the tiny, worn shoe. “And ran away in fear?”
“That’s one possibility.”
“Are you saying you think your Blue Satin Cinderella might have shot him?”
“Perhaps.”
“So who is she?”
“I have no idea. But I know someone who might.”
“Oh, God. Not you again,” exclaimed Samuel Perlman when Sebastian came upon him in the showrooms of Christie’s in Pall Mall.
Sebastian ran his gaze over the framed sepia-colored draw-
ing of a woman’s head that Perlman was examining. “I’d have thought you just inherited enough of this sort of thing from your uncle to satisfy the acquisitive urgings of even the most ardent collector.”
“I like to keep an eye on what’s available,” said Perlman, leaning forward to squint at the drawing’s signature. “Do you think it’s really a Leonardo?”
“You tell me.”
Eisler’s nephew had changed into tight, buff-colored trousers, a claret-and-white-striped waistcoat, and a monstrously wide cravat meticulously arranged in a complicated style known as the Waterfall. He straightened. “After our previous conversation, I’d hoped I’d seen the last of you.”
Sebastian showed his teeth in a smile. “Let that be a lesson to you: If you don’t care to see me again, you might consider being a bit more forthcoming in your answers to my questions.”
Perlman breathed a resigned sigh. “What now?”
“I’ve been hearing some interesting tales about your uncle and women.”
“Women?” Perlman gave a high-pitched titter. “Don’t be ridiculous. My uncle was an old man.”
“Not that old.”
Perlman moved on to a massive, heavily framed oil that took up a considerable section of one wall, his attention all for the darkly swirling scene before him.
Sebastian said, “I’m told you used to provide your uncle with whores.”
Perlman cast him a quick sideways glance. “And precisely who, one wonders, told you that?”
“Does it matter?”
When Perlman remained silent, Sebastian said, “I think your uncle may have had a woman at his house the night he was shot. Did you send her to him?”
“I did not.”
“But you’re not denying that you did sometimes act as his procurer.”
Perlman kept his gaze on the vast oil. “What an ugly little word.”
“You have one you prefer?”
“I won’t deny I did occasionally perform certain . . . commissions for him.”
“Define ‘occasionally.’”
“Every few weeks . . . or so.”
“Where did the women come from?
“The Haymarket. Covent Garden. Really, Devlin, you know as well as I do where to find women of that sort.”
“Are you saying you supplied him with common women you picked up off the street?”
Perlman swiped the tip of his nose between one pinched thumb and forefinger and sniffed. “That’s the kind he liked.”
“I’ve heard he also liked another kind of women. Pretty young gentlewomen who owed him money—or whose husbands owed him money.”
“I wouldn’t know anything about that,” said Perlman loftily.
“You wouldn’t?”
“I would not.” He cast a quick glance around, but the auction rooms were nearly deserted in the gloom of the rainy afternoon. “Listen: I am not denying my uncle had an appetite for women. He did. It was . . . unseemly. But to my knowledge he satisfied those needs with whores. Now, if you’ll excuse me? You are distracting me. This is not a leisure activity, you know. Art collecting is serious business.”
“In a moment. So you would have me believe you never heard of him coercing a gentlewoman to share his couch?”
“I have not, no.”
Sebastian smiled. Unlike Tyson, Samuel Perlman was a terrible liar. “Then tell me this: Who owed your uncle money?”
Perlman gave a tsking huff of derision. “That sort of information is privileged. I couldn’t tell you, even if I knew.”
“Are you saying you don’t know?”
“As a matter of fact, I don’t. The bastard must have written it all down somewhere, but I’ll be damned if I can find his ledgers. He obviously hid them.”
“That’s one possibility,” said Sebastian.
“Are you suggesting there’s another?”
“Whoever shot Eisler could have taken them.”
Perlman gave another of his derisive little laughs. “My uncle was shot by Russell Yates. And everyone in London knows it . . . except you, apparently.”
Sebastian shifted his gaze to the large canvas beside them, a biblical scene complete with plumed Roman soldiers, fainting women, and an angry bearded man with a bare, heavily muscled chest who may or may not have been Samson. “Looks like a Van Dyke.”
Perlman opened his eyes in astonishment. “Impressive.”
“But that doesn’t mean it is.”
Sebastian turned toward the door.
He’d taken two steps when Perlman stopped him by saying, “I do know the name of one man who owed my uncle money. Beresford. Blair Beresford.”
Sebastian paused. “I thought you said you consider that sort of