that, Herr Standartenfuhrer Wegman. Have you been keeping them in a humidor, as I told you?"
"I have no humidor "
"Then I'll have to get you one," Eigen said.
One of his colleagues, a portly, round-faced SS Gruppenfuhrer, a brigadier general named Johannes Koller, sniggered softly. He had been showing his comrades an assortment of sepia-toned French postcards. He quickly put them away in the breast pocket of his tunic, but not before Eigen saw them: they were old-fashioned lewd photographs of a statuesque woman wearing only stockings and garter belt and striking a variety of lascivious poses.
"Please. They were stale when you gave them to me. I don't think they were even from Cuba."
"They were from Cuba, Herr Kommandant. Rolled on the thigh of a young Cuban virgin. Here, have one of these, with my compliments." The young man reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a velvet pouch containing several cellophane-wrapped cigars. "Romeo y Julietas. I hear they're Churchill's favorites." He handed one to the German with a wink.
A waiter approached with a silver tray of canapes. "Pate de foie gras, gentlemen?"
Koller snatched two in one swift movement. Daniel took one.
"Not for me," Wegman announced sanctimoniously to the waiter and the men around him. "I no longer eat meat."
"Not easy to come by these days, eh?" said Eigen.
"That's not it at all," said Wegman. "As a man ages, he must become a grass-eating creature, you know."
"Yes, your Fuhrer is a vegetarian, isn't he?" Eigen said.
"Quite right," Wegman said proudly.
"Though sometimes he swallows up. whole countries," Eigen added in a level tone.
The SS man glowered. "You seem to be able to turn up everything and anything, Herr Eigen. Perhaps you can do something about the paper shortage here in Paris."
"Yes, it must drive you bureaucrats mad. What is there to push anymore?"
"Everything is of inferior quality these days," said Gruppen-fuhrer Koller. "This afternoon, I had to go through an entire sheet of postage stamps before I found one that would stick to the envelope."
"Are you fellows still using the stamp with Hitler's head on it?"
"Yes, of course," Koller said impatiently.
"Perhaps you're licking the wrong side, nein?" Eigen said with a wink.
The SS Gruppenfuhrer flushed with embarrassment and cleared his throat awkwardly, but before he could think of a reply, Eigen went on: "You're entirely right, of course. The French simply aren't up to the standards of German production."
"Spoken as a true German," said Wegman approvingly. "Even if your mother was Spanish."
"Daniel," came a contralto voice. He turned, relieved at the chance to break free from the Nazi officers.
It was a large woman in her fifties wearing a gaudy, flouncy floral dress that made her look a little like a dancing circus elephant. Madame Fontenoy wore her unnaturally black hair, run through with a white skunk stripe, up in a bouffant. She had enormous gold earrings that Daniel recognized as louis d'or, the antique gold coin, twenty-two karats each. They pulled at her earlobes. She was the wife of a Vichy diplomat, herself a prominent hostess. "Pardon me," she said to the Germans. "I must steal young Daniel away."
Madame Fontenoy's arm was around a slender young girl of around twenty in an off-the-shoulder black evening gown, a raven-haired beauty with luminous gray-green eyes.
"Daniel," said Madame Fontenoy, "I want you to meet Genevieve du Chatelet, our hostess's lovely daughter. I was astonished to hear she hadn't met you she must be the only single woman in Paris you don't know. Genevieve, this is Daniel Eigen."
The girl extended her delicate long-fingered hand, a brief warning look flashing in her eyes. It was a look meant only for Daniel.
Daniel took her hand. "A pleasure to make your acquaintance," he said with a bow of his head. As he clasped the young beauty's hand, his forefinger gently scratched her palm, tacitly acknowledging her signal.
"Mr. Eigen is from Buenos Aires," the dowager explained to the young woman, "but he has a flat on the Left Bank."
"Oh, have you been in Paris long?" asked Genevieve du Chatelet without interest, her gaze steady.
"Long enough," said Eigen.
"Long enough to know his way around," said Madame Fontenoy, her eyebrows arched.
"I see," Genevieve du Chatelet said dubiously. Suddenly her eyes seemed to spy someone across the room. "Ah, there's ma grande-tante, Benoite. If you'll excuse me, Madame Fontenoy."
As the girl took her leave, her eyes alighted on his, then swept meaningfully in the direction of an adjacent room. He nodded, almost imperceptibly, understanding the semaphore at once.