she belonged on the cover of the copy of Vogue she
was reading. She put it down and turned as my father
and I came out to greet her. He kissed her on the
cheek.
"Should I say good morning or good
afternoon?" he asked.
"For you two, it looks like it's definitely
afternoon," she replied, her eyes on me. "Did you
have a good time?"
"A wonderful time," I declared.
"That's nice. I see you bought a new painting,
Pierre."
"Not just a new painting, Daphne, a new Ruby
Dumas," he said, and gave me a wide, conspiratorial
smile. Daphne's eyebrows rose.
"Pardon?"
My father unwrapped the picture and held it up.
"Isn't it pretty?" he asked.
"Yes," she said in a noncommittal tone of
voice. "But I still don't understand."
"You won't believe this, Daphne," he began,
quickly sitting down across from her. He told her my
story. As he related the tale, she gazed from him to
me.
"That's quite remarkable," she said after he
concluded.
"And you can see from the work and from the
way she has been received at the gallery that she has a
great deal of artistic talent, talent that must be
developed."