“He was a friend of my family in Paris, but I wasn’t even born. He came to Paris to paint around 1920. He hung around Chou En-lai and the others at the Pascal Restaurant, on the Rue de l’Ecole de Medicine.” Chen speaks the last words in French. “He helped Chou stage a protest of the Chinese Legation, traveled around Europe with Chou to get recruits for the Chinese Communist Youth Corps.”

Paul is hearing this for the first time. “Chou?” he asks.

“Yes, China’s premier. The same.”

“He never said.”

“They parted ways. Chou returned to China to fight with Sun Yat Sen. Your father came home. What he really wanted was to return to his painting, and his family was here. His father died suddenly. Your auntie was a young girl, and he was the only son. He was a Marxist, but also filial.”

Paul is quiet. He isn’t a Marxist, but he already knows it’s going to be impossible to be filial.

“I looked him up when I came to study. He remembered my family from those days in Paris. When I met him, he was living and painting in the Monkey Block.”

“Monkey Block?”

“That’s what they called the block on Montgomery at Washington. The street was a hangout for artists and writers. The building was full of artist studios. Used to be the Black Cat Café in the basement.”