Claude's father.

Irene had an image of the man, which her memory could command forth any time she wished. She wished often. It gave her a certain pleasure to see the man in her mind's eye, and in that way guess what her son might look like if…

If he had not been saved by her for something better, something else. He would be her creation, nurtured on her pleasures. She would be both father and mother, and she would enjoy both roles. What would that hard-muscled lover of one night – David; too soft a name for him. Really – what would he have thought of their son? He would wretch in agony, seeing the distorted issue of their union. She delighted in the disgust he would feel. But of course he did not know, and he never would. Claude was her son, and the tanned and too suave advertising copywriter was merely the agent of fate. She would have given herself to almost any man that night. The child had been her idea, her idea alone. She would raise him herself. He would be her creation.

She would not remember David's face, except that she saw its reflection every time she looked at Claude. And it was more out of love for Claude than anything else that she relished the memory of that night with his father. Strange, she thought, how often he came to mind…

That evening she had stared at herself in the mirror before leaving her apartment, searching for any tell-tale clues. She had not been out with a boy since she was a senior in high school, and she feared that she somehow might give herself, and her secret, away.

But no, she told herself calmly, she looked fine, even desirable. Boys had always liked her then, and even now men made passes at her frequently, though she was usually careful to avoid situations in which they could. Her hair looked good this way, the honeyed flax pouring over her shoulders.