Toward the end of the nineteenth century, on a crisp autumn Sunday in Paris, a dreamy young man named Gerhard takes a solitary stroll. Handsome and well-bred, with a comfortable embassy job, he seems perfectly poised to continue his predictable ascent in society. Yet a fateful naivete and a mysterious timidity lie twined at the root of his soul, choking off his engagement with life and making him as vulnerable to its dangers as a sleepwalker. A chance...