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Gas you here?"

It was, as the Chief knew, a private cocktail party the night before the public opening of Clara’s big show Only the select were invited to a vernissage, especially at the famous Musée in Montréal The monied, the influential, the artist’s friends and family And the artist In that order

Very little was expected of an artist at the vernissage If they were clothed and sober most curators considered the panicked and disheveled in a tailored power suit that had experienced a recent failure The skirt was slightly twisted and the collar was riding high as though she’d tried to scratch the middle of her back

"I’m an art dealer" Thethe crea Just themore The paper was thick and textured A fine-quality business card No doubt for a fine-quality business

"Do you know Clara’s work?" Ga the card into his breast pocket

"Not at all, but I’m friends with the chief curator of the Musée and she slipped me one of the brochures I was frankly astonished The description says Mada in Québec all her life and is almost fifty And yet no one seems to know her She came out of nowhere"

"She came out of Three Pines," said Gamache and at the blank look froe south of here By the Vermont border Not many people know it"

"Or know her An unknown artist in an anonye And yet--"

Monsieur Marois opened his aresture, to indicate the surroundings and the event

They both went back to gazing at the portrait in front of them It showed the head and scrawny shoulders of a very old woh blue shawl to her throat It had slipped to reveal skin stretched over collarbone and sinew

But it was her face that captivated the , with the clink of glasses, the lively conversations, thewhat she heard and saw The happiness all around her The laughter Hating the world that had left her behind Left her alone on this wall To see, to watch and to never be included

Like Proreat spirit endlessly tormented Grown bitter and petty