Jomier opens his journal on his computer and searches for ‘Tom’ to see how long that first marriage had lasted. Three, four years? The legitimate baby, a girl they called Rose, had been their only child. As soon as he had secured Arabella Tom started sleeping with other women. He thought it only reasonable while his wife was pregnant: ‘Who wants to fuck a balloon?’ He also thought it reasonable when she was no longer pregnant: ‘Who wants to fuck a woman with oozing tits?’ He thought it reasonable when the baby was off the breast and Arabella had recovered her figure: ‘If you’ve been shagging all afternoon, you don’t feel like it at night.’ The shagging all afternoon was essential if Tom’s novel was to be a success. Middle-aged women who edited the books’ pages had to be motivated to provide prominent, favourable reviews. And it was absurd not to fuck the publicist who took him on tour since they were staying in the same hotel. So too the girl who sold foreign rights at the Frankfurt Book Fair. He denied these infidelities to Arabella but she knew and he knew that she knew. He got drunk and slept on the sofa; she cried herself to sleep in their double bed.

The entries in Jomier’s journal tell the story. ‘Tom off to New York.’ ‘Tom back from New York.’ ‘Tom going to live in New York to write for Soho Soundbites. A won’t go with him.’ ‘Tom said to be dating Hannah Schultz of Schultz & Beyerman.’ ‘Tom and A are now divorced.’ ‘Saw Tom in NY with his new girlfriend, Barbara Holmes of Holmes Oil.’ ‘Tom’s getting married to Susie Aschenbach, daughter of his publisher.’ Another marriage. Another child. Another divorce. More rich women – some now divorced like Tom – but no record of any more marriages to date.