“In my neighbor’s house. Her husband used to collect them. She said he bought them from a man who sold used furniture and odds and ends on a street corner, but she has no idea who the man was or where he set up shop. Her husband passed away years ago. She’s going to dig through his papers, but my impression is he was something of a pack rat so it might take a while to find anything like notes or a receipt. I figured I would try you here.”

She shook her head. “Sue might know. I would let you look at the archives, but I’m the only one here today and I can’t leave the desk. Unfortunately only a small fraction of our collection is digitized. We just don’t have the manpower to get most of it online. But she’s in, let me see, Friday at eleven. Can you try to stop by then?”

My first bit of luck so far: I had a closing shift that day and would be able to pop in again before I headed over to the spa. “Sure, that works for me.”

“You can try to research in our databases, too, but so many of our subscriptions have been slashed.”

“Friday sounds great, thank you so much. I’ll come back.”

“A few years ago, we would have been able to do so much more, but …” She shrugged and looked up. I became aware of how warm the library was, the muggy air pressing on my arms, and wondered if their air-conditioning had been cut, too.

I left unsure as to whether I should be hopeful or depressed. Maybe Mil would find something useful. At least the name of the person who sold the paintings to her husband, any scrap of information I could grab on to. Though a part of me also felt apprehensive about finding out who the artist was. After New York—where everyone was climbing over one another to get their name out, to trade in on favors and name drops to get laid, to get money, to get attention—there was something so appealing about the anonymity of this painter. The way he or she had continued to document and interpret the shifts and moods of the city, whether ever recognized for it or not, had integrity. It was humbling to see the care the artist had put into these paintings, and I loved the way they opened up the city, the layers of the past that were invisible otherwise. Like the city’s memory of my father—lost.