Then I’d be the exotic, wouldn’t I? He gave a short laugh. But we’re here, aren’t we. Here we are. And there you are. I wasn’t ready to argue about who looked like where, so I said, Okay then, not the main character. What else have you got? For exotics, he said, flipping through the pages of his list. Let me see. There didn’t used to be much of a choice. You could be a jovial, well-meaning exotic, or a stupid, drunken, wife-beating abuser of an exotic, or a hostile exotic falling off a horse, or a clever, malevolent exotic with some kind of big evil plan. If you were a woman, you could be a sexy exotic—a smouldering, beautiful, amoral degenerate. On the other hand, you could be a comical servant. That was it. That was it? I said. I was dismayed. But there’s more options now, he said. His manner was warming up. You could be the best friend, he said. You wouldn’t get the girl, but at least you’d get a girl of some sort. Or you could be the next-door neighbour, drop by for friendly chats. Or you could be some guy with lore—sort of like a coach. Teach the main character how to slice off heads, one-handed, with a sword. We can always use those. Or you could be a wise person; you could have, like, an ancient religion, or you could say meaningful but obscure things, issue what-do-you-call thems. Portents, I said. Yes, he said, like that. Once you only had to be a woman to get those wise parts, any kind of a woman, but then women started having jobs and no one could believe they were wise any more. Nowadays if you’re a wise woman you have to be an exotic woman. You can have wisdom if you’re a man, but you have to be old as well. Beards help. Can you sing? Not particularly, I said. Too bad, he said. The opera’s out, then. Lots of plots there. I could’ve put you in the chorus. They don’t care what anyone looks like. They all wear those exotic outfits anyway. Listen, I said.