“My name is Sullivan and I came to see you. I’ve just arrived from New York and…”
“Came to see me? My dear girl, you should know that I never see anybody before luncheon. I’ve only just woken up. It’s simply not civilized.” She turned back to where the hall disappeared into darkness. “Leo!” she yelled. “Make sure you don’t come out in your underwear. There’s a young lady standing in our foyer.” Then she turned back to me. “If you want to pay a call on me, then come to one of my salons like everybody else. You’ll usually find people here most evenings although Saturday night is when we have our big weekly shindig. A painter, are you? Or a buyer? Because I should warn you that you won’t get me to part with any of my paintings.”
It was as hard to stop her as a train thundering down the track at full speed. “Mrs. Stein,” I began.
She held up her hand. “Hold it right there. It’s Miss Stein or Gertrude if you like. I’m not big on formality. I’m not married either. Never intend to be.”
“But you spoke to someone called Leo,” I stammered, wondering if I had committed a faux pas and Leo was perhaps her lover.
“My brother. We’re sharing the place at the moment, and sharing our passion for collecting art too. I suppose you’d better come in. We can’t stand talking here.”
She led me through to a light and airy drawing room. It was elegantly but sparsely furnished. I couldn’t tell what the wallpaper looked like because every inch of the walls was covered in paintings—some of them quite lovely—portraits of young women with flowing hair, ballerinas on stage, picnics in a park, and some quite incomprehensible—wild daubs of bright color with cats hanging in midair and women with two faces. I wrenched my gaze away as she said, “Well, sit down then. What was it you wanted?”
I perched on the edge of a brocade sofa. “I wondered if you had come across two friends of mine. American women—Miss Walcott and Miss Goldfarb.”
“Yes, I met them when they first got here,” she said brusquely. “Why, have they sent you with the olive branch? Are you supposed to mediate a peace between us?”
“A peace between you? Had you quarreled?”
“Let’s just say there was a parting of the ways. They came to one of my Saturday night salons. I rather liked Goldfarb—got a good brain, one could tell. Didn’t think so much of the other one. A bit wishy-washy. She brought a couple of her paintings to show me. I thought she might have a smidgeon of talent and told her so, but she needed to take some lessons in the handling of color. Hadn’t got a clue about mixing shades. I said I could recommend someone to tutor her. I guess she didn’t care for that too much because the next time I met them she said she had been promised an introduction to Bryce. I pointed out that if she went to Bryce she would no longer be welcome at my place. ‘You have to choose carefully,’ I said. She replied that she didn’t wish to offend me but was hopeful he would include her in his upcoming exhibition.”
Miss Stein paused, leaning forward toward me in her chair as she continued rubbing her hair inside the towel. “Personally I didn’t think she had much of a chance with him. ‘He’s stuck in the depths of Impressionism,’ I said, ‘and he thinks women only belong in the kitchen or the bedroom.’ Besides, what about Miss Goldfarb? We know what his opinion was about Jews. Exactly why I broke off all contact with him. Still, he got his just desserts in the end, didn’t he, although I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead, I suppose.”
“You know about Reynold Bryce’s death?” I asked cautiously.
“Of course. It was in the International Herald this morning. Stabbed by a hotheaded young Jew, so they surmise.”
“They know who killed him?”
“A young Jewish man was seen running away down the street about the time he was killed,” she said. “I’m not surprised, frankly, after his outspoken tirades against Jews. I’d have willingly done it myself, odious man. He liked to think of himself as the doyen of American artists here, but all he wanted really were sycophants around him, people who painted the way he did, no innovators, nobody with creative genius.”
I was trying to process what I had just learned. If a young, zealous Jew killed Reynold Bryce then his death might have nothing at all to do with Sid and Gus’s disappearance.
“So do you remember when was the last time you saw my friends?”
She stared out of the window. “Some time ago. Not recently, that’s for sure. You have to understand that I see a lot of people.”
“Not recently,” I repeated.
“Why are you so keen to know when I saw your friends?” she demanded.
“Because they’ve disappeared. I don’t know where they’ve gone and I’m worried about them.”