“A gap year?”
Stuart seemed pleased with his suggestion. “Yes, a gap year between nursery and primary school. So what if he’s only five?
Why not? Gap years are all the rage.”
Irene looked pensive. “You know, you might have something there. It could be a year in which he did his Grade seven theory and one or two other things. It would take him out of the 122
“Send him abroad? Perhaps he could work in a village in South America, or Africa even.”
Irene thought for a moment, as if weighing up the suggestion.
“Hardly. But it would be a rather good way of letting him develop without having to look over his shoulder at other children. I’m sure he’d benefit. And perhaps I could take him to Italy – to perfect his spoken Italian.”
Stuart laid aside his newspaper. “I was thinking of taking the pressure off a bit, rather than adding to it. I thought of a year out, so to speak. Perhaps we should leave Italian for the time being.”
This suggestion did not go down well with Irene. “It would be a criminal waste of everything we’ve done so far if we let his Italian get rusty,” she said coldly. “And the same goes for the saxophone and theory of music. For everything in fact.”
“But perhaps at this age we should concentrate on his
“Neither here nor there,” said Irene dismissively. “There is evidence – ample evidence – that the development of linguistic skills in the early years leads to much greater facility with language when one’s older. Every minute is precious at this age. The mind is very plastic.”
Stuart opened his mouth to say something, but thought better of it and was silent. He knew that he could not win an argument with Irene, and nine years of marriage to her had convinced him that he should no longer try.
“I’ll think about it further,” said Irene. “The only decision we have to make now is not to take him back to that woman and her so-called nursery school. And I don’t think we should.”
“
Irene looked satisfied. “In that case, I shall have a look around and see what’s possible. I’ll do this after we’ve started his therapy.”
Stuart gave a start. This was new information. Had therapy been discussed before? He could not recall anything being said
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about it, but then sometimes he stopped paying attention when Irene was talking. He might have missed the discussion.
Irene, noticing his puzzlement, explained. “The Scottish Institute of Human Relations,” she said. “We have an appointment there on Monday. A Dr Fairbairn. He’s been highly recommended and he’ll be able to advise us on why Bertie has suddenly started playing up.”
“Do we really need all this?” asked Stuart.
Irene stared at him. No response was necessary, or at least no verbal response.
“First thing,” he said in a businesslike fashion. “First thing is hotel bits and pieces. Meal and ballroom.”
“All fine,” said Sasha, who composed the rest of the committee, the other members having sent their apologies. “The menu’s approved and the hotel said they would look after the flower.”
Todd smiled. “Flower? Only one?”
Sasha nudged him playfully. “You know what I meant. Flowers.
The fact that we have very few people coming doesn’t mean we’re only going to have one flower.”
Todd looked down at the list in front of him and shook 124
his head. “On which subject,” he said, “this is really very disappointing. Nothing’s come in this morning, I take it? Nobody else signing up?”
Sasha shook her head. “When the phone went before breakfast I hoped that it would be somebody. But it was the dress shop about my dress. So it looks like that’s it.” She paused. “Are you still sure that we should go ahead? Couldn’t we come up with some other explanation for a late cancellation?”
Todd’s reply was firm. “No. Absolutely not. We’ve been through this before. And, anyway, other parties have their problems with parties, so to speak. Have you ever been to a Labour Party do?
Awful. Dreadfully dull events. Like a primary school parents’
