"At least he makes no secret of his decadence," she declared, and I was suddenly reminded of something Didier had told me about Karla, and the power of secrets. "Perhaps that's what we really have in common, Didier and I-we both hate hypocrites. Hypocrisy is just another kind of cruelty. And Didier's not cruel. He's wild, but he's not cruel. He's been quiet, in the last while, but there were times when his passionate affairs were the scandal of the city, or at least of the foreigners who live here. A jealous lover, a young Moroccan boy, chased him down the Causeway with a sword one night. They were both stark naked-quite a shocking event in Bombay, and in the case of Didier, something of a spectacle, I can report. He ran into the Colaba police station, and they rescued him. They are very conservative about such things in India, but Didier has one rule-he never has any sex- involvement with Indians-and I think they respect that. A lot of foreigners come here just for the sex with very young Indian boys. Didier despises them, and he restricts himself to affairs with foreigners. I wouldn't be surprised if that's why he told you so much of other people's business tonight. He was trying to seduce you, perhaps, by impressing you with his knowledge of dark business and dark people. Oh, hello! Katzeli! Hey, where did _you come from?"
We'd come upon a cat that was squatting on the sea wall to eat from a parcel someone had discarded there. The thin, grey animal hunkered down and scowled, growling and whining at the same time, but it allowed Karla to stroke its back as it lowered its head to the food once more. It was a wizened and scabrous specimen with one ear chewed to the shape of a rosebud, and bare patches on its sides and back where unhealed sores were exposed. I found it amazing that such a feral, emaciated creature should permit itself to be petted by a stranger, and that Karla would want to do such a thing. Even more astounding, it seemed to me then, was that the cat had such a keen appetite for vegetables and rice, cooked in a sauce of whole, very hot chillies.
"Oh, look at him," she cooed. "Isn't he beautiful?"
"Well..."
"Don't you admire his courage, his determination to survive?"
"I'm afraid I don't like cats very much. I don't mind dogs, but cats..."
"But you must love cats! In a perfect world, all the people would be like cats are, at two o'clock in the afternoon."
I laughed.
"Did anyone ever tell you you've got a very peculiar way of putting things?"
"What do you mean?" she asked, turning to me quickly.
Even in the streetlight I could see that her face was flushed, almost angry. I didn't know then that the English language was a gentle obsession with her: that she studied and wrote and worked hard to compose those clever fragments of her conversation.
"Just that you have a unique way of expressing yourself. Don't get me wrong, I like it. I like it very much. It's like... well ... take yesterday, for instance, when we were all talking about truth. Capital T Truth. Absolute truth. Ultimate truth. And _is _there any truth, is anything true? Everybody had something to say about it-Didier, Ulla, Maurizio, even Modena. Then you said, The truth is a bully we all pretend to like. I was knocked out by it. Did you read that in a book, or hear it in a play, or a movie?"
"No. I made it up myself."
"Well, that's what I mean. I don't think I could repeat anything that the others said, and be sure of getting it exactly right.
But that line of yours-I'll never forget it."
"Do you agree with it?"
"What-that the truth is a bully we all pretend to like?"
"Yes."
"No, I don't, not at all. But I love the idea, and the way you put it."
Her half-smile held my stare. We were silent for a few moments, and just as she began to look away I spoke again to hold her attention. "Why do you like Biarritz?"
"What?"
"The other day, the day before yesterday, you said that Biarritz is one of your favourite places. I've never been there, so I don't know, one way or the other. But I'd like to know why you like it so much."
She smiled, wrinkling her nose in a quizzical expression that might've been scornful or pleased.
"You remember that? Then, I guess I better tell you. Biarritz... how to explain it... I think it's the ocean. The Atlantic. I love Biarritz in the wintertime, when the tourists are gone, and the sea is so frightening that it turns people to stone. You see them standing on the deserted beaches, and staring at the sea- statues, scattered along the beach between the cliffs, frozen stiff by the terror they feel when they look at the ocean. It's not like other oceans-not like the warm Pacific or the Indian.
