My stomach sank. I was already out of the running. There were no bids, however, so I thought I might still stand a chance. Bignon’s face was stoic. He repeated the price, gavel hovering in the air, and all seemed lost until he spied something—a raised finger belonging to the old man standing by himself in the row in front of me—and the fall of the hammer was postponed another moment as Bignon’s voice barked, “We have two thousand. Do I hear two thousand, two hundred and fifty?” I studied my competitor jealously: he was hatless and bald, grizzled and bent forward, dressed despite the weather in an outmoded, shapeless trench coat. His profile was vaguely familiar—I must have seen his face before—but where? There was another lull and another last-second bid. Again I looked around for the culprit: this time my attention fell on a thick-necked man in an expensive-looking suit at the back of the room. The two bidders continued the rally two or three more times before the old man’s tenacity carried the day and the man in the suit relented. The gavel struck the lectern at last, marking the manuscript’s sale, the auction’s end, and my own abject failure.

I followed the successful bidder in the trench coat to the front of the room, where the purchasers had gathered to settle their accounts and collect their trophies. I overheard him spell out his name to one of the auctioneer’s assistants: V-E-N-N-E-T. The Baudelaire manuscript was the only item he’d purchased. When he turned toward me, I saw his full face for the first time, and again sensed an untraceable recognition.

One of the assistants tapped me on the shoulder. “Do you have something to collect?”

I shook my head.

“In that case, please make way for the buyers.”

I went to the back of the room and smoked a Salomé while I waited for Vennet. Where had I seen that face before? An image of a riverside bookstall down by the wine market came to mind. Was he a bouquiniste? Having put the manuscript in a brown leather satchel, Vennet left the auction room. From a distance, I followed him as he descended the stairs and exited the building. He set off in the direction of the Rue de la Grange Batelière. I noticed, walking a short distance behind, that he was also being followed by not one but two separate men: the thick-necked fellow in the expensive suit who’d bid against him during the auction and another man, thin and bespectacled, wearing a gray homburg hat, whom I hadn’t previously noticed. From what Madeleine had told me, I’d expected one pursuant—an employee of the Baudelaire Society—but not two. When the bookseller turned right into the Passage Jouffroy, his two pursuants quickened their steps and also disappeared into the arcade.