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Cash.”
    “My God.” As the complexities began to multiply in her mind, she spoke in a soft, awed voice. “The responsibility—the danger.”
    He nodded. “Exactly. Danger for him, danger for her.”
    “How the hell would you go about contacting a museum and telling them you wanted to return a twenty-five-million-dollar Van Gogh?”
    “Good question.” Bernhardt finished his salad, began wiping up the dressing with a chunk of French bread.
    “So why the sudden urgency? The FBI—what’s that all about?”
    “There’s a man named Ned Frazer whose specialty is fencing stolen art. Apparently he’d done business with DuBois in the past, before DuBois had his stroke. So then, about a year ago, Frazer went to DuBois with something DuBois couldn’t pass up. It was a stolen Renoir, one that DuBois was tracking. It was apparently the dream of a lifetime for him. Except that, now, he was in a wheelchair. So he needed someone he could trust to get the painting hung in the secret gallery. He also needed someone to carry the money, make the payoff, actually take possession of the painting.”
    “Betty.”
    He nodded. “Betty.”
    “But—what—was she afraid of the deal, afraid of receiving stolen property?”
    “That was part of it—at first, anyhow.”
    “Well? What’s the rest of it?” She finished her own salad, began sopping up the dressing with the last of the French bread. Bernhardt raised the empty basket over his head, was rewarded with a curt nod from the waiter.
    “Apparently,” Bernhardt said, “Betty is one of those women who doesn’t think she’s attractive to men. Low self-esteem, that’s the current buzzword. Result: she was always getting involved with no-good men, one after the other. Maybe she subconsciously craved the way they mistreated her. Apparently her father was a drunk and a bully and a wife beater. Then he left them, after messing with both their heads, permanently.”
    “So what’s the bottom line?”
    “Betty started working for DuBois, making damn good money, about two years ago. About six months ago—and about six months after she knew about the stolen art—a guy with slicked-down hair and bench-press muscles and a good tan and no visible means of support moved in with her. It was a classic story. She met him at a bar one Friday night, and they went to her place afterwards. He stayed all night—and the next night, too. And the weekend. After a week, he moved in with two suitcases and a guitar he couldn’t play and a set of weights.”
    “Nick Ames.”
    “Right.”
    “And she told Ames about DuBois—about the stolen art.”
    Ruefully Bernhardt nodded. “It was pillow talk. She didn’t mean to tell him; it just came out a bit at a time. She probably felt like she had to tell someone, especially when Ned Frazer showed up. And there was no one else. She certainly couldn’t tell her mother.”
    “Loneliness …” Paula sighed. “The heartbreak of loneliness.” She smiled at him, discounting the soap-opera cliché.
    “Exactly.”
    “So what happened? Shall I guess?”
    “Sure. Guess.”
    “Nick Ames,” she said promptly. “He decided to try a little blackmail.”
    Impressed, with his mouth full of wine, Bernhardt nodded vigorously. Saying finally, “That’s a pretty good guess.”
    “It was obvious,” she answered, “given the way you structured the story.”
    “Oh, God—I’m obvious. Is that it?”
    “Only to me, love.” Her smile was mischievously sweet.
    “Hmmm.”
    “So what happened?” As she spoke, their dinners unceremoniously arrived, along with a basket that contained only two hunks of bread. Bernhardt sprinkled Parmesan cheese on his fettucini and white clam sauce, began to eat. “How’s the scampi?”
    “Perfect.” She savored a forkful, then said, “DuBois had Ames killed, to shut him up.”
    “I’m sure of it. I’m also sure that Justin Powers set the whole thing up. He hired Dancer to find Betty, and then he hired the hit