September

  She said, “I’m sorry. So silly.” She sniffed lustily, searched for a handkerchief, couldn’t find one. Across the table, Conrad offered his own, white and clean and freshly ironed, and she took it gratefully and blew her nose. She said, “I’m tired and I’m miserable.” She tried to make light of it. “I’m also slightly pissed.”

  He said, “You can’t drive yourself home.”

  “I have to.”

  “Stay here the night and go back in the morning. We’ll get a room for you.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Why not?”

  Tears poured again. “I have to get back for the dogs.”

  He did not laugh at her. He said, “Stay here for a moment. Order coffee. I just have to make a telephone call.”

  He laid down his napkin, pushed back his chair, and went. Virginia mopped her face, blew her nose again, glanced around the dining room, anxious that no other person had noticed her sudden attack of weepy emotion. But the other diners were all absorbed in their dinners, munching stolidly at fried fish, or spooning their way through the ‘offly guid’ trifle. The tears, thankfully, receded. The waitress approached to remove their plates.

  “Did you enjoy your steak?”

  “Yes, it was delicious.”

  “Are you taking sweet?”

  “No. I don’t think so, thank you. But if we could have some coffee?”

  She had brought the coffee, and Virginia was already drinking the black and noxious stuff, which tasted as though it had been made out of a bottle, when Conrad returned to her. He drew back his chair and sat down. She looked at him inquiringly, and he said, “That’s all settled.”

  “What have you settled?”

  “I’ve cancelled my room, and cancelled the hire car for tomorrow. I’ll drive you back to Strathcroy. I’ll drive you home.”

  “Will you go to Croy?”

  “No. They’re not expecting me until tomorrow morning. I can go to the pub you mentioned.”

  “No, you can’t, because they won’t have a room. They’re filled with grouse-shooting visitors who’ve taken Archie’s moor.” She sniffed away the last of her weeping, poured his coffee. “You can come to Balnaid. Stay the night there. The guest-room beds are all made up.” She looked up, and caught the expression on his face. She said, “There’s no problem,” but even as she said this, knew that there was.

  In the darkness, Conrad drove. It had stopped raining, as though the skies had run out of water, but the wind was from the south-west, and still damp, and the night stayed overcast. The road climbed and wound and dipped, and in the hollows lay pools of floodwater from the overflowing ditches. Virginia, bundled in her Barbour, thought of the last time that she had made this journey; the evening Edmund had met her off the shuttle and they had had dinner together in Edinburgh. Then the sky had been an artist’s wonder of rose-pink and grey. Now the darkness was sombre and menacing, and the lights that shone from the windows of farmhouses scattered over the surrounding braes of Strathcroy gave little relief, seeming distant and unreachable as stars.

  Virginia yawned.

  “You’re sleepy,” Conrad told her.

  “Not really. Just too much wine.” She reached out and rolled down the window, and felt the cold, wet, mossy air pour over her face. The tyres of the Subaru hissed on the wet tarmac; out of the darkness came the long call of a curlew.

  She said, “That’s the sound of coming home.”

  “You certainly live a long way from anywhere.”

  “We’re just about there.”

  The street of the village stood empty. Even Mr Ishak had closed up his shop, and the only lights were those that burned from behind drawn curtains. On such a night people stayed at home, watched television, made tea.

  “We turn left, over this bridge.”

  They crossed the river, turned into the lane beneath the trees, came to the open gates, the drive that led to the house. All was, predictably, in darkness.

  “Don’t go around to the front, Conrad. Park just here, at the back. I don’t use the front door when I’m on my own. I’ve got the back-door key.”

  He drew up, turned off the engine. While the headlights still burned, she climbed down and went to unlock the back door, reach inside and switch on a light. The dogs had heard the car and were waiting, and showed gratifying excitement at her return, hurling themselves at her feet and uttering small welcoming noises in the back of their throats.

  “Oh, what good doggies.” She crouched to fondle them. “I’m sorry I’ve been such a long time. You must have thought I was never coming home. Go on, out you both go and spend pennies, and I’ll give you lovely biscuits before you go to bed.”

  They bundled happily out into the darkness, barked at the alien figure alighting from the Subaru, went to smell him, were patted and spoken to, and then, reassured, bounded off into the trees.

  Virginia went on, switching on more lights. The big kitchen slumbered, the Aga was warm, the refrigerator gently hummed to itself. Conrad joined her, carrying his grip.

  “Do you want me to put the car away?”

  “No matter. We’ll leave it in the yard for the night. Just take the keys out…”

  “I have…” He laid them on the table.

  In the uncompromising brightness, they regarded each other, and Virginia found herself overcome, quite suddenly, by a ridiculous shyness. To deal with this, she became businesslike and hostessy.

  “Now. You’d like a drink? A nightcap. Edmund has some malt whisky he keeps for these occasions.”

  “I’m okay.”

  “But you’d like one?”

  “Yes, I would.”

  “I’ll get it. I won’t be a moment.”

  When she came back bearing the bottle, he had taken off his coat and hat, and the dogs had returned from their nightly expedition and were already curled up on the beanbags by the Aga. Conrad, hunkered down, was making friends with them, talking softly, smoothing their high-domed well-bred heads with a gentle hand. As Virginia appeared, he stood up.

  “I’ve closed the door, and locked it.”

  “How kind. Thank you. Actually, we often forget to lock doors. Thieves and robbers don’t seem to be a problem in Strathcroy.” She set the bottle down on the table, found a glass. “You’d better pour it yourself.”

  “You’re not joining me?”

  She shook her head, rueful. “No, Conrad, I’ve had enough for this evening.”

  He poured the malt and filled the tumbler from the cold tap. Virginia fed the dogs with biscuits. They took them politely, not snapping nor grabbing, and munched them up appreciatively.

  “They’re beautiful spaniels.”

  “Edmund’s gun dogs, and very well-behaved. With Edmund in charge, they don’t dare be anything else.” The biscuits were finished. She said, “If you’d like to bring your drink upstairs with you, I’ll show you where you’re sleeping.” She gathered up his hat and coat, and Conrad collected his grip, and she led the way out of the kitchen, turning lights off and on as she went. Down the passage, across the big hall, and up the stairs.

  “What a lovely house.”

  “It’s big, but I like it that way.”

  He followed behind her. Below them, the old grandfather clock ticked the minutes away, but their feet made no sound on the thick carpets. The spare room faced over the front of the house. She opened the door and turned on the switch, and all was illuminated by the cold brilliance of the overhead chandelier. It was a large room, furnished with high brass bedsteads and a mahogany suite of Victorian furniture that Virginia had inherited from Vi. Taken unawares, it presented an impersonal face, without flowers or books. As well, the air was stuffy and unused.

  “I’m afraid it doesn’t look very welcoming.” She dropped his hat and coat on a chair and went to fling open the tall sash window. The night wind flowed in, stirring the curtains. Conrad joined her and they leaned out, gazing into the velvety darkness. Light from the window drew a chequered pattern on the
gravel beyond the front door, but all else was obscured.

  He took a deep lungful of air. He said, “It all smells so clean and sweet. Like fresh spring water.”

  “You have to take my word for it, but we’re looking at a wonderful view. You’ll see it in the morning. Out over the garden to the fields and the hills.”

  From the trees by the church, an owl hooted. Virginia shivered and withdrew from the window. She said, “It’s cold. Shall I close it again?”

  “No. Leave it. It’s too good to shut away.”

  She drew the heavy curtains, settling them so that there should be no chinks. “The bathroom’s through that door.” He went to investigate. “There should be towels, and the water’s always hot if you want to take a bath.” She turned on the small lights on the dressing table, and then the bedside light, and then went to switch off the cold brilliance of the chandelier. At once the high-ceilinged room was rendered cosier, even intimate. “I’m afraid there’s no shower. This isn’t a very modern establishment.”

  He emerged from the bathroom as Virginia turned back a heavy bedcover, revealing puffy square pillows encased in embroidered linen, a flowered eiderdown. “There’s an electric blanket if you want to turn it on.” She folded the cover, laid it aside. “Now.”

  There was nothing more to occupy her hands, her attention. She faced Conrad. For a moment neither of them spoke. His eyes, behind the heavy horn-rims, were sombre. She saw his rugged features, the deep lines on either side of his mouth. He was still holding his drink in his hand, but now moved to set it down on the table beside the bed. She watched him do this, and thought of that hand gently fondling the head of one of Edmund’s dogs. A kindly man.

  “Will you be all right, Conrad?” An innocently intended question but as soon as the words were spoken she heard them as loaded.

  He said, “I don’t know.”

  There’s no problem, she had told him, but knew that the problem had lurked between them all evening and now could no longer be pushed out of sight. It was no good prevaricating. They were two grown-up people, and life was hell.

  She said, “I’m grateful to you. I needed comfort.”

  “I need you…”

  “I had fantasies about Leesport. Going back to Grandma and Gramps. I didn’t tell you that.”

  “That summer, I fell in love with you…”

  “I imagined getting there. In a limousine from Kennedy. And it was all the same. The trees and the lawns, and the smell of the Atlantic blowing in over the Bay.”

  “You went back to England…”

  “I wanted someone to tell me I was great. That I was doing all right. I wanted not to be alone.”

  “I feel like a shit…”

  “It’s two worlds, isn’t it, Conrad? Bumping, and then moving apart. Light years away from each other.”

  “…because I want you.”

  “Why does everything have to happen when it’s too late? Why does everything have to be so impossible?”

  “It’s not impossible.”

  “It is, because it’s over. Being young is over. The moment you have a child of your own being young is over.”

  “I want you.”

  “I’m not young any more. A different person.”

  “I haven’t slept with a woman…”

  “Don’t say it, Conrad.”

  “That’s what loneliness is all about.”

  She said, “I know.”

  Outside in the garden, nothing moved. Nothing stirred the dripping leaves of the rhododendrons. Eventually, a figure slipped away down the narrow paths of the shrubbery, leaving a trail of footmarks on the sodden grass, the indentations of high-heeled shoes.

  28

  Wednesday the Fourteenth

  Isobel sat at her kitchen table, drank coffee and made lists. She was an inveterate list-maker, and these small inventories of things to be done, food to be bought, meals to be cooked, telephone calls to be made, as well as reminders to herself to split the polyanthus or dig up the gladioli, were constantly pinned to her kitchen noticeboard, along with postcards from friends and children, and the address of a man prepared to clean the outside of the windows. At the moment she was working on three lists. Today, tomorrow, and then Friday. With one thing and another, life had suddenly become very complicated.

  She wrote: “Dinner Tonight.” There were some chicken joints in the deep-freeze. She could grill these or make some sort of a casserole.

  She wrote: “Get chicken legs out. Peel potatoes. String beans.”

  Tomorrow was more complicated, with her house party committed in three different directions. Isobel herself would be at Corriehill for most of the day, helping Verena and her band of ladies to arrange flowers and somehow decorate that enormous marquee.

  She wrote: “Secateurs. String. Wire. Wire-cutters. Beech branches. Rowan branches. Pick all the dahlias.”

  But, as well, there was Vi’s birthday picnic by the loch to think about, and a day’s shooting for Archie, because tomorrow they were driving grouse over Creagan Dubh, which meant that he would be joining the other guns.

  She wrote: “Baps and cold ham for Archie’s piece. Gingerbread. Apples. Hot soup?”

  As for Vi’s picnic, Lucilla, Jeff, Pandora, and the Sad American would probably want to go to that, which meant a hefty contribution of goodies from Croy.

  She wrote: “Sausages for Vi’s barbecue. Make some beefburgers. Slice tomato salad. French bread. Two bottles wine. Six cans lager.”

  She poured more coffee, went on to Friday. “Eleven people for dinner,” she wrote, and then underlined the words and sat debating over grouse or pheasant. Pheasant Theodora was spectacular, cooked with celery and bacon and served with a sauce of egg yolks and cream. As well as being spectacular, Pheasant Theodora could be concocted in advance, which precluded a lot of last-minute labour while the dinner guests were drinking cocktails.

  She wrote: “Pheasant Theodora.” The door opened and Archie appeared.

  Isobel scarcely raised her head. “You like Pheasant Theodora, don’t you?”

  “Not for breakfast.”

  “I didn’t mean for breakfast, I meant for dinner the night of the party.”

  “Why can’t we have roast grouse?”

  “Because it’s a fiddle to serve. Little last-minute bits and pieces, like scraps of toast to arrange and gravy to stir.”

  “Roast pheasant then?”

  “Same objections.”

  “Is Pheasant Theodora the one that looks like sick?”

  “It does, a bit, but I can cook it ahead.”

  “Why don’t you just cook a head?”

  “Ha ha.”

  “What’s for breakfast?”

  “It’s in the bottom oven.”

  Archie went over to the Aga and opened the oven door. “A red-letter day! Bacon, sausages, and tomatoes. What’s happened to the porridge and boiled eggs?”

  “We have visitors staying. Bacon, sausages, and tomatoes are what we always give visitors.” He brought his plate over to the table and settled himself beside her, pouring coffee, reaching for the toast and the butter.

  “I thought,” he said, “that Agnes Cooper was coming to help on Friday evening.”

  “So she is.”

  “Why can’t she roast the pheasant?”

  “Because she’s not a cook. She’s a washer-up.”

  “You could always ask her to cook.”

  “All right. I will. And we’ll have mince and tatties for dinner because that’s all the poor woman’s capable of.”

  She wrote: “Clean silver candlesticks. Buy eight pink candles.”

  “I just wish Pheasant Theodora didn’t look like sick.”

  “If you say it looks like sick in front of all our guests, I shall cut your throat, there and then, with a fruit knife.”

  “What are we going to have for starters?”

  “Smoked trout?”

  Archie put half a sausage into his mouth and chewed it thoughtfully. “
And pudding?”

  “Orange sorbet.”

  “White or red wine?”

  “A couple of bottles of both, I think. Or champagne. We’ll be drinking champagne for the rest of the evening. Perhaps we’d better stick to that.”

  “I haven’t got any champagne.”

  “I shall order a crate today, in Relkirk.”

  “Are you going to Relkirk?”

  “Oh, Archie!” Isobel laid down her biro and gazed at her husband in hopeless exasperation. “Do you never listen to anything I tell you? And why do you think I’m all dressed up in my posh clothes? Yes, I am going to Relkirk today. With Pandora and Lucilla and Jeff. We’re going shopping.”

  “What are you going to buy?”

  “Lots of things for Friday night.” She did not say, a new dress, because she still hadn’t made up her mind about this extravagance. “And then we’re going to lunch in the Wine Bar, and then we’re coming home again.”

  “Will you get me some cartridges?”

  “I’ll get you anything you need if you’ll write me a list.”

  “So I’m not expected to come.” He sounded pleased. He hated shopping.

  “You can’t come because you’ve got to be here when the Sad American arrives. He’s driving a hired car from Relkirk, and he’s due sometime this morning. And you’re not to go wandering off, otherwise he’ll be faced by a deserted house and think he’s not expected and go away again.”

  “Might be as well. What shall I give him for lunch?”

  “There’s soup and pâté in the larder.”

  “Which room’s he sleeping in?”

  “Pandora’s old room.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “I can’t remember.”

  “So how am I supposed to greet him? Hail, Sad American.” Archie seemed to find this funny. He made his voice enormously deep. “Big Chief Running Nose Speaks with Forked Tongue.”