The World According to Bertie

Domenica sighed. “Brick! Brick! I’m sorry, we’ve really said everything there is to be said about bricks. Antonia?

Antonia?”

Markus shook his head sorrowfully and muttered something under his breath. For a moment, Domenica felt real alarm – not for herself, now, but for Antonia. Had something happened?

She took a few steps forward so that she was standing right before him. She repeated her sign. Surely he could understand that, at least.

As she gestured, Domenica found herself remembering one of the most curious books in her library, Jean and Thomas Sebeok’s Monastic Sign Languages. She had come across this book years ago 240 For a Moment, Domenica Felt Real Alarm in Atticus Books in Toronto and had been astonished that anybody should have made a detailed study of such a subject. But there it was, complete with page after page of photographs of Cistercian monks, bound by their rule of silence, making expressive signs to one another to convey sometimes quite complex messages. She had toyed with buying it, but had been put off by its price of one hundred and forty Canadian dollars. This had been a bad decision: we always regret impulsive purchases not made, and no sooner had she returned to Scotland than she thought how much pleasure she would have obtained from the book.

Years later, finding herself again in Toronto for an anthropological conference, Domenica had returned to Atticus Books and innocently asked: “Do you by any chance have a book on monastic sign language?”

The proprietor of the bookshop concealed his delight. “As it happens,” he said . . .

But now, standing before Markus, she found herself desperately trying to recall the Cistercian sign for where is, a simple enough phrase and presumably a commonly used sign – but not one she could remember. Instead, she remembered the sign for cat, which involved the twisting of an imaginary mustache on both sides of the upper lip with the tips of the thumbs and forefingers.

That was no good, of course, but the need now passed, as Markus appeared to have grasped the gist of her inquiry and was smiling and nodding his head. “Antonia,” he said enthusiastically and pointed downstairs. Then he tapped his watch and held up five fingers. That, thought Domenica signified five minutes, or possibly five hours. Among some North American Indians, it might even have meant five moons. Five minutes, she decided, was the most likely meaning.

It was not even that. A few moments after communication had been established between Domenica and Markus, the front door of the flat was pushed open and Antonia appeared, carrying a bulging shopping bag. She gave a start of surprise at seeing Domenica in the flat, and then she cast a glance in the direction of Markus. But that was all it was – a glance. It was not a

“I’ve let myself down,” she said. “Badly.” 241

lingering look of the sort that Domenica had seen her give him before: this was a dismissive glance.

“I wish he would get on with his work rather than standing about,” she muttered to Domenica. “Polish builders are meant to be hard-working.”

This remark, taken together with the glance, was enough to inform Domenica immediately that the affair between Antonia and Markus was over. She was not surprised, of course, as she had wondered how a relationship which must, by linguistic necessity, have been uncommunicative, could last. The answer was now apparent: a week or so.

She looked at Antonia, who had placed the shopping bag on the ground and was beginning to unbutton her coat.

“You clearly need a cup of tea,” she said. “Or something stronger. How about . . . a glass of Crabbie’s Green Ginger Wine? Come to my flat.”

Crabbie’s Green Ginger Wine, those wonderful evocative words, balm to the troubled Edinburgh soul, metaphorical oil upon metaphorically troubled waters! And redolent of everything quintessentially Edinburgh: slightly sharp, slightly disapproving, slightly superior.

“Tea, please,” said Antonia.

72. “I’ve let myself down,” she said. “Badly.”

Domenica ushered Antonia into her flat and closed the door behind her. “You’ll forgive me if I have a glass of Crabbie’s,”

she said. “I shall make tea for you. Earl Grey?”

“Oh, anything will do,” said Antonia. She looked up at her neighbour. “This is very kind of you.”

“Not at all,” said Domenica. “I sense that . . . Well, I might as well be frank. Things are fraught next door, I take it?”

Antonia looked down at her shoes. “A bit.” There was a short silence, and then she added, “Very fraught, actually.”

242 “I’ve let myself down,” she said. “Badly.”

“Markus?”

Antonia sighed. “Yes. I must confess that I have been having a little fling with him.”

“I could tell that,” said Domenica, adding, hastily, “Not that it’s any business of mine. But one notices.”

“I don’t care if anybody knows,” said Antonia. “But it’s over now, and it’s not very easy having one’s ex working in the house.

You’ll understand that, won’t you?”

“Of course,” said Domenica. “I had a boyfriend once in the field, years ago. He was a young man from Princeton, a heartbreaker – unintentionally, of course. When it didn’t work out, we found that we still had three months of one another’s company in the field. We were in New Guinea and we could hardly get away from one another. Sharing a tiny hut which the local tribe had thoughtfully built for visiting anthropologists. It was very trying for both of us, I think.”

Antonia nodded. “It must have been. It’s not quite that bad for me, but I still feel a bit raw over the whole thing.”