There was no point in staying any longer. I rose to my feet. “I have to go,” I said. “Maybe I could have your address, Mr. Walcott, and give you mine, just in case you hear anything about your cousin.”

Willie Walcott and I exchanged addresses. “Do come up and visit me if you feel like it. Don’t be put off by the girls who live on the first floor,” he said. “They are dancers, not what you might think they are.” He promised to get in touch with me if he heard anything about Sid and Gus. I got up and tried to pay for my coffee. Protests came from all around the table. “But we haven’t even started discussing your poetry yet. You simply can’t go.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’ll come back another time.”

“Come to the poetry circle on Monday. It’s a lively group,” the redheaded one said. “We meet here, but it tends to be something stronger than coffee.”

I left them and found that the rain had eased to a fine misty drizzle. I followed the Boulevard Saint-Michel in the direction of the Seine, anxious now to get back to Liam and frankly at a loss of what to do next. At least Willie Walcott had suggested someone else I might contact—the Jewish relative that Sid had met, who had clearly impressed her, much to the annoyance of Willie Walcott. And my Montmartre painter friends would surely be able to help me locate him. But it seemed like one of those childhood games in which one stumbles around blindfolded and everyone yells out “warmer” and “colder” as one seeks for something. I was getting nowhere and time was ticking on.

On the Boulevard Saint-Michel students were now pouring out of buildings on my right, making for the small cafés and bistros along the street. They laughed and shouted to one another, apparently without a care in the world except for a small group that stood up on a fountain, shouting through a bull horn. “Justice for Drefus now!” they chanted. “Reinstate him. Punish the true guilty one.”

Their words were answered with some cheers and some catcalls. I hurried past, not wanting to get caught up in a brawl.