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he’d sold it to Greenwood for even more? Or he’d been bidding for Greenwood all along? Greenwood was squirrelly, everyone in the auction business knew. Sometimes he came to the auctions himself and bid, sometimes he came but sat like a stone Buddha while someone in the annex room was bidding for him, sometimes he bid by phone, and sometimes he was bidding by secret agreement with the auctioneer when he pulled his ear or took off his glasses. He enjoyed the sport of it.
    Avis was lost in a painting of a young girl sitting in a wood with a boy lying on the grass beside her when she realized Greenwood was in the room watching her.
    â€œWhat do you think?” He was looking pleased with himself.
    â€œThis is Edward Arthur Walton, isn’t it?”
    His eyebrows went up. “Very good.”
    â€œBut isn’t this The Daydream ? I thought it was a lost work.”
    â€œSomeone found it.”
    Someone who obviously knew well what Greenwood was looking for. She turned back to the painting.
    â€œDo you like it?” He was observing her like a cat studying a cricket.
    â€œI do like the Naturalists. But I’m surprised you do.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œMost people like either the Impressionists or the realists, but not both.”
    â€œIs that so.” He seemed amused. “And which do you like?”
    â€œI like both.”
    â€œWhat don’t you like?”
    â€œIn paintings?”
    â€œYes.”
    She considered. “I don’t think I like surrealism very much.”
    She was beginning to wonder if he would apologize for keeping her waiting so long. But instead he crossed the room and stood before an Eakins, one of his absurdly beautiful shirtless young men, rowing on a river.
    â€œWhat’s the best picture in this room?”
    â€œI can’t answer that.”
    â€œWhy not?”
    â€œYou know why not,” she said, and then realized she’d been rude. He didn’t seem to mind.
    â€œThen what’s the most important?”
    â€œFor me? The Caillebotte.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œBecause he painted so little and it’s a very good one.”
    â€œBut very small.”
    â€œSize isn’t everything.” Oh god. Was that suggestive? She wished the butler would come back. What the hell was she doing here?
    â€œWhat’s your favorite Eakins?”
    â€œThe portrait of Louis Kenton.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œBecause I love portraits. Because he floats there in space, looking unhinged and sad.”
    â€œKenton was Eakins’s brother-in-law, wasn’t he?”
    She smiled. “You do your homework.”
    â€œOnly a fool would spend this kind of money without doing his homework. You didn’t think I was a fool, did you?”
    â€œI did not.”
    â€œWhy do you like portraits?”
    â€œI like it that you can stare at them and wonder about them the way you can’t with actual people. You have time.”
    â€œI like that picture too, but I don’t see Kenton as sad, I see him as weak. An interesting subject, weak men. Did you know that he hit his wife in the face and she had to run away from him in the middle of the night?”
    â€œI did. But he isn’t doing it in the painting. In the painting he’s alone and sad.”
    â€œWhy do women tolerate men like that? I’d kick him down the stairs.”
    Greenwood was tall, and she realized, powerfully built, although he didn’t move or dress like an athlete.
    She said, “This is really not my field.”
    â€œNo. I’d buy the Kenton, though. Would you?”
    She turned and looked at him. Okay, it’s a test, she thought. I’m good at tests.
    â€œYes. I don’t think the Met is selling, but there’s an oil study of it at the Farnsworth we might take a shot at.”
    He grinned. “Now how do you know that?”
    â€œI told you. It’s my favorite Eakins.”
    â€œThere’s a Renoir