Focuses on the friendship of two men: William Beckwith, a young gay aristocrat who leads a life of privilege and promiscuity and the elderly Lord Nantwich, an old Africa hand, searching for someone to write his biography and inherit his traditions.

"Did I have a grievance? Most of us, without looking far, could find something that had harmed us, and oppressed us, and unfairly held us back. I tried not to dwell on it, thought it healthier not to, though I'd lived my short life so far in a chaos of privilege and prejudice. Dave Win is thirteen years old in 1961, when he first goes to stay with the wealthy Hadlows, who sponsor his scholarship at a boarding school where their son Giles is his classmate....