I had nothing to add to this, so I said nothing. He seemed to find this neither uncomfortable nor telling, which meant he was accustomed to people who understood that silence wasn't an obligation to fill.
"Your family is from the northeast," he said. "Originally."
"Yes."
"I spent some time there, years ago. Business." A pause that contained something. "I knew of your grandfather. Francis Deveraux, he had a certain reputation in certain circles. A man who kept his own counsel."
The sitting room was warm. The light through the front windows was the light of late morning in November, clear and without warmth. I was very aware of the distance between my chair and the door, which I had positioned to be manageable.
"He was a private person," I said.
"Yes." The word carried something underneath it that I couldn't immediately identify, not quite sympathy, not quite assessment. The particular weight of a man who knew more than he was showing and wanted me to sense the weight without being able to locate its source. "His death was a loss. I was sorry to hear of it."
"Thank you."
"How long ago was it? Two years, perhaps?"
"Three."
"Ah." He looked at his hands briefly, a gesture that might have been genuine reflection or might have been a beat inserted to control the pace of the conversation, the same way a skilled negotiator inserted silences. "And you came to New Orleans after that. Eventually."
"I came to New Orleans because of the arrangement with the Moreau family," I said. Flat, factual, giving him nothing to work with beyond what he already knew. "You're aware of the arrangement."
"Of course." Another smile. "I hope it's been, workable. These situations can be difficult. A great deal of adjustment required."
"It's been fine."
He looked at me for a moment. Something moved in his expression, something that wanted to be impressed and redirected itself before it arrived fully. I kept it.
"You're studying here," he said. "At Harlow."
"Economics."
"Practical." A pause. "Your grandfather had a head for systems. The way things worked underneath the visible structure." He tilted his head slightly. "You have that quality too, I think. The way you look at a room."
I said nothing.
"It's a compliment," he said pleasantly. "Though I understand it might not feel like one, being noticed that way."
"I don't mind being noticed," I said. "I mind being misread."
He was quiet for a moment. The quality of the quiet shifted, not by much, not enough that you'd catch it if you weren't already tracking the register of everything he said and didn't say. But it shifted. The ease became fractionally more deliberate.
"Of course," he said. "That's a reasonable preference." He recrossed his knee. "I won't take too much of your time. I only wanted to introduce myself properly. We'll likely see each other again, there are various occasions where our paths will overlap, and I prefer to know the people I encounter in this particular world."
"It's a small world."
"Smaller than it looks." He stood, which meant I stood, and I was at the door before he'd finished straightening his jacket. He smiled again. "Thank you for receiving me."
"Of course."
Henri appeared at exactly the right moment, he had been listening, I was certain, in the way of someone who understood that the household's management sometimes required information, and showed Salas to the front door. I stayed in the sitting room doorway and watched.
At the threshold, Salas paused. Reached into his breast pocket. Produced a card, plain, cream-colored, just an address printed on it in simple type, nothing else.
He held it out to Henri, who brought it to me.
"In case you find yourself wanting a different perspective," Salas said pleasantly, from the doorway. "On anything. New Orleans can be a difficult city to read from the inside. Sometimes an outside view is useful."