“Higher, I think. Sorry, what were you saying, Corinna?” K
itty asked, momentarily distracted.
“I said…oh never mind. I hope you can work things out with Bernard amicably.”
“What does ‘amicably’ mean?”
“Friendly, peacefully.”
“I don’t want a war with Bernard. I just want him to be able to share Gisele with me, that’s all.”
“That’s the spirit. Anyway, good luck, and be sure to call me the next time you’re in Hong Kong.”
“We’ll take Gisele for high tea at the Four Seasons!”
“No, the Mandarin. Always the Mandarin. And don’t say ‘high tea’—high tea is only for factory workers. It’s ‘afternoon tea.’?”
“Of course. Whatever you say, Corinna.”
Kitty hung up the phone and took a few steps back. “You know, Oliver, you were right. It didn’t need to be higher. Let’s move it all back to where you had it originally.”
Oliver T’sien winked at her. “I was right when I told you to buy this house, and I was right when I told you to buy the painting, wasn’t I? I always imagined it looking utterly exquisite against this wall. It’s all about how the light filters in through those old lead-glass windows.”
“You’re right, it’s all going to be utterly exquisite,” Kitty said, gazing out the window as the workmen began rehanging The Palace of Eighteen Perfections on her drawing-room wall.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I could not have written this book without the help, inspiration, expertise, patience, support, genius, and general good humor of these remarkable people:
Alan Bienstock
Ryan Matthew Chan
Lacy Crawford
Cleo Davis-Urman
David Elliott
Simone Gers
Aaron Goldberg
Jeffrey Hang
Daniel K. Isaac
Jenny Jackson
Jeanne Lawrence
Baptiste Lignel
Wah Guan Lim
Carmen Loke
Alexandra Machinist