so much on the strong ones. Who did anything about Stalin?”
“They didn’t want a nuclear war.”
Isabel had to agree. “No, they didn’t. I suppose that demonstrates that moral philosophy has to be practical. It has to take into account who has a big fist. It also has to bear in mind who we are, our human limitations. It’s not just something that one does in armchairs.” As she spoke, she thought of her own armchair. The last time she had sat in it, she had drifted off to sleep while watching the news. For a moral philosopher’s armchair, she thought, it’s somewhat under-used.
GRACE WAS ONLY TOO PLEASED to be left in charge of Charlie that morning while Isabel went into Bruntsfield. She would take him down to the canal, she said, to look at the boats. And then there was her friend who lived in Harrison Gardens and who always welcomed a visit from Charlie. After that he could have his sleep.
With these arrangements in place, Isabel made her way along Merchiston Crescent to the post office at Boroughmuirhead. The streets were quiet; students from Napier University had been discouraged from parking in the area since the introduction of a permit system that restricted parking to the local residents. This uncluttered the streets, except on occasions when a student was late for a class and decided to feed the meter. It was also, she thought, an example of how people might be forced to be good. If we were not prepared to walk—the environmentally responsible thing to do—or to wear crash helmets—the personally responsible thing to do—then those in power over us might force us to do these very things. The difficulty with this, of course, was squaring such an approach with human freedom. Isabel had not been much of a skier, but on her relatively few ventures on to the slopes she had enjoyed the feeling of the wind in her hair. Having to wear a helmet to ski—as some people were proposing—would spoil that sensation. And where would such enthusiasm end? Walking itself had some dangers— as the late Dr. Henderson had unfortunately found out—and there must be figures somewhere for the risk of falling over and cracking one’s skull even when walking a short distance, as she was now doing.
Would anyone seriously propose that it should be compulsory to don a helmet to walk? The question was absurd, and yet even as she asked it she realised that even such an absurdity could not be ruled out. If a society could ban the throwing of sweets into the audience during a pantomime, or insist that people holding a church barbecue should attend a course to teach them how to fry sausages safely, then it was capable of anything. Yes, she thought, our very ordinary freedoms were being rapidly eroded by the nanny state, but it was difficult to make the point without sounding strident, or like an opponent of motherhood and apple pie. So she had done nothing to defend these freedoms, which made her … the realisation was a shocking one: it made her one of Christopher Dove’s free riders.
The purchase of stamps at the post office at least took her mind off issues of civic duty and freedom. Then, crossing the road, she made her way towards the delicatessen. She had decided to tell Cat directly about the engagement and to breeze her way through any hostile reaction. She should not be intimidated by her niece; the worst thing one could do with a moody person was to pander to her moods. If Cat chose to go into a sulk, then she could do so, and Isabel would simply bide her time until she was ready to come out of it. She always did get over things, even if it took a little while.
Five or six doors from the delicatessen was the small jewellery shop, run by two young women, where Isabel had seen the ring that she thought she would buy for Jamie. She had imagined that she might go there with him and have his ring finger measured, but now, on impulse, she went in. One of the jewellers was at her workbench at the back of the room, peering through a large magnifying lens at some intricate piece of jewellery. She looked up when Isabel came in and smiled; they knew one another slightly, as Isabel occasionally took in items from the collection of jewellery she had inherited from her mother. There had been a pearl necklace that needed restringing. It had belonged to a great-aunt in Mobile, Alabama. “Particularly fine pearls,” the jeweller had said. “Look at their lustre.” Isabel had looked and had seen why it was that pearls needed their own adjective: pearlescent. There was no other word for their colour, their sheen, their very texture.
“Pearls?” the jeweller said.
“No, a ring this time,” said Isabel. “I saw a ring in the window—a man’s ring. Gold.”
The jeweller set aside the necklace she had been examining and switched off the workbench light. “Was it rose gold?”
Isabel said that it was. “It was a lovely colour. That’s why I noticed it.”
“We still have it,” said the jeweller, standing up and reaching for a bunch of keys. “I made it myself. I thought that a man might walk past the window and buy it as a signet ring. But none has. Perhaps there aren’t enough men.”
Isabel laughed. “There never are, are there?” And she thought: that’s absolutely true—the demographers confirm it. Yet one of these increasingly rare men has asked me to marry him.
The jeweller extracted the ring from a display case and handed it to Isabel; it felt heavy in her hand, as it should, and warm too. She held it in her palm and knew. This was the ring she would give Jamie.
“Could you have it engraved?” she asked.
The jeweller nodded. She was looking at Isabel with interest, as if she was aware that this was an important moment. “Of course. I could do it myself. It’s broad enough. Sometimes it’s tricky with very delicate rings, but there’ll be no problem with this one. Just write down what you want.”
The jeweller handed Isabel a small piece of paper and a pen. Isabel gave her back the ring and took the paper. But then she realised that she had no idea what she wanted engraved. Jamie’s initials? The initials of both of them? A date? The problem for Isabel was that she found herself in this realm of personal, emotional gesture, and she was unsure of the territory. There were people, she felt, who were much better at this sort of thing than she was. There were people who were unembarrassed by writing
She picked up the pen and wrote out a few words. Then she handed the piece of paper to the jeweller.
The jeweller read the message. “Isabel Dalhousie gave this ring.” She smiled. “That’s nice wording. I was worried that you were going to write
“I couldn’t,” said Isabel. “Because it isn’t. Nothing’s eternal.”
The jeweller put the piece of paper down on her desk. “You should see some of the things that engravers are
