I handed him the contract. “I’d appreciate any advice.”

Bram Sr. was rotating in a slow circle in the middle of the gallery, one arm outstretched. “You should have seen the shows Violet had here.” His tone held profound admiration. “The parties. All four floors and the basement. At her last party, she had a carousel down there.”

“Still there,” his grandson and I said at the same time.

Bram Sr. peeked in the basement door. “I’d love to see it, but I’m afraid my knees no longer like stairs.” He let his gaze roam the first floor again. “Everyone who was anyone in New York used to be here. The newspapermen would be waiting outside, shouting questions as celebrities came and went. City councilmen, who were here with their mistresses, would sneak in through the back.”

While his grandson read my contract, I pictured the clothes, the music, the fancy cocktails. “Wish I could have seen that.”

He used his cane to point at the window at the back that opened to the miniscule courtyard of dying grass and now overflowing garbage containers. “Did you know a neighbor called the police on your grandmother for sunbathing naked out there? The young officer was hopelessly starstruck by Violet. He ruled that the courtyard was Violet’s personal property, in no way public, and issued the complaining neighbor a Peeping Tom fine.”

Ha! “She never told me that.”

“Everyone was in love with her.” Bram Sr.’s voice thickened with enough nostalgia to make me wonder, was he?

“How long were you friends?”

“Fifty-seven years.”

The last bite of bagel stuck in my throat. Time stopped. Mom is fifty-six years old.

Bram Sr.’s hair was gray. My gaze whipped to his grandson’s. Brown, a shade close to my mother’s. Wrong eye color, but both my mom and I had inherited Violet’s green eyes. I zeroed in on Bram Sr.’s chin. Was that a hint of a cleft?

Would a grandfatherly hug be all right?

Did he know?

Oh-God-oh-God-oh-God. I fought the bagel down at last.

Had my grandmother told him? Or had he guessed? Was he here to tell me? Why not contact me before? Why not contact my mother? Why ignore our existence all this time? Was I Bram’s cousin?

I gulped coffee so I wouldn’t blurt those questions, gulped it too fast, and then coughing made me jerk my hand. Black liquid splashed all over the table, nearly nailing the UPS envelope next to the remains of my breakfast.

Bram snatched the envelope up and dropped it on his chair as he stood, holding my Ludington’s contract safe. “I’ll grab the paper towels from the kitchen.” He was halfway across the room before he asked, “Mind if I use the bathroom in the back? The church bathroom is full of crucifixes. It’s an uncomfortable space.”

“No. Of course. Go ahead.”