“Are you sure?” asked Jessica. “I put a price of five hundred dollars on that picture to make certain nobody would buy it because I wanted to give it to my mom.”

“It was also the gentleman’s favorite,” said Miss Tomkins. “And the price didn’t seem to bother him.”

“What was this gentleman’s name?” asked Samantha, quietly.

“I’ve no idea. He came just before the show opened and bought every one of Jessica’s pictures.” She looked around the room. “But he seems to have left.”

“I wish I’d seen him,” said Jessica.

“Why?” asked Samantha.

“Because then I could have filled in the face.”

*   *   *

“How much?” said Ellie May in disbelief.

“About a million and a half dollars,” admitted Cyrus.

“That must be the most expensive one-night stand in history, and I’m damned if I’m going to let the little hussy get away with it.”

“But she’s a lady,” said Cyrus.

“She won’t be the first lady who recognizes a sucker when she sees one.”

“But there’s still a possibility that little Freddie is mine.”

“I have a feeling,” said Ellie May, “that little Freddie isn’t even hers.”

“So what are you going to do about it?”

“Make damn sure Lady Virginia realizes she hasn’t got away with it.”

*   *   *

Hakim drifted out of a shallow sleep. He blinked, pressed a button in his armrest and his seat straightened up. Moments later a stewardess offered him a warm flannel. He gently rubbed his eyes, forehead and finally the back of his neck, until he felt half awake.

“Would you like some breakfast, Mr. Bishara?” the stewardess asked as she removed the flannel with a pair of tongs.

“Just orange juice and a black coffee, please.”

He glanced at the woman on his right but he could see that she only had a few more pages of her book to read, so he reluctantly decided not to interrupt her.

When the pilot announced they would be landing in thirty minutes, the woman immediately disappeared into the lavatory and didn’t reemerge for some time. Hakim concluded that there had to be a lucky man waiting for her at Heathrow.

Hakim always liked to be among the first passengers to disembark, especially when he was only carrying hand luggage and wouldn’t be held up in the baggage hall. His chauffeur would be waiting for him outside the terminal building and, although it was a Sunday, he still intended to go into the office and tackle the mountain of unanswered mail that would have piled up on his desk. Once again, he cursed the Nigerian oil minister.