"I'd like to make some sketches." She dived into her handbag. "He does a grand battement just like a ballet dancer."

A ballet dancer. A ballet dancer. The words brought a picture to Qwilleran's mind: a cluttered office, a painting hung crookedly on the wall. The second time he had seen that office, over a patrolman's shoulder, there was a body on the floor. And where was the painting? Qwilleran could not remember seeing the ballet dancer.

He said to Zoe, "There was a painting of a ballet dancer at the Lambreth Gallery —»

"Earl's famous Ghirotto," she said as she sketched rapidly on a pad. "It was only half of the original canvas, you know. It was his one great ambition to find the other half. It would have made him rich, he thought."

Qwilleran was alerted. "How rich?"

"If the two halves were joined and properly restored, the painting would probably be worth $150,000."

The newsman blew astonishment through his moustache.

"There's a monkey on the other half, she said, "Ghirotto painted ballerinas or monkeys during his celebrated Vibrato period, but only once did he paint both dancer and monkey in the same composition. It was a unique piece — a collector's dream. After the war it was shipped to a New York dealer and damaged in transit — ripped down the middle. Because of the way the picture was composed, the importer was able to frame the two halves and sell them separately. Earl bought the half with the dancer and hoped to trace the half with the monkey."

Qwilleran said. "Do you suppose the owner of the monkey has been trying to trace the ballet dancer?"

"Could be. Earl's half is the valuable one; it has the artist's signature." As she talked, her pencil skimmed over the paper, and her glance darted between sketch pad and performing cat.

"Did many people know about the Ghirotto?"

"Oh, it was quite a conversation piece. Several people wanted to buy the ballerina — just on speculation. Earl could have sold it and made a nice little profit, but he was holding out for his dream of $150,000. He never gave up hope of finding the monkey."

Qwilleran proceeded circumspectly. "Did you see the ballerina on the night of the crime?"

Zoe laid down her pencil and pad. "I'm afraid I didn't see much of anything — that night."

"I was there, snooping around," Qwilleran said, "and I'm pretty sure the painting was gone."

"Gone!"

"It had been hanging over the desk on my previous visit, and now I remember — the night the police were there — that wall was vacant."

"What should I do?"

"Better tell the police. It looks as if the painting's been stolen. Tell them about the phone call, too. When you get home, call the Homicide Bureau. Do you remember the detectives' names? Hames and Wojcik."

Zoe clapped both hands to her face in dismay. "Honestly, I had forgotten all about that Ghirotto!"

When Zoe had gone from Qwilleran's apartment leaving him with a can of coffee, a pound of sugar, a half-pint of cream, a pack of cigarettes, and two pounds of chocolate chip cookies — he wondered how much information she had withheld. Her nervousness suggested she was sifting the facts. She had stammered when asked if anyone else had a key to the Lambreth Gallery. Admittedly she had avoided telling the police everything that occurred to her. And she claimed to have forgotten the existence of a painting valuable enough — possibly — to make murder worthwhile.

Qwilleran went upstairs to prepare Koko's dinner. Slowly and absently he diced meat while pondering other complications in the Lambreth case. How valid was Sandy's hint that this was "a family affair"? And how would that connect with the disappearance of the Ghirotto? There was also the vandalism to take into account, and Qwilleran reflected that the missing painting fell in the same category as the damaged subjects; it depicted the female figure in skimpy attire.

He opened the kitchen door and looked out. The night was crisp, and the neighborhood smells were made more pungent by the cold. Carbon monoxide hung in the air, and oily rags had been burned at the comer garage. Down below him was the patio, a dark hole, its high brick walls cutting off any light from distant streetlamps.

Qwilleran turned on the exterior light, which cast a weak yellow glow on the fire escape, and thought, What does that guy have against using a little extra electricity? He remembered seeing a flashlight in the broom closet, and he went to get it — an efficient, long-handled, well, balanced, powerful, chrome-plated beauty. Everything Mountclemens owned was well designed: knives, pots and pans, even the flashlight. It threw a strong beam on the walls and floor of the empty patio, on the ponderous wooden gate, on the wooden fire escape. Patches of frozen slush clung to the steps, and Qwilleran decided to postpone further investigation until daylight. Tomorrow he might even take Koko down there for a romp.

That evening he went to dinner at a nearby Italian restaurant, and the brown, eyed waitress reminded him of Zoe. He went home and played Sparrow with Koko, and the cat's movements reminded him of the missing ballet dancer. He lighted the gas logs in the fireplace and scanned the secondhand book on economics that he had bought at the Press Club; the statistics reminded him of Nine Oh Two Four Six Eight Three — or was it Five?

… On Sunday he went to visit Nino.

The artist's studio-home in an alley garage was as dismal as it sounded. A former occupant had left the building coated with grease, to which was added the blight of Nino's collection of junk.

Having knocked and received no answer, Qwilleran walked into the agglomeration of joyless castoffs. There were old tires, bushels of broken glass, chunks of uprooted concrete sidewalk, tin cans of every size, and dispossessed doors and windows. He made note of a baby carriage without wheels, a store window mannequin with arms and head missing, a kitchen sink painted bright orange inside and out, an iron gate covered with rust, and a wooden bedstead in the depressing modernistic design of the 1930's.

A heater suspended from the ceiling belched warm fumes in Qwilleran's face, while the cold drafts at ankle level were paralyzing. Also suspended from the ceiling by a rope was a crystal chandelier of incredible beauty.

Then Qwilleran saw the artist at work. On a platform at the rear stood a monstrous Thing made of wooden oddments, ostrich plumes, and bits of shiny tin. Nino was at, fixing two baby carriage wheels to the monster's head.

He gave the wheels a twirl and stood back, and the spinning spokes, glinting under a spotlight, became malevolent eyes.

"Good afternoon," said Qwilleran. "I'm a friend of Zoe Lambreth. You must be Nino."

The sculptor appeared to be in a trance, his face illumined with the thrill of creation. His shirt and trousers were stiff with paint and grease, his beard needed trimming, and his hair had not recently known a comb. In spite of it all, he was a good, looking brute — with classic features and an enviable physique. He looked at Qwilleran without seeing him, then admiringly he turned back to the Thing with spinning eyes.

"Have you given it a title?" asked the newsman.

"'Thirty,six, " said Nino, and he put his face in his hands and cried.

Qwilleran waited sympathetically until the artist had recovered and then said, "How do you create these works of art? What is your procedure?"

"I live them," said Nino. "Thirty-six is what I am, I was, and I will be. Yesterday is gone, and who cares? If I set fire to this studio, I live — in every leaping flame, flash, flare, floriferous flourish."

"Do you have your materials insured?" "If I do, I do. If I don't, I don't. It's all relative. Man loves, hates, cries, plays, but what can an artist do? BOOM! That's the way it goes. A world beyond a world beyond a world beyond a world."