“I don’t know if I mentioned,” Brooke said to me, “that Hazel is also a gifted ballerina. She’ll be performing for us later.” She came closer to me so that she could whisper in my ear. “I have an idea for Brian’s birthday. I want to surprise him with a gallery wall—photos of Hazel dancing.”

“Of course,” I said. “Perfect.”

Brooke was entirely undiscriminating in her opinions of her child—so different from Amelia. Amelia had high standards for herself, and those high standards extended to her daughter. She wasn’t inclined to heap praise on Natalie if it wasn’t warranted.

I concluded that all of Hazel’s relatives at the party considered themselves an important part of the girl’s life and had probably never missed a birthday. The child didn’t realize what she had. Her significant place in people’s lives. Her privilege was of a different kind than Natalie’s. For all of Natalie’s material advantages, she would never have the same kind of self-esteem that Hazel had. She simply wasn’t that central. Natalie drifted on the periphery of the Straubs’ lives, in an outer lane around their whirlpool.

Mack the Magician showed up on time. We’d seen each other at five birthdays in the last two months. I remember the first time we met. We were working on a party in the East Village and we left the clients’ town house together. When we reached the sidewalk, he pointed at the brown leather biker jacket I was wearing. “Funny, I didn’t see you arrive with that.” I smiled and kept walking, but I’ve hated him ever since.

At two thirty, when Hazel’s party was winding down, I slipped into the front vestibule to phone the Straubs’ house.

“Delta?” Fritz picked up the phone.

“Hi, I left my sweater at your place last night. I—”

“Amelia missed her meeting in Dallas.” Fritz was speaking quickly in a hoarse voice. “She left the house at five in the morning and was supposed to fly straight there, but she didn’t show up. The clients called me. They can’t reach her. I can’t reach her. I left a message for Ian, but I haven’t heard back.”

“I’ll be there soon.” I attempted to keep my voice in a low, steady vocal range. Changes in pitch indicate fear or anxiety.

I packed up the camera equipment, which I’d already placed near the front door; it took longer than it normally would have because my arms and hands were trembling terribly and I found it difficult to zip and unzip my camera case.