Georgian too. Such a loss.”
Isabel looked at the dried flowers, dusty and pale, washed of colour. “Such a tucked-away bedroom,” she said. “So snug.”
Florence gave her a conspiratorial look. “Yes. I can see you in this place, you know. You and your friend.” She looked through the open door in the direction of the kitchen.
For a moment Isabel said nothing. She felt embarrassed by the misunderstanding, but she also felt flattered that Florence should imagine that she and Jamie were together in that sense.
Yes, she thought, it would be good to be living here with him, living together as lovers. But she could not let Florence continue to believe something that was false, and so she started to explain. “Jamie and I—” she began. But she did not continue, as Jamie had appeared in the doorway.
“The bedroom,” said Isabel, letting him look past her. “Isn’t it nice?”
Jamie nodded his approval. Again he went to the window and looked out, poking at the wooden frame as he did so. He had told Isabel about rotten window sills in New Town flats and the importance of knowing just what repairs one was letting oneself in for. This wood appeared to be solid, though, and he turned to face into the room. Florence was staring at him, a smile about her lips.
Isabel could not say anything about Jamie now, could not give the explanation that was needed, and so she looked at her watch and then at Jamie. “We should be getting along,” she said.
“We have to . . .” She left that unfinished. They did not have to T H E R I G H T AT T I T U D E T O R A I N
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do anything, but she felt that she had seen enough of the flat and she wanted to be out in the street. She would offer for it, she thought. She would talk to Simon Mackintosh, her lawyer, and make an offer.
They said goodbye to Florence, who saw them off in the hall. Then, on the stairway, on the way down, Jamie turned to her and said, “As nice as it gets around here.”
“Really?”
“Yes. Top floor, which will make a difference to the noise.
Bedroom at the back. Well maintained. And the wiring’s new. I had a quick look.”
Isabel smiled at him. “I knew that it was a good idea to bring you.”
They went out onto the street, closing the heavy, blue-painted communal door behind them. A young couple walked past them, going in the direction of Royal Circus, the woman’s midriff was exposed, the mottled white flesh shaking as she moved, and the man’s jeans were fashionably torn, affording a view from the rear of dark-blue undershorts. Display of the body, thought Isabel; changing conceptions of the private. It was no longer socially impermissible for men to show their undershorts, and perhaps that was not unreasonable. Was there anything inherently more private about one garment rather than another?
Jamie was going to Castle Street, and Isabel, who was returning home, had planned to go in that direction, so they walked together up Gloucester Lane towards the end of Heriot Row. Gloucester Lane was a narrow cobbled alleyway on both sides of which were mews houses. Jamie pointed out how much more expensive these were, although sometimes they were smaller than the flat they had just looked over.
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A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h
“It’s strange how much people will pay for an address,” he said. “Don’t you think that rather odd?”
“Not at all,” said Isabel. “Jockeying for social position is what people do. Instinctively. We’re competitive creatures.”
He looked up at a window in which a black-and-white cat was seated, eyeing them disdainfully. “You’re a bit of a snob, Isabel.”
He had not intended to say it; it had just come out. And now it was uttered, and he regretted it, as he sensed Isabel bristle beside him.
She stopped and turned to him. “I most certainly am not,”
she said. “That’s most unfair. It really is.”
He reached out and took her arm. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that seriously. You’re not a snob. You’re not.”
Isabel brushed his hand away. “All I said was that people do tend to go for what they think of as socially prestigious. And they do. Everywhere, in every society you care to mention.
That’s just a factual observation. A snob would say that it mattered where you came from, what your address was, and so on. I don’t say that for a moment. Not one moment.”
Jamie knew that she was right, and that his comment had been wrong and hurtful. Poor Isabel. She tried so hard to do the right thing—she agonised over these things all the time—and he had gone and accused her of something really nasty, which she did not deserve.
She had started to walk off without him, and he ran to catch up with her. “That was a stupid remark I made,” he said. “Really stupid. Will you forgive me?”
Her voice was cold. “Think nothing of it.”
“I meant—
She was silent, and so Jamie persisted. “You know, you often T H E R I G H T AT T I T U D E T O R A I N
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