Lucy Musing — Brad Field

An American girl in Paris, Lucy Musing -- nineteen, pretty, witty, but down on her luck -- sees a botched shooting in a restaurant. The evident target is Hertzig, a weary old Swiss operative in the gray world of fiscal espionage. Cops swarm, the two are questioned at Quai D'Orsay. When the police find that they are both foreigners, they are let go. Outside, Lucy attaches herself to Hertzig for her own survival's sake. Hertzig dares not trust her; dares not get rid of her. Did she finger him for the shooter? Each cautiously checks into the other's background. During this, the gunman shoots again, kills a man, no innocent victim. In the midst of the danger, Lucy finds Hertzig funny; he finds her bright. The setting -- July, 1953, the year Stalin died, but before AIDS -- offers the way Paris felt before it got so modern.