Paris, France "It's very small," the englishwoman said, sounding disappointed.

Mac Rudolph laughed, put his arm around the woman's slender neck, and al owed his hand to fal onto her breast. She wasn't wearing a bra.

"Oil on a wooden panel," he said. "Thirty inches by twenty-one, or seventy-seven centimeters by fifty-three. It was meant to hang in the dining room in the home of the Florentine merchant Francesco del Giocondo. But da Vinci never got it finished."

He felt her nipple stiffen under the fabric of the blouse. She didn't move his hand away.

Sylvia Rudolph slid up on the other side of her, her hand easing its way under the woman's arm.

"Mona Lisa wasn't her name," Sylvia said. "Just Lisa. Mona is an Italian diminutive that can be taken to mean 'lady' or 'her grace.'"

The woman's husband was standing behind Sylvia, his body pushed up against hers in the crowd. Very cozy.

"Anyone thirsty?" he asked.

Sylvia and Mac exchanged a quick glance and a grin.

They were on the first floor of the Denon wing of the Louvre, in the Sal e des Etats. Hanging on the wal in front of them, behind nonreflective glass, was the most famous portrait in the world, and the guy was thinking about beer?

"You're right," Mac said, his hand gently gliding down the Englishwoman's back. "It is smal. Francesco del Giocondo's dining room table can't have been very large."

He smiled over at the woman's husband.

"And you're right, too. It's time to drink some wine!"

They found their way out of the museum, down the modern staircase toward the Porte des Lions, and stepped out into the middle of a Parisian spring evening.

Sylvia inhaled deeply, breathing in the intoxicating mix of exhaust fumes, river water, and freshly opened leaves, and laughed out loud.