The Lost Art of Gratitude

He was surprised; his fingers were fishy and he could not touch her. “Why?”

“Why not? I was thinking of a poem I once read, about a ghost that haunts the heart. I felt frightened.”

He smiled. “You shouldn’t. Not with me here.”

“I know.”

He reached for a kitchen towel to wipe his hands. She released him.

“The woman in the poem looks forward to her encounter with the ghost that haunts her heart. She’s not frightened at all.”

He looked away. Was she talking about Cat? Cat did not haunt him any more. And Isabel was no longer haunted by John Liamor, surely. He reached for the bottle of wine that he had opened and put into an ice-cooled sleeve. He poured two glasses and handed one to her.

“Are you ever frightened?” she asked.

He thought for a moment. He had been frightened, but it was a long time ago. At school there had been a boy who delighted in picking on him, twisting his arm behind his back until he screamed for mercy; it was something sexual, he later realised, but he was too innocent to know that then. The older boy wanted him but could not have him, so love became hate, as it so readily could. He had been frightened because he did not understand.

“I used to be frightened,” he said. “Of rather odd things. Not now, though. Not for a long time.” He looked at her. “And you?”

“I’m frightened of losing things,” she said. “I’m frightened that something’s going to happen to you—or to Charlie.”

His face showed his concern. “What parent doesn’t feel that? You think that something awful will happen if you don’t do something or other. You bargain with fate.”

She took a sip of her wine. “You have to put it out of your mind. Otherwise …”

“Exactly.”

“Minty Auchterlonie. There’s something about her that frightens me. I’m not really frightened, I suppose. But she makes me feel …”

“Anxious?” Jamie prompted.

“More than that. I get the impression that if you crossed her she’d think nothing of doing something really vindictive.”

Jamie shrugged. “She might, I suppose. But sometimes …” He broke off. “I saw Peter Stevenson today, you know. In Bruntsfield. When I was getting the scallops from Hughes’ fish shop. He was buying kippers.”

Isabel laughed. “How reassuring.”

“Your mentioning Minty reminded me,” Jamie went on. “We got chatting. I was walking back up to Church Hill as I had to go to the supermarket. I mentioned to him that we’d recently met up with Minty again. Remember, he helped you first time round with her.”

“Oh, yes.”

“Yes. He still doesn’t trust her, you know. He’s convinced that Minty pulled the wool over your eyes over that insider-dealing matter a few years ago. He said that although she’s the head of that bank there are quite a few people in Edinburgh who don’t approve of her.”

Isabel was interested, but only moderately so; there was nothing surprising in what Jamie had said. To get to the top of anything, and particularly finance, she imagined that one would have to be prepared to step on a lot of people. Minty must have done that—and made enemies in the process.

“But then he said something that made me wonder. I meant to tell you when I got back, but I forgot to. Sorry.”

Isabel waited. Jamie had now started to slice the potatoes for his potatoes dauphinois. “Why is this dish called dauphinois?” he asked.

Isabel was not sure. “It may be because it’s from the Dauphinois Alps,” she said. “That’s probably the reason. On the other hand, there may be a more romantic explanation. Did the Dauphin like his potatoes done that way?” It was unlikely, but it brought the Dauphin to mind, and his brief marriage to Mary Queen of Scots. For a moment she pictured them sitting together at a table in the French court, Mary with her teenage groom, offering him potatoes dauphinois.

“It was very tragic,” she said.

Jamie sliced another potato and laid the slices on their bed of cream and garlic. “What was very tragic?”

“The Dauphin. Francis. Mary loved him, you know, although they were betrothed when they were terribly young. She loved him. And then he went and caught an ear infection that led to an abscess in the brain. Imagine how painful his death must have been: screaming agony because pain in the ear is so close to where you are. Perhaps they had some painkillers in those days—various plants. I hope they did. Opium, maybe. Otherwise, just imagine it.”

Jamie brought her back to the subject. “Minty,” he said. “Peter said that she was in trouble—or could be. He wasn’t very specific.”

Isabel was immediately intrigued. Peter Stevenson was one of the best informed of her friends; he knew things others did not, but rarely spoke about them—which was one of the reasons, she thought, why he knew things in the first place. Could Peter Stevenson be aware of Jock Dundas and the issue of Roderick’s paternity? Surely not. Minty would hardly have talked about that, not if she wanted to keep it secret from Gordon. Edinburgh was a village: a word in the wrong place travelled every bit as quickly as a word in the right place.

She asked Jamie what Peter had said, and he told her, “Just that. Minty’s in a bit of trouble, and he was not surprised. He said something about her sailing too close to the wind.”

It was a metaphor that Isabel liked, and used herself. It conveyed very well the notion of taking full advantage