It was the end of autumn, the time when the wind grew dry and began to sting the skin. The place was a back alley in the Gothic Quarter of Barcelona's old town. Dead leaves had piled up on the cobblestones, and laundry fluttered overhead like a patchwork of flags. About an hour remained until dusk—the sky still held its blue, but only the outlines of distant buildings had already begun to stain orange. At the dead end of that alley stood a single bar.*

An old wooden sign creaked and swayed. The door was left open, and from inside spilled the smell of cigarette smoke and coffee, along with the voices of a few locals.