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said all the people leaving the apartment were bundled up. He could have hidden his face with the pictures. Everybody was carrying presents and shopping."
    “It's true Menard can't prove he wasn't there, but I was hoping he could prove he was. He can't. Gino says the alibi checks out. Menard got a Polaroid shot of Bergma for Gino to flash at the hotel. They all swore he was there. It'd take time to get his car out of the hotel garage, get up to Côte des Neiges, kill Latour, and get back. His absence for that long would have been noticed. We're on the wrong track. Have to go back to square one."
    It was hard to give up this excellent suspect. He had the perfect motive. “Aristotle tells us a likely impossibility is preferable to an unconvincing possibility,” I said.
    “I guess that must have been before they invented logic."
    “Who else could it have been? Bergma must have a cohort."
    “That's one possibility. ‘Evils draw men together.’ Aristotle said that too. A big help to mystery writers, Aristotle. If we find the forgeries in Bergma's house tonight, we can still pin him down. But if we don't...” He shrugged.
    “If we don't, we start searching the museum."
    “We find out who his helper is first. And if that turns up a blank, then we have to find the third man. The son-of-a-bitch, the buyer."
    “The buyer was supposed to be getting the originals. He wasn't after the phonies,” I pointed out.
    “Maybe he didn't trust Bergma—or Latour. If he got his own hands on the forgeries ... Well, it'd give him the upper hand. Bergma's still my first choice. It just isn't going to be as easy to pin it on him as I hoped."
    “We've got to watch Bergma like a hawk. The Art Nouveau show opens tonight, John. Don't you think we should be there?"
    “I plan to pick up the tickets when we're at the museum this afternoon. Would you like something with that coffee? I know your sweet tooth."
    “Let's save that for the museum. They have nice desserts, and we're meeting Gino there."
    We just had the coffee, and I used the quiet period to bring up Christmas again, before John could raise a less pleasant subject, like Chuck Evans. “We have to make plans for Christmas, John. Mom's dying to meet you. Would you be interested in coming home with me? We should make reservations. The airlines are really crowded at this time of the year."
    “We could always drive. It's not that far. I'd like to go with you, but I can't walk away if this case is still up in the air, Cassie."
    “I'm not going if it isn't solved!"
    But I knew Mom would hit the roof if I didn't show up. Mom's a very matriarchal Italian. Our family is close. I really wanted to go anyway. I never spent Christmas any place but home. Maine would be lovely at this time of year, with glittering snow piled in mountains. Quite a bit like Montreal, really. The protective rise of Mount Royal watching over the city at the north always reminded me of Maine.
    “Then I think maybe we'd better get shopping for a Christmas tree,” he suggested.
    “You really think the case will last that long?"
    “It's a possibility, but if you'd rather spend the holiday with your family..."
    “I want to spend it with you and the family, in that order. If you stay, I stay. I'll call Mom tonight and let her know I might not be home."
    “We can go for New Year's,” he suggested as a sop.
    “It's still five days away. We'll solve the case. Let's go."

CHAPTER 6

    With white-knuckled hands clenched to the wheel, John snaked through the oncoming traffic at considerable risk to life and limb, and we soon found ourselves in front of the towering gray Museum of Fine Arts. A display case in front of the building advertised the Art Nouveau Grand Opening, at twenty-five bucks a head. One of the posters would help to liven up my apartment. It was a reproduction of an Erté design of a lady in a long red gown with sleeves like wings, spread out around her.
    “I doubt if it'll be sold out at these prices,”