Then he got up, leaving me alone with them, and went to join two men sitting in the armchairs near the bar. I have only a disjointed memory of that evening, as if it had unfolded on a staccato rhythm, faster and faster. Who was the man at the table with the ballerina that evening? It could not have been Hovine, whom I met later, or Jean-Pierre Bonnefoux, who studied with her under Kniaseff at Studio Wacker. We exit the restaurant, and the man with her, whose face has been erased forever, leaves us on the sidewalk. I am alone with her. She tells me she needs to walk and that her building isn’t far away. I offer to accompany her.

We follow Boulevard Pereire, then Avenue de Villiers. The air is warm, almost like in summer, and yet I seem to recall it was in the month of November. And I’m certain that the trees hadn’t yet shed their leaves.