A Time of Love and Tartan

  Andrew shook his head. “That’s very sad.”

  “This sort of thing is happening everywhere,” Domenica continued. “In South America, too. People who have managed to avoid the modern world are being rooted out of their homes in the jungle, hunted down in some cases, all for timber and minerals.”

  She looked at the pygmy woman. “This woman is showing us what we ourselves have lost, and what our grasping world is taking away from them. Their innocence, their gentleness, their friendliness.” She stopped. She had remembered something. “You know, it’s just come back to me. When I was doing my fieldwork out there I had some dealings with the Baka people – they live in the Congo. And they had a word for the spirit of the forest in which they lived: Jengi. It’s one of the few words that you find in many of the other forest languages in the region. Jengi.”

  The effect of Domenica’s uttering the word Jengi was electric. The two pygmy guests suddenly sat bolt upright, their eyes shining.

  “Jengi,” said the man, and pointed out of the window. “Jengi.”

  “He’s telling us something,” said Andrew.

  Both of the pygmies now got up from their seats and walked over to the window. They were not quite tall enough to look out of it easily, but standing on their toes, they could just see over the sill.

  “Jengi,” said the man once more, pointing now at the tops of the trees in Drummond Place, just visible from the flat.

  Then he turned around and gazed at his hosts with an ineffable sadness.

  “He’s seen God in the Drummond Place trees,” said Domenica quietly. She wanted to cry. She wanted to cry for the loss of so many of the things that had made the world a richly-textured place: for community, and local culture, and the forests, and the people who lived in them; because now all that was going, swept away, consumed, cut down, taken away.

  Stuart Plans His Future

  One floor below, unaware of the meeting taking place upstairs in Angus and Domenica’s flat, an encounter of a very different sort was about to occur. Since his resignation from his post as a government statistician, Stuart had been busy preparing for his new life, both professional and domestic. The professional side of this preparation had involved a consultation with a financial adviser whom he had met in the Cumberland Bar. This man knew all about redundancy packages and pension entitlements and such things, and was an expert in what he called “exit strategies.”

  “I take it they’ve offered redundancy terms?” said the adviser, over a pint of McEwan’s India Pale Ale. “The civil service tends to be quite good about those sort of things. Better than the private sector, on the whole.” He paused, looking momentarily concerned. “You have been offered something, I take it . . . ”

  Stuart tried to look nonchalant. “Actually, I resigned. Handed in my dinner pail – in a manner of speaking. Not permanently, of course – I’m still alive . . . ” He smiled weakly. “But no, I resigned.”

  The adviser bit his lip. “An actual resignation? As in: I quit?”

  “As in I quit.”

  The adviser took a sip of his McEwan’s. “That’s almost unheard of,” he said. “Nobody resigns from the civil service. They die, yes, and they very, very rarely are nudged out, but they don’t go and resign.”

  “Well, I did.”

  The adviser put down his glass. “Amicably, I assume.”

  Stuart hesitated. But now bravado took over. “No, I insulted the Supreme Head of Personnel.”

  The adviser made a noise somewhere between a whistle and a gasp. “Well, that’s something. Her. I’ve come across her. Few have survived who’ve done that. Or not survived in post. You’re a brave man, Stuart – a brave, currently unemployed man.”

  “Well, it’s done,” said Stuart. “I suppose I’ll need to make arrangements.”

  The adviser produced a sheet of paper, and listened while Stuart gave him figures. Then he did some quick calculations, checked them, and then shook his head. “Not good,” he said. “And your wife? Does she work?”

  “She’s going back to university to do a PhD,” replied Stuart. “Up in Aberdeen. She’s got hold of some funding for that, but I imagine I’ll have to contribute.”

  “You need a job pronto,” said the adviser.

  “I know,” said Stuart. “I’ve registered with a head-hunter and I’ve been offered a couple of interviews.”

  The adviser looked relieved. “That’s fine,” he said. “I suspect you’ll be all right. We’ll freeze the pension and start contributions to a private scheme. You can sell your ISAs.” He handed over the sheet of paper. “There’s one thing I want to ask you. What was it like insulting the Supreme Head of Personnel? Was it . . . was it cathartic?”

  “Immensely,” said Stuart.

  “Then it was worth it,” said the adviser. He leaned forward. “You know, I think I’ve met your wife. My own wife is in one of her book groups. She’s called Irene, isn’t she?”

  Stuart nodded.

  The adviser took another sip of his beer. “I don’t want to pry,” he said. “I wouldn’t normally ask another chap about this sort of thing, but tell me: are things . . . all right, so to speak?”

  Stuart glanced at the other people in the bar, the other Cumberland regulars. How many of them could say that their lives were all right, so to speak? Some, he thought; but only some.

  “No, they aren’t,” he said. “She’s going off to Aberdeen, and there’s somebody there. She hasn’t said as much, but I’ve been able to put two and two together. I should have done that years ago, but I didn’t. I was too . . . ” He searched for the word. It was there before him, but he felt loath to make the admission. Then he did. “I was too weak – far too weak. I allowed her to browbeat me on practically everything. Every so often I’d stand up to her and assert myself, but then, sooner or later, I’d fold, and we’d be back to normal. And normal for us was her calling the shots.”

  The adviser was sympathetic. “Oh, my dear fellow,” he said. “I’m so sorry. I’d heard a bit of that from others. You know how people speak. Well, they’d said something about all this. They said that your wife was a complete pain . . . ” He stopped himself. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be personal.”

  Stuart smiled. “You don’t have to worry.”

  “No,” said the adviser. “I can’t possibly.”

  “Well,” said Stuart. “My life is going to change. She’s going to be away in Aberdeen and, frankly, I don’t think we’ll see much of her down here.”

  The adviser looked concerned. “But your boys? You’ve got two boys, haven’t you?”

  “Yes, I have. But my mother lives just around the corner and she’s going to be moving in. She offered – I didn’t have to ask her.”

  “Thank heavens for mothers,” said the adviser. “Well, for some mothers, I suppose – almost all, in fact.” He glanced over his shoulder and leaned forward again. “It seems to me that you’ve had a somewhat trying experience.” His voice was now not much louder than a whisper. “There are lots of men in that position, you know. Oh, and lots of women too – women have had a dreadful time of it at the hands of men in the past – and many still do. There are plenty of bullies out there but . . . ” He lowered his voice further. “But some of these bullies are women, you know.”

  Stuart shrugged. “Statistically . . . ” he began.

  The adviser cut him short. “Yes, yes, I know about all that. But the point is, Stuart, that you’ve been a victim. And victims sometimes need to acknowledge their victimhood. That’s the first step. Then they need to realise that nobody’s going to look after men unless men start looking after themselves.”

  Stuart thought for a moment. “But isn’t that what men have been doing for a very long time? Looking after one another? Giving each other jobs and perks and so on? Restricting the freedom of women?”

  The adviser raised a finger to his lips. “Not too loud, old chap. Remember who runs this country now? Women. You never know when they’ll be listening i
n. They’ve been wiring up our bars for sound.” He paused. “You’re right about that, but that’s largely in the past, you know. The boot’s on the other foot now. Women are in charge. They’re taking over, and you know what? – they’re looking after other women. It’s men who are threatened now. Look at the intake of universities – men are in the minority in all the student intakes. Look at how our young men are failing. And is anybody saying they should be given a leg up? They aren’t.”

  “Well, there’s been a lot of historical injustice . . . ”

  “Historical, Stuart! Historical!” hissed the adviser. “But this is the present.” He reached into his pocket and took out a small card that he handed to Stuart. “Read that. Commit the telephone number to memory, and then burn it. Then call us when you’re ready.”

  Stuart read the print on the card. Men Underground, it said. And then, under that, The Male Resistance. He saw a telephone number.

  Off to Aberdeen

  After that strange meeting in the Cumberland Bar, Stuart had turned his attention to the personal side of his life. He had told his mother, Nicola, both of his resignation and Irene’s intention to go to Aberdeen; she had been supportive – and, more than that, she had been positively enthusiastic.

  “I’m sorry Irene’s going up to Aberdeen,” she said, thinking, I wish it were further. Ulaanbaatar, for instance, or South Georgia Island.

  “Oh well,” said Stuart. “She’s always wanted to do a PhD.”

  “Of course,” said Nicola. “Quite understandable.” She thought: quite understandable if you’re an incorrigible intellectual snob with a desire to impress others.

  “Her academic career is very important to her,” Stuart went on.

  Academic career? thought Nicola. Pontificating at the Carl Gustav Jung Drop-in Centre? Is that meant to be an academic career? “Of course,” she said. “Of course it is. She has so much to contribute.” Her unasked-for opinions, for example.

  “She knows people up there,” Stuart continued. “She won’t be lonely.”

  Nicola smiled. “Well, that’s good to know. And she knows one person particularly well. Her nights certainly won’t be lonely.”

  Nicola had offered not only to look after Bertie and Ulysses, but also to move in to do so. She had risen to that challenge while Irene had been held in that Persian Gulf desert harem, and she had found that the art of looking after small children, rather like the art of riding a bicycle, never left one. In fact, she was delighted to do it; her life in Edinburgh, although reasonably full, lacked an element of purpose, and day-to-day responsibility for two small grandsons was purpose of the highest nature.

  As the meeting was taking place upstairs of Domenica and her pygmy visitors, Nicola was downstairs in the Pollock flat, awaiting with Stuart the return of Irene from a lecture she had been attending at the Scottish National Gallery on the Mound. “I hope Irene is not going to be awkward about any of this,” she said to Stuart. “What if she decides to take the boys to Aberdeen?”

  “She won’t,” said Stuart.

  “I must say, darling, I find it a bit strange that she should be so cool about leaving them. That’s not very typical behaviour for a mother, if I may say so.”

  “Irene is not very typical, Mother,” said Stuart.

  “No, dear, she isn’t. And I have a feeling – just a tiny, wee feeling − that you might be better off by yourself. And the same goes for Bertie and Ulysses.”

  “Possibly,” said Stuart. “But I don’t want any recrimination. I don’t want any nastiness.”

  Nicola rushed to reassure him. “Of course not. I’d never say anything.”

  They heard the sound of a key in the door, and Stuart went into the hall to greet Irene.

  “Well, that was a highly entertaining lecture,” said Irene as she came in. “It was all about Poussin. A very well-informed lecturer. He concentrated on that painting they have down in London, in the National Gallery. Man Bitten by a Snake.”

  “Mother’s here,” said Stuart. “She’s in the kitchen.”

  Irene appeared not to be interested, but wandered through into their bedroom followed by Stuart. “It’s a remarkable painting,” she said. “I’ve seen it before, of course, but I’d never really studied it – and it’s astonishing how much more you see once you do that. There’s that man lying on the ground and the large snake engaged with him. Then there’s a figure running off to report the tragedy. It’s quite disturbing.”

  “Oh well, you were safe in the Scottish National Gallery.”

  “Oh, don’t be so ridiculous, Stuart.”

  “I wasn’t being ridiculous. I was simply pointing out that you shouldn’t be frightened of a mere painting.”

  Irene looked at him disdainfully. “But that’s the whole point of art, Stuart. It engages us, so that the things that the artist portrays become real. And that’s exactly what a member of the audience said at the end. He complained.”

  “About what?”

  “About the failure to warn the audience at the beginning of the lecture. He said the gallery people should have warned us that this particular painting could be distressing. He said we were entitled to safe space.”

  Stuart looked at Irene in astonishment. “This character said that they should have warned you about . . . about Poussin?”

  Irene nodded. “And I think he had a perfectly valid point. That’s what the safe space movement is all about – ensuring that people aren’t made to feel uncomfortable.”

  “And only hear the things they want to hear?” said Stuart.

  Irene gave him a warning glance. “You said your mother was here?”

  “Yes, she’s in the kitchen. I thought we should all talk about the boys.”

  Irene looked out of the window. “I’ve been thinking, Stuart.”

  Stuart held his breath, wondering whether she had changed her mind.

  “I’ve been thinking of going up there next week,” said Irene. “I can’t wait to start work on my PhD.”

  Stuart breathed out. “That’s fine,” he said, trying not to sound too eager. “You must get down to it. You need to commit yourself to it.”

  Irene looked at him. “Has our marriage been a success, Stuart?”

  He returned her gaze. There was so much he wanted to say, but he knew that he would never say it.

  “I think, by and large, it has. But then . . . ”

  “Yes, Stuart?”

  “But then, I think we’ve drifted apart. I think we’ve . . . ”

  “Been on different vectors? Is that it?”

  He had no idea what she meant, but it sounded as if that might be it. Vectors sounded rather like aircraft approach paths, but perhaps there were vectors for people too – vectors that took them through the troubled airspace that was our daily life. The troubled airspace of our daily lives . . . He would have to remember that. That girl – the one he had met in Henderson’s Salad Table Restaurant, the one studying twentieth-century Scottish poetry; she would appreciate that phrase.

  “Irene,” he said. “May I ask you to do one thing?”

  She looked at him. “In principle, yes.”

  “Say thank you to my mother.”

  She did not reply immediately. He noticed that her watch strap was frayed. It was strange, he thought, that at moments of great intensity, one sees the details, the things of no consequence in themselves, but things that may say so much about our human frailty.

  At last she responded. “Yes, I’ll do that. Because it’s very good of her, Stuart.”

  He felt relieved. “I know.”

  “And it’s good of you, too.”

  He was silent.

  “It’s good of you to give me my freedom, Stuart.”

  He leaned forward and kissed her lightly on the cheek. She touched his shoulder. She said, “Will you forgive me, Stuart?”

  He nodded. He could not speak. But he could forgive, and had done so now.

  How the Truth Emerges

  “You can
’t avoid it, Stuart,” said Nicola. “Sooner or later you’re going to have to talk to Bertie about what’s happening.”

  Stuart sighed. “I know, mother, I know. You’re absolutely right. And I shall.”

  “When?” asked Nicola.

  “Soon.”

  “When?” she repeated.

  He sighed again. “This evening. You’re collecting him from school, aren’t you? When he comes back, I’ll talk to him.”

  Nicola nodded. “Fine. And what does he know at the moment? He must suspect that something’s up.”

  Stuart told her that Bertie had overheard Irene talking to Hugo Fairbairn and had made a few comments about her going to Aberdeen. More than that, he was not sure.

  “Has anything been said to him at school? You know how children hear of things.”

  Stuart shook his head. “As far as I know, nobody there will know anything about it.”

  In this, he was wrong: the topic of Irene’s departure had already been discussed in the Steiner School playground. Olive had broached the subject, having heard her parents talking about it while she was hiding under their bed, which she often did.

  “I hear your mummy has a lover, Bertie,” she said. “Do you know who he is?”

  Bertie bit his lip. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Olive.”

  “Well, I can tell you, Bertie. It’s a person called Hugo Fairbairn. That’s right: Hugo Fairbairn. And he lives up in Aberdeen.”

  Bertie looked at the ground.

  Olive’s lieutenant, Pansy, now entered the conversation. “Don’t just look at your shoes, Bertie Pollock,” she said. “It’s rude to look at your shoes when somebody’s talking to you.”

  “Pansy’s right,” said Olive. “You should look people in the eyes when they talk to you. Everybody knows that.”

  Bertie forced himself to meet Olive’s gaze. “How do you know about my mummy?” he asked. “You just make things up, Olive – you always do that.”

  Olive would not let that pass. “Oh, I make things up, do I, Bertie? Well, if that’s what you say, then you’re accusing my mummy and daddy of making things up too – because I heard it from them, so I did!”