Luis found all this very exciting. He had enthusiasm for myths, legends, bad omens, bad weather, supernatural happenings and inexplicable events. His passion for superstitions and doomsaying drove his other family members crazy. He didn’t often meet curious strangers with whom he could share his fantastic tales.

He was a scoundrel and a saint and a survivor. A tangled Celtic knot of thorns and roses. Ragged and sincere. It moved her deeply. Like a forgotten melody that suddenly struck a vibrant chord inside her heart. He was almost irresistible.

His deadpan expression turned bitter with a curl of his lip. “Save your sermon for some other sap. Nobody shares money—not even dead people. Why do you think they invented wills and trust funds?

Their encounter had formed a strange chemical bond. Mitch, a hardened ruffian, had opened up the prison of his soul to her. And Kika, who led a bitterly puritanical existence, had started to make love to him on her sofa.

The woman felt healed. This stranger understood her. He knew, on a personal level, everything she was going through. And he was asking her to stay alive. Because of him, her angry feelings melted away. She wanted to live again.

Gory frontline memories from war in the Philippines returned to Mitch as he submerged himself in the brush. He sunk deep into the leaves and mud, and stayed there. He remembered scenes from the jungle. The tremors of falling bombs. The smell of smoke.