“Isn’t this the 1960s Barbie you were looking for?”

He held up an impossibly proportioned doll with an impossibly high price tag.

“Shut up,” Heinrich said.

Neil chuckled.

“Got any 78s or cylinders to go with those players?” Jordan asked the dealer.

The old man behind the table shook his head. “Feller came along about an hour ago and cleaned me out.”

“Just our luck,” Heinrich grumbled.

They moved on.

“Hey Heinrich,” Neil called in a loud voice. “Isn’t this the Shaun Cassidy single you were looking for? He was a real heartthrob back when you were a teenybopper.”

A passerby carrying a collection of lead soldiers gave Heinrich a disgusted look.

“Can it, Neil.”

The lawyer snickered.

A few minutes later they struck pay dirt at a stand piled high with 78s. They dove in like a half dozen birds of prey. Within ten minutes they all had several records under their arms and the vendor was a few hundred dollars richer.

“I can’t believe he had Malinowski’s original recordings from the Trobriand Islands!” Neil exclaimed. “These are some of the first ethnographic recordings ever made, and still some of the best.”

“And a complete run of Ernest Hogan,” Jordan said with pride as he examined his purchases.

“I thought you had all his stuff in cylinder,” Avram said.

“Yeah, but it’s better to preserve those and play the vinyl,” Jordan replied.

Avram nodded. “You think I paid too much for this Vladimir Kastorsky?”

“Nah. It’s in near mint condition and the coloring on the logo is well preserved,” Thornton told the newbie as he pointed to a golden cupid on the center of the record.

“He was one of the best Russian bass singers ever,” Avram said with a sigh.

“It’s worth paying a bit more for something you like,” Heinrich said.

Just then Heinrich saw something he liked. A dusky woman with soft brown eyes and raven black hair down to her shoulders. She looked to be in her late thirties, so not out of the market for an athletic guy in his forties like himself. Her dress was conservative, a plain black knee-length skirt and red top on her petite but fit frame. The woman walked quickly down the aisle, her eyes darting every which way, obviously looking for something specific. She stopped a little past them at a stand with a bunch of statuettes that looked like they were from ancient Greece.

Heinrich broke away from the pack and went over to the stand. The woman was picking up the statuettes one by one and checking them with an expert eye. Heinrich could tell a pro when he saw one. The look was the same no matter what the collectible.

“Fascinating stuff,” Heinrich said. “I wish I knew more about archaeology.”

The woman nodded but didn’t reply. She picked up a little bronze figure of a nude woman.

“Aphrodite?” he asked.

“Yes. She’s in her Uranian aspect. You can see from the globe she stands on,” the woman said in an accent that marked her as a native New Yorker.

“Interesting. And what were her characteristics in that aspect?”

The woman looked equal parts annoyed by the distraction and eager to share her enthusiasm. It was easy to rope a collector into a conversation. He only wished more chicks came to fairs like this.

“The ancient Greeks believed that Aphrodite had two aspects. The more common one we tend to think of today is the goddess of earthly love. The Uranian aspect was more celestial and symbolized a more elevated form of love. Unlike with most Greek deities, her worshippers did not offer her libations of wine, and her priestesses took vows of chastity.”

“Oh, I see,” Heinrich said, although he didn’t. Why worship the goddess of sex if you couldn’t get any?

“Hey, Heinrich! Isn’t this the German-made 1920s porcelain Kewpie doll you were looking for?”

Neil waved an annoyingly cute yet priceless doll over his head while the nervous vendor tried to snatch it from his hands.

“Jackass,” Heinrich shot back. He turned to the woman. “That was a joke. I collect old music.