‘So, you want to know more about Lena?’ Gustav’s voice had the scratchy quality of an instrument not much used.

‘It’s just that she reminds me of someone I once knew. Very strongly.’

Gustav sighed. ‘Her mother … Her mother was a strange woman. I knew her quite well because they lived just nearby, down that way, overlooking the river wharf.’

‘How well?’

‘Please wait. I need to arrange the elements of the story. A writer’s habit.’

Anton nodded.

‘Very well. Let me assuage your curiosity at once. I was her lover.’

‘The mother?’

‘Yes. Carina was her name. She was an uneducated woman. Probably from Moravia originally. I never discovered. She was someone who lived only in the moment. I don’t think she could read or write. She was like an animal that needs only warmth and sleep and some physical comfort. I became intrigued by her.’

‘From a professional point of view?’

‘At first. I thought if I created a character somewhat like her in a book it might help me see which habits of thought and sensation separate the human from the other animals. It might be interesting.’

‘In an anthropological way.’

‘Yes, but then I got to know her. And for one thing, I felt I couldn’t use her like that. She had some privacy, some rights, even if she never read the book and even if it was well disguised …’ Gustav looked round the room and stopped speaking.

‘And for another thing?’

‘Yes.’ Gustav met Anton’s gaze. ‘For another thing, I also saw that she was just as fully human as anyone else and that defining a human being as someone capable of rising above animal needs was a false trail.’

Restraining a desire to ask another question, Anton sipped from his coffee cup.

‘She asked me to make love to her one day,’ said Gustav. ‘It was a casual invitation. You might think we made a strange couple and I suppose we did. But we were never … together in that sense. I would just go to her house. I’d take some schnapps if I had some and leave the bottle. She was happy with the arrangement. I’d never had a lover like this before. She didn’t want me to get to know her or make her feel safe and valued. She just wanted me to make love to her as much as I could. I became fond of her. She had no pride. If I didn’t call for weeks, she didn’t mind.’

‘But wasn’t that more like being with an animal, a pet?’

‘No. There was friendship, of a simple kind. I liked her. Sometimes I thought she liked me, but what she really liked was sex. I think she had begun as a child with her brother and a neighbour. Perhaps her father as well. Then all the boys and the men in her building. The way she put it to me was that it was the great pleasure of her life. If people were willing to pay her, she liked that best. But she’d do it anyway. She had many lovers and many children.’