This was what he did when he felt like a failure: he withdrew. Erika said he withdrew into himself. He said, No—his self was no refuge. He understood what she meant, of course, the figure of speech. 

The first set had ended things. The second was just to let the air in.

Finally, in the mid-sixties, after two of my colleagues at the institute tried and failed several times, I managed to bring the two elderly gentlemen together.

Chance put the widower next to the widow. Or maybe chance had nothing to do with it, for the story began on All Souls. Be that as it may, the widow was already there when the widower tripped, stumbled,

We were in the car, swinging through the traffic, & the air inside drooped with folded wings at the shut windows & the scent she used, sweeping through the streets that swirled in eddies of changing light, talking

That’s me, lurking by the elementary school wrought-iron fence, standing with my hands in the pockets of my peacoat. I’m half Chinese, half Caucasian, shoulder-length black hair, ovoid face, epicanthic

We were bloated. Here in Hong Kong we had nine floors full of staff. I had been sent from New York to run two of these floors, our regional marketing and sales departments. We had seventy employees

We had conjectured the impact of the blockade: shortages of petrol and tobacco, a dearth of news, an end to the tourist trade. But now we were told potable water would be rationed. Water surrounded us

He says he is a friend. He is no friend of mine. I have been saying that since I arrived here in Sarzana, to whoever will listen. I sleep on a thin wooden bed.

It would have made me laugh in English, I think, the word he used for himself and that he insisted I use for him—not that he had had to insist, of course, I would call him whatever he wanted.