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On this particular afternoon, we had two important appointments. Just after lunch, Max Shofar dropped by for what I told him on the phone would be an important updating on the von Grümh case. He can be a gracious person when he wants to be, especially in his unfeigned and knowledgeable appreciation of the objects in my office and in the collections generally.

“I always go away renewed after I’ve visited here,” he told me, seated in front of my desk in a blue blazer and tan trousers.

I explained the presence of Alphus who was seated off to one side as a kind of pet-sitting I had to do. He nodded at my primate friend, who nodded back very civilly.

We exchanged some small talk, mentioning Merissa, but in no particulars. I detected an enhanced level of respect in his attitude toward me. I wondered if Merissa had told him about my amorous accomplishments. More than likely it had to do with my role in the Sterl case.

“So what’s this updating you mentioned on the phone?”

I leaned forward over my desk and caught a whiff of his subtle cologne. “We found the originals in Heinie’s sailboat.”

The man’s face lit up. “Well, that gets me off the hook.”

I waited a moment. “Not quite. I’ve learned that the so-called originals are also fakes.”

His smile turned knowing and rueful. “He shouldn’t have done it.”

“Done what?”

He paused, glanced over at Alphus, evidently pondering what to tell me. He said, “Heinie outsmarted himself.”

“How so?”

“I would say he found a forger to knock off copies of his collection to go to the museum. For that he got the kind of public applause he so desperately needed and a hefty tax break. But the guy he went to made two copies and kept the originals.”

“Who might that be?”

Again he hesitated. He sighed. “Okay, for defensive purposes, I keep track of the better fakers. They’re getting so good with lasers and metallurgy, it’s more and more difficult to distinguish between what’s real and what’s a replica, to use a nice term.” He looked at Alphus with surprise, as though noticing something odd.

“Who?” I repeated.

“Well, of course, there’s the Lipanov establishment. Bulgaria. They make replicas, have for a long time. But I don’t think they would have done business with Heinie for what he wanted.”

“Okay.”

He thought for a moment. “Since Heinie had a boat, he could have taken them to Levi Stein. He’s an Anglo-Israeli who set up in the Bahamas some time back. He makes replicas openly and forgeries on the side. Or so I’ve heard.”

I was taking notes. “Anyone more local?”

“There’s Henry Song in Manhattan. I’ve heard he supplies the growing market in China with first-rate fakes.”

“That doesn’t sound like it would have been Heinie’s cup of tea.”

“You’re right. He would have looked down his nose at Chinese-made fakes.”

“But no one local?”

“I’ve heard of a Swiss guy out in the Berkshires in one of the small towns. Nothing really substantial. And more in the line of antiques, swords, old guns, even medieval armor.”

A distant, dim bell rang in my memory, but more as a number than anything tangible.

“Otherwise,” Max continued, “he would have had to go to Europe. And that’s got problems of its own.”

“Such as?”

“Taking them out. Bringing them back. It isn’t like the old days.”

“And you never put him in touch with anyone?”

He looked at me with rueful resignation. “Norman, I’ve told you. I don’t deal in fakes. I go out of my way to find them because they’re toxic. That’s why I’m trying to stay away from this whole thing.”

I believed him. I thanked him and asked, as casually as I could, “Do you mind if I ask you a couple of basic questions regarding Heinie’s murder?”

He shrugged. “No, why should I?”

Still, he frowned at the bluntness of the questions, particularly when I asked him if he murdered von Grümh. But he answered them all with no hesitations.

“What was that all about?” he asked when I had finished. Again, he was aware of Alphus’s intent gaze at him.

“Just something I told Lieutenant Tracy