‘I lived with a man,’ she said, ‘a long, long time – too long. It was one of those awful mistakes people make. I lived with him a long time after I wanted to get out, but he couldn’t let me go. He’d try, but he couldn’t. So finally I ran away.’

He was listening, weighing but not judging. Nothing changed under the rose and blue hat. She was twenty-five or so. It would have been a waste if she had not loved and been loved.

‘We were too close,’ she said. ‘We should probably have had children – to stand between us. But you can’t have children when there’s no roof to the house.’

All right, he knew something of her. It would not be like last night when something kept saying, as in a story conference: ‘We know nothing about the girl. We don’t have to know much – but we have to know something.’ A vague background spread behind her, something more tangible than the head of Siva in the moonlight.