which had not been present in their relationship before: a financial dimen-sion. As they left the auction house, with Charlie returned to his sling on Isabel’s front, Jamie thought about what had been said.
And there was something else worrying him, something else that had not been spoken about but that had to be discussed at some point. Who was financially responsible for Charlie? He 2 4
A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h had not thought about this, in the drama of Isabel’s pregnancy, but a few days previously it had occurred to him that now there would be bills. He had seen an article in the paper about the cost of a child until it reached the age of independence, and the figure had been daunting. Tens—scores—of thousands of pounds were needed to feed, clothe, and educate a child, and the age of independence itself seemed to be getting higher and higher. Twenty-five-year-olds still lived with, and on, their parents, and the paper cited one case of a daughter of thirty-two, still in full-time education, still being supported by her father. Was Charlie going to be that expensive? And if he was, would he be able to pay his share?
They were going for lunch in the restaurant at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, which was on Queen Street, a short walk from the auction house. Outside, in spite of the fact that it was June, the wind had a note of chill in it, a wind from the east, off the North Sea. Isabel looked up at the sky, which was clear but for a few scudding clouds, wispy, high-level streaks of white.
“It’s so bright,” she said, shivering as a gust of wind swept up Broughton Street and penetrated the thin layer of her jersey.
“Look at that sky. Look up there.”
Jamie stared up into the blue. He saw a vapour trail, higher than the clouds, on the very edge of space, it seemed, heading westwards towards America or Canada. He thought of the shiny thin tube suspended, against gravity, in that cold near-void; he thought of the people inside. “What do you think of when you see those jets?” he asked Isabel, pointing up at the tiny glint of metal with its white wisp of cotton wool trailing behind it.
Isabel glanced up. “Trust,” she said. “I think of trust.”
Jamie looked puzzled. “Why would you think of that?” Then he started to smile; he knew the answer, and Isabel was right.
“Yes, I see.”
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They turned the corner onto Queen Street. On the other side of the street, a block away, rose the red sandstone edifice of the Portrait Gallery, an ambitious neo-Gothic building which Isabel had always liked in spite of what she called its “Caledo-nian spikiness.” The gallery restaurant, tucked away and old-fashioned, was popular with people who wanted to sit, four to a table, in high-backed chairs reminiscent of suburban dining rooms. Isabel liked it because of its welcoming atmosphere and the overflow paintings from the main gallery hanging on its walls.
“I like coming here,” said Jamie, as they sat down at their table. “When I was a boy, I used to be brought here to see the pictures of the kings and queens of Scotland. I was interested in seeing Macbeth, but of course we haven’t a clue what he looked like.”
“A much maligned king,” said Isabel as she loosened Charlie’s sling. “Shakespeare cast him as a weak man, a murderer, but in fact he had quite a successful reign. Scotland prospered under Macbeth.”
“
Isabel doubted this. It was only too easy to blame women, she thought, although she had to admit, if pressed, that there were some women who deserved any blame that came their way. Mrs. Ceau?sescu was such a case, as she pointed out.
“She was shot, wasn’t she?” said Jamie.
“I’m afraid so,” said Isabel. “And nobody deserves that. Not even the most appalling tyrant, or tyrant’s wife. She pleaded for her life, we are told, as did her husband, in his long winter coat, standing there in front of those young soldiers. He said that they should not shoot his wife, as she was a great scientist. At least he tried to do something gentlemanly at the very end.”
They were silent for a moment; Romania and firing squads 2 6
A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h seemed a world away from the atmosphere of the Portrait Gallery. Jamie looked at Charlie. The cruelties of the world, its viciousness, seemed so dissonant with the innocence of the child. He returned to kings.
“George IV,” he said. “That was another favourite picture of mine. Ever since I heard that the artist who painted the picture of his arrival in Edinburgh showed him in his kilt but without the pink tights that apparently he wore when he arrived in Scotland.”
Isabel laughed. “That sounds almost as bad as those Soviet portraits. I saw one in the State Gallery in Moscow years ago. It was a collective portrait of the politburo or some such group.
The ones who had been discredited or executed were simply painted out and replaced with large flower arrangements. But the contours of the paint showed that something had been done. Such a bad sign—the appearance of flowers in official portraits.”
Jamie looked at her quizzically. He was not quite sure how to take remarks like that from Isabel. It was, he said, her Dorothy Parker streak. “But I’d never take a streak from another woman,” Isabel had protested.
“There you go,” said Jamie.
But now there was this odd remark about flowers. “Why flowers?” he asked.
“Well,” said Isabel, “look at political broadcasts by presidents and prime ministers. The shaky ones, those one thinks are lying, or at least being economical with the truth—they bedeck the tables behind them with large floral arrangements. I take that as a sure sign that there’s something fishy going on. Flags and flowers. They’re stage props. And soldiers. Being seen talking to the troops is very good for votes.”
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The waitress arrived and they gave their order. Jamie reached across the table and touched Charlie’s arm.
