The Careful Use of Compliments

But then Cat suddenly turned to Jamie and said, “My, you’re looking fit, Jamie!”

Isabel breathed a sigh of relief; they were not in for the long haul after all. But then Cat added, “Somebody’s obviously keeping you rather well.”

The significance of this remark took a moment or two to sink in. Isabel, prepared for the worst, immediately saw the concealed meaning: Jamie was accused of being a kept man. The sheer effrontery of this was astonishing, but Jamie, unprepared, appeared not to notice the choice of words, at least not to begin with. As they moved through to the sitting room from the bedroom, he suddenly stiffened and half turned to Isabel. Their eyes met, and she gave a discreet shake of the head, a turning up of the eyes, as if to say, Don’t bother. Rise above it.

Claudia passed a glass of wine to Isabel and then one 1 2 4

A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h to Jamie. Isabel raised her glass to Cat, who responded halfheartedly.

“We had to bring Charlie,” Isabel said. “Grace had one of her migraines. She doesn’t get them very often but . . .”

“Charlie sleeps through things,” said Jamie. “He’s very good.”

Both Cat and Claudia turned to look at Jamie as he spoke.

Then Claudia turned to Cat and said, “Who had that awful baby? The people who came to dinner, and it screamed and screamed?”

“Oh them,” said Cat. “Yes. It was heading for Scottish Opera, that one.”

Jamie frowned. “I’m sure it wasn’t their fault. You can’t stop a baby screaming when it gets going. What can you do?”

He looked at Cat, as if awaiting an answer. She met his gaze, but only for a moment. How does one look upon somebody whom one used to like? Like that, Isabel thought, watching Cat’s expression; quick glances, expressing self-reproach, or surprise, perhaps, at the fact that one could have liked the other. And in the case of an ex-lover who had left one, it could be resentment that prevailed—resentment that the other was leading a life in which one played no part, the ultimate slap in the face. Cat, though, had got rid of Jamie, not the other way round, and she could hardly resent his finding somebody else.

Perhaps not, but if that somebody was one’s aunt . . .

Isabel saw that Jamie still appeared to be waiting for Cat to answer his question. A change of subject, she decided, would help.

“Speaking of Scottish Opera,” she said, “Did you see their Rosenkavalier, Cat?”

Cat’s answer was abrupt. “No.” And then she added, “No, I didn’t.”

T H E C A R E F U L U S E O F C O M P L I M E N T S

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This, thought Isabel, is going to be difficult; perhaps they should have turned round on the stairway after all.

“Rosenkavalier has its moments,” said Jamie suddenly.

“Yes . . . ,” Isabel began. “I agree. I think . . .”

“I saw Carmen in London,” interjected Claudia. “English National Opera did it.”

For a few moments there was silence. Isabel smiled encouragingly. “Carmen is always fun,” she said. “Everybody loves it.”

Jamie shot her a glance. “Maybe,” he muttered.

Isabel persisted. “It’s like all the established repertoire,” she said. “People like the familiar in opera. Carmen fills the house.”

For a moment Jamie said nothing. Isabel noticed that his hands were clasped together tightly and that his knuckles showed white. When he spoke, his voice was strained. “Yes, but that’s the problem, isn’t it? All the old stuff leaves no space for anything new.”

“New operas,” said Isabel mildly, “can scare people away. It’s a fact of life.”

“So we shouldn’t perform them?” Jamie snapped. “Just the same old stuff? La Boheme, La Traviata? ”

Isabel glanced at Cat, who was staring up at the ceiling, perhaps to avoid looking at Jamie. She did not want to prolong the discussion that she had started and that had suddenly turned into an argument, but at the same time she found herself resenting Jamie’s deliberately provocative stance. She did not disapprove of new opera—he knew that—and it was unfair of him to portray her as a traditionalist. She was not.

“I didn’t say that there was no place for new operas,” she said firmly. “I didn’t. All that I’d say is that opera companies have to live in the real world. They have to sell tickets, and this means doing the things that people come to see. Not all the time, of course. But they do have to do them.”

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A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h

“And that means no new works?” retorted Jamie.

“No,” she said. “No.”

Isabel felt ill at ease. It was unlike Jamie to be argumenta-tive, but it occurred to her that the tension of the evening was the explanation for his snippiness. She could understand that, but it still hurt her that he should pick a public fight with her, and she was reflecting on this when they heard Charlie begin to cry.