At the moment, sitting in the warm penthouse, the last of the snow scattering as the weather system crossed the lake, strong air currents from the west clearing the two vast blues of air and water, Amy and the Adletskys were waiting for Mrs Heisinger to appear. What Bodo Heisinger was saying was that Madge was concerned about the appraisal of the furniture. It just wouldn’t do. She had bought the sofas, chairs, breakfronts, carpets, hangings, mirrors, paintings, in the best shops, mainly at the Merchandise Mart, and with no decorators to guide her. She had kept all the bills.

Mr Adletsky, very low-keyed, said, ‘Ten years ago, or even fifteen?’

Certainly, said Bodo Heisinger, but the value of the antiques, like this beautiful Irish gaming table, had doubled.

‘We have your appraisal. Mrs Wustrin is preparing hers.’

In the guide to great fortunes published in Austin, Texas, Adletsky was ranked well above Malcolm Forbes and Turner of CNN, whereas Bodo Heisinger did not appear at all. In the old days he had manufactured squirt guns, peashooters, wind-up she-monkeys who combed their monkey hair while jiggling a hand mirror – nowadays, of course, children wanted hideous outer-space aliens, monstrously muscled and distorted. He had anticipated this, and his company was doing extremely well. It was tolerant of Adletsky to let Bodo play the great capitalist. The sums named were as trivial to the Adletskys as change slipping from your pants pocket between the sofa cushions and down into the upholstery.

Dame Siggy may have been concerned lest Heisinger carry things too far. She had set her heart on the apartment, and there was no reason why she shouldn’t have it, a woman of such wealth. But Bodo was beginning to bore Adletsky. Irritation would come next. He was quite capable of standing up and asking coldly for his hat and coat.

Well, perhaps when he was younger, in the days when the fortune was being founded, Adletsky had been an imperious sorehead, angry, impatient, intolerant. I had the impression that he was now much more temperate. There were reasons for Heisinger’s ‘negotiating stance,’ of which Adletsky was aware. Even a remote business titan, simply because he lived here, couldn’t help knowing. It had all been reported by the papers and on the air. Madge Heisinger was the criminal wife, convicted of trying to have the elderly toy manufacturer killed.

Some weeks before all this, Adletsky had discussed the history of the case with me. I was no longer his brain truster and on the payroll. By now I was running a very profitable business. I had stopped accepting his fee. But I was pretty well up on the matters that had begun to interest him –human matters. And it was plain to him that the woman he referred to as ‘your very good friend Mrs Wustrin,’ or ‘your protégé,’ held a special place in my feelings. It may have seemed curious to him that a man like me should have such feelings for anyone. He had once or twice said to me, ‘I don’t take you for an emotional heavyweight. But all that means is that I missed something when I sized you up. We are both oddball Jews, Harry. But I founded this considerable fortune, which it so happens is a very Jewish thing.’