He appears most comfortable around Indian characters, though they are not thoroughly developed in the novel, and he is regularly discomfited by representatives of European culture and Christianity in particular.

This is compounded by Walsh's increasing awareness of his mortality, symbolized by the human ankle bone he sees in a pyre and his grandmother's morbid fixation on death.

This portion of the novel is largely concerned with his schoolboy experiences, his developing sexuality, and the eventual death of his father, who has remained in India.

The final portion of the novel consists of a bohemian stage in Walsh's life, set in Soho and outside London.

Walsh ultimately rejects this lifestyle and concludes the novel with his first love, Ruth, who is terminally ill. She is diagnosed by the same doctor who delivered him and witnessed his mother's death.