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 gravely serving their tiffin of limp sandwiches and tepid soda. And when Aunt Julia had revived, he led her out, incongruous under a wide umbrella, to confront the Dreamer in the Ruins. The hum of explanation came drowsily to Owen and the girl.

Their pretext—of hunting for small Buddhas among the rubbish—led them slowly out of ear-shot. Prodding into likely or impossible corners, happy to be together, they encountered awkward, expectant silences, which neither knew how to break. From above crumbled walls, and parching screens of jungle, the bronze face of the Dreamer smiled with downcast eyes, as though they too appeared in the illusion of Forms, along with so many past phantoms—war and worship, growth and decay, other lives and loves—so many eager shadows flitting imperious and futile across this solitude.