“Ask Augusta to look for your notebook,” he said sleepily, after a time. “It’s out there on the shelves somewhere. She’ll know where to find it.”

“What do I need a notebook for?” Genevieve took up the tray with the empty cups. “I’m not going to write any more poetry.”

“Your caricatures.” He was struggling to keep his eyes open now. “I told you before—they’re very good.”

“Do you really think so?”

But the only reply from the bed was a snore.

Back in the other room, Augusta and Marianne were sitting at the table. Augusta was puzzling over a difficult bit of scrawl, trying to decipher it. She held the page out to Marianne, who peered closely and shrugged her shoulders. Genevieve felt an urge to go over there and help. Maybe she’d be able to make out the mystery words. But something held her back.

The street outside was empty. The drains smelled bad. She thought, as she walked away, of her worthless poetry notebook, hidden somewhere among the chaos of the tiny apartment. She thought about Lulu’s mocking smile; about the dreadful lie she’d told her husband and the way it had made his face light up. That heaviness was still there in her body. It ached in every bone, muscle and fiber.

She thought about the freckle at the base of Paolo Zachari’s neck. The lemon scent of his skin. The heat in his mouth. She tried to send the thoughts away, but they kept on coming.

When she arrived home, she waited for Céline to be out of earshot, and then went to the telephone.

The lilac notelet lay in tiny pieces in the wastebasket. Robert was having none of it. His wife was beautiful and sharp-tongued, and consequently she had rivals among her circle. Enemies. The letter had “jealous woman” stamped all over it.

If only he could put it from his mind and concentrate on his work.

“Mr. Shelby King, I—” Marie-Claire was poking her head around the door.

“Haven’t I told you always to knock?”

The secretary looked crushed. “But I did, sir.”

“Did you? Oh.” Robert fussed with his pen and tried to appear as though he had been concentrating hard on the paperwork in front of him.

“Three times.”

“Well, knock a little louder in the future.”

“Yes, sir. Would you like some coffee?”

“No, thank you. Marie-Claire?”

“Yes?” That look of hope. Hope of what? Perhaps he’d made a mistake, giving her those flowers.

“I’m sorry. For snapping at you, I mean. I’m a little distracted this morning. Would you open the window before you go, please? It’s rather stuffy in here.”