“Both, I think I can safely say. But I’d prefer not to discuss this subject any further, if you don’t mind. I find it highly distasteful, especially with one who didn’t even know him. And I would like to eat my food before it gets cold.” He looked around. “What happened to my glass?”

“I put it down on that table,” I said. “One of the waiters must have cleared it away.”

“Damn. I’d better go and get another one. I need a steady supply of alcohol to keep me going.”

With that he turned his back on me. Interesting, I thought. Willie Walcott had been that new toy once. Had he been angry at being cast aside? Or had there been more new toys since him? And Willie was impoverished, so I had heard. Had he been relying on some kind of financial help from Reynold Bryce? And if Reynold had cut off that help… I paused, trying to picture the innocent-looking Mr. Walcott plunging a kitchen knife into Bryce’s chest. It didn’t seem likely, and yet I had learned by now that murderers are often the most unlikely of people.

I wondered who might know about the details of Reynold Bryce’s private life and be willing to talk about it. I tried moving about the room, invisible, and listening in with the hope of overhearing gossip, but I didn’t hear his name mentioned once. This was the Parisian art world of today, I gathered. Reynold Bryce belonged to yesterday and as such he had become irrelevant. But one thing I could surmise—they didn’t think that one of their own might be responsible or they’d have been discussing it.

I tried infiltrating groups and asking questions but at any gathering where people know each other intimately they showed no interest in an outsider. I was looking for Mary, hoping that we could make an early exit when I felt someone take my hand. It was that rather frightening Creole man, Vollard.

“You are looking for something, madame,” he said. “And you do not find it. A lost lover, maybe? A new lover?”

I laughed. “I am happily married, monsieur.”

“So is everyone in this room. That does not preclude the taking of lovers. It is an amusing sport and less exhausting than tennis. Everyone does it.”

I wondered for one awful moment whether he was suggesting that he might fill that role for me. But then he went on. “You are a fish out of water here. Why did you come?”

“I’m newly arrived in Paris. I’m staying with my friend Mary Cassatt. She thought I should experience the Steins’ salon at least once.”

“Ah, La Cassatt. Is she painting these days? Tell her to work harder. She is one whose work I can sell at the drop of a hat. And the best prices too.”