The place looked as if it hadn’t changed since the thirties, like a bedroom long walled off that you discover when knocking down a partition in an apartment, with its period furniture, its unmade bed still bearing the imprint of a head on a pillow, and the evening paper lying on the nightstand, its headline announcing the assassination of President Paul Doumer. No doubt that was why the bar was called the Hole in the Wall. From outside, it was very difficult to spot the entrance in the dark wall.