Of her five illicit entanglements, Paula says cheerily, “I’m sorry that I wasn’t able to be happy with Richard, or to make him happy, but do I regret my affairs? Not one bit. I am pleased and proud to have shared happy and fulfilling moments with some of the loveliest men on the planet. The thing is, I find other human beings fascinating and irresistible. I just really love and care about people. I’m not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but I have a warm, giving spirit, and every relationship I’ve ever had with a man has meant a lot to me. Each one of my romantic and sexual experiences has been life-enhancing and has made me a better person.”

One can’t help wondering if the category of “people” that Saint Paula claims to love and care about includes any women—in particular, the betrayed wives of her five dalliances—and why her giving spirit wasn’t tempted by the prospect of giving all those husbands back to their rightful owners at the earliest available opportunity. Could it be that there was a taking spirit on the payroll at the same time? Mere hair-splitting on my part, of course, since all that matters in the final analysis is that Saint Paula has been rogered to a state of better personhood. I suppose it’s cheaper than psychoanalysis. Talking of which . . .

“I’d love to get her on my couch,” said Mrs. Me, who, as careful readers will remember, is a psychotherapist. “I’m not sure she’s the hypocrite you think she is. Not intentionally, anyway. Most people haven’t got a clue what’s really motivating them. Riddiough might well believe that her addiction to infidelity is a kind of offshoot of a more general joie-de-vivre and affection for humanity.”

“But that’s obviously bollocks,” said I (for that is my clinical specialism: things that are obviously bollocks).

Mrs. Me agreed. “That’s why I’d be interested to get her on my couch,” she said. “To find out what’s really going on.”