He turned at last to the staff worker, who had been trying to look as if she could not hear a thing. “Don’t be fooled. I might be an actor. I wasn’t always this size, you know. I was young and fit and witty, and the readers loved me. Now I’m old and fat and witty, and the readers still love me. It’s a good life.”

Dr. Boadu’s cynicism grew, the woman’s boredom increased, and Julian looked around for more diversion. He took a gingerbread man from the tray and held it out invitingly as he beckoned a child closer for a conspiratorial whisper.

“It’s kinder to eat them headfirst. Severs the nerves in the neck. A painless death.”

The child gave him an anxious look and ran off, the gingerbread man firmly gripped in his hand.

“Julian, you are far more sinister in person than your books would suggest,” Dr. Boadu said wryly, but his eyes followed the silent child with puzzled concern. He leaned toward the woman before she could move on with her tray and asked quietly, “Whose child is that?”

The volunteer paused, eyes scanning the crowd. “That’s his mother over there,” she said finally, indicating a thin woman with a narrow, unsmiling face.

Dr. Boadu frowned; then his eyes widened, and he turned away quickly.

“You know her?” asked Julian shrewdly. “Old girlfriend?”

The pathologist looked around nervously, exasperated by the indelicate comment, but fortunately the woman with the tray had made her escape and moved too far away to overhear. “Her husband was a murder victim.”

Julian made a moue of distaste. “Is everything in your life about work? Aren’t there any other pathologists in the City? Tell me now, because the idea that someday I could be on a slab with you slicing up my innards makes me want to move far, far away.”

“Unless you plan to get murdered, I don’t think you have to worry,” Dr. Boadu replied, but he said it absently rather than with sarcasm, still staring surreptitiously at the woman and the boy. “Why is that child so quiet?”

Julian’s eyes narrowed with professional malice. “Wait here. I’ll go find out.”

Shocked, but too slow in his reaction, the pathologist watched helplessly as Julian walked straight to the child’s mother. Afraid he would be caught staring, he retreated and nudged himself between a wall and a large potted plant near the end of the buffet table. In an effort to appear occupied, he grimly began to fill his plate with savory hors d’oeuvres.