Her letter to Gray came from a night such as this, a sleepless night with nothing beyond the silence except the rattle of primitive plumbing. Earlier, she had planned a quiet evening with The Brothers Karamazov or Swedenborg's Apocalypse Revealed, but finally it seemed that she simply and desperately just wanted a friend.

Her letter to Gray was handwritten in green ink, the stationery embossed with a black border. The tone was light and informal. The closing was typical: Eternally, M. Although completed well in time for the morning post, she actually had the letter delivered by hand . . . then spent at least two days waiting for a reply that never came.

In fact Gray did respond to Mata Hari's letter, spending more than an hour on his balcony composing a short but tender note. He never sent it; and for two distracted days he remained indoors frantically working with pastels until he hardly even thought about her. For company he had his cat. For solace he had a bottle of gin, left over from that night he had heard about Spangler.

At the end of those two days he attended an exhibition of moderns at one of the smaller galleries, then drifted at random through the Latin Quarter until he found a suitable girl. Her name was Julie Reage, and she too eventually survived in three or four watercolors.

End of an obsession with Zelle ... or so it seemed that week in mid-December. For the most part Gray also lived mainly for himself, once more returning to an insular world of still lifes and nightscapes. He grew particularly intrigued with a vision of hoarfrost on the windowpane. He spent hours attempting to duplicate candlelight. Eventually he even spent an evening with a very pretty red-haired child from Bouville. But he did not sleep with her . . . and although it was late when he finally returned, Margaretha was still waiting patiently.

He saw her first through a half-open door, dozing in yellow lamplight. Her hair, like a shadow, fell across her face. Her hands looked very small and pale. A few of his later drypoints were scattered at her feet. The cat was asleep in her lap. For a moment he actually considered slipping away, finding a cab, and going off. In the end he sat down on the window box and reached for another cigarette. After what must have been a minute, but felt like an hour, she opened her eyes.

"Hello, Nicky. How are you?"

"What do you want, Margaretha?"

She smiled. "Nothing really." Then reaching for the dangling cat's paw: "And what's his name?"

Gray took a deep breath: "Cat."

"As in stray cat?"

"I suppose."

"Well, I don't like it. I think you should have named him Socrates. Or maybe John-Phillip."