At 18:15 the last visitors are herded toward the exits. By 19:00 the lights dim floor by floor. Then the museum breathes.
Guards do their first round with flashlights. Marble floors reflect the beams like dark water. In the Grande Galerie the Italian paintings wait in silence, no longer competing for attention. Veronese’s enormous Wedding at Cana covers an entire wall and finally has room to speak.
In the Islamic art wing the lattice windows throw patterns across empty carpets. The air smells of old wood and faint wax from centuries of polishing. Somewhere a door closes by itself; temperature changes do that in a building this old.
Cleaners arrive around midnight. They know which statues not to touch and which benches creak loudest. By 5 a.m. the first bakers arrive in the underground staff canteen. The smell of croissants drifts up through ventilation shafts while the Winged Victory stands alone on her staircase, wings catching the first pale light of morning. Then the gates open again and the silence is gone for another day.