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it. It was daybreak, the birds were rowing, it all sounded as though she was in a glass bowl. In the distance she heard the occasional sounds of sparse traffic and the shunting of locomotives.
    Before long, Hubert and Gillian were writing to each other every day. Matthias wondered why she was checking her e-mail all the time. She shrugged. Under cover of her pseudonym, Gillian asked Hubert why he wanted his models to undress when he claimed their bodies didn’t interest him. He answered in almost identical words to those he had used at the interview, so she didn’t believe him. He wrote about the encounter as part of the process, of the right moment, of the impossibility of planning. He asked her for her picture. Gillian wrote back that she didn’t have any photographs of herself.
    Have we ever met?
    Gillian didn’t see his e-mail till the next morning. She had to go to Hamburg for a couple of days to record a feature about an elderly writer who had produced a kind of autobiography. Her flight didn’t leave until midday, and she was still in bed when Matthias left for work. He kissed her goodbye.
    She had slept badly and felt depressed without knowing why. Even before her first cup of coffee, she sat down at the computer. She told Hubert that she didn’t want to model for him. She had imagined him taking her photograph in her apartment and it hadn’t felt right. Not the nudity, but his presence in her apartment, his looking around and making a picture of her life. No hard feelings.
    She drank her coffee and smoked a cigarette. While she showered, she imagined Hubert painting her portrait. She looked around his studio. He pointed to an old leather sofa. Without taking off her coat, she sat down. He took a chair, sat down facing her, and started sketching her. After a time he put down his sketchbook and appeared irresolute. At last he said, very softly so that she barely understood, she could change behind the partition.
    When Gillian reappeared, naked, from behind the partition, Hubert was just loading film into a big camera. Not looking up, he asked her to lie on the sofa with a book. He peered into the camera’s viewfinder, she couldn’t see his eyes, but sensed his cold, prying look.
    Gillian packed her traveling bag. She still had time, and checked her e-mails. Hubert had written back already. He wrote that if she didn’t want to be photographed in her apartment, they could meet at his studio. You’re giving yourself away, she thought, you’re changing the rules as you’re going along.
    Their e-mails were batted back and forth in double-quick time.
    Are you alone?
    You wish.
    So you are.
    Now you’re taking advantage of me.
    How so?
    You’re imagining me.
    What alternative do I have if you refuse to show yourself to me?
    Why do you only paint women? And why naked?
    This time it took longer for an answer to come. His answer disappointed Gillian. She thought a moment, typed a question, deleted it. Wrote it again.
    Do you sleep with your models?
    When she fired off the e-mail, there was another one from Hubert. He wrote that the model’s nakedness created upset, disturbance, erotic tension. Art was the harnessing of this energy in a painting.
    Gillian regretted her question now. Again, Hubert’s answer took a while.
    Shall we meet?
    That’s unprofessional.
    Shall we meet?
    You’re repeating yourself.
    Life is repetition.
    No.
    Then what do you want?
    Gillian thought. She typed her answer, read it back, and smiled as she pressed Send. She didn’t wait for his reply and switched off the computer. The sound of the ventilator ceased, and the apartment became very quiet.
    In Hamburg it was raining. Gillian took a taxi from the airport to the author’s apartment. The film team was alreadythere, and the author was getting annoyed because the cameraman wanted to rearrange his living room. He also refused makeup, even though he had probably worn it hundreds of times. Gillian explained that it was to allow him to