The Charming Quirks of Others

But we are, she thought. We are a great deal further than you imagine.

“I take it, then, that you’ll ask Harold Slade to stay?”

“I shall,” he said. “In fact, I’ve already done that, and he was happy to agree.”

“Temporarily?” she asked.

“No, permanently.”

“But what about Singapore?”

Alex smiled. “Oddly enough, I think they’re going to be quite pleased if Harry doesn’t go—or some of them will be. I had a chat with my counterpart, the chairman of that school’s board. He became quite frank and admitted that they were not exactly of one mind about the appointment. There was a strong faction on their board that wanted an internal appointment—the deputy head. The chairman let slip that he was of that persuasion himself, but had been out-voted. He’ll be pleased when Harry calls off.”

Isabel sighed. “Well, that seems to settle that,” she said. “I must say again that I’m somewhat surprised that you asked me to look into this in the first place. Everything seems to have settled itself rather satisfactorily.”

He said nothing. She turned to face him again. There had been a note of anger in her voice, and he reacted; he looked concerned.

“But I didn’t ask you,” he said. “My wife did. She acted entirely off her own bat and then presented me with a fait accompli. I concurred and let you get on with it.”

Isabel turned away, looking out of the window at the lawn below. Two boys were engaged in what appeared to be a wrestling contest, one throwing the other down and then sitting on his chest. Their hair was dishevelled, their shirts hanging out of the tops of their trousers. The boy on the ground hit the other on the back and rolled him off. Then he kicked him, but only lightly. They were obviously good friends.

“May I ask you,” she said, turning back to face Alex. “May I ask you this: Who does your wife think wrote the letter?”

He hesitated, seemingly unsure as to whether to answer. But then he said, “Janet Carty.”

“And she voiced these suspicions to you?”

“Yes, she said she was pretty sure it was her. She urged me to take action.” He looked bemused. “In fact, she seemed to think that your investigation would back her up.”

Of course she did, thought Isabel. And she remembered the evening at Abbotsford, recalling the sight of Jillian mouthing something across the table at Harold Slade; and the look on his face as he responded. Lovers. Of course they were lovers. And what if Jillian had a rival? And this rival was Janet Carty? It would make perfect sense for her to undermine the secretary and at the same time stop, or at least delay, her lover’s departure for Singapore.

“I’m confident that Janet Carty did not write the letter,” she said. “If there’s one thing that’s clear to me, it’s that.”

He looked interested. “How can you be so sure?”

“Because I know who wrote it.”

She spoke impulsively, and immediately regretted it. I should not have said that. I can’t tell him his wife is having an affair. Why? Because it could bring his whole world down around him, and who am I to do that? The affair might come to an end, fizzle out, and Jillian might return to him. And who am I to preclude that possibility?

He fixed her with an intense gaze. “But you implied a few moments ago that you had no idea.”

She began to move towards the door. “That was then,” she said.

“Then who was it?”

She hesitated. She did not trust this man and she could not trust him not to take his anger out on his wife.

“I choose not to tell you.”

He raised his voice almost to shouting pitch. “You choose not to tell me?”

Perhaps this is why his wife is looking elsewhere, she thought. Perhaps he needs somebody to tell him.

“That is what I said, Mr. Mackinlay. You are an arrogant man, I’m afraid. You are used to demanding that people comply with what you want of them. I shall not.”

She walked past him. She half expected him to try to stop her leaving, but he did not.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I would normally give people the information to which they are entitled, but I do not think you deserve this information. So I shall not.”

She left the room. He said nothing as she opened the door and stepped out into the corridor.

Miss Carty was outside. You have been listening at the door, thought Isabel; it is quite apparent from your demeanour.

ISABEL DROVE BACK even more slowly than she had driven there. The road was quiet, and she felt calmer now as she made her way home under the wide sky of late afternoon. To her right, on the horizon, were the folds of the Lammermuir Hills, blue against blue. Between the road and the hills were rich stretches of green, squared by hedges and drystone walls that marched off into the distance.

I love this country, she thought. I love it because it is soft and green and the sky is a theatre of white and grey and is so heartbreakingly beautiful in all its moods. I love it because of its people, who are frustrating and interesting and full of joy and sorrow, in equal amounts perhaps; who plot and scheme and yet find time to love one another and make songs and music and plant rhododendrons and write poetry and talk Gaelic and catch fish. I love it for all of that.

As her car picked up speed when the road dipped down towards Flotterstone, Isabel thought about what she had done. She had been asked to find things wrong with three people with whom there was essentially not much