Isabel smiled, although Jamie was looking at her disapprovingly, as if she were reading something private. Jamie came over to join her and squinted briefly at the invitations. “You shouldn’t read other people’s things,” he whispered. “It’s rude.”
“Pah!” hissed Isabel. “That’s why these things are up here. To be read. I’ve seen invitations on mantelpieces
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A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h She led him away from the mantelpiece to stand before a large watercolour of poppies in a garden. “That’s her,” she said.
“Elizabeth Blackadder. Poppies. Garden walls with cats on them.
But terribly well done in spite of the subject matter.” And she thought: I have no pictures of poppies in my house; I have never been stuck at the hips going through somebody else’s window.
This was where Paul Hogg, returning with two glasses in his hands, found them.
“There you are,” he said cheerfully. “What you came to see.”
“It’s a very good one,” said Isabel. “Poppies again. So important.”
“Yes,” said Paul. “I like poppies. It’s such a pity that they fall to bits when you pick them.”
“A clever defence mechanism,” said Isabel, glancing at Jamie.
“Roses should catch on to that. Thorns are obviously not enough.
Perfect beauty should be left exactly as it is.”
Jamie returned her look. “Oh,” he said, and then was silent.
Paul Hogg looked at him, and then looked at Isabel. Isabel, noticing this, thought: He’s wondering what the relationship is. Toy boy, probably; or so he thinks. But even if that were the case, why should he be surprised? It was common enough these days.
Paul Hogg left the room briefly to fetch his own drink, and Isabel smiled at Jamie, raising a finger to her lip in a quick con-spiratorial gesture.
“But I haven’t said anything yet,” said Jamie. “All I said was ‘Oh.’ ”
“Quite enough,” said Isabel. “An eloquent monosyllable.”
Jamie shook his head. “I don’t know why I agreed to come with you,” he whispered. “You’re half crazy.”
“Thank you, Jamie,” she said quietly. “But here’s our host.”
Paul Hogg returned and they raised their glasses to one another.
T H E S U N D A Y P H I L O S O P H Y C L U B
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“I bought that painting at auction a couple of years ago,” he said. “It was with my first bonus from the company. I bought it to celebrate.”
“A good thing to do,” said Isabel. “One reads about brokers, financial people, celebrating with those awful lunches that set them back ten thousand pounds for the wine. That doesn’t happen in Edinburgh, I hope.”
“Certainly not,” said Paul Hogg. “New York and London maybe. Places like that.”
Isabel turned towards the fireplace. A large gilt-framed picture was hung above it, and she had recognised it immediately.
“That’s a fine Peploe,” she said. “Marvellous.”
“Yes,” said Paul Hogg. “It’s very nice. West coast of Mull, I think.”
“Or Iona?” asked Isabel.
“Could be,” said Paul Hogg vaguely. “Somewhere there.”
Isabel took a few steps towards the painting and looked up at it. “That business with all those forgeries some years back,” she said. “You weren’t worried about that? Did you check?”
Paul Hogg looked surprised. “There were forgeries?”
“So it was said,” said Isabel. “Peploes, Cadells. Quite a few.
There was a trial. It caused some anxiety. I knew somebody who had one on his hands—a lovely painting, but it had been painted the week before, more or less. Very skilled—as these people often are.”
Paul Hogg shrugged. “That’s always a danger, I suppose.”
Isabel looked up at the painting again. “When did Peploe paint this?” she asked.
Paul Hogg made a gesture of ignorance. “No idea. When he was over on Mull, perhaps.”
Isabel watched him. It was an answer of staggering lameness, but at least it fitted with an impression that she was rapidly form-1 4 8
A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h ing. Paul Hogg knew very little about art, and, moreover, was not particularly interested. How otherwise could one have a Peploe like that—and she was sure that it was genuine—how could one have a Peploe and not know the basic facts about it?
There were at least ten other pictures in the room, all of them interesting even if none was as dramatic as the
