He had even taken Allen into his confidence, showing him the plans he had drawn up, and the artist's rendering he had caused to be made. "Look", he said under his trim moustache, "you're in number nine, which is a bit—"

"—well, it's not really—"

"Could use more space? I know. You can see this— and this will become a split-level studio apartment. The entrance is at number ten, we'll put a wall here, you come in the front—foyer, kitchen (the original one). Now, here, windows, we'll redo them—and make it nice. Then number nine is actually a few feet lower, right? Two bedrooms. And what was your kitchenette will be an extra room—you know, a room—for uh, anything. To have enough room you need to have an extra room."

Not just extra room, of course, but a continuum of Raum, including infinite, improbable surface, here vast and gradual, there abruptly slithering into a crease, a recessive orifice, a sharp u-turn.

Allen said to himself: the entrance to Menot Valley is not mined. It is valuable grazing land. It is heavily-guarded, but a skillful man can cross the frontier at night undetected. From the promontories on either side the enemy can observe most of the pass, except for a narrow defile directly below the western promontory; hidden far above by the slope of the mountain, a view of it is also intermittently obstructed by a ridge. That's where my room will be.