“That will be fine, Ms. Warshawski. The address is the Roanoke Building, twelfth floor. I’ll tell the doorman to look out for your car.”

The Roanoke was an old dowager on Oak Street, one of six or seven buildings bordering the strip between the lake and Michigan Avenue. All had gone up in the early decades of this century, providing housing for the McCormicks and Swifts and other riffraff. Nowadays if you had a million dollars to invest in housing and were related to the British royal family, they might let you in after a year or two of intensive checking.

I set a speed record for two-finger typing and got reports and invoices into their envelopes by eight-thirty. I’d have to forgo whiskey and steak—I didn’t want to be logy for an encounter with someone who could set me up for life—but there was time for soup and a salad at the little Italian restaurant up Wabash from my office. Especially if I didn’t have to worry about parking at the other end.

In the restaurant bathroom I saw that my hair was frizzing around my head from this morning’s drizzle, but at least the black dress still looked tidy and professional. I put on a little light makeup and retrieved my car from the underground garage.

It was just nine-thirty when I pulled into the semicircle under the Roanoke’s green awning. The doorman, resplendent in matching green livery, bent his head courteously while I gave him my name.

“Ah, yes, Ms. Warshawski.” His voice was fruity, his tone avuncular. “Mr. Humboldt is expecting you. If you’ll just give me your keys?”

He led me into the lobby. Most modern buildings going up for the rich these days feature glass and chrome lobbies with monstrous plants and hangings, but the Roanoke had been built when labor was cheaper and more skillful. The floor was an intricate mosaic of geometric shapes and the wood-paneled walls were festooned with Egyptian figurines.

An old man, also in green livery, was sitting on a chair next to some wooden double doors. He got up when the doorman and I came in.

“Young lady for Mr. Humboldt, Fred. I’ll let them know she’s here if you’ll take her on up.”

Fred unlocked the door—no remote-control clicks here—and took me to the elevator at a stately tread. I followed him into a roomy cage with a floral carpet on the floor and a plush-upholstered bench against the back wall. I sat casually on the bench, crossing my legs, as though personal elevator service were an everyday occurrence with me.

The elevator opened onto what might have been the foyer of a mansion. Gray-white marble tiles showing streaks of pink were covered here and there by throw rugs that had probably been made in Persia when the Ayatollah’s grandfather was a baby. The hall seemed to form an atrium, with the elevator at its center, but before I could tiptoe down to a marble statue in the left corner to explore, the carved wooden door in front of me opened.