The World According to Bertie

85. A Dangerous Turn in the Conversation Dr Fairbairn was pleased with the amount of work he had got through by the time Irene arrived in his consulting rooms at eleven o’clock.

“I have had a very satisfactory morning, so far,” he said, as he ushered her into the room. Then he thought that the words

“so far” might suggest that the morning was about to change, which had not been the meaning he had intended to convey. So he quickly added: “Not that I’m suggesting the tenor of the day will change because of your arrival. Au contraire.”

Irene waved a hand airily. “I did not interpret it in that way at all,” she said. “Have you been seeing patients?”

Dr Fairbairn waited until Irene had sat herself down before he continued. “No, not at all. I’m working on a paper, long-distance, with Ettore Esteves Balado,” he said. “He’s an Argentine I met on the circuit, and we found ourselves interested in much the same area. We’re writing on the Lacanian perspective on transference.” He paused, smiling at Irene. “And it’s going very well. We’re practically finished.”

Irene looked at his blue linen jacket. Linen was such a difficult material, with its propensity to crumple. She had a white 288 A Dangerous Turn in the Conversation linen blouse with a matching skirt which she loved to wear, but which crumpled so quickly that after five or ten minutes she looked like, well, Stuart had put it rather tactlessly, like a handkerchief that had been left out in the rain. It was an odd analogy, that, and she wondered what the Lacanian interpretation might be. We did not choose our words simply for their expressive power; our words were the manifestation of the conflicts of our unconscious, indeed, they themselves formed the unconscious itself. Lacan had made that quite clear, and Irene was inclined to agree. She did not think that we could find a stable unconscious; our unconscious was really a stream of interactions between words that we used to express our desires and conflicts.

So when Stuart had made those remarks about a handkerchief in the rain, he did not mean that her linen outfit was a handkerchief left out in the rain, or indeed even looked like one.

What his words revealed was that he feared disorder (or rain) and that he wanted her, Irene, to be perfect, to be ironed. And that, of course, suggested that he looked to her for stability to control his sense of impermanence and flux, his confusion. No surprises there, she thought: of course he did. Stuart might have many good points, but in Irene’s view, strength – what people called backbone, or even bottom – was not Stuart’s strong suit.

Mind you, it was strange that people should use the word

“bottom” for strength or courage. What was the Lacanian significance of that?

Her eyes returned to Dr Fairbairn’s blue linen jacket. He had said something, she recalled, about the combination of fibres in the jacket, and that must be the reason it looked so uncrumpled. The question in her mind, though, was: at what point did the insertion of other fibres deprive the material of the qualities of real linen? If it was merely a treatment of the linen, then that was one thing; if, however, it involved polyester or something of that sort, could one still call it linen?

Dr Fairbairn, aware of her gaze, fingered the cuff of his A Dangerous Turn in the Conversation 289

sleeve self-consciously. “I’ll give you a copy of the paper,” he said. “When it’s finished. I know of your interest in these things.”

“Argentina?” said Irene.

“Yes, Buenos Aires. My friend Ettore is one of their best-known analysts there. He has a very extensive practice.”

Irene nodded. She had heard that there were more psycho-analysts in Buenos Aires than anywhere else in the world, but was not sure why this should be. It seemed strange to her that a country associated with gauchos and pampas should also have all those analysts. She asked Dr Fairbairn why.

“Ah!” he said. “That is the question for Argentine analysts.

They’re immensely fortunate, you know. Everyone, or virtually everyone, in Buenos Aires is undergoing analysis. It’s very common indeed.”

“Surprising,” said Irene. “Mind you, the Argentine psyche is perhaps a bit . . .”

“Fractured,” said Dr Fairbairn. “They’re a very charming people, but they have a somewhat confused history. They go in for dreams, the South Americans. Look at Peronism. What did it mean? Evita? Who was she?”

For a moment, they were both silent. Then he continued. “I think the reason Freud is so popular in Argentina is, like most of these things, explained by a series of coincidences. It just so happened that at the time that Freudian ideas were becoming popular in Europe, the Argentine public was in a receptive mood for scientific ideas. You must remember that Argentina in the twenties and thirties was a very fashionable place.”

“Oh yes,” said Irene. She was not going to let him think that she knew nothing about all that. “The tango . . .”

“Hah!” said Dr Fairbairn. “The tango was actually invented by a Uruguayan. The Argentines claimed him, but he was born in Uruguay.”

“Oh.”

“But no matter,” he went on. “The point is that La Jornada, one of the most popular newspapers in Buenos Aires, actually

290 A Dangerous Turn in the Conversation started a daily psychoanalytical column in the early thirties. It appeared under the byline ‘Freudiano,’ and readers were invited to send in their dreams for analysis by Freudiano. The paper then told them what the dreams revealed – all in Freudian terms.”

“But what a brilliant idea!” said Irene. “Perhaps The Scotsman could do that.”

“Are we not perhaps a little too inhibited in Scotland?” asked Dr Fairbairn.

“But that’s exactly the problem,” said Irene heatedly. “If we were to . . . to open up a bit, then we would all become so much more . . .”

Dr Fairbairn waited. “Like the Argentines?” he ventured.

Irene laughed. “I’m not sure,” she said. “They’ve had a tendency to go in for dictators, haven’t they?”

“Father figures,” said Dr Fairbairn.

“And generals too,” added Irene.

“Military figures,” said Dr Fairbairn.

“But they do dance so marvellously,” mused Irene. “And there’s something deeply appealing about a Latin American type.

They’re so tactile.”

Dr Fairbairn watched her. This conversation was fascinating, but it was straying into dangerous territory. He should bring it Bertie and the Baby: an Expert Explanation 291

back to the topic in hand, which was not the history of Freudian theory in Buenos Aires, nor Latin American sultriness, but Bertie.

How was Bertie doing? And, in particular, how was he getting on with his new brother, Ulysses? But that triggered another thought in his mind: where exactly was Ulysses? He asked the question.

86. Bertie and the Baby: an Expert Explanation

“Ulysses is in the waiting room,” said Irene. “In his baby buggy.

Sound asleep.”

“I see,” said Dr Fairbairn. “And how is Bertie reacting to him?”

Irene was always ready to see psychological problems, but she had to admit that in his dealing with his brother, Bertie showed very little sign of resentment.

“He’s very accepting,” she said. “There appears to be no jealousy, although . . .” She hesitated. She had remembered Bertie’s comments on the baby that had been mistakenly brought back from the council nursery. That had been slightly worrying.

Dr Fairbairn raised an eyebrow. “Although?”

“Although he did make a curious remark about exchanging Ulysses.”

This was greeted with great interest by Dr Fairbairn, who leaned forward, eager to hear more. “Please elucidate,” he urged Irene. “Exchange?”

Irene had not intended to discuss the incident in which Ulysses had been parked in his baby buggy outside Valvona & Crolla –

she was not sure how well either she or Stuart emerged from that tale – but now she had to explain.

“It was a most unfortunate slip on my husband’s part,” she said, almost apologetically. “He left Ulysses outside Valvona & Crolla.”

292 Bertie and the Baby: an Expert Explanation

“A handbag?” said Dr Fairbairn and smiled; he thought this quite a clever reference and was disappointed when Irene looked at him in puzzlement.

“The Importance . . .” he began.

“Of being Ulysses!” capped Irene. She had understood all along of course, and had merely affected puzzlement.

Dr Fairbairn had to acknowledge her victory with a nod of the head. “But, please proceed. What happened?”

“Well, he was found,” said Irene. “Somebody must have called the police and they took him off to the council emergency nursery. We went there very quickly, of course, and retrieved Ulysses, or the baby we thought was Ulysses. In fact, it was a girl.” She paused. “And unfortunately, Bertie made the discovery.

He saw that this baby didn’t have . . . well, he thought that the relevant part had fallen off.”

Dr Fairbairn made a quick note on his pad of paper. “That’s most unfortunate,” he said. “But it clearly reveals castration anxieties. As you know, most boys are worried about that.”

“Of course,” said Irene. And she wondered for a moment about Stuart.

“And the interesting thing is this,” went on Dr Fairbairn.

“As you’ll recall, one of the main concerns of Freud’s famous patient Little Hans was that he would suffer this unfortunate fate through the agency of dray horses.” He paused and looked at Irene with bright eyes. “Isn’t it extraordinary how real life mimics the classic cases. Don’t you agree, Dora?”

Irene frowned. “You called me Dora.”

Dr Fairbairn shook his head. “No,” he said. “You’re mistaken.”

“No, you made the mistake. And a classic one, if I may say so. Surely you don’t regard me as Dora?”

Dr Fairbairn smiled urbanely. “Of course not. Perish the thought. But I didn’t call you Dora, anyway, and so let’s return to this issue of baby exchange.”

“He suggested that we keep the girl,” said Irene. “For Bertie and the Baby: an Expert Explanation 293

some reason, he seemed quite happy that Ulysses had been mislaid.”

“Well, there you are,” said Dr Fairbairn. “He obviously feels that a girl would be no threat to him in his mother/son relationship with you. He’s Oedipus, you see, and you are Jocasta, mother of Oedipus and wife of Laius. Bertie resents his father – obviously – because he, Bertie, wants your unrivalled attention. Ulysses is a rival too, and that’s why Bertie secretly wishes that Ulysses did not possess that which marks him out as a boy.

“When he saw that the baby whom he took to be Ulysses did not have that, then it was the fulfilment of his wildest dream.

Now there was no danger for him – and that, you see, is why he would have wanted to keep the other baby.”

Irene had to agree with the perspicacity of this analysis. He was really very clever, she thought, this doctor in his crumple-free blue linen jacket; so unlike virtually all other men she had ever met. Men were such a disappointing group, on the whole; so out of touch with their feminine side, so rooted in the dull practicalities of life; and yet here was Dr Fairbairn, who just understood.

She sighed. Stuart would never understand. He knew nothing of psychodynamics; he knew nothing of the unconscious; he knew nothing, really.

“Of course,” she said suddenly. “There’s always Ulysses.”

Dr Fairbairn said nothing. He picked up his pen and stroked it gently. “Oh yes?” he said noncommittedly.

“Ulysses will have identity conflicts, will he not? When he’s old enough to question who he is?”

“We all wonder who we are,” said Dr Fairbairn distantly.

“Who doesn’t?”

“So Ulysses will look at his family and think: who are these people? Who’s my mother, who’s my brother, who’s . . .” She broke off. She had almost said “Who’s my father?” but decided not to.

Dr Fairbairn was staring down at his desk. Then he looked 294 A Fantasy Sail on That Slow Boat to China at his watch. “Gracious! Is that the time?” He looked up. “I have somebody coming, I’m afraid. Is there anything else you need to tell me about Bertie before I see him tomorrow?”

There was. “He’s had a bit of trauma at school,” said Irene.

“That will probably come out. His class teacher has been suspended, and he’ll no doubt lose her. She pinched one of the girls. A nice child called Olive.”

“Goodness me!” said Dr Fairbairn.

“Yes,” Irene continued, “I heard about it from Bertie, and of course I had to raise it with the school.”

“You reported it?”

“Yes,” said Irene. “I couldn’t stand by.”

He thought for a moment. “But Bertie was very fond of that teacher, wasn’t he? He always spoke so warmly of her. Don’t you think that he might blame you for the fact that he’s losing her?”

Irene was silent.

Dr Fairbairn, realising that Irene seemed unwilling to pursue the matter, gave a shrug. “No matter. These losses are an inevitable part of life. We lose so much, and all we can hope is that our separation anxiety is kept within reasonable bounds. I have lost so much. You, no doubt, have done so too.”

He looked out of the window. He was a lonely man, and he only wanted to help others. He wanted to help them to recover a bit of what they had lost, and it gave him great pleasure when he did that; it was like making something whole again, mending a broken object. Each of us, you see, has a secret Eden, which we feel has been lost. If we can find it again, we will be happy, but Edens are not easily regained, no matter how hard we look, no matter how desperately we want to find them.

87. A Fantasy Sail on That Slow Boat to China The break-up with Matthew was a great relief to Pat. She had been worried by Matthew’s completely unexpected proposal at A Fantasy Sail on That Slow Boat to China 295

the Duke of Johannesburg’s party; she was too young for that, she knew, and yet she was unwilling to hurt Matthew, who was, she also knew, in his turn unwilling to hurt her. She would never settle down with him; she would never settle down with anybody, or at least not just yet. She stopped herself. That was simply untrue. If somebody came who swept her off her feet, who intoxicated her with his appeal, well, it would be very pleasant to settle down with such a person. If one is really in love, really, then the idea of spending all one’s time in the company of the person one loves, tucked away somewhere, was surely irresistible. That was the whole point, was it not, about slow boats to China – they provided a lot of time to spend with another. And would she have wanted to get on a slow boat to China with Matthew? The answer was no. Or with Wolf? The thought was in one sense appalling – Wolf was bad – but, but . . .

For a moment, she thought of the cabin on this slow boat, in which she and Wolf were sequestered, and she saw herself and Wolf in this cabin, and there was only a half-light and the engine of the boat was throbbing away in the distance somewhere and it was warm and . . . She stopped herself again. This was a full-blown fantasy, and she wondered if it was a good thing to be walking down one side of George Square, fantasising about a boy such as Wolf, while around her others, whose minds were no doubt on higher things, made their way to and from lectures.

Or were they fantasising too?

She had reached the bottom of the west side of George Square, the point where the road dipped down sharply to a row of old stables on one side and Basil Spence’s University Library on the other. She had not been paying much attention to her surroundings, and so she was surprised when she found herself drawing abreast of Dr Geoffrey Fantouse, Reader in the History of Art at the University of Edinburgh, expert in the Quattrocento, and the man whose seminars on aesthetics she attended every Wednesday morning – together with fifteen other students, including Wolf, who sat, smouldering, on the 296 A Fantasy Sail on That Slow Boat to China other side of the room and who studiously averted his gaze from hers; as well he might, given his history of deception and attempted seduction.

“Miss Macgregor?”

Pat slowed down. “Dr Fantouse. Sorry, I was thinking. I wasn’t looking.” And she had been thinking, of course, though he would never guess about what.

Dr Fantouse smiled. “As an aesthetician,” he said, “I would be inclined to suggest that one should first look, then think.”

Pat thought for a moment. She did not immediately realise that this was a joke, but then she understood that it was, and she laughed politely. Dr Fantouse looked proud, in a modest sort of way.

It was clear that they were both walking in the same direction – across the Meadows, that broad, tree-lined expanse of park that separated the university area from the semi-Gothic nineteenth-century tenements of Marchmont – and so Pat fell into step with the aesthetician.

“You’re enjoying the course?” he asked, glancing at her in his mildly apologetic way.

Pat suspected that nobody ever told Dr Fantouse that his course was enjoyable, and yet she knew how much effort he put into his work. It must be hard, she thought, being Dr Fantouse and being appreciated by nobody.

“I’m really enjoying it,” she said. “In fact, it’s the best course I’ve ever done. It really is.”

Dr Fantouse beamed with pleasure. “That’s very good to hear,”

he said. “I enjoy it too, you know. There are some very interesting people in the class. Very interesting.”

Pat wondered whom he meant. There was a rather outspoken, indeed, opinionated girl from London who was always coming up with views on everything; perhaps he meant her.

“Your views, for example,” went on Dr Fantouse. “If I may say so, you always take a very balanced view. I find that admirable.” He paused. “And that young man, Wolf. I think that he has a good mind.”

A Fantasy Sail on That Slow Boat to China 297

Pat found herself blushing. Wolf did not have a good mind; he had a dirty mind, she thought, full of lascivious thoughts . . .

like most boys.

Dr Fantouse now changed the subject. “Do you live over there?” he said, pointing towards Marchmont.

“I used to,” she said. “Now I live at home. In the Grange.”

It sounded terribly dull, she thought, but then Dr Fantouse himself was very dull.

“How nice,” he said. “Living at home must have its appeal.”

They walked on. Dr Fantouse was carrying a small leather briefcase, and he swung this beside him as he walked, like a metronome.

“My wife always makes tea for me at this hour,” said Dr Fantouse. “Would you care to join us? There is usually cake.”

Pat hesitated. Had the invitation been extended without any mention of a wife, then she would have said no, but this was very innocent.

“That would be very nice,” she said.

Dr Fantouse’s house was on Fingal Place, a stone-built terrace which looked out directly onto the footpath that ran along the Meadows. Pat had walked past these houses many times before and had thought how comfortable they looked. They were beautiful, comfortable in their proportions, without that towering Victorianism that set in just a few blocks to the south. That an authority on the Quattrocento should live in one seemed to her to be just right.

The flat was on the first floor, up a stone staircase on the landings of which were dried-flower arrangements. The door, painted red, bore the legend fantouse, which for some reason amused Pat; that name belonged to the Quattrocento, to aesthetics, to the world of academe; it did not belong to the ordinary world of letterboxes and front doors.

They went inside, entering a hall decorated with framed prints of what looked like Italian cities of the Renaissance. A door opened.

“My wife,” said Dr Fantouse. “Fiona.”

Pat looked at the woman who had entered the hall. She was 298 Some Tea and Decency with the Fantouses strikingly beautiful, like a model from a pre-Raphaelite painting.

She stepped forward and took Pat’s hand, glancing inquiringly at her husband as she did so.

“Miss Macgregor,” he explained. “One of my students.”

“Pat,” said Pat.

Fiona Fantouse drew Pat away into the room behind her. Pat noticed that she was wearing delicately applied eye shadow in light purple, the shade of French lavender.

88. Some Tea and Decency with the Fantouses The sitting room into which Fiona took Pat was an intimate one, but big enough to accommodate a baby grand piano, along with two large mahogany bookcases. The wall behind the piano was painted red and was hung with small paintings – tiny landscapes, miniatures, two silhouetted heads facing one another. A low coffee table dominated the centre of the room, and on this were books and magazines, casually stacked, but arranged in such a way that they did not tower or threaten to topple. A large vaseline glass bowl sat in the middle of the table, and this was filled with those painted wooden balls which Victorians and Edwardians liked to collect. The balls were speckled, like the eggs of some exotic fowl, and seemed to be, like other things in the room, seductively tactile.

Pat noticed that to the side of the room there was a small tea table, covered with a worked-linen tablecloth. On this was a tray, with a Minton teapot and cups and saucers. Then there was a cake – as Dr Fantouse had said there would be – a sponge of some sort, dusted with icing sugar, and a plate of sandwiches –

white bread, neatly trimmed.

“We sometimes have people for tea,” said Fiona. “And so we keep an extra cup to hand.”

She sat herself beside the tea tray and asked Pat how she liked her tea. On the other side of the room, facing them, Dr Some Tea and Decency with the Fantouses 299

Fantouse perched on a high-backed chair, smiling at Pat and his wife.

“Miss Macgregor belongs to the coffeehouse generation,” he remarked. “Afternoon tea will not be her usual thing. Perhaps you would like coffee?”

“I like tea,” said Pat.

“There are so many coffeehouses,” said Fiona. “And they are all full of people talking to one another. One wonders what they talk about?”

Both Dr Fantouse and his wife now looked at Pat, as if expecting an answer to what might otherwise have seemed a rhetorical question.

“The usual things,” said Pat. “What people normally talk about. Their friends, I suppose. Who’s doing what. That sort of thing.”

Dr Fantouse smiled at his wife. “More or less what we talk to our friends about,” he said. “Nothing has changed, you see.”

The two Fantouses looked at one another with what seemed to Pat to be relief. There was silence. Fiona passed Pat a cup of tea and Dr Fantouse rose to his feet to cut slices of cake.

“There’s something very calming about tea,” remarked Fiona.

“I sometimes think that if people drank more tea, they would be calmer.”

Pat looked at her. The Fantouses were very calm as it was; was this the effect of tea, or was it something more profound?

Fiona seemed to warm to her theme. “Coffee cultures can be excitable, don’t you think?” she said. “Look at the Latins. They never talk about things in a quiet way. It’s all so passionate. Look at the difference between Edinburgh and Naples.”

There was a further silence. Then Dr Fantouse said, “I don’t know. Perhaps we might become a bit more . . .”

All eyes turned to him, but he did not expand on his comment, but lifted a piece of cake and popped it into his mouth. Fiona turned to Pat, as if expecting her to weigh in on her side and 300 Some Tea and Decency with the Fantouses confirm the difference between Edinburgh and Naples, but she did not.

Dr Fantouse licked a bit of icing sugar off a finger. “Un po di musica, as Lucia would say. Would you care to play, my dear?”

Fiona put down her teacup and smiled at Pat. “It’s something of a ritual,” she said. “I usually play for a few minutes after we’ve finished tea. Do you play yourself? I would be very happy for you to play rather than . . .”

Pat shook her head. “I learned a bit, but never got very far.

I’m hopeless.”

“Surely not!” said both Fantouses in unison. But they did not put the matter to the test, as Fiona had now crossed the room and seated herself at the keyboard.

“This is the Eriskay Love Lilt,” she announced. “In a rather charming arrangement. It was Marjorie Kennedy Fraser, of course, who rescued it. And the words are so poignant, aren’t they? Vair me or ro van o / Vair me o ro ven ee / Vair me or ru o ho / Sad I am without thee.”

Pat found herself watching Dr Fantouse as his wife played.

He was watching her hands, as if transfixed. When she reached the end of the piece, he turned to Pat and smiled.

“We could have more,” he said, “but we ration ourselves.

People have so much music – don’t you think? – that they don’t bother to listen to half of it. Music should be arresting, should be something which makes one stop and listen. But we’re inun-dated with music. Everywhere we go. People are plugged into their iPods. Music is piped into shops, restaurants, everywhere.

A constant barrage of music.”

“But you will have more tea?” asked Fiona.

Pat shook her head. “I must get on,” she said. “You’ve been very kind.”

“You must come again,” said Fiona. “It’s been such fun.”

“Yes, it has,” said Dr Fantouse. “That’s the nice thing about Edinburgh. There are so many pleasant surprises.”

They saw Pat to the door, where Pat shook hands with both A Peculiar and Yet Harmless Enthusiasm 301

of them. She saw again the delicate eye makeup on Fiona’s eyes.

Who was it for? she wondered. For Dr Fantouse? Did he notice such things?

As she went downstairs, a boy of about eleven or twelve was coming up. He looked as if he had been playing football, his knees muddied, his hair dishevelled. She looked into his face, a face of freckles, and saw that he had grey eyes. For a moment, both stopped, as if they were about to say something to one another, but then the boy looked away and continued up the stairs. Pat felt uneasy. It was as if she had seen a fox.

She went out into the street and glanced up at the windows of the flat. Dr Fantouse was standing at the window, his wife beside him. They noticed Pat and waved. She waved back and thought: how many people in this city live like that? Or was this a caricature, an echo of what bourgeois Edinburgh once was like but was no more? Or, again, had what she seen that afternoon been simple, quiet decency, nothing more? As she walked up the narrow road that led past the Sick Kids Hospital, she remembered what she had once read somewhere, words of little comfort: for most of us, nothing very much happens; that is our life.

89. A Peculiar and Yet Harmless Enthusiasm

“So, Lou,” said Robbie Cromach. “Tuesday’s your birthday, and you and I are going somewhere special! You choose.”

Big Lou smiled at Robbie, her boyfriend of two months, the man whom she felt she knew rather well, but in a curious way did not know at all. He was a thoughtful man, and paid much more attention to Lou’s feelings than had any of her previous boyfriends. They had been a disaster – all of them – selfish, exploitative, weak; indeed, one or two of them all of these things at the same time. But Robbie was different; she was sure of that.

302 A Peculiar and Yet Harmless Enthusiasm

“Well, that’s really good of you, Robbie,” she said. “Only my birthday’s on Monday, not Tuesday and . . .”

She did not finish. Robbie was frowning. “Monday . . .” he began.

“Yes. So we’ll have no difficulty getting in anywhere.”

Robbie was still frowning, and Big Lou realised that he must have something on that evening. She had told him several times that her birthday was on Monday – he had asked her and she had told him. Now it appeared that he had made other arrangements for that night. She sighed, but she was used to this. Big Lou’s birthday had never been anybody else’s priority in the past, and it looked as if that would not change now; she had thought that it might be different with Robbie, but perhaps it was not.

“You’ve got something on?” The resignation showed in her voice. “You can’t change it?”

Robbie, who had called in on Big Lou’s coffee bar to accompany her to her flat on closing time, shifted his weight awkwardly from foot to foot.

“Sorry, Lou,” he said. “Monday is a really important evening for me.” (And for me? thought Lou.) “I’d love to be able to change it, but I’m afraid I can’t.” He paused. “But I don’t want you to spend your birthday by yourself, Lou. So why don’t you come with me? There’s an important meeting. Really important.”

Big Lou rubbed at the gleaming metal surface of the bar. It would be the Jacobites, she thought: Michael, Heather, and Jimmy, and others no doubt, all equally obsessed, all equally poised on the cusp of delusion. She looked at Robbie, who smiled back at her encouragingly. When you take on a man, thought Big Lou, you take him on with all his baggage. So women had to put up with football and golf and drinking in pubs, and all the things that men tended to do. In her case, she had to take on Robbie’s peculiar historical enthusiasm, which, when one came to think of it, was harmless enough. It was not as if they were some sort of guerrilla A Peculiar and Yet Harmless Enthusiasm 303

movement, dedicated to changing the constitution by force, and prepared to blow people up in the process – these were mild, rather ineffective people (or at least Michael, Heather, and Jimmy were), who hankered after something utterly impossible. And there were plenty of people who harboured unrealistic, unlikely beliefs, who wanted the unattainable in its various forms. There was a saint for them, was there not?

Saint Jude, she thought, patron of lost causes and desperate situations.

“All right,” she said. “I’ll come along. And maybe we could have a late dinner – afterwards. The meeting won’t go on forever, will it?”

Robbie’s relief was evident. “Of course not. And thank you, Lou. Thank you for being . . . so understanding.”

Big Lou smiled. “That’s all right,” she said. “As long as you’re happy, Robbie. That’s the important thing.”

“I am, Lou. I am.”

“But what’s the meeting about?” she asked. “Why is it so important?”

Robbie thought for a moment. “Michael asked for it,” he said. “He’s going to give us the details of the arrival . . .” He broke off, evidently uncertain as to whether or not he should continue.

“Go on,” encouraged Big Lou. “The arrival of . . .”

“Of the emissary,” said Robbie. “As you know, he’s coming very soon. He’s coming, Lou!”

Big Lou raised an eyebrow. “This Pretender fellow they were talking about last time?”

“He’s not a Pretender, Lou.” Robbie’s tone was aggrieved, and Big Lou immediately relented. He believed in this.

“Sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to be rude.”

“This is serious, Lou,” said Robbie. Now he lowered his voice. “This man is a direct descendant, a direct descendant of Prince Charlie himself. And he’s coming here to make contact with his people again. He’s entrusting us – us, Lou – to look after him. We’re going to meet him at Waverley Station and 304 A Peculiar and Yet Harmless Enthusiasm then we’re going to have a press conference to introduce him.

It’s going to be all over the newspapers, Lou. It’s going to make people think.” He paused. “And I’ve been asked to take him up to the west.”

Robbie waited for a reaction to this, but Lou did not know what to say.

“He wants to follow in the steps of Prince Charlie,” Robbie continued. “So I’m going to take him over to South Uist. Then we’ll cross over to Skye, just as Prince Charlie did.”

Big Lou stared at Robbie. “That means crossing the Minch,”

she said.

“Aye, it does,” said Robbie.

“In a wee boat?”

“I haven’t made arrangements yet,” said Robbie. “I think that the prince was rowed, wasn’t he? Him and Flora MacDonald.”

“And you’re going to row?”

Robbie shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe we’ll have a small outboard motor, something like that.”

Big Lou nodded. “The Minch can get pretty wild,” she said.

“You wouldn’t want to sink. Not with a New Pretender on board.

That wouldn’t look too good, would it?”

Robbie looked at her reproachfully. “I’m serious, Lou. I know that this may not mean much to you, but it means a lot to us. It’s a link with our country’s past. It’s part of our history.”

Big Lou was placatory. “I know, Robbie. I know.”

“Do you, Lou? Do you? You aren’t laughing at me, are you?”

She moved from behind the counter and went to stand beside Robbie. She reached out and put her arms around his shoulders. “I wouldn’t laugh at you, Robbie. I’d never laugh at you. You’re a good man.”

Big Lou was tall, but Robbie was slightly taller. He looked down at her. “I love you a lot, Lou,” he said. “I really do. You’re kind. You’re clever. You’re beautiful.”

A Theme for the Definitive Masterpiece 305

She caught her breath. Nobody had said that to her ever before. Nobody had called her beautiful, and now he had, this man, this man with all his funny notions, he had called her beautiful. So perhaps I am, she thought. Perhaps I’ve been wrong to think of myself as plain. There is at least one man who thinks otherwise, and that, for many women and certainly for Big Lou, was enough.

90. A Theme for the Definitive Masterpiece For Angus Lordie, the return of Cyril from durance vile had been a transforming event. The sense of emptiness, the list-lessness, that had afflicted him during the period of Cyril’s absence faded immediately, like a blanketing haar that suddenly lifts to reveal a morning of clarity and splendour. This, he thought, is what it must be like to be given a reprieve, to be told that one was well when one had imagined the worst. Now he had energy.

His first task was to pick up the brush that he had so dispirit-edly laid aside. The group portrait over which he had been labouring was finished with alacrity, and the sitters, who had appeared sombre and depressed, were invigorated by a few bold strokes: a smile there, a jaunty dash of colour there – they were 306 A Theme for the Definitive Masterpiece easy to rescue. Once that was done, though, there was the question of the next project, and Angus had been giving some thought to that.

The previous night, while taking a bath, it had occurred to him that there was no particular painting to which he could point and say: “That is my masterpiece.” Certainly, he had executed some fine paintings – although he was modest, Angus had enough self-knowledge to recognise that – but the best of these was no more than primus inter pares. Two of them were in the collection of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, and one of them had gone abroad, to vanish into the private collection of a Singaporean banker – or was it a Singaporean baker? The dealer in Cork Street who had written to tell him of the sale had handwriting which was difficult to interpret, but Angus had hoped that it was a baker rather than a banker. He could imagine his Singaporean baker, a rotund man with that agreeable, genial air that seems to surround those who have made their money in food. He liked to think of him sitting there in his Singaporean fastness, appreciating his painting, nibbling, perhaps, on a plate of pastries.

Of course, Singapore was close to Malacca, where Domenica had conducted her recent researches into the domestic economy of contemporary pirates, and Angus had asked her on her return if she had ventured south.

“I went there for a few days after I left Malacca,” she had said. “You’ll recall the dénouement of my researches? I felt that after that I should treat myself to a bit of comfort, and so I went to Singapore and stayed in the Raffles Hotel. Such luxury, Angus! The Indian doorman at Raffles has the most wonderful mustache – apparently the most photographed thing in Singapore!”

“There can’t be much to see if a mustache is the main attrac-tion,” observed Angus.

“Well, it’s a small place,” said Domenica. “And a big mustache in a small place . . . Mind you, it’s getting bigger.”

“The mustache?”

A Theme for the Definitive Masterpiece 307

Domenica smiled, but only weakly. There was occasionally something of the schoolboy about Angus, at least in his humour.

“No, Singapore itself is getting bigger. They have land reclamation projects and they’re inching out all the time. Their neighbours don’t like it.”

Angus was puzzled. “I don’t see what that’s got to do with them. Presumably they’re reclaiming from the sea.”

“Yes, they are. But the Indonesians have stopped selling them sand to do the reclamation work. And Malaysia gets jumpy too.

They don’t like to see Singapore getting any bigger, even if it’s just a matter of a few acres.”

“Neighbours can be difficult,” said Angus.

Domenica thought for a moment of Antonia and the blue Spode cup. There were parallels there, perhaps, with relations between Malaysia and Singapore. “Dear Singapore,” she said.

“They’re frightfully rich, and as a result nobody in Southeast Asia likes them very much. But I do. They make very rude remarks about them; it’s very unfair. And Singapore gets a little bit worried and feels that she has to expand her air force. But that leads to problems . . .”

Angus looked at Domenica quizzically.

“They can’t really fly very easily,” she explained. “Singapore is terribly tiny in territory terms. When the air force takes off, it has to take a sharp right turn or it ends up flying over Malaysian airspace, which they’re not allowed to do. So it somewhat hampers their style.”

Angus smiled. “I see.”

“So they keep the air force elsewhere,” went on Domenica.

Angus raised an eyebrow. “One would hope that they don’t forget where they put it,” he said. “It would be a terrible shame if one put one’s air force somewhere and then forgot where it was. I’m always doing that with my keys . . . Easily done.”

Domenica laughed again. “I think they have a book in which they write it all down,” she said. “Actually, they keep their air force in Australia.”

308 A Theme for the Definitive Masterpiece

“Well, at least Australia’s got the room,” said Angus.

Domenica agreed. “Yes, but it’s a bit strange, isn’t it? Rather like the Bolivians and their navy.”

“No sea?”

“Not anymore. And the tragedy is that they really want a navy, the Bolivians, poor dears. They’ve got a lake, of course, and they keep a few patrol boats on that and on the rivers, but what they want is a pukka navy . . . like the one we used to have before . . . Anyway, Navy Day in Bolivia is the big day, and everybody gives money for the cause. And they have numerous admirals, just like we have now. No ships, alas, but bags of admirals. And then there was the Mongolian navy, of course. They only had one boat and seven sailors, only one of whom could swim!”

“Interesting,” Angus began. “But . . .”

“But the point is this: the Uruguayans, to their credit, let the Bolivians keep a real ship in Montevideo. It’s rather like the Australians allowing Singapore to keep its air force in Darwin or wherever it is. So kind.”

“There’s not enough kindness in the world,” said Angus.

With that the subject changed, and now Angus remembered it as he went over in his mind possible themes for what he hoped would be his masterpiece. Kindness, he thought – there’s a subject with which a great painting might properly engage! But how might one portray kindness? There were those Peaceable Kingdom paintings, of course, in which all animal creation stood quietly together – the wolf with the lamb, the lion with the zebra, and so on. But that was not kindness, that was harmony, which was a different thing. Angus wanted to paint something which spoke to that distinct human quality of kindness that, when experienced, was so moving, so reassuring, like balm on a wound, like a gentle hand, helping, tender. That was what he wanted to paint, because he knew that that was what we all wanted to see.

91. Angus Opens His Front Door to . . . Trouble Angus Lordie was still thinking of kindness, and of the great painting he would execute in order to portray that theme, when the doorbell sounded. Cyril, half-asleep on a rug on the other side of the room, lifted his head and looked at his master. He knew he should bark, but what was the point? Whoever it was on the other side of the door would not be deterred by his barking, and if he continued, and barked more loudly, God (as Cyril thought of Angus) would simply get annoyed with him.

So he glanced towards the door, growled briefly, and then lowered his head again.

Angus looked at his watch. It was just before ten in the morning, and he was still seated at the kitchen table, the detritus of his breakfast on the plate before him: a few crumbs of toast, a small piece of bacon rind, a pot of marmalade. He was dressed, of course, but had not yet shaved, and he felt unprepared for company.

He rose to his feet, crossed the hall and opened the front door.

“Mr Lordie?”

There was something familiar about the face of the woman who stood on his doorstep, but he could not place her. There were new neighbours several doors down; was she one of them?

No. The Cumberland Bar? No, she was the wrong type. Perhaps she was collecting for the Lifeboats; they had plenty of women like that who raised money for the Lifeboats – so much, in fact, that the Lifeboats were in danger of positively sinking under all their money.

He nodded. “Yes.”

The woman’s lips were pursed in disapproval. Surely I can go unshaven in my own house, thought Angus. Surely . . .

“You may not recall our meeting some time ago,” she said.

“It was in the gardens. At night.”

Angus smiled. “Of course. Of course.” He had no recollection of meeting her, but she was one of the neighbours, he 310 Angus Opens His Front Door to . . . Trouble assumed. There would be some issue with the shared gardens; keys or benches or children breaking branches of the rhodo-dendrons.

“Good,” said the woman. “So you’ll remember that your dog

. . . your dog paid attention to my own dog. You’ll remember that, then.”

It came back. Of course! This was the owner of the bitch whom Cyril had met in the gardens. It had been most embarrassing, but it was hardly his fault – nor Cyril’s, for that matter.

One could not expect dogs to observe the niceties in these matters when a female dog was in an intriguing condition. Surely this woman . . .

“And now,” said the woman, staring at Angus, “and now my own dog is experiencing the consequences of your dog’s . . . your dog’s assault.”

Angus stared back at her. Cyril had not assaulted the other dog. They had got on famously, in fact, and this woman must know that.

“But I don’t think that my dog . . .” Angus began, to be cut short by the woman, who sighed impatiently.

“My dog is now pregnant,” said the woman. “And your dog is responsible for it. There are six, the vet says.”

“Six?”

“Six puppies, Mr Lordie. Yes, the vet has performed an ultra-sound examination of Pearly, my dog, and has found six puppies.”

Angus swallowed. “Well, well. That really is . . .”

“Most unfortunate,” snapped the woman. “That’s what it is. There are six puppies for whom I cannot be responsible.

I live in a small flat and I cannot keep seven dogs. Which means that you are going to have to shoulder your responsibilities.”

For a few moments, Angus said nothing. He did not doubt that the puppies were there, and that Cyril was the father, but was he really responsible for them? He knew all about the Dangerous Dogs Act (after Cyril’s unfortunate brush with the law), Angus Opens His Front Door to . . . Trouble 311

but were the laws of paternity and aliment of puppies the same as those that applied to humans? Surely not.

The woman broke the silence. “And so what I’m proposing to do is to pass the puppies on to you the moment they are ready to leave their mother. That will be . . .” She consulted a small red diary which she had taken out of her handbag, and gave a date. “I take it that that will be convenient.”

Angus stared at her in astonishment. “No,” he said. “We can’t have six puppies here. This is . . . this is my studio as well as my flat. I simply can’t have six puppies.”

“You should have thought of that before you allowed your dog to . . . to approach my dog,” said the woman. “You should have thought of the consequences of your dog’s actions.”

Angus felt a wave of annoyance come over him. He had been polite to this woman, but she had been hectoring and imperious. Had she spoken to him courteously and sought his assistance, he might have made some proposals about sharing the care of the puppies until they were found a new home, but she had not done that, and now he felt like digging in.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “From my point of view, you took the risk when you took a bitch in heat out into the gardens. You should have known better. You cannot blame my dog for behaving as he did. In fact, you should count yourself lucky that the puppies will have good blood. Cyril, I would have you know, is a pedigree dog, while yours, if I may say so, is undoubtedly a mongrel of some sort. Cyril lowered himself when he consorted with her . . .”

“How dare you!” hissed the woman. “You . . . you impossible man!” She paused, as if to summon up further insults, but there were none; instead: “The puppies will be brought on the appointed day. I shall leave them at the bottom of the stairs, in a box, if you are not in. And that is all there is to it.”

She turned round and began to walk down the stairs. Angus watched her for a moment. He wanted to call out, to shout out some final, resounding comment that would stop her in her tracks, but he did not. He was incapable of being rude, just as 312 A New Version of the Fateful Olive Incident his father before him, and his grandfather, had been incapable of rudeness, particularly towards a woman. So he closed the door behind him and went back into the flat.

Cyril watched him. He knew, in some extraordinary, non-conceptual way, that the events at the door concerned him. But what had he done wrong? He could think of nothing. All he had ever done was to be a dog, which deserved no blame – and perhaps no praise either. But the ways of the gods were arbitrary, as in Greece of old, and the manner in which Angus was looking at him now made Cyril realise that this was serious –

extremely so.

92. A New Version of the Fateful Olive Incident When it was announced to the class that Miss Harmony was to be replaced, there was a sudden, shocked silence. For a few minutes, the children were left alone, waiting for the arrival of the new teacher, and it was in this period that recriminations were fervently aired.

“Somebody told on her,” said Tofu. “Somebody’s mummy went and complained because she had heard about Miss Harmony’s act of self-defence.”

People reacted in different ways to this. For his part, Bertie froze. He had an inkling of the fact that it was his mother who was responsible for the downfall of Miss Harmony, but he had no intention of revealing this.

“Not my mother,” he said, in a small voice.

Everybody looked at him, and he blushed. He was a truthful boy and he would not normally tell a lie, but, in this case, he felt he could say what he said because he had no actual proof that Irene had been the cause of Miss Harmony’s departure.

Moreover, on a strict construction, all he had said was “Not my mother,” which was a sentence capable of many interpretations. “Not my mother” could mean: May misfortune strike A New Version of the Fateful Olive Incident 313

others, but not my mother (the first phrase being understood).

Or it could be a general denial of maternity; there were many senses in which the statement could be read. So it was not really a lie.

“Nobody said it was her,” said Larch suspiciously. “Although

. . .” He left the rest of the sentence unfinished, and Bertie quaked.

“Bertie only said that because he knows that everybody hates his mother,” said Tofu kindly. “Isn’t that so, Bertie?”

Bertie swallowed. “Well . . .” He trailed off. They knew what his mother was like – there was no point in trying to hide it, but did they actually hate her?

Tofu’s pronouncement evoked a very different reaction in Olive. “Self-defence?” she said, glowering at Tofu. “What do you mean by self-defence, Tofu?”

“I meant what I said,” retorted Tofu hotly. “Miss Harmony only pinched your ear because you were threatening her. I saw you. I saw you try to scratch her. And I’m going to tell everybody. I’m going to tell the other teachers.”

Olive’s eyes opened wide in outrage. “Scratch her? I never did. You’re a liar, Tofu! Everybody knows what lies you tell.

Nobody will believe a liar like you.”

“I will,” said Larch. “I’ll tell them that Tofu’s telling the truth. I’ll tell them that you had your hands round Miss Harmony’s neck and that she had to pinch you to bring you to your senses.”

“Precisely,” said Tofu. “And Bertie will say the same thing.

And Lakshmi. And everybody, in fact, because everybody knows how horrid you are, and they’ll blame you when Miss Harmony commits suicide. In fact, she’s probably done that already. That’s what people do when they’re falsely accused of things.”

“Yes,” said Larch. “She’s probably climbing up the Scott Monument right now . . .” He leaned forward and pointed an accusing finger at Olive. “And it’ll be your fault, Olive! Your fault!”

314 A New Version of the Fateful Olive Incident Olive opened her mouth to say something, but was prevented from doing so by Tofu. “So,” he said, “we have to find out who told on Miss Harmony and we have to get that person to say that it was all made up and that it was self-defence, as I’ve said.”

“And then we’ll get Miss Harmony back,” said Pansy. “Because she was the nicest teacher we could ever hope to get. She was kind, and she liked all of us.”

“Except Olive,” said Tofu. “She knew what Olive was like.

That’s why she pinched her.”

“I thought you said it was self-defence,” crowed Olive. “Now you’re saying it was because she hated me.”

“Both,” snapped Tofu. “She hated you and she had to defend herself. Both are true.”

The argument might have continued had it not been for the arrival of the new teacher, a man in his midtwenties, who walked into the classroom and stood smiling at the top of the class. He introduced himself as Mr Bing.

“I’m your new teacher,” he said, “now that Miss Harmony . . .”

“Is dead,” supplied Tofu.

“Oh no,” said Mr Bing. “Miss Harmony’s not dead! Where on earth did you get that idea? She’s just reassessing her career.

People often do that, boys and girls – they have another look at what they’re doing and decide whether they aren’t better off doing something quite different. That’s all.”

“But did she want to reassess her career?” asked Tofu. “Or was she forced to go because she had to defend herself against Olive?”

Mr Bing frowned. “I’m not sure that I understand you . . .

what’s your name, by the way?”

“Tofu.”

Mr Bing hesitated for a moment. “Well, Tofu,” he said, “it’s possible that Miss Harmony might have become a little bit stressed. And it’s possible that she might have done something a little bit impulsive.”

“It was self-defence,” said Tofu, looking around the class for support. “Olive tried to strangle her, and it was the only way in which she could calm her down. She gave her a little pinch to

A New Version of the Fateful Olive Incident 315

get her to loosen her grasp round her neck. That’s true, isn’t it, everybody?”

A chorus of support was raised.

“Yes,” said Larch, his face contorted into an expression of sincerity. “She’s quite dangerous, Mr Bing. We all know that.

But Miss Harmony still wants to protect her, and so she probably didn’t say anything about Olive trying to strangle her. Miss Harmony is so kind, you see. If somebody tries to strangle her she never says anything about it.”

Mr Bing seemed flustered. “Well, we might talk about this later,” he said. “For the time being, I should like to get to know you all. So what we’re going to do is to write a little piece about ourselves – just a page or so. And then we’ll put our names on top of that, and in that way I’ll know all about each of you! Now isn’t that a good idea?”

“Some people can’t write yet,” said Larch. “Olive can’t.”

“No,” said Tofu. “She’s illiterate, Mr Bing.”

Olive glared at Tofu, but was steadfastly ignored.

“Well,” said Mr Bing. “In that case, those who can write will write, and those who can’t can draw pictures for me! How about that? They can draw pictures of themselves and of their favourite things to do.”

“How do you draw fibs?” asked Tofu. “Because Olive will have to draw them.”

316 The World of Bertie – in His Own Words

“Now Tofu,” scolded Mr Bing. “We mustn’t say such things.

What you’ve just said about Olive creates negative karma. But I’m sure that you didn’t mean it, and so we’ll move on and start our little project. I’ll give you each a bit of paper and you can get down to work. What fun we shall all have!”

93. The World of Bertie – in His Own Words Giving the tip of his pencil a lick for good luck, Bertie began to write:

The world according to Bertie.

My name is Bertie Pollock, and I’m a boy. I live in Scotland Street, which is a place in Edinburgh. Our house is at No. 44, which is easy to remember. It is hard to get lost in Scotland Street, because it just goes up and down and you can see each end if you stand in the middle. I have a brother called Ulysses, who is very small and can’t talk or think yet. My Daddy’s name is Stuart, and he works for the Scottish Executive, where he makes up numbers. I think that he is very good at that because he has been promoted and given more money.

My Mummy’s name is Irene. She is quite tall and she talks more than Daddy, who sometimes tries to say something but is told not to say it by Mummy. Mummy has a friend called Dr Fairbairn, who is mad. He wears a blue jacket which Mummy says is made of stuff called linen. Dr Fairbairn lives in Queen Street. Most people have a living room, but he has a waiting room. He keeps copies of a magazine called Scottish Field in his waiting room so that people can read it before they go in to talk to him. I like reading Scottish Field because it has pictures of dogs and castles in it, and also pictures of people having fun.

Often I see a picture of Mr Roddy Martine in it and also Mr Charlie Maclean. They go to parties and have lots of fun. I am not sure what they do apart from having fun, but I still think that they are quite busy.

The World of Bertie – in His Own Words 317

Dr Fairbairn does not have much fun. I think that this is because he knows that they are going to send him to Carstairs one day. That is where they send all the really dangerous mad people. I think that they have booked a place for him there, but he is not ready to go just yet. Mummy will probably visit him there because she likes talking to him and she will miss him when he gets sent to Carstairs.

When she is not talking to Dr Fairbairn, Mummy likes going to the floatarium in Stockbridge. That is where she floats, in a special tank that makes you feel as if you are lying down on top of something. Mummy took Dr Fairbairn to the floatarium one day to show him how to float. I think that the tank is big enough for two people. Dr Fairbairn liked it because he seemed much more cheerful afterwards and did not just talk about ink-blots and dreams. Mummy said I should not tell Daddy about how we took Dr Fairbairn to the floatarium, as that would make Daddy want to go too and he would not like floating as much as Dr Fairbairn liked it. Mummy said that Daddy is happier with sums and numbers and that is the best thing for him to do.

My brother Ulysses looks just like Dr Fairbairn, but I do not think that he is mad like him. My friend Tofu tells me that there are lots of mad babies in Carstairs and that they have special padded playpens for them. I am not sure if this is true, because Tofu tells a lot of fibs and you never know when he is fibbing.

One day his pants will go on fire and that will serve him right for all those fibs he has told.

We do not have any pets. I would like to have a dog, and a cat too. I would also like a rabbit and a hedgehog. Mummy says that all of these things are smelly and are best left in the wild.

She says that dogs are really wolves and would be happier in the forest. She said that cats hate people and are spiteful too.

She says that rabbits are an evolutionary mistake and that hedgehogs have lots of fleas. So I am not allowed to have any of these animals.

There is a dog who lives in Drummond Place. He belongs 318 The World of Bertie – in His Own Words to a man called Mr Lordie, who paints pictures and who smells of turpentine. The dog is really nice. He is called Cyril and he has a gold tooth. When he opens his mouth to stick out his tongue you can see the gold tooth inside. He is a very smiley dog and everybody in Scotland Street, where I live, likes him, except for Mummy, because Cyril bit her when she called him bad and smelly. He was arrested for biting other people, but it was not him, and they got him out of the pound before they shot him. Now he is back and can go to the Cumberland Bar again. That is where people go to drink beer in the evenings. You cannot go there unless you are eighteen.

There is a different rule for dogs. Dogs can go there even if they are only one.

When I am eighteen I am going to go to live in Glasgow or Australia, or maybe Paris, where I have already been. Once I went to Glasgow and I met a very fat man there called Mr O’Connor. Mr O’Connor eats deep-fried Mars bars and is very proud of Glasgow. Mummy did not like him when he came to see us, but my Daddy likes him, a bit.

That is everything about me. I am happy with my life except for some things. I do not want to have anymore psychotherapy and I do not want to go to yoga anymore. I would like to go out with my Dad more and I would like Olive not to come and play at my house. I would like to have some nice friends, nicer than Tofu, and I would like to make a fort in the gardens with these friends. I would also like to go fishing with my friends, on a boat, but I cannot do that now because I do not have a boat and I do not have those friends yet.

I think the world is nice. I think that it is very sad that there are people who are unkind to one another. I also think that it is sad that there are people who want to kill other people just because they do not like them. I think that we should share things, and not be selfish, like Tofu.

Miss Harmony was a very kind teacher. We all loved her and she was very kind to us. I hope that wherever she is she

Some Battles Are Destined to Be Lost 319

is happy. I want her to come back, though. I want things to be the same again and for everybody to be happy. That is what I want.

Bertie Pollock (6).

94. Some Battles Are Destined to Be Lost Domenica had arranged to meet her old friend Dilly Emslie for coffee in the Patisserie Florentin in North West Circus Place. They had last met shortly after Domenica’s return from the Malacca Straits, and Domenica had given Dilly an account of her anthropological research project among contemporary pirates – a project that had ultimately led to the discovery that the pirates stole intellectual property rather than anything else. Dilly had greeted this news with some relief; it was she who had encouraged Domenica to take on a new piece of research in the first place, although she had not envisaged that she would choose to work among pirates. Had Domenica come to an unfortunate end, she would have felt a certain responsibility, and so now, if Domenica again showed signs of itchy feet, she would certainly not give her any encouragement.

320 Some Battles Are Destined to Be Lost The two old friends had much to discuss.

“I take it that everybody behaved themselves while I was off in the Malacca Straits,” said Domenica, as she contemplated a small Italian biscuit that had been placed on the side of her plate.

“I’m afraid so,” said Dilly. “Or if they didn’t, then word hasn’t reached me yet.”

Domenica sighed. “So disappointing. That’s Edinburgh’s one, tiny little fault: most people behave rather well.”

“On the surface,” said Dilly, smiling. “But there are some people who are still capable of surprising one.”

“Next door, for example,” said Domenica. “My erstwhile friend, Antonia – she of the work-in-progress on the lives of the Scottish saints, and, incidentally, the person who removed a blue Spode teacup from my flat, but that’s another story – she has just finished an affair with a Polish builder, would you believe it? A man who had only one word of English, and that was

‘brick.’”

“The strong and almost silent type,” said Dilly.

Domenica laughed. “Yes, but it’s over now, and she’s decided to look for a better sort of man. Where she’ll find somebody like that, I have no idea, but hope springs eternal. Meanwhile, she continues to write about her saints.

“A very popular field at the moment,” she went on. “Do you know that Roger Collins is writing a great work on the lives of the popes? He’s got quite far with it. I had tea with Judith McClure and she showed me the new study they’ve built. There are two desks in it – one for Judith and one for Roger, with a rather comfortable-looking chair that Roger can swing round in while he’s writing about popes.”

“This city, taking a broad view of its boundaries, is becoming very productive,” said Dilly. “Roger Collins and his book on popes. And Allan Massie, with those marvellous historical novels of his. Even if the Borders claim him he’s almost Edinburgh.

And . . .”

“Ian Rankin writing all about criminal goings-on,” interjected Some Battles Are Destined to Be Lost 321

Domenica. “Such an active imagination, and a very fine writer too. And then there’s Irvine Welsh, with his vivid dialogue!”

“Quite an impressive range,” said Dilly.

Domenica nodded. “And that’s only mentioning the books that make it into print. Imagine all the others. On which subject, do take a look at Stuart Kelly’s Book of Lost Books – it’s all about books that people have talked about but which were never really written or have been lost. Great missing masterpieces. Books that never were, but which may still contribute to their authors’

reputations!”

They moved on. Had Domenica seen the latest article by Lynne Truss?

“A real heroine,” Domenica said.

“Yes,” said Dilly. “But I can’t help but feel that she’s fighting a losing battle. The other day I saw an article about grammatical mistakes that had two grammatical mistakes in it. And these weren’t the examples – they were in the text itself.”

“Of course, language changes,” said Domenica. “And how do we decide what’s correct? What did Professor Pinker say about the songs of the whales?”

“Oh, I think I remember that,” said Dilly. “Didn’t he say that it would be nonsensical to point out that the whales made mistakes in their songs? That whale songs were what whales sang?”

“Something like that,” said Domenica. “He implied that grammatical rules should merely reflect the language that people used, because that’s where they came from in the first place.”

Dilly smiled. “So they weren’t handed down on tablets of stone? No Académie Française?”

“No. So if you were to ask me how I was, I suppose I could now reply either ‘Fine,’ which is what I’d actually say, as would you, or ‘Good,’ which is what lots of other people now say. They say: ‘I’m good.’” Domenica paused before continuing. “And I always think: how immodest! Because good is a moral quality when used without a noun.”

322 Some Battles Are Destined to Be Lost

“There are some battles which are destined to be lost,” said Dilly.

Domenica lifted up her biscuit, examined it, and popped it into her mouth. “You’re right. And I suppose that if we don’t have an Académie Française to authorise words we must rely on what happens in the street, so to speak. Mind you, not all new words come into existence like that. Some new words are really very clever. Somebody must have made them up.”

Dilly thought for a moment. “Like Robinsonade. Do you know what that is? No? It’s a word for a book which deals with people being taken out of their normal surroundings and dumped somewhere where they have to struggle to survive. It comes from Robinson Crusoe. So Lord of the Flies is a Robinsonade.”

They sipped at their coffee. “Well, words aren’t the only things that change,” Domenica went on. “Look at Edinburgh.

What used to be a prim, maiden aunt of a city is now something quite different. Should we embrace these changes?”

“If they’re for the better,” said Dilly. “And lots of them are, surely?”

Domenica looked wistful. “Yes, some are. But I’m not sure if all of them are. I’m not sure if I think that crudity of language and attitude are things that we should embrace with enthusiasm. You know, I went to a Burns Supper a couple of years ago and I had to sit through a tirade against men from one of the speakers – a very aggressive performance. The speaker thought it appropriate to speak like that at a celebration of Burns’

birthday. But I found myself wondering: why is it considered smart to be crude and combative?”

“There are quite a lot of people like that,” said Dilly.

They were both silent for a while. The sun came in through a high window, slanting. There was the smell of olive oil, of freshly baked bread; there was the murmur of conversation at a nearby table. For a brief moment, Domenica closed her eyes and imagined a parallel Scotland, one of kindness and courtesy, where the vulgarity of our age had no place, other than a shameful Faster and Yet Faster – with a Surge of Panic 323

one. Was it wrong to dream of such a thing? Or was it just

“uncool”?

95. Faster and Yet Faster – with a Surge of Panic Matthew knew that he was moving too quickly, but he was like a man driving a car down a very steep hill; there were brakes, of course, but the car itself wanted to go faster and faster. He knew that what he should do with Elspeth Harmony was to get to know her better and then, if he was still sure that she was the right person, he could suggest whatever it was that he wanted to suggest. And what he wanted to suggest was marriage – just that. Matthew was now over twenty-eight. In fact, he was twenty-nine and would be thirty on his next birthday. Thirty!

People, or some people, would begin to look at him with something approaching pity. He would begin to get better insurance rates and he could start going on those overthirty holidays that he had seen advertised. The advertisements, of course, did not say anything about a top age limit – all they said was that the holidays were for those over thirty, and that meant, he realised, that he might find himself on holiday with people of forty or even fifty!

No, he would have to do something about finding somebody, and that is exactly what he had done. He had not looked for Elspeth – she had just turned up, on his doorstep, or the doorstep of his gallery, and they had immediately taken to one another.

And now all he wanted to do was to make sure that she would stay with him and that she would move in to India Street. They would become a couple – a couple! – and they would build up a bank of memories, of things they had done together, places they had been. They would travel. They would go to Barbados, to the Seychelles, to India. They would take photographs of one another riding camels and sitting on a houseboat in the backwaters of 324 Faster and Yet Faster – with a Surge of Panic Kerala while the sun went down and birds flocked to the trees.

They would lie on a beach in Thailand, on Ko Samui, and listen to the waves. All this lay ahead, and Matthew wanted it to start as soon as possible.

His visit to Elspeth Harmony’s flat was going well enough.

She was distraught over her suspension from the school, but he was succeeding in getting her to see the positive side of this.

“Look on it as a career change,” he said. “Lots of people have them. And everybody says that it’s a good thing.”

She thought about this for a moment. “But I haven’t got another career to go to,” she said. “And do you think anyone will give a job to somebody who’s been fired? Do you think that?”

“Not fired,” said Matthew. “You can resign before they fire you. You can resign right now.”

“But everybody will know that I’ve only resigned because I was about to get fired,” she pointed out. “You know what this town’s like. Everybody knows everybody else.”

Matthew decided that it was time to be more direct. “So what if they know?” he said. “I know, and I’m still going to offer you a job.”

She stared at him in surprise.

“Yes,” he said. “You can have a job in my gallery. Straightaway.

You can start tomorrow, if you like.” He paused. “Not that you’d have to do any work. Not real work. All you’d have to do is look after the gallery sometimes – when I go to auctions or to meet a client. Things like that.”

“But I don’t know anything about art,” she protested.

“Nothing at all.”

Matthew was about to say: “And nor do I,” but did not.

Instead, he said, “That doesn’t matter. You can learn as you go along. You can read Duncan Macmillan’s book on Scottish art.

There’s lots of information there. And you’ll pick it up. But you really don’t need to bother.”

Elspeth laughed. “This sounds like a most peculiar job,” she said. “I have no qualifications for it, and I won’t have to do much Faster and Yet Faster – with a Surge of Panic 325

work. Will it be paid? Or will it be one of these jobs where you have to pay yourself to do it?”

“It’ll be paid,” said Matthew eagerly. “And the pay is really, really good.”

She hesitated. She did not want to ask what the salary was, but this was such a peculiar situation that she might as well.

“How much?” she inquired.

Matthew shrugged; he had not thought about the salary. “Oh, about . . .” He waved a hand in the air. “About sixty thousand a year.”

Elspeth said nothing for a moment. Then, her voice quiet:

“I really don’t think we should talk about this anymore,” she said. “It’s very kind of you, but . . .”

Matthew felt a surge of panic. I’m going to lose her, he thought.

I’ve mishandled this. She thinks that I’m trying to . . . to buy her!

He knew that he had to act, or he would have a lifetime to regret not acting. “Elspeth,” he said earnestly. “I may as well tell you that the job . . . Well, you can have the job of course, if you want it, but what I’m really talking about is something quite different. I want to ask you something, and I want you to know that whatever I’ve said up until now doesn’t count for anything. But what I’m about to say to you now, well, I really do mean it. I want to ask you if you will marry me. That’s all.

I know that we hardly know one another, I know that, but I feel that you and I are . . . well, I just think that it feels right. It feels so right that I want you to know everything that I’m thinking, and it would be dishonest to pretend that I’m not thinking this.

I want you to marry me. Please. Please. I really mean it.”

She said nothing for a few moments, but she was thinking, quickly. Nobody had ever asked Elspeth Harmony to marry him before. And she wanted to get married. She wanted to have a husband and children of her own. She liked Matthew; she liked him a great deal. Liking can become love. In fact, it had just done precisely that. Right then. She loved him.

“I’ll marry you,” she said. “Yes, I’ll marry you.” But then she thought: I should check up on one thing first.

326 Bruce Samples the Porsche Experience

“Would you want a family?” she asked. “Children?”

“Hundreds,” said Matthew. “Or at least four or five.”

“But we probably wouldn’t be able to afford that many,” she said, smiling at his enthusiasm.

Matthew watched her as she spoke. Perhaps he should tell her. He did not want to tell her before she had said yes, but now he felt that he could.

96. Bruce Samples the Porsche Experience On the day that Matthew proposed – successfully – to Elspeth Harmony, Bruce went to see a motor dealer. The dealer knew Bruce’s future father-in-law and had received a call from him several days earlier on the subject of Bruce’s car; instructions were given, and the dealer in due course telephoned Bruce to arrange the appointment.

For Bruce, this was the first result of the agreement he had reached with Graeme Donald following their meeting over dinner in Julia’s flat. Bruce had been surprised by the directness with which the older man had spoken. There had been no beating about the bush, no tactful references to vague possibilities: it had all been spelled out in the most unambiguous terms. Graeme Donald would see to it that his daughter’s husband would be well looked after.

There would be an engagement, followed by a wedding, and once that was over, then the real benefits would begin to flow.

Nothing could be simpler.

The car, which went with the soon-to-be-assumed director-ship of the holding company (that would be put into effect after the wedding), would be an earnest of things to come, and, besides, with Bruce shortly assuming operational responsibility for the wine bar in George Street, transport would be necessary. So the call to the dealer was made.

The dealer, who operated from a small showroom in Bruce Samples the Porsche Experience 327

Morningside, was of course a freemason, and was a member of the same lodge as Graeme.

“Julia’s young man is not in the craft yet,” said Graeme. “But that will be arranged soon enough. I think he’s sound enough.”

As it happened, the dealer was not listening when Graeme said this, with the result that when Bruce arrived at his garage, he gave him a warm and prolonged handshake, in the course of which, using his thumb, he firmly pressed Bruce’s middle knuckle.

At the same time, the dealer kept his heels together and the toes of his shoes out, thus forming an angle of exactly ninety degrees with his feet. This is what is known as being on the square and is a sure sign of masonic status.

When Bruce felt his knuckles being pressed in this peculiar fashion, he misunderstood the signal. Of course these chaps go for me, he thought. Quite understandable, but he would have to give a signal that he played for the other team.

“My girlfriend couldn’t come with me,” said Bruce, repeating, for emphasis, “Girlfriend.”

The dealer smiled. “We’re better off without them,” he said, meaning, of course, that in his view the choosing of cars was really a male matter, best done by men.

They moved on to the cars. “I have four Porsches in stock,”

said the dealer. “All of them low mileage. Would you like to take a look?”

Bruce nodded, and was shown over to the first of the Porsches, a silver model, a low-slung, sneaky-looking car.

“Great cars,” said Bruce.

“They go from nought to sixty like that,” said the dealer, snapping his fingers. “This one here is a 911 Turbo.” He patted the top of the car. “You’ll be wondering about the difference between it and the GT3? A few facts and figures?”

“Great,” said Bruce, bending down to look in the window.

“Maximum Torque (Nm) at rpm in the Turbo is 620 Nm (with overboot to 680 Nm),” the dealer began. He paused, while Bruce absorbed this information. “Whereas, with the GT3 –

and that red car over there, that’s a GT3 – the max torque is 328 Bruce Samples the Porsche Experience 405 Nm. Also,” and here he raised a finger, “also, there’s a different compression ratio. 9.0:1 in the Turbo, and 12.0:1 in the GT3. Mind you, there’s a bottom line.”

“There always is,” said Bruce.

“Yes,” said the dealer. “The bottom line is this: the maximum speed in each case is 193 mph. Tops. That’s the max.”

Bruce looked thoughtful. “Not bad,” he said.

The dealer nodded. “Dr Porsche is working on pushing that up a bit, but for the time being, 193 mph it is.”

Bruce opened the door of the silver car and slid into the driver’s seat. He held the leather-covered steering wheel and gazed at the array of instruments. This was very good. At 193

miles per hour, it would take him how long to reach Glasgow from Edinburgh? That was about three miles a minute, which meant that one would divide forty by three, to get just over thir-teen. So he could reach Glasgow in fourteen minutes!

Bruce looked up at the dealer, who was standing by the door, looking down on him, smiling. “Could we take this for a test drive?” he asked.

The dealer nodded. “Of course. If you hold on a moment, I’ll get the key.”

Bruce moved his hands gently up and down the steering wheel and then felt the gear lever. The head of the lever was covered with leather and silver, with a little Porsche symbol on the top.

The dealer came back, lowered himself into the passenger seat and passed the keys over to Bruce. “It’s all yours,” he said.

Bruce switched on the engine and listened appreciatively to the throaty roar which resulted. “You can get that sound as a ring-tone for your mobile phone,” said the dealer. “That’s what I have on my own phone.”

“Great,” said Bruce.

“All right,” said the dealer. “Let’s take her out.”

The silver car slipped out onto the road outside the showroom.

Bruce felt the power of the engine as he pressed down on the accelerator, a strong, throbbing feeling, as if there were something live within the machine, some great, stirring creature. He pressed the accelerator down farther, and the roar, and the power, grew.

Bruce Samples the Porsche Experience 329

They soon found themselves up in the Braids, where the comparatively empty roads allowed Bruce to increase his speed.

This was heady, intoxicating.

“Feel the G-forces!” said Bruce, giving the engine its head for a few seconds.

“Serious,” said the dealer. “Really serious G-forces.”

They turned round, the car engine making a satisfactory growl even at idling speed. Then they drove back to the showroom.

“Fantastic,” said Bruce. “That’s the one.”

The salesman looked awkward, and Bruce frowned. Had he already sold that model – in which case, what was the point of letting him take the vehicle out for a test drive?

“Well, actually,” the dealer began, “your father-in-law, if I may call him that, has already chosen something for you.”

Bruce looked puzzled. “Chosen?”

“Yes,” said the dealer. “You’re to get a GT3, I’m afraid. The red one over there.”

Bruce bit his lip. “Then why let me drive the Turbo?”

The dealer smiled. “I wanted you to have the best Porsche experience you could,” he said. “And that’s with the Turbo. But the GT3 is still a great car.”

Bruce turned away. It had suddenly occurred to him that he was walking into something for which he might not have bargained.

Trapped, he thought; I’m trapped. But was it better, he wondered, to be trapped with a Porsche or not trapped without a Porsche?

The former, he decided.

97. Do We Have to Love Our Neighbour?

Domenica Macdonald looked at her watch. Five o’clock in the afternoon. As Lorca observed, she thought, at that terrible five in the afternoon. A las cinco de la tarde. It was five in the afternoon by all the clocks, said Lorca. And five sounded so sinister, so final (in spite of the existence of six o’clock). Three-thirty had no such associations. Somehow, it did not seem quite so sombre, so tragic, to say: it was at three-thirty in the afternoon.

Ah, that terrible three-thirty in the afternoon! Three o’clock seemed somehow more innocent, less brooding, than five, as Rupert Brooke sensed when he referred to the church clock standing at ten-to-three. Nothing ominous happened at ten-to-three, as opposed to five minutes to midnight (a dreadful, worrying time) or, of course, five in the afternoon.

She looked out of her window onto Scotland Street, where the evening shadows were beginning to lengthen. It was a fine evening, something for which she was grateful, as she had chosen it for the dinner party she had long been planning to mark her safe return from the Malacca Straits, back to Edinburgh, into the bosom of the New Town and those who made up her circle of friends. She remembered how, before she had left for Malaysia, she had been joined in this very room by those self-same friends. She remembered how Angus had made a speech, as he always did on such occasions, and how his speech – which was quite touching – had modulated into a poem about small places, as she recalled. The poem had said something about being grateful for the small scale, for the local, for the minor things that gave meaning to life. And Angus was right: these things were being forgotten in the headlong rush into globalisation, which drained identity out of life, rendered it distant, impersonal. Thank heavens, thought Domenica, for the Royal Bank of Scotland, which still had people round the corner to whom one could speak on the telephone, unlike others, who put one through to India, or Sri Lanka, or even Wales. That was a good object lesson for the Do We Have to Love Our Neighbour? 331

rest: the Royal Bank of Scotland was a global bank, but they still knew how important it was to remain rooted. That made Domenica proud. People made a big fuss about sporting heroes – some of whom were pretty ghastly, she thought – but nobody seemed to make a fuss of bankers. And yet they did great things and made piles of money. The big challenge, though, was to get them to share it . . . and also to make sure that they were nice to people with overdrafts.

Domenica herself had no overdraft, but she suspected that virtually everybody else had one. An overdraft was a rite of passage, in a sense; one went from pocket-money as a child straight into the world of overdraft as a student. And many people remained there, never graduating to the really adult phase when their bank account was in credit. Anthropology had paid little attention to this, she reflected. There were plenty of studies on debt bondage patterns elsewhere, but few, if any, on such bondage in urban Western societies. In some countries, one might be reduced to virtual slavery, saddled with debts incurred by one’s grandfather, and labouring endlessly just to pay the interest. But here, for many, the sentence was not all that dissimilar, even if the debt was not inherited.

She thought about her friends and wondered how many of them lived on an overdraft. Angus Lordie, she thought, was one.

His finances were a closed book to her; she knew that he received commissions for portraits, but these were sporadic, and she doubted if he made a great deal from them. Angus occasionally painted opulent people, and charged accordingly, but his strong democratic instincts, so deeply rooted in the Scottish psyche, also inclined him to paint those whose pockets were not so deep, indeed were shallow, or had large holes in them; these people he painted for nothing, or next to nothing. Which was wonderful, thought Domenica, and meant that the future record of what Scottish people looked like would be a far more balanced one than the record we had from the past, when artists painted only the wealthy. So we know what rich faces looked like in those days, but we had little idea of what the features of the indigent 332 Do We Have to Love Our Neighbour?

were like. No, that, she decided, was nonsense, but it had been an interesting thought.

Yet how did Angus survive? Of course he had relatively few outgoings, as he appeared to eat very little, probably rather less than that dog of his. And his studio was really rather cold most of the time, which suggested that he did not have large gas bills.

So perhaps he was all right after all, and she need not worry.

Of course it was tempting to speculate on the personal finances of others – what greater pleasure is there than to see somebody else’s bank statement, a guilty pleasure of course, and a furtive one, but tremendously interesting? But it was not a healthy thing to do, and Domenica decided that if she saw Angus Lordie’s bank statement lying around, she would fold it up and return it to him, without looking. Or perhaps without looking a great deal.

But for this evening, as she stared out at Scotland Street, at the sun on the tops of the roofs, so beautiful, so beguiling, she reflected that she had spared no expense, or trouble, in preparing the meal for her friends. With their pre-dinner drink they would have Spanish olives from Hasta Mañana in Bruntsfield, generous olives the size of small ping-pong balls.

Then they would sit down to table, to a salmon timbale made with smoked salmon from the smokehouse in Dunbar, followed by a venison cassoulet, and finally a sort of apple tart which she had constructed and covered with strips of pastry in Celtic designs (a touch of which she felt inordinately proud).

She looked at her watch again. Twenty minutes had passed in reverie, and it was time to get things ready. She hesitated.

She had not invited Antonia, and now she felt the first twinges of guilt; perhaps she should go and ask her right now, at the last moment. But do we really have to love our neighbour? she wondered. Really?

Domenica looked out of the window again. The sky was clear, with just the slightest trace of cloud, high, attenuated, so delicate. And the answer came to her quite clearly: yes, we do.

Thus do epiphanies come in Scotland Street, as elsewhere in The Domenica Connection Becomes Clear 333

Edinburgh, across the tops of roofs, from an empty sky, when the city’s fragile beauty can touch the heart so profoundly, so unexpectedly.

98. The Domenica Connection Becomes Clear

“Olives!” said Angus Lordie, reaching out to the bowl which Domenica had placed on the table. “Yes,” said Domenica. “For you – and others. So please don’t eat them all. Exercise restraint if you can, Angus.”

Angus gave her a reproachful look – as if he, of all people, with his ascetic attitudes – would exercise anything but restraint.

But if he looked reproachful he did not feel it; quite the opposite in fact: Angus liked to be told off by Domenica, and the more she scolded him, the more he liked it. What a masterful woman, he thought, so calm, so assured; so much like . . . Mother.

The realisation came to him quite suddenly. Domenica was his mother. That was why he liked her; that was why he did not mind being told what to do and what not to do, especially at the table. Now it was olives; all those years ago it had been soor plooms that the late Patricia Lordie, wife of Fitzroy Lordie, innovative agriculturist and pioneering figure in the Perthshire soft-fruit industry, told her son Angus not to eat in excess; but the tone, and the authority, was much the same. Women are here to tell us what to do, thought Angus; that is why they are here, and we are here to do their bidding.

Angus looked at Domenica with moist, admiring eyes. How comfortable it would be to be married to her, to have her running his life for him, looking after him. They would breakfast together in this very room, looking out over the tops of the roofs, with the glorious day before them. They could discuss what was in the news – or such bits as bore discussion – and then they would take a walk and Angus would go to Valvona & Crolla, with a list drawn up by Domenica, to purchase whatever it was that

334 The Domenica Connection Becomes Clear she needed in order to prepare the evening meal. Oh bliss! Oh sheer matrimonial bliss!

But then it occurred to him that none of this would be possible, fond though its imagining might be, for the simple reason that Domenica did not like Cyril. She had made this perfectly clear to him – and to Cyril – on a number of occasions, and she would never agree to having the dog live with them. But this practical obstacle did not stand too much in the way of fantasy, and in his mind’s eye he saw the pair of them standing before the altar at St John’s in Princes Street, he in his kilt, Domenica in an elegant cream-coloured outfit, while beside him, neatly groomed, Cyril watched proceedings with interest. They could modify the vows, perhaps: do you, Domenica, take this man, and his dog

. . . No, it was impossible. And Angus could hardly fire Cyril after all those years of devotion that the dog had shown him.

No, it could never be.

Domenica looked at her watch. Angus always arrived half an hour early at her parties, something which she encouraged, as it gave them time to discuss the guests before they came. She often consulted Angus on the proposed guest list and was prepared to strike people off if he raised a sufficiently weighty objection.

“Oh, we can’t have her,” Angus once said, pointing to a name on Domenica’s list for an earlier dinner party. “She talks about nothing but herself. All the time. Have you noticed it? Yak, yak, yak. Moi, moi, moi.”

The Domenica Connection Becomes Clear 335

“True,” said Domenica, drawing a line through the name.

“Mind you, that is the most perennially fascinating subject, don’t you find? Ourselves.”

Angus thought about this. He did not talk about himself, and so he could not agree, but when he thought of others he could see the truth of Domenica’s observation. Most people were delighted to talk about themselves and their doings, asked or unasked.

“And we can’t have him,” he said, pointing at another name.

“Because if we have him, then we can’t have her. And if one had to choose, I would have thought that she was the one we really wanted.”

Domenica scrutinised the list. “Yes,” she said. “I’d forgotten about that. Was it true, do you think? Do you think that he really did that?”

“Apparently he did,” said Angus, shaking his head over the foibles of humanity. Edinburgh was a city that took note of these things. Indeed, he had heard that there was a book somewhere in Heriot Row in which these things were all written down, so that they could be remembered. The book, he had been told, was in the hands of a carefully chosen committee (although anybody was entitled to nominate an incident for inclusion), and went back as far as 1956. It had once been proposed that the record should be expunged ten years after an event, but this suggestion had been turned down on the grounds that many of the older scandals still gave a great deal of enjoyment to people and it would be wrong to deprive them of that.

The guest list that evening had been fully approved by Angus, and he was looking forward to the good conversation that he knew would take place. As he sat there, watching Domenica carry out a few last-minute preparations, Angus thought about the painting he had begun a few days before and which now dominated his studio. It was an extremely large canvas, ten feet by six, and he was at present sketch-ing in the outlines of his planned great work on kindness: a 336 Mr Demarco Sees Danger for the Fringe seated woman, beneficent, portrayed in the style of Celtic illuminations, comforts a crouching boy, a figure of modern Scotland.

“I’m working on an important picture,” he said to Domenica,

“on the theme of kindness.”

Domenica, who had been peering into a pot on the top of the stove, looked over her shoulder at Angus. “A very good subject for a picture,” she said. “I approve. Do you have a title for it yet?”

Angus shook his head. He thought of it simply as Kindness, but he knew that this sounded a bit weak, a bit too self-explanatory.

“In that case,” said Domenica, “I suggest that you call it Let the More Loving One.”

Angus frowned. “Let the More Loving One?”

Domenica turned away from the stove. “It’s a line from Auden,” she said. “‘If equal affection cannot be / Let the more loving one be me.’”

They were both silent for a moment. Behind Domenica, the pot on the stove simmered quietly; there was a square of light on the ceiling, reflected off window glass, shimmering, late light.

Angus thought: yes, that is precisely the sentiment. That’s it exactly. That’s all we need to remember in this life; two lines to guide us.

99. Mr Demarco Sees Danger for the Fringe They sat at the table, Domenica’s guests, all in perfect agreement, at least on the proposition that the first course was exceptional. At the head of the table sat Domenica herself, anthropologist, widow of the late proprietor of the Cochin Sunrise Electricity Factory, author of numerous scholarly papers including, most recently, “Intellectual Property and Piracy in a Malaccan Village.” At the opposite end of the table, in a position which indicated his special status in this house Mr Demarco Sees Danger for the Fringe 337

as old friend and quasi-host, sat Angus Lordie, portraitist and occasional poet, pillar of the Scottish Arts Club, and member of the Royal Scottish Academy. On Domenica’s right sat James Holloway, art historian and a friend of Domenica of many years’ standing, whose advice she had sought on many occasions, and followed. On his right, Pat, the attractive but somewhat bland student who had got to know Domenica when she lived next door as tenant of Bruce Anderson, the surveyor –

now the fiancé of Julia Donald – an unrepentant, a narcissist, a success. Then there were David Robinson and Joyce Robinson, both old friends of Domenica; her neighbour, Antonia, invited at the last moment out of guilt; Ricky Demarco, that great man, the irrepressible enthusiast of the arts, artist, impresario; Allan Maclean of Dochgarroch, chief-tain of the Macleans of the North, and Anne Maclean; and, of course, Humphrey and Jill Holmes. That was all, but it was a good sample of Edinburgh society, and there were many who were not there who, had they known, would have given much to have been present.

Angus looked about the table. He had been charged by Domenica with responsibility for ensuring that everybody’s glass was well filled, and they were. Now, sitting back, he savoured both the timbale and the conversation.

“It’s a disaster,” said Ricky Demarco. “A complete disaster.”

Silence fell about the table as all eyes turned to Demarco.

Was he referring to the timbale?

“Yes,” he said. “The Festival Fringe is in great danger.”

Most were relieved that the subject was the arts and not salmon timbale; David Robinson, in particular, looked interested. People were always predicting the demise of the Edinburgh Festival, he reflected, but somehow it always got better. And the same was true of the Fringe, the Festival’s unruly unofficial partner, which seemed to get bigger and bigger each year.

“Danger of what?” asked David.

“Drowning in stand-up comics,” said Demarco. “Haven’t you 338 Mr Demarco Sees Danger for the Fringe seen how many of them there are? They flock to Edinburgh, flock like geese over the horizon.” He waved a hand airily.

“Thousands of them.”

Pat picked at a small fish bone that had become lodged in her teeth. She rather enjoyed going to hear stand-up comics, even if there were rather a lot of them.

“I quite like them,” she said quietly.

Fortunately, nobody heard her, and she was only twenty anyway.

“I must admit, for the most part, they’re very unfunny,” said Angus. “Or am I out of touch?”

“You’re out of touch,” said Domenica. “But you may nonetheless be right about their unfunniness. I find most of them rather crude and predictable. No, I agree with Ricky. These people are getting a bit tedious.”

“They are,” said Demarco. “And the problem is this: they charge so much, some of them, that they mop up all the ticket money. The Fringe should be about the arts, about drama, music, painting. And all these people do is stand there and tell joke after joke. Just think of it: the world’s biggest, most exciting arts gathering reduced to a motley collection of comedians telling jokes. Is that what we’ve come to?”

Angus looked down at his plate. “I wish I found more things funny,” he said. “But I don’t. The only people who can make me laugh anymore are Stanley Baxter and Myles Na Gopaleen.”

David Robinson agreed about Na Gopaleen. “Yes, Flann O’Brien was a very funny writer. Do you remember his book-distressing service for the nouveau riche?”

“Of course I do,” said Angus. “They would come and make newly acquired books look suitably used. And for an extra fee they would write appropriate marginalia so that people thought that you had actually read the books.”

“Irish writers can be very entertaining,” said Domenica. “But what about public life? How long is it since we’ve had an amusing politician?”

Mr Demarco Sees Danger for the Fringe 339

There was a complete silence. Mrs Thatcher had been tremendously funny, but she had gone now.

“Harold Macmillan,” said Humphrey, after a while. “He made the entire United Nations laugh once, although the laughter took a long time to travel round the Assembly as his remark had to be translated into numerous languages. The Germans laughed last, only because of their word order, I hasten to add.”

“What did he say?” asked Domenica.

“Well,” said Humphrey. “Mr Khrushchev started to get very heated when Macmillan was making his speech and he took off his shoe and started to bang it on the table. Whereupon Macmillan looked up and said, in a very cool drawl: ‘Could we have a translation of that, please?’ The whole place collapsed.”

They all laughed. Then Humphrey raised a finger in the air.

“Mind you, I know an even funnier story about Khrushchev.”

They looked at him.

“This story concerns Chairman Mao,” said Humphrey. “He was said to have had a very good sense of humour. He was asked once what he thought would have happened had it been Nikita Khrushchev rather than President Kennedy who had been assas-sinated. He thought for a moment and then said: ‘Well, one thing is certain: Aristotle Onassis would not have married Mrs Khrushchev!’”

Angus let out a hoot of laughter, but he noticed that Pat looked puzzled. Leaning across the table he whispered to her:

“Mrs Khrushchev, my dear, was a terrible sight. One of those round, squat Russian women whom one imagined picking potatoes or working in a tractor factory.

“Mind you,” he went on, “Russian women weren’t the only frumps. I had a friend who was once invited to meet a foreign leader (a delightful chap, now, alas, deceased) and was being shown around the leader’s tent – he lived, you see, under canvas.

Anyway, he saw this picture of a very ugly-looking chap hanging on the side of the tent and he was about to ask: ‘Who’s that 340 Not an Ending – More an Adjournment man?’ when an official leaned forward and whispered to him:

‘That, sir, is our beloved leader’s mother.’”

100. Not an Ending – More an Adjournment The salmon was entirely consumed, and at least one pair of longing eyes was directed to the empty plate on which the large timbale had stood; but there was to be no more, and those who had hoped for a second helping were sent empty away. But more was to come; now they progressed to the venison cassoulet, accompanied by Sardinian Rocca Rubia, a wine which Philip Contini himself had pressed into Domenica’s hands; and beyond that to the apple tart with the Celtic-inspired pastry strips.

The conversation around the table was noisy and enthusiastic, as wide-ranging as it always was in Domenica’s flat – that was her effect upon others, a freeing of the tongue, an enlargement of confidence. Even Pat, who might have felt inhibited in such accomplished company, found herself expounding with ease on obtuse topics, emboldened by Domenica’s smile and encouraging nods of agreement. And outside, slowly, the light faded into that state of semi-darkness of the Scottish mid-summer; not dark, not light, but somewhere in between, a simmer dim perhaps, or something like it.

At one point, at an early stage of the dinner, Domenica heard, but only faintly, the sound of Bertie practising his saxophone downstairs, and grinned. She glanced at Angus and at Pat; they as well had both heard, and smiled too, for they could picture Domenica’s young neighbour at his music stand, under the supervising gaze of his mother. Poor Bertie, thought Angus, what a burden for a boy to bear in this life, to have a mother like that, and how discerning Cyril had been when he bit her ankle in Dundas Street. And although on that famous occasion he had been obliged to look apologetic and to administer swift Not an Ending – More an Adjournment 341

punishment to Cyril, his heart had not been in the retribution, and, as soon as possible, he had rewarded the dog with a reassuring pat on the head and the promise of a bone for his moral courage.

And as Angus remembered this incident, Domenica found herself thinking of how well Auden’s words in his poem on the death of Freud fitted Bertie’s situation. He had written there of the child “unlucky in his little State,” of the hearth from which freedom was excluded; such powerful lines to express both the liberating power of Freudian insights, but also to describe the plight of a child. Of course, Auden had believed in Freud then, had imagined that the problem of human wickedness was a problem for psychology, a belief which he had later abandoned when he had come to recognise that evil could be something other than that. On balance, Domenica thought that she agreed here with the younger rather than the older Auden. What tyrant has had a happy childhood?

When they rose from the table to go through for coffee, Angus came up to Domenica and took her hand briefly. It was an unusual gesture for him, and Domenica looked down, almost in surprise, at his hand upon hers, and he, embarrassed, let go of her.

“I wanted to thank you for the apple tart,” he said. “You know I like it.”

“That is why I chose it,” she said.

“Well, thank you,” he said.

“You heard Bertie playing back then?” she asked. “I believe it was ‘Mood Indigo.’”

Angus nodded. “It was.” He paused for a moment. “He’ll be all right, that wee boy. He’ll be all right.”

Domenica hesitated before she replied. But yes, she thought he would be, and this comforted her. As they entered the drawing room, she turned to Angus and whispered to him: “You will say something, won’t you? They’ll be expecting it, you know. You always have a poem for these occasions.”

Angus glanced at his fellow guests. “Are you sure they want to hear from me?”

342 Not an Ending – More an Adjournment Domenica was sure, and a few minutes later, when everybody was settled with their coffee, she announced to her guests that Angus had a poem to read.

“Not exactly to read,” he said.

“But it is there, isn’t it?” pressed Domenica. And she thought, as she spoke, perhaps I would get used to canine company after all. Yes, why not?

Angus put down his cup and moved to the window. There was still a glow of light in the sky, which was high, and empty, the faintest of blues now, washed out. Then he turned round, and he saw then that every guest, every one present, was a friend, and that he cherished them. So the words came to him, and he said:

Dear friends, we are the inhabitants Of a city which can be loved, as any place may be, In so many different and particular ways; But who amongst us can predict

For which reasons, and along which fault lines, Will the heart of each of us

Be broken? I cannot, for I am moved

By so many different and unexpected things: by our sky, Which at each moment may change its mood at whim With clouds in such a hurry to be somewhere else; By our lingering haars, by our eccentric skyline, All crags and spires and angular promises, By the way we feel in Scotland, yes, simply that; These are the things that break my heart In a way for which I am never quite prepared –

The surprises of a love affair that lasts a lifetime.

But what breaks the heart the most, I think, Is the knowledge that what we have

We all must lose; I don’t much care for denial, But if pressed to say goodbye, that final word On which even the strongest can stumble, I am not above pretending

Not an Ending – More an Adjournment 343

That the party continues elsewhere,

With a guest list that’s mostly the same, And every bit as satisfactory;

That what we think are ends are really adjournments, An entr’acte, an interval, not real goodbyes; And perhaps they are, dear friends, perhaps they are.