Haig nodded, raising a hand to show no offense had been taken.

“But my God, Eggy, you met a few of them: Heather, Chloe, Loretta—women to die for. All crazy about him and he broke their hearts.”

“You bravely stepped into the breach a few times, as I recall.”

“We can’t have people misusing beautiful things, Eggy. Anyway, on the whole I’ve had no luck in that department. Nina took me for pretty much everything I had.”

“You mean she didn’t give you everything she had.”

Gerard ignored this. “And that Argentinean woman almost got me killed.”

“As I recall, she’d just finished tying you to her bed for a spot of kinky high jinks when her husband walked in.”

“I was damn well helpless.”

“I’m surprised he didn’t kill you.”

Smiling, Gerard said, “You know why, don’t you? Have I never told you?”

“No.”

Gerard leaned in. “He was of the other persuasion. A patented palm tickler. Ordered his wife out and had the time of his life.”

“No.”

“Tell you the truth, I was so relieved I still remember it fondly.”

“No!”

Gerard sat back again, his face contorting with that near sneeze of laughter. “Nothing’s ever as bad as you think, Eggy boy, long as you survive.” He nodded toward the child. “His mother was the most beautiful creature you’ve ever seen in your life. Sprog’s got her eyes—look at them—huge ruddy great things. Stunning. She was like every strange and beautiful thing in that country in one face. And her expression….” He shook his head. “The wisdom of ten thousand years.” He pulled the boy’s hand out of his mouth again. “Wish he didn’t look so bloody Indian. Nothing of me in him. He’s black as pitch.”

“He’s not that dark. And he does look like you.”

Becoming aware that he was being talked about, the boy looked at Haig with an expression that was utterly pitiful, over at Gerard as if at something brutishly incomprehensible, and then back into the street with a resigned anxiety that suggested just how much he had already endured.

“Why didn’t you leave him with his mother?”

“No clue where she is.” He hesitated. “I am a fool. You know what I’m like when I get something in my head.”

“I know: idée fixe.”

“And an astonishing idea it was too, Eggy. I mean, I thought I was going to stay in India forever. And this woman would be—well, like my wife.”

“Except no one would know about her, of course.”

“Not at first, but I thought eventually yes. I’d teach her to speak English, educate her.”

“Oh, my God.” With exhausted despair, Haig rubbed his closed eyes with both hands. “Oh, my God.”

“Anyway, I won’t go through everything. I bought her—outright—for twenty pounds.”

“You bought her?”

“I think from her parents, but I can’t be sure. And I married her. I did marry her—in the native way. I didn’t want her to get…you know; tried to be careful. Only knew when she began to show. Asked her to get rid of it, but she didn’t understand. Had no luck teaching her English.”