“We’ll come back to that. You were taking money from Ms. Nijinsky, weren’t you, Ms. Morgan?”

Morgan frowned. “Taking money? Certainly not. I borrowed some money from her, and only at her insistence. I was remodeling my apartment, and I ran out of cash. I had some six-month CDs that were not due to mature for another three months, and Sasha said it would be crazy to cash them and lose the interest, and that she wanted to loan me the money to finish the project. It came to twenty thousand dollars out of the eighty that I spent on the project.”

This was not going the way Stone had meant it to. “You want us to believe that Ms. Nijinsky just loaned you the money—you, a person she had only recently met?”

“I don’t much care what you believe,” Morgan said coldly. “The money was a loan; I insisted on giving Sasha a promissory note for the amount, although she wouldn’t accept interest.”

“You’re aware that we have Ms. Nijinsky’s financial records and that we can search them for this note?” He was faltering now. Why hadn’t he gone through those records more carefully?

“That’s fine with me. I have a copy, if you need it.”

“Ms. Morgan, after the disappearance of Sasha Nijinsky, police experts removed a palm print from the outside of the sliding glass door of her apartment’s terrace. That palm print has since been identified as yours. On the outside of the door, Ms. Morgan, on the terrace from which Ms. Nijinsky fell. How do you explain that?”

“I told you that I had seen Ms. Nijinsky many times over the past weeks, often at her apartment. In fact, I think I remember when I could have left that palm print. On our last night together, Sasha and I took our wine out onto the terrace. There was no furniture out there, but it was a nice evening, and there was one break in the surrounding buildings where you could see some city skyline. I got something in my shoe, and I leaned against the sliding door while I shook out the shoe. I’m sure that must be the palm print you’re referring to.”

Leary, sitting next to Stone, was becoming restive.

Stone hurried. “Ms. Morgan, when Sasha told you she was seeing a man—at the same time she was making love to you—how did you feel about that?”