Chloe looked at her father; he seemed to be put out and absent. He could not stop looking at the shelf of cat food, particularly the display of five blue packets of Virbac 'Adult cat au canard, with duck'. Claire wasn't in Paris, and Bertrand was at a photographic shoot. Laurent had been called in to help with Putin's annual visit to the vet. The cat was on Chloe's lap in his basket, giving intermittent little growls that Chloe immediately silenced by running her fingers along the wire. Perhaps she had been harsh when she told him the other night that he had been an idiot to terminate the bag saga in that way. She had been so disappointed that the whole beautiful search which she had partic.i.p.ated in a little had ended with a letter to which Laure would not be able to respond. Laurent had been immovable. No, he shouldn't have put his telephone number or email address at the end of the letter. He had to disappear, and cover his traces; on no account did he want to find himself having to answer the quite legitimate questions that the owner of the handbag would have for him. Perhaps it was excessive masculine caution. Or a misunderstanding of feminine psyche and its needs? Laurent had taken a route that not only offered an elegant solution but had also closed down the affair for ever.

'Was there a cat over there too?' said Chloe. It was as if she was referring to a far-off land where he would never go again, like those exiles who recall the land of their birth.

'Yes,' said Laurent seriously.

'What was he like?'

'Black.'

'And what was the name again?'

'Belphegor,' replied Laurent.

'Not the cat's, hers.'

'Valadier.'

'Putin,' said the vet loudly, coming into the waiting room.

Two ladies with little dogs looked up from their magazines and exchanged glances. One of them raised her eyebrows in consternation; the other shook her head.

'Poor cat,' one murmured.

As soon as he was out of the basket, Putin looked fierce and hissed at the vet.

'He's always so happy to see me,' commented the vet, trying to sound jolly. 'He's a great advertis.e.m.e.nt for our profession, your cat.'

Laurent was looking at photos of animals pinned on the wall. Between a husky and a Norwegian cat, there was a black cat, still as a statue, staring into the lens and apparently waiting patiently.

Laure took a seat outside a cafe and ordered a noisette. Had she been a smoker, now would have been the moment to light up with that air of concentration adopted by all nicotine consumers as they take their first drag. Twelve bookshops, and not a single Laurent matching his description. She went back to her notes of William's account: fairly tall, slim, light-brown hair, mid-forties, brown eyes.

The previous evening, she had made a list of all the local bookshops, immediately striking off L'ile en Livre and Fleur de Mots where she bought books regularly and knew all the staff either by name or sight. She was working on the basis that the thief had probably not crossed the whole of Paris to dump her bag, and therefore there was a strong possibility Laurent worked in the immediate area, or at least within the same arrondiss.e.m.e.nt. The waiter brought Laure her coffee and she poured in a sachet of sugar. She had started with Au Fil des Pages, a bookshop five streets from where she lived.

'h.e.l.lo, bit of a strange question, but do you by any chance have a bookseller called Laurent working here?'

Laure had asked the same thing no less than eight times, softly and with an apologetic smile. In the end she met a total of four different Laurents. The first time the blonde girl answered, 'Yes, of course, I'll just call him down,' she felt her stomach flip. The girl came out from behind the till and disappeared between the shelves.

'Laurent,' she called up the stairs. 'There's someone here to see you.'

'He's coming,' she told Laure on her return, before moving on to serve the next customer.

A man in his forties with light-brown hair and little steel-rimmed gla.s.ses came down to greet her.

'h.e.l.lo, great to meet you at last!' he exclaimed, holding out his hand. 'Did you find it OK?'

Laure went quiet for a moment, feeling a little fl.u.s.tered. Then, holding his gaze, she smiled and told him actually it had not been plain sailing.

'Tell me about it,' he agreed, sounding exasperated. 'Since they started the roadworks in the middle of the crossing it's become much harder to spot us, but you got here, that's the main thing. I'll show you where the paperbacks are,' he said, motioning for her to follow him. 'You have to keep a close eye on them because these are the ones that get nicked, but you know all that. Your other section is just on the table here and on these five shelves: crime. You said in your email you were very familiar with American crime writers, which is great, but I'm keen on French detective novels too. What have you read recently?'

Laure stared back at him.

'You must have the wrong person,' she said, smiling in confusion.

'The Wrong Person?' asked the bookseller, frowning. 'No, I don't think we do have that one. Who's the author?'

The poor man didn't have a clue about the business of the bag and the cat and Laure backed out of the shop, muttering her apologies. There were no booksellers by the name of Laurent at L'Enjolivre, and none at La Compagnie des Mots, L'Arbre a Mots or La Belle Plume either. The owner of Le Chat a Lunettes, on the other hand, smiled broadly at Laure's question.

'Laurent ...? That's me.'

The only thing was he was in his sixties, with white hair and gla.s.ses with sky-blue plastic frames. Laure found herself giving another garbled account of how her bag had been returned to her by a bookseller called Laurent, who had fed her cat but left no address for her to contact him.

'I'm sorry, I don't think I'm being very clear,' said Laure, making a mental note to leave out the bit about the cat from now on, because it was all getting way too difficult to explain to a complete stranger who had no idea what she was going on about.

'No, no, it's perfectly clear to me. I can think of far more complicated stories about bags and cats,' the bookseller replied. 'Take this one, for example. Listen carefully: On my way to Notre-Dame, I see a man with seven wives. Seven wives each with seven bags. And in each of those seven bags, seven cats. Seven cats with seven kittens each. How many are going to Notre-Dame?'

'... Forty-nine times forty-nine, plus seven women, plus the man ... A lot,' replied Laure.

'No,' said the bookseller, 'not a lot. The answer is one. I'm the only one going to Notre-Dame; as for the man, the women, the bags and cats, we'll never know. You lose, but don't worry, no one ever gets it right. Lunch?'

Laure politely declined the offer from 'the cat with gla.s.ses' and went on with her search. She encountered another two Laurents on her way: a tall, dark man with close-cropped hair and a short man with a greying beard. As she neared the end of her list, she made do with opening the door and glancing around the shop floor. None of the staff at these bookshops matched the description William had given. The three at L'Arc en Mots were all women, and there was only a blonde woman sitting behind the till and a tall boy with a goatee at Le Cahier Rouge. La Boite a Livres was run by a pair of men, but neither fitted the bill. She was about to stake her bet on Mots Pa.s.sants, where a man in his forties with light-brown hair was bending down to look at a computer screen, when the telephone by his side began to ring. He picked it up.

'Good afternoon, Mots Pa.s.sants,' he said, before immediately adding, 'No, it's Pierre ...'

Even if Laurent had found the bag around here, his bookshop was not necessarily nearby. He might very well live in this arrondiss.e.m.e.nt and own a bookshop on the opposite side of town. It was also perfectly conceivable that he had only been pa.s.sing through the area. The thief could have driven off after the mugging, perhaps jumping on a scooter parked a few streets away. He might even have taken the Metro and dumped her bag ten stops away. She wondered what Sophie Calle would have done with a story like hers. Something infinitely more poetic than the afternoon she had just endured, that was for sure.

Laure slowly resigned herself to the idea that the game was up, the trail had gone cold and she would never meet the stranger who had quoted Modiano, fed her cat and written: 'I'm sorry to have intruded so far into your life. It wasn't my intention.' She placed her mauve bag on her lap, took out the purse she had bought the day before and picked out the correct change. Returning it to the bag, her fingers brushed against her lucky red dice. Will I meet Laurent the bookseller one day? she asked silently, and then she dropped the two dice onto the white marble table. A wry smile crossed her lips. If fate was optimistic, as the numbers suggested, the reality was anything but. She picked up her Montblanc pen and one by one crossed out the names of the twelve bookshops in her red notebook.

In the large gla.s.s-fronted office on the first floor, Chloe looked at the director of the Ateliers Gardhier in silence.

'It's an eighteenth-century frame, typical of its time. The gold is very faded,' murmured Sebastien Gardhier, inspecting the frame of the little still life. 'You'll have to come back in a month. I hope your parents are not in too much of a hurry?'

Chloe shook her head. 'Can I go and see the people working in your studio?'

Sebastien smiled at her. 'Yes, you can. You can also ask them some questions, but above all you must watch closely. That's the first thing: you have to look,' he said, raising his index finger. 'So off you go and keep your eyes open,' he added, walking her over to the stairs.

'It's horrible, that frame,' she had said the previous evening at dinner.

Bertrand followed her gaze as far as the little picture on the wall. 'Don't say that, Chloe,' he replied, cut to the quick. 'That picture means a lot to me, it comes from my father.'

'It's not the picture that's horrible,' Chloe murmured, 'it's the frame. Look, it's all tarnished.'

'That's true,' Betrand conceded. 'It certainly wasn't always like that.'

The picture was of a lobster in the middle of a fine still life. Chloe explained that the mother of one of her school friends was a gilder; perhaps she could take it to her?

'The picture isn't a priority,' said Claire evasively.

'Now it is,' cut in Bertrand portentously. 'I'm delighted that Chloe is taking an interest in one of my possessions. Tomorrow morning, Chloe, you can take it down, we'll wrap it up together and you can take it to your friend.'

'It might be expensive,' said Chloe in a little voice, pretending to get out of it.

'That doesn't matter,' said Bertrand, still in that tone that brooked no refusal. 'I can easily afford to have that frame gilded.'

Chloe nodded then announced she was going to get the dessert from the kitchen.

Claire looked at Bertrand. 'I appreciate you doing that,' she said softly. 'Thank you.'

'You know,' said Bertrand, helping himself to some wine, 'underneath her rebellious faade, I think your daughter has the makings of a real little homemaker. She's going to surprise us.'

A first name, surname and profession. It had only taken Chloe four minutes to find Laure Valadier's work address.

In the silent studio seven gilders were at work. The first one she came across was a young man with bleached, shaved hair. She quickly eliminated the men: him, the bearded one with grey hair chewing his unlit pipe, and the short one with gelled hair. A dark-haired woman with a ponytail turned to her and smiled.

'I'm allowed to watch,' said Chloe quietly, walking towards her.

The woman was laying gold leaves next to each other on a large gla.s.s sheet. The movement of the brush from cheek to the gilding cushion was strangely hypnotic. Each leaf was placed to the millimetre in the correct position. Chloe looked at the woman. Even though she was pretty, something told Chloe that her father would not fall in love with a woman like this. And she immediately dismissed the next woman along who had short blonde hair and a pinched expression. Definitely not, thought Chloe. The one with curly hair and little gold gla.s.ses, might she read Modiano, stop him in the street to ask him to sign a book and put it away in a mauve handbag? Chloe went over to her. She looked good in her faded jeans and white Repetto pumps. Was this Laure? The woman looked up and Chloe smiled at her. She didn't know what to think. Her lipstick was pearly pink, and she wore sea-green eyeliner. Chloe hadn't seen anything in the make-up bag that would suit this woman.

She took a step sideways behind a panel covered in gold leaf and found herself looking at a woman with light-coloured eyes. Pale blue or grey. She went over to her. She had shoulder-length brown hair pulled up on top with a blue flower hair clip turned between three twists of hair. She was wearing a grey sweater, a slim-fitting black skirt and high-heeled ankle boots. As Chloe approached, she noted the lovely complexion, and a little detail she had a beauty spot above her upper lip. She was applying her gold leaves to the base of an antique statue with that movement which made the gold leaf crinkle with static electricity and then smoothing it onto the damp surface. She took a knife and on her calfskin gilding cushion trimmed the next leaf into a triangle, then placed it at an angle and pressed it with precision into the base. 'h.e.l.lo,' she said softly. 'You're having a look around our studio?'

'Yes, I brought in a frame for my parents and I wanted to see how you worked.'

'Good idea. You see how we all have our leather gilding cushion and knife; there are twelve steps to go through before you get to what I am doing.' She then went on in a friendly manner, 'In fact, you can gild almost anything.' She smiled and her eyes lit up. 'I've done plenty of things, ceilings, railings, roofs ...'

But Chloe wasn't listening any more, she was staring at the cashmere jumper on which she had just spotted a characteristic little shining point caught in the fibres and resistant to any fluff remover: a cat hair. Black. There was another, and another. She leant close to Laure and closed her eyes: yes, definitely Habanita. There was no doubt, here she was, the woman with the mauve handbag. Chloe opened her eyes just as Laure was preparing to place a new leaf.

'His name is Laurent Letellier,' she murmured. 'He's the owner of Le Cahier Rouge.'

Laure's hand stopped in mid-air, the gold leaf lost its static and fell twisting to the ground.

Wednesday 12 February I haven't kept a diary since I was seventeen. I think it was soon after my baccalaureat that I gave it up for reasons I'm not sure of, because from the age of twelve or thirteen I had written one religiously. (Note to self: Look for my diaries in the boxes in the cellar.) I remember sticking all kinds of things in them: tickets from films and plays I had been to see, leaves I had picked up on walks and bills for meals I had eaten on cafe terraces. They were a record of what I had done when, down to the nearest minute. I think I held on to them as 'evidence' of some kind. They helped me to find my place in the world and, in a broader sense, to prove to myself that I really existed. I suppose I must have decided at some point that I no longer needed to do that, because I gave up writing a diary, stopped telling the story of my life and tried to just live it instead.

I'm certainly not planning to go back to writing down everything I do each day. For starters, I don't do enough noteworthy things, and besides I already jot stuff in my red notebook if the urge takes me. But since this morning, I've been feeling the need to make a record of what has happened. I know the name and address of the man who brought my bag back. His name is Laurent Letellier. He's the owner of Le Cahier Rouge. I've just realised that's almost word for word what his daughter told me. That sentence was so unexpected and it's still lingering in my mind, bouncing around inside my head like that ancient video game with two lines either side of the screen and a dot going back and forth between them. I once spent an entire Sat.u.r.day playing it with Natacha Rosen and her brother, David. That was over thirty years ago. I don't know what they're doing now, but I'm pretty sure I'm the only one of us currently thinking about that rainy Sat.u.r.day at their house in Garches.

The bookseller's daughter is called Chloe. I had coffee with her sitting by the window of the studio. My grandmother would have described her as 'a very determined little person'. That's exactly what she is.

'I think my dad wishes he'd given you his address, and I think you'd like to have it,' she said without beating around the bush. She knows the whole story. I told her I had done the rounds of all the local bookshops, and she seemed to like that idea.

'I'd have done exactly the same thing,' she remarked, running her hand through her hair in a very feminine and ever so slightly arrogant way (was I like that at her age?). I had actually been into her father's bookshop, but I hadn't asked if there was a bookseller called Laurent. I'd had enough of the endless curious looks and disappointments by then.

'When did you go to Le Cahier?' she asked. She took out a Pleiade diary, telling me her father gave her one every year and she could get me one too if I wanted. Then she said something I had to get her to repeat: 'Thursday? That's the day we took Putin to get his jabs.' (Chloe has a cat called Putin she wouldn't tell me why.) After that she stood up, saying it was time to go to school. She asked me to promise never to tell her father she had come. I promised.

She also asked if I had a husband and children. I told her I didn't have children, but that I had had a husband and that he was dead, that he had been killed a long way away in Baghdad in a terrorist attack. Chloe looked straight at me, shaking her head very slowly without saying a word. I liked the fact she held my gaze; normally when I tell people, they look away and then turn back with sympathy in their eyes, and I feel like giving them a slap.

Thursday 13 February I pressed the buzzer and heard his voice. It was a little after 8 p.m. The bookshop shutters were down. There were a number of names on the building's intercom, including a certain 'L. Letellier'.

'h.e.l.lo?' said the voice.

I wanted to reply: 'I'm Laure Valadier ...' He would probably have paused for a moment and told me to come up. Or perhaps he would have come down. But I couldn't get the words out. I suddenly felt the need to give myself a bit more time, so I said, 'I'm sorry, I've got the wrong address.'

'No problem. Have a good evening,' the voice replied, and the conversation ended with a click.

I remained outside the gla.s.s door, looking in at the entrance hall. There was a door on the right which must be the way into the bookshop; the same kind of door leads to the design shop Arcane 17 beneath my flat. I looked at the staircase and the mosaic tiled floor, and thought about the fact that these were things this man whom I don't know but who knows me so well saw every day. Chloe told me he has not always been a bookseller; he used to be an investment banker until one day he decided to pack it all in. As someone who has been doing the same thing for the last twenty-four years, I like the idea that it's possible to start a new life.

As I walked back to the taxi rank, I kept thinking how strange it was that we had actually spoken, although he didn't know it. Even distorted by the intercom, he had a nice voice, and his 'Have a good evening' stayed with me throughout my dinner at Jacques and Sophie's. Everywhere I go I end up having to tell the whole story of the mugging and the coma; I'm getting a bit tired of talking about it. I haven't even mentioned it to my sister, who sent me an email saying, 'No news? All good?' I replied, 'Yes, all good, you?' I'm not sure I ever will tell her everything that's happened over the last two weeks. I have less and less in common with Benedicte and when we talk about the past, our memories are completely at odds. Sometimes it feels as if we didn't have the same parents.

Friday 14 February Today I imitated Sophie Calle. I went to see the bookshop from the outside. I found a bench in the square and sat looking through the window of Le Cahier Rouge. There were three people inside: a tall boy with a goatee and long hair, a blonde woman in her sixties, and Laurent. He is much as William described him. (William, by the way, can't get over the fact I've found his address he keeps badgering me to go into the shop.) Laurent is indeed 'fairly tall, slim, light-brown hair, mid-forties, brown eyes', but then I always knew William could be relied upon to describe a guy. At first I had to watch him from a distance because I didn't want to get too close to the shop window. I know he would recognise my face. At eleven o'clock, the long-haired bookseller with the goatee came out into the square to meet a guy in a hoodie who sold him some weed. I'm sure that's what it was: a quick, no-nonsense transaction under the statue. I don't know if Laurent is aware of his employee's predilection for marijuana, but the blonde woman gave the kid a look and shook her head in resignation when he came back in she's definitely on to him.

At lunchtime, Laurent went out, and I followed him. He walked up to the top of Rue de la Pentille and then turned into Rue du Pa.s.se-Musette. I was quite a long way behind him and could only see him from the back. It occurred to me I should have brought Xavier's Nikon 51, the only one of his cameras I've ever known how to use. I could have taken pictures and emailed them to him at the bookshop anonymously. He sat down outside a cafe by the market called l'Esperance. I waited at the corner of the road for a little while before going to sit two tables behind him. The waiter joked that it was quite an event to see him there for lunch. They had a short conversation from which I gathered that Laurent usually visited the cafe first thing in the morning. I ordered a Caesar salad and a gla.s.s of white wine; the bill's pasted below. So it was 1.38 p.m. and the waiter was named on the slip as: garon 2. Caesar salad: 9.30. Gla.s.s of wine: 4.20. Coffee: 2.20. Total: 15.70.

Laurent had a meat dish with a sauce, a gla.s.s of red wine and coffee. He spent his lunch break reading a book with a strange-looking white cover. It must have been one of those copies that booksellers get sent before they are published. He had a pencil in his hand and was underlining parts of the text. Leaning forward, I was able to see him in profile. Laurent has a very straight nose and full lips and he hadn't shaved. He has gentle, almost sad-looking eyes which suddenly wrinkled up with laughter when the waiter made some joke I didn't catch. I've always liked men who can go from looking serious to warm in the s.p.a.ce of a few seconds. That was true of Xavier, and my father.

Two tables from Laurent there was a blonde woman in a grey suit reading a file. Twice she glanced up at him, drawing on her Vogue cigarette as if deep in thought. She looked like the kind of woman who knew she only had to smile to catch a man's attention, reeling him in in the time it took to ask him to pa.s.s the salt.

'I have no sugar,' she said loudly. 'Could I have some sugar please, garon?'

Laurent, who hadn't used his sugar, didn't even look up from his book while the waiter moved the bowl to the woman's table. Better luck next time, I thought, smiling to myself. As with most men who are attractive without being conventionally handsome, Laurent is clearly oblivious of his charms. The woman left without adding a grain of sugar to her coffee.

I'm scared I might like this man.

Sat.u.r.day 15 February I've had my hair cut. The last time I had it done was after scattering Xavier's ashes at Cap de la Hague. I can't remember the name of the salon I went to near Barneville. I can't even remember the hairdresser's face. Anyway, it's pretty short ... But I think that's a good thing. I asked Catherine to collect up the hair. She put it in a plastic bag for me. I burnt it on the fire.

Sunday 16 February Nothing.

I shouldn't have cut my hair.

Monday 17 February The bookshop's shut. Stupid me, I should have known. I'll go tomorrow.

Tuesday 18 February I'll go tomorrow.

Wednesday 19 February I've written so much that I'm almost at the end of my red notebook I've even started writing on the inside of the back cover. But I only have a few lines to go. I'm sitting on a bench in the square. The two other booksellers have gone. Laurent hasn't locked the door. I can see him standing on a ladder at the back of the shop. This time, I'm going in.

Laurent glanced towards the door which had just opened with a tinkle. Using a pair of pliers and a cloth, he was attempting to fix the connection on a pipe which had leaked over a section of the paperbacks. It must have come loose when the water was switched back on a month ago. It had been slowly dripping, soaking the backs of the shelves without anyone noticing.

'h.e.l.lo, I'm looking for a book ...'

'You've come to the right place,' replied Laurent, tightening up the copper band as firmly as he could.

'I don't know the author ...'

'Do you know what it's about?' Laurent tried instead, continuing to inspect the pipe. The band had nudged up a millimetre.

Laure took off her woolly hat and undid her scarf.

'It's the story of a bookseller who finds a handbag in the street one day, takes it home with him, empties out its contents and decides to look for the woman who owns it. He succeeds but when he finds her, he runs off like an idiot.'

Laurent froze on the ladder. Then, very slowly, he turned to look at her.