As Nell and I followed Lucy Willis to her office at the rear of the building, I caught a glimpse of Arthur standing at the top of the stairs, chatting with two women who might, in very dim light, have been mistaken for Nell and me. One was blond, at any rate, and the other was brunette, and the brunette was dressed in black from head to toe. But the fact that the blonde was at least twice my age—the brunette had to be pushing eighty—probably should have tipped Arthur off to his mistake. “I’m sorry for the confusion,” Lucy murmured. “My sisters have both taken maternity leave, so we’re rather pressed at the moment. My cousin has been working long hours. He sometimes ...” She left the sentence hanging, shrugged apologetically, and continued down the hallway. Lucy, I thought, was being kind. I was willing to bet that the mess in Arthur’s office was the rule rather than the exception, and his readiness to fork over clients’ funds to a pair of vaguely familiar strangers suggested that the state of his bookshelves was an accurate reflection of the way he conducted business.
