don’t remember,” he said.

Her eyes had lost that glaze now.

“What,” he said. “A lot went on yesterday. So, sorry.”

“Your father. You were talking to him.”

“More than I did in the past, I suppose,” he said.

He gave her a chaste buss, a kiss, on the forehead. She grabbed him.

“Oh, it’s okay if you do it, is it,” he said.

“Be quiet,” she said.

She brought his head down and kissed his eyes, one by one, slowly. Then she stepped back, her arms at full length on his shoulders.

“You Italians,” he said. “I don’t stand much of a chance with you, do I? Tease, lecture. Tease, nag, fly off the handle. Hey, instead of a movie, do you want to-”

“The movie,” she said. “I’ve been looking forward to it.”

Just as he had not. Some documentary thing made by an Italian about Tibet.

“What a strange and complicated little boy you are,” she said.

FOUR

Work gave Felix a break from trying to figure out what had made Giuliana moody. Sepp Gebhart glanced up from his keyboard as he came into the duty room.

“Gruss, Gebi.”

He glanced toward the Bezirkinspektor’s office. Schroek’s desk lamp, one that he put on no matter the time of day, was not lighted. The same Dieter Schroek commanded this post in Stefansdorf by remote control some days. It suited everyone. Felix had heard solid rumours that Stefansdorf would be closed as soon as the amalgamation happened.