“Only this: I think Gerald gave or perhaps sold you some letters and photographs before he died. As a sort of legacy or insurance policy, I don’t know. And you decided to copy his example and use them as a way of making a bit of extra money now and then. When you needed to raise a bit of cash for a new toy like that Alfa Romeo you’re driving.”

“Are you suggesting what I think you’re suggesting?”

“Didn’t I make it clear? You’re a blackmailer, too, Robin.”

“Nonsense. I’m a writer. And I make a good living as a writer. A few years ago I wrote a novel called The Servant, which has done very well—look, I don’t have to sit here and be insulted by you.”

“You do unless you want me to tell your uncle exactly what you and Harold Hebel were arguing about the first time I saw you both at La Voile d’Or.”

Robin Maugham paused, blushing to the edge of his handmade shirt collar, and then lit a cigarette, trying to affect a nonchalance that plainly wasn’t there. “No secret there,” he said. “I should have thought that was bloody obvious. He had a compromising photograph involving my uncle and I was rather keen to get it back.”

“In my experience people don’t normally behave like that with a blackmailer.”

“Is there a correct way to behave? Don’t be absurd.”

“Usually people are very meek because they’re afraid.”

“Possibly because they’re the ones being blackmailed.”

“According to the manager at the Voile you and Hebel met for a drink. More than once. Your name is in Hebel’s address book. And his diary. I searched his room at the Grand the other night. I think it was Hebel who told you that I was a private detective. And I think your argument was because you were very anxious to know exactly how he came by that photograph.”

“From Louis Legrand, of course.”

“No. That’s what Hebel said. But it’s just not possible. You see, Louis Legrand has been in prison in Marseilles for several months. I checked with the police, in Nice. Hebel couldn’t possibly have met your little friend Loulou.”

“I don’t like your tone.”

“I don’t like it myself. You’re right. It makes me sound like a queer. Like a bitch. Maybe I should paint my toenails, buy a silk shirt—then I could fit right in at the Villa Mauresque. Either way I don’t think your uncle will have any trouble believing me. Even without lipstick I can make an attractive argument about this to him.”