"Albrecht shook. He paced. Unable to manage his emotions, he left the apartment, but she lingered there alone while he walked the avenue to his post office, produced his key and opened his box and removed his magazines in brown paper, knowing that they were book catalogs and archeology journals and gazettes. The trip did something for his nerves. Being downtown without the usual faces and the crowds left him with feelings and sensations like tumbling down and away into the ash of a burning cigar, or thumbing the pages of a book as if to feel the slight rush of air escaping the edge of the pages. When he passed through the indoor shops and shuttled across the marble floor, it gave him a feeling of largesse that contained him from head to toe."