Golden sand and water, parties and open-air markets. It’s such a different picture from their present-day scrabbling and striving in wartime, and Strange finds himself unexpectedly wistful, listening to Benedict and imagining it. The way he himself looks back on New York, on endless conveniences and everyday luxuries and portalling himself to the tropics for a nighttime swim.

“I’ve heard Rialto’s nice. Skinny-dipping in the warm ocean, that sort of thing.”

Adding, contemplative, “I’d have liked to see Minrathous. Properly, before all this, I mean. The way it was supposed to be.”