In driving through Germany from north to south, they occasionally deviate from the itinerary on the maps, passing through towns Oleg has heard his parents speak of. Towns where his ancestors had roots and that they left, one day, at the invitation of a Russian tsarina. “All this on account of that little princess who decided to come to Russia …”

Often the facade of a palace, lit by a low sun, strikes him as grievously familiar. Yes, he has seen it before! Neither in a photograph nor in a film, but in the fanciful terraces of the model constructed by his father. He remembers that voice, all of whose inflections, touching bursts of enthusiasm and hidden sorrows he can now fathom: “I told you about that beautiful forest at Reinhardswald. Sababurg Castle is there. Look. I’m just building it …” His father begins humming: “So hab ich dieses Schloss erbaut …” He breaks off, studies his son with distraught compassion. “You know this castle without ever having been there. When you were little your mother used to tell you stories. And they all happened at Sababurg …”

At Kassel, in the window of an antique shop near their hotel, Oleg sees an old magic lantern, very similar to the relic preserved for generations by the Erdmann family. Characters in wigs revolving in a slow repetition of scenes for which there can be no development, no outcome … What strikes him is the madness of this haunting little ring of tiny figures within the narrow confines of the glass lantern: the world of human beings is no different! The same merry-go-round that conceals the preparations for wars, the coming to fruition of slaughter. The great park Eva takes him to was landscaped on top of the ruins of the town of Kassel, flattened by bombing. With a bewilderment that chokes him, Oleg tells himself that before that catastrophe the magic lantern’s little figures used to revolve like this, and that, after it, once the mechanism was rewound, they would be ready to go through their paces all over again. And that what these snow-laden trees in their beauty are hiding is, in truth, ruins, broken lives, thousands of dead …

Their journey seems to him to be a mad undertaking, a ridiculous attempt to resist the earth’s rotation. He senses the same doubt in Eva. Back in their room, before taking off their coats, they stand there facing one another, at a loss, waiting for an admission of failure to be made. Then, suddenly, they put their arms around one another in an awkward embrace, silent, as if seeking to shield one another from an explosion … And that night, their first night of intimacy, Oleg grasps that love can also be this protective tenderness, one that holds grief at bay, one whose very essence is the gleam of snow coming from the window, as well as the trembling fingers of this sleeping woman’s hand. A very simple certainty: the goal of their journey was this somnolent city, this room looking out over the tall, white trees, the bluish resonance of the dark shadow on the woman’s hand where his lips brush against it.

From Stuttgart Eva calls her translation agency, succeeds in negotiating more time. Oleg makes several vain attempts to reach Zhurbin. Finally he calls Tanya on her cell phone and she exclaims: “So that’s it then. You’ve gone back to your Teutonic roots!” This observation is followed by a yell: “But this call is costing me a million! Your Zhurbin’s been arrested. They’re charging him with misappropriation of funds … Ciao!” A fairly run-of-the-mill charge, Oleg thinks, and one that will enable the “hunters” to carve up all the businesses Zhurbin has been running.

He tells Eva that Zhurbin has been jailed, talks about the child who lives in Lugano, the little girl to whom, when in Berlin, he forgot to send a postcard. “We could go and see her,” suggests Eva. “It’s almost on our route. Provided the Swiss don’t block your entry. You don’t have a visa …”

They cross the border early in the morning, with Oleg hiding under a pile of clothes on the backseat. “If they find you, pretend to be asleep,” Eva advises. “After all, you don’t have your pockets stuffed with watches …”

Once in Switzerland they decide to pass through the country without spending a night there, still on account of this lack of a visa. They drive on, relieving one another at the wheel and taking turns sleeping, and succeed in reaching Lugano around three o’clock in the afternoon. “We ought to buy the little girl a gift,” suggests Eva. Oleg remembers Zhurbin telling him about the child communicating with fishes. They buy two fish, fairly ordinary, but swimming around quite energetically in a transparent plastic pouch, into which, apart from the water, the salesman has put a little pondweed.

The management of the boarding school where Nina lives have no objection in principle to their visit. “We’re a couple,” Oleg whispers in Eva’s ear. “If I were on my own they’d never let me near the child.” The director’s assistant is consulting a large visitors’ book. Suddenly her face tenses, she asks them to wait a minute, and disappears behind the heavy door of the neighboring office. “If worst comes to worst,” they agree, “we could simply ask them to give the fish to the child …”

The assistant returns accompanied by a very plump man with very white skin whose look signals real embarrassment.

“We’re very happy to be able to speak to Mr. Zhurbin’s friends because … well, it’s a rather delicate matter … his payments for the fees are already a month overdue. And for a week, now, we’ve not been able to reach him.”

Oleg surprises himself with his own cool composure. (“My histrionic experience in films has not been wasted.”) In the tones of one who is completely solvent, he says: “Doctor, I’m telling you this in great confidence. Mr. Zhurbin is preparing to take up a highly important post in the Russian government, so this is not a matter of forgetfulness on his part. There’s been an unfortunate malfunction during the breaking in of his new team. He knew I was planning to visit Nina and has asked me, as I was coming, if I could settle this small financial matter. I suppose you accept dollars …”

They leave the office, and guided by a nurse, follow a footpath among fir trees. “I now have a thousand dollars left, and that’s it,” whispers Oleg, looking like a gambler who’s just been cleaned out. Eva smiles: “It doesn’t matter. We’ll eat pasta and sleep in the car …”

The footpath leads around a small pond fenced in by a wooden trellis. Some ten children, accompanied by three teachers, are playing around this patch of water. At a call from the nurse a little girl in a woollen hat detaches herself from the group, runs up, and takes hold of Eva’s hand, as if she had always known her. “Come and see. My fishes talk to me!”

They go up to a narrow gate fastened with a hook. Nina opens it, under the vigilant eye of one of the teachers, goes up to the edge and starts reciting a nursery rhyme. The water quivers, is streaked with fins, flashes with golden scales. The child takes a piece of bread from her pocket, throws crumbs to the fish, calling them by their names. “Naughty things!” she murmurs suddenly, as a light lapping sound can be heard—that of mouths snapping at the last crumbs, or at nothing. “They say the bread was good but they prefer cookies …” The child crouches down, watches the fish swimming away, seems to forget the grown-ups. Her lips are moving in an inaudible conversation. Oleg realizes that these few moments leave him the time to see the sky upturned in the dark transparency of the pond, to hear a bird, to breathe in a more measured way. Yes, to feel he’s alive. “Nina, we’ve brought two more for you, but they don’t know how to talk yet,” says Eva. “You can teach them Russian.” The child opens the bag and whispers: “Take care, the water’s chilly. Don’t catch cold.” With a glint of orange, two bodies vanish into the pond. She stands up, looks at Oleg and Eva, makes an effort to find words not known at her age: “I’ll wait for you … I’ll show you my turtles as well. Next time, Daddy will come with you, yes?”