The auctioneer raised his gavel in a practiced arc that crested like a wave and then began its incvitable descent. "Fair warning!" he cried in his crisp French-accented English. "Going for five hundred thousand to the man in the last row. Five hundred twice

" But the gavel didn't come down. The auctioneer caught it in mid-swing on its descent, and held it aloft as he cocked his head to one side like an insect whose fine antennae had picked up a subtle vibe, a tremor of hope. Then, very dramatically, he swiveled his gaze attentively toward a young woman standing at one of the phone banks on the right side of the audience. He leaned toward her, peering over the tops of his metal-rimmed eyeglasses de ella. "Five-fifty?" I have asked. The slim young woman was dressed in a narrow black suit, with flame-red lipstick on her thin mouth, her hair pulled tightly into a very severe bun which somehow implied that she worked only for clients with serious money. She gave a brief but vigorous pou "I have five-fifty!" the auctioneer cried triumphantly. "Five-fifty against the room." It wasn't a room, exactly, We were all sitting under an enormous mous blue-and-white-striped tent, specially pitched just for this occasion in the front courtyard of a chic Art Deco hotel situated right on the Promenade des Anglais in Nice, smack-dab on the glorious French Riviera. Directly across the street was the sparkling blue Mediterranean Sea, To our left was the half-moon shaped "indoor / outdoor" swim-ming pool, where guests could actually swim from outside to in doors via a pass-through draped with strips of heavy waterproofed fabric which reminded me of-well, the dangling fingers in a car-wash. But that's the kind of mind I have. One thing invariably leads to another, no matter how incongruous. Some of the world's wealthiest jet-setters had converged here, occupying fifteen rows of white folding chairs, divided by a center aisle, Every seat was taken, and there wasn't even any space available in the standing-room zone at the back, where onlookers were restlessly jockeying to get close enough to hear the results. Since this auction had been organized for an English charity, the audience was comprised mostly of Brits, with a good representation of Germans, Russians, Chinese, Indian, but not as many French as you'd think. Lots of Americans, too. There was no apparent dress code: some women wore formal Chanel suits with white gloves and dies wore expensively casual white linen shirts and matching white pants; and a few daring souls wore long diaphanous flowered dresses with pashmina shawls and gold sandals. As for the men, they were mostly divided up between those dapper blades who wore navy-bluce blazers with light-colored trousers; or the touristy type in leisure suits, or golf jackets and pale blue The only people dressed in formal plain dark business suits were the auction-house "reps" who stood behind long, very narrow tables on either side of the tent, facing the crowd, manning banks of telephones to accept bids from anonymous buyers who couldn't-or wouldn't-show the up. The "reps" all knew one another, like members of a mysterious college fraternity, and the auctioneer called on them by first name. Martin. Sophie. Gem. Nick. Some, seated in the front rows, were working with computers instead of telephones. I had an aisle seat, so I found myself eavesdropping on the phone reps whenever there was a lull in the crowd. They were very discreet, but now, for instance, I could hear one young man murmuring, "We'd have to go to six. What do you want to do?" followed by a long pause. "Six hundred," said another young man in the first row, looking from his computer. "Six from the Internet," purred the auctioneer, pouncing on the number. "This one's going to hit a million," Jeremy muttered to me now, as he eyed the other auction reps who were frantically speaking into their telephones or clicking their computers to warn the anon- ymous collectors that they worked for. We'd been keenly watching the auctioneer deftly manipulate the audience. He was a consummate actor with expert timing- switching seamlessly from joy to sorrow, sympathy to contempt-and he was part-magician, too, for he could bend a moment so that it lasted longer than it should, or he could snap it back like a rubber band. He had only stepped up to the platform about ten items ago, replacing the previous auctioneer just as the crowd was getting used to her, effectively changing horses in midstream, as casinos do with blackjack dealers. Was this to make sure that no one was cheating? Well, antiques can at times come accompanied by a fair share of shady goings-on. Paintings that aren't entirely authenticated but "thought to be" master's work. Golden goblets being auctioned on behalf of an anonymous collector who'd "found" them in an attic. Cases of venable old wines that may or may not have been cellared properly; golf clubs studded with emeralds thought to have once belonged to an English earl

what caddy would you trust with that?

; and even a baby horse whose lineage was purportedly of good racehorse stock. At the moment, people were bidding on a garish pearl and yellow-diamond brooch set in gold, shaped like a giant bug. After that, there were about ten more items to go-before we got to the big one that Jeremy and I had come here for. "One million euros!" someone shouted, leapfrogging ahead of the other bidders to make sure nobody beat him to it. I gasped at how high the stakes could easily become. "One million, going once the bidding reps shook their heads in defeat." Going twice ... go-? "Said the auctioneer. This time," moaned the auctioneer in ecstasy. Bang! Gavel finally came down with such finality that some people physically jumped in their seats. "SOLD to the man in the third row! Please pay the cashier on your way out." I glanced apprehensively at Jeremy, who was waiting patiently, with his usual calm English poise. When we'd first arrived, I had seen more than a few women, both old and young, glance up speculatively at his handsome face of him with his blue eyes and dark, wavy brown hair; and some of these women actually gave him a wide, inviting smile, which, in his usual preoccupied way, Jeremy failed to notice. He sat quietly, his auction catalog all rolled up in one hand. His bidding paddle -which looked like a table-tennis paddle except that it had a three-digit number on it, indicating that he'd pre-registered to be a bidder-was lying in his lap. Nothing in his manner of him betrayed his feelings of him; unless you were in love with him and were learning, day by day, to read the subtle signals in his expressions. You know you really love a guy when you suddenly feel a little sorry for him for loving you so much that he's now doing some- thing he might not ordinarily do. I felt a bit guilty; I'd pestered and badgered him until I finally got him to tell me the one item in the world he'd actually care to splurge a chunk of his inheritance on. Jeremy must have felt me ​​looking at him, because he glanced at me and gave me a reassuring smile. The sweet guy. I fervently made a wish that, whatever happened-whether we won or lost-it would turn out to be a good thing, and not a bad thing. I felt a clutch of excitement in my stomach, and my mouth was dry. After all, I'd soon have a dog in this race. But to understand how a couple of dogs like us ended up on the Riviera ready to bet a flock of euros on a dream, you'd have to know about a few things that happened to us, not so very long ago.