The World According to Bertie - Alexander Hanchett Smith [26]
Domenica decided that the issue of trousers had been explored enough. ‘And these builders,’ she said. ‘Where will you get them?’
‘My friend Clifford Reed is a builder,’ Antonia said. ‘And a very good one, too. He’ll help me out. He said he will. He has a Pole he’s going to send over to take a look at what needs to be done, and then to do it. There are lots of Poles in Edinburgh now. All these builders and hotel porters and the like. All very hardworking. Staunch Catholics. Very reliable people.’
Domenica thought for a moment. ‘You’ll have to get a large mug to serve your Pole his tea in,’ she said. ‘None of this Spode for him. He’ll want something more substantial.’
She watched Antonia as she spoke. It was a somewhat obvious thing for her to say, she thought; a bit unsubtle, in fact. But she watched to see its effect on Antonia. Of course the true psychopath would be unmoved; such people were quite capable of telling the coldest of lies, of remaining cool in the face of the most damning accusations. That was why they were psychopaths – they simply did not care; they were untouched.
‘Of course not,’ said Antonia flatly. ‘I keep my Spode for special occasions.’
Domenica was completely taken aback by this remark and was not sure how to take it. I keep my Spode for special occasions. This could mean that she kept her Spode (as opposed to stolen Spode) for such occasions, or that her own visit was such an occasion, and merited the bringing out of the Spode. It must be the latter, she told herself. It must be.
Their conversation continued in a desultory fashion for a further half-hour. There was some talk of the early Scottish saints – Antonia’s novel on the subject was not progressing well, Domenica was told – and there was a brief exchange of views about the latest special exhibition at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery. Then Domenica looked at her watch and excused herself.
She rose to her feet and began to walk towards the door. As she did so, something lying at the foot of the kitchen dresser caught her eye. It was a slipper, a slipper embroidered in red, and it was remarkably similar to one that she had. She glanced at it quickly and then looked away. What were the odds that two people living on the same stair in Scotland Street would both have identical pairs of red Chinese slippers? Astronomically small, she thought.
∗ Lit: nothing about humanity is alien to me; a common Edinburgh way of saying: I’ve seen it all.
18. Bruce Finds a Place to Stay
Since he had returned to Edinburgh, Bruce had been staying with friends in Comely Bank. These people were a couple whom he had known in his earlier days in Edinburgh; Neil had been at school with him at Morrison’s Academy in Crieff, and he had known Caroline slightly before she met Neil. Both Neil and Caroline were keen skiers, who had met on a skiing trip to Austria. Not all romances which start in the chalet or on the ski slopes survive the descent to sea level, but this one did. Now they were married, and living in Comely Bank, in a Victorian tenement halfway up the hill towards the heights of the west New Town. ‘Not quite Eton Terrace,’ Bruce had observed. ‘Nor St Bernard’s Crescent, for that matter. But nice enough. If you like that sort of thing.’ Comely Bank was comfortable and was only a fifteen-minute walk from the West End and Neil’s office, but, in Bruce’s words again, it was ‘hardly the centre of the known universe’.
In fact, even as he passed these somewhat dismissive comments, Bruce was trying to remember a poem he had heard about a man who died and who had ‘the Lord to thank / For sending him straight to Heaven from Comely Bank