Lara hoped that was a good sign. She did her best to smile back.

The Englishman patted the dark velvet upholstery to the right of him, indicating she should sit there. Lara did as she was told, turning her body towards him. She placed her right hand on his inner thigh and leaned towards him, feigning a little gasp of pleasure as her left breast brushed against his arm.

Lara waited for a second, expecting the reaction that such a blatant display of availability usually provoked. But when the man put his hand around her wrist, it was not to guide her fingers higher towards his crotch, but to gently push her back until she was sitting upright on the banquette. Lara could not stop the fear of rejection flickering across her face, but he smiled, much more softly this time, and said, 'It's OK, don't worry.' Then he looked at her quizzically. 'You do speak English, right?'

'Little bit,' said Lara, who was rapidly adding a whole new vocabulary to the smattering she had learned at school.

'OK then, what's your name?'

'Lara.'

'Hi,' he said. 'My name's Carver.'

3

The Englishman called Carver looked Lara up and down. His face betrayed no indication of what he thought of her.

'I very good at sex,' she blurted, not knowing what else to say. 'You take me please, we have good time.'

Now Carver laughed. He looked past her, towards Tiger Dey, and said, 'I'll give the girl one thing, she's enthusiastic.'

As the Indian smiled in agreement, Carver looked at Lara again, leaned towards her and, almost to himself, murmured, 'But you're not enthusiastic really, are you, Lara? I can tell.'

Lara felt confused, unable to decide if she was doing well or badly. She could not read this man's eyes. At first she had thought they were blue, but close up she wondered if they might be green. In the dim light of the club it was hard to tell. Either way, there was something not quite right, almost unnatural about them.