She took their daughters, but she let Alistair see them, on one condition. “Go to a therapist and fix what’s broken in you,” she told him. “Stop using work to run from the people who love you.”

“I will,” he said.

Nellie spent weeks recovering. At first she refused a prosthetic, and refused his money. She had no wish to live in a rich man’s house again, or to become his charity project.

“I don’t need a hero, Alistair,” she told him. “I need you to face what you did.”

“I’ll help you even if you hate me for the rest of your life,” he answered.

Something in her eased at that. She accepted the new leg and moved into a small apartment near the clinic, and she began working there, helping poor families.