He stared at Jack a moment as if trying to remember who he was, then fell off to sleep again. Jack listened to the needle spin. Then he put on Crosby, Stills and Nash. “The Marrakesh Express” played as he leafed through a volume on Ivan the Terrible. He finished his beer and slipped out quietly and made it back through the dusky streets to the house before Catherine came home. “What did you do today?” she asked. “Not much,” he said.

The next day he bought an old, withered copy of Somerset Maugham’s stories from the shop. A few days later, a book of birds. Each afternoon, he went over to Christopher’s shop. When he closed, they’d amble to the pub and then back to the flat. They spoke little, and when Christopher did, the words came out in a disjointed, clipped rush.

“I’m glad you’re living here, Jackie,” he said. “What are we but a couple of strangers in this town?”

“Either way.”

“Yeah.” He shuffled to the stereo to change the record. “Were you ever married?” Jack shook his head. “I was,” said Chris, “but she took off with some other geezer.” His belly swung to and fro. He picked a ball of dust off the needle. Then he filled up two small glasses with the Russian vodka that Jack had brought. “Yeah,” he said. “Fuck it,” said Jack. “Yeah,” Christopher Nolan said and palmed the large stomach under his T-shirt.

Catherine was opening in a play downtown at eight and Jack left to get there at three. He started walking, then he jumped on a bus and got off at some place that attracted him. Then he recognized the name of a pub in an area that Catherine had warned him about. He studied the pub’s wooden façade, the old plate glass and its silver designs, and the gas lamps that hung outside. A man in electric-blue carpet slippers and a ravaged face crossed the street and opened the door. On a blind impulse Jack followed him into the forbidden bar.

He ordered a double gin and looked preoccupied.

Beside him the man ordered a Carlsberg Special and a Black Bush.

He looked at Jack. “How would you like a thirteen-year-old?”

“I’m all right,” said Jack.

“She has a beautiful arse,” said the man. “I can get you any wee young thing you want now. Just give me the nod.”

“Sure.”

“Take a look at these here now,” the man said, and he handed Jack a pile of photos in an envelope.

Each was of a young nude girl aged about thirteen or fourteen.

“See the pussies on them?” he said. “They’re yours now, boy, whenever you want them.”

“Here,” said the barman, “put those away.”

“It’s all right,” explained the man with a wink. “I know this lad.”

The barman looked Jack in the eye.