A bored voice interrupted my fantasies, an insolent noise enquiring whether there was anything else that I needed, and I looked up irritably as the young man's older colleague, overweight and with dark bags beneath his eyes, stood before me. I glanced at the Riesling, which was almost empty—had I really drunk an entire bottle of wine alone?—and shook my head, certain that it was time for bed. "But tell me," I said, hoping that my eagerness would not be a cause for humiliation. "The boy who was serving earlier. Is he still here? I wanted to thank him."

"His shift ended ten minutes ago," he replied. "I expect he's gone home by now."

I tried not to let my disappointment show. It had been so long since I'd felt such a powerful and unexpected attraction to anyone that I didn't know how to act when thwarted. I was uncertain what I wanted from him but then what does one want from the Mona Lisa or the statue of David other than to sit silently in their presence and appreciate their enigmatic beauty? I was due to return home the following afternoon so could not even plan a surreptitious visit to the bar the following night. It was over; I would not see him again.

Something like a sigh escaped me and I might have laughed at my own foolishness but there was no laughter inside me now, just longing and regret. The solitude I'd endured throughout my life had stopped being painful many years before but now, without warning, it had reared its head again and old, forgotten heartaches sought my attention. My thoughts turned to Oskar Gött and the single year of our acquaintance. If I closed my eyes I could see his face before me still, his complicit smile, his deep blue eyes, and the arch of his back as he lay asleep in the guesthouse in Potsdam on the weekend of our bicycling holiday. If I concentrated I could recall the anxiety I'd felt that he should wake and discover my indecency.

And then, to my surprise, I was interrupted once again. I looked up and there was the young waiter, now changed into a pair of dark jeans, a casual shirt with two buttons undone at the neck and a leather jacket with a fur trim around the collar. He carried a woolen hat in his hands.

"I'm sorry to disturb you," he said, and I knew immediately that he was not German as I'd assumed but English, his voice betraying echoes of Yorkshire or the Lake District. "It's Mr. Erich Ackermann, isn't it?"

"That's right," I said, surprised that he should know my name. "May I shake your hand?"

He reached out. The skin on his palm looked soft and I noticed how neatly trimmed were his nails. A fastidious creature, I thought. He wore a plain silver band on the middle finger of his right hand.

"Certainly," I said, a little bewildered by this turn of events. "We don't know each other, though, do we?"

"No, but I'm a great admirer," he said. "I've read all your books. I read them before Dread came out too so I'm not just jumping on the bandwagon."

"That's very kind of you," I said, trying to conceal my delight. "Very few people have."

"Very few people are interested in art," he replied.

"That's true," I agreed. "But the lack of an audience should never be a deterrent to the artist."

"I've even read your book of poems," he added, and I grimaced. "They were ill advised," I said.

"I disagree," he said, quoting a line from one that made me hold my hands in the air, pleading with him to stop. He beamed then, and laughed, displaying wonderfully white teeth. As he did so, a slight crinkle appeared beneath his eyes. He was so very beautiful.

"And your name?" I asked, pleased to have an opportunity to stare at him.

"Maurice," he replied. "Maurice Swift."

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Maurice," I replied. "It's nice to know that there are still some young people who are interested in literature."

Excerpted from A Ladder to the Sky by John Boyne. Copyright © 2018 by John Boyne. Excerpted by permission of Hogarth Books. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.