The World According to Bertie

by Alexander McCall Smith

  ‘You’ve got something on?’ The resignation showed in her voice. ‘You can’t change it?’

  Robbie, who had called in on Big Lou’s coffee bar to accompany her to her flat on closing time, shifted his weight awkwardly from foot to foot.

  ‘Sorry, Lou,’ he said. ‘Monday is a really important evening for me.’ (And for me? thought Lou.) ‘I’d love to be able to change it, but I’m afraid I can’t.’ He paused. ‘But I don’t want you to spend your birthday by yourself, Lou. So why don’t you come with me? There’s an important meeting. Really important.’

  Big Lou rubbed at the gleaming metal surface of the bar. It would be the Jacobites, she thought: Michael, Heather and Jimmy, and others no doubt, all equally obsessed, all equally poised on the cusp of delusion. She looked at Robbie, who smiled back at her encouragingly. When you take on a man, thought Big Lou, you take him on with all his baggage. So women had to put up with football, and golf, and drinking in pubs, and all the things that men tended to do. In her case, she had to take on Robbie’s peculiar historical enthusiasm, which, when one came to think of it, was harmless enough. It was not as if they were some sort of guerrilla movement, dedicated to changing the constitution by force, and prepared to blow people up in the process – these were mild, rather ineffective people (or at least Michael, Heather and Jimmy were), who hankered after something utterly impossible. And there were plenty of people who harboured unrealistic, unlikely beliefs, who wanted the unattainable in its various forms. There was a saint for them, was there not? Saint Jude, she thought, patron of lost causes and desperate situations.

  ‘All right,’ she said. ‘I’ll come along. And maybe we could have a late dinner afterwards. The meeting won’t go on forever, will it?’

  Robbie’s relief was evident. ‘Of course not. And thank you, Lou. Thank you for being . . . so understanding.’

  Big Lou smiled. ‘That’s all right,’ she said. ‘As long as you’re happy, Robbie. That’s the important thing.’

  ‘I am, Lou. I am.’

  ‘But what’s the meeting about?’ she asked. ‘Why is it so important?’

  Robbie thought for a moment. ‘Michael asked for it,’ he said. ‘He’s going to give us the details of the arrival . . .’ He broke off, evidently uncertain as to whether or not he should continue.

  ‘Go on,’ encouraged Big Lou. ‘The arrival of . . .’

  ‘Of the emissary,’ said Robbie. ‘As you know, he’s coming very soon. He’s coming, Lou!’

  Big Lou raised an eyebrow. ‘This Pretender fellow they were talking about last time?’

  ‘He’s not a Pretender, Lou.’ Robbie’s tone was aggrieved, and Big Lou immediately relented. He believed in this.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I didn’t mean to be rude.’

  ‘This is serious, Lou,’ said Robbie. Now he lowered his voice. ‘This man is a direct descendant, a direct descendant of Prince Charlie himself. And he’s coming here to make contact with his people again. He’s entrusting us – us, Lou – to look after him. We’re going to meet him at Waverley Station and then we’re going to have a press conference to introduce him. It’s going to be all over the newspapers, Lou. It’s going to make people think.’ He paused. ‘And I’ve been asked to take him up to the west.’

  Robbie waited for a reaction to this, but Lou did not know what to say.

  ‘He wants to follow in the steps of Prince Charlie,’ Robbie continued. ‘So I’m going to take him over to South Uist. Then we’ll cross over to Skye, just as Prince Charlie did.’

  Big Lou stared at Robbie. ‘That means crossing the Minch,’ she said.

  ‘Aye, it does,’ said Robbie.

  ‘In a wee boat?’

  ‘I haven’t made arrangements yet,’ said Robbie. ‘I think that the prince was rowed, wasn’t he? Him and Flora MacDonald.’

  ‘And you’re going to row?’

  Robbie shrugged. ‘Maybe. Maybe we’ll have a small outboard motor, something like that.’

  Big Lou nodded. ‘The Minch can get pretty wild,’ she said. ‘You wouldn’t want to sink. Not with a New Pretender on board. That wouldn’t look too good, would it?’

  Robbie looked at her reproachfully. ‘I’m serious, Lou. I know that this may not mean much to you, but it means a lot to us. It’s a link with our country’s past. It’s part of our history.’

  Big Lou was placatory. ‘I know, Robbie. I know.’

  ‘Do you, Lou? Do you? You aren’t laughing at me, are you?’

  She moved from behind the counter and went to stand beside Robbie. She reached out and put her arms around his shoulders. ‘I wouldn’t laugh at you, Robbie. I’d never laugh at you. You’re a good man.’

  Big Lou was tall, but Robbie was slightly taller. He looked down at her. ‘I love you a lot, Lou,’ he said. ‘I really do. You’re kind. You’re clever. You’re beautiful.’

  She caught her breath. Nobody had said that to her ever before. Nobody had called her beautiful, and now he had, this man, this man with all his funny notions, he had called her beautiful. So perhaps I am, she thought. Perhaps I’ve been wrong to think of myself as plain. There is at least one man who thinks otherwise, and that, for many women and certainly for Big Lou, was enough.

  90. Singapore

  For Angus Lordie, the return of Cyril from durance vile had been a transforming event. The sense of emptiness, the listlessness, that had afflicted him during the period of Cyril’s absence faded immediately, like a blanketing haar that suddenly lifts to reveal a morning of clarity and splendour. This, he thought, is what it must be like to be given a reprieve, to be told that one was well when one had imagined the worst. Now he had energy.

  His first task was to pick up the brush that he had so dispiritedly laid aside. The group portrait over which he had been labouring was finished with alacrity, and the sitters, who had appeared sombre and depressed, were invigorated by a few bold strokes: a smile here, a jaunty dash of colour there – they were easy to rescue. Once that was done, though, there was the question of the next project, and Angus had been giving some thought to that.

  The previous night, while taking a bath, it had occurred to him that there was no particular painting to which he could point and say: ‘That is my masterpiece.’ Certainly, he had executed some fine paintings – although he was modest, Angus had enough self-knowledge to recognise that – but the best of these was no more than primus inter pares. Two of them were in the collection of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, and one of them had gone abroad, to vanish into the private collection of a Singaporean banker – or was it a Singaporean baker? The dealer in Cork Street who had written to tell him of the sale had handwriting which was difficult to interpret, but Angus had hoped that it was a baker rather than a banker. He could imagine his Singaporean baker, a rotund man with that agreeable, genial air that seems to surround those who have made their money in food. He liked to think of him sitting there in his Singaporean fastness, appreciating his painting, nibbling, perhaps, on a plate of pastries.

  Of course, Singapore was close to Malacca, where Domenica had conducted her recent researches into the domestic economy of contemporary pirates, and Angus had asked her on her return if she had ventured south.

  ‘I went there for a few days after I left Malacca,’ she had said. ‘You’ll recall the dénouement of my researches? I felt that after that I should treat myself to a bit of comfort, and so I went to Singapore and stayed in the Raffles Hotel. Such luxury, Angus! The Indian doorman at Raffles has the most wonderful moustache – apparently the most photographed thing in Singapore!’

  ‘There can’t be much to see if a moustache is the main attraction,’ observed Angus.

  ‘Well, it’s a small place,’ said Domenica. ‘And a big moustache in a small place . . . Mind you, it’s getting bigger.’

  ‘The moustache?’

  Domenica smiled, but only weakly. There was occasionally something of the schoolboy about Angus, at least in his humour. ‘No, Singapore its
elf is getting bigger. They have land reclamation projects and they’re inching out all the time. Their neighbours don’t like it.’

  Angus was puzzled. ‘I don’t see what that’s got to do with them. Presumably they’re reclaiming from the sea.’

  ‘Yes, they are. But the Indonesians have stopped selling them sand to do the reclamation work. And Malaysia gets jumpy too. They don’t like to see Singapore getting any bigger, even if it’s just a matter of a few acres.’

  ‘Neighbours can be difficult,’ said Angus.

  Domenica thought for a moment of Antonia and the blue Spode cup. There were parallels there, perhaps, with relations between Malaysia and Singapore. ‘Dear Singapore,’ she said. ‘They’re frightfully rich, and as a result nobody in south-east Asia likes them very much. But I do. They make very rude remarks about them; it’s very unfair. And Singapore gets a little bit worried and feels that she has to expand her air force. But that leads to problems . . .’

  Angus looked at Domenica quizzically.

  ‘They can’t really fly very easily,’ she explained. ‘Singapore is terribly tiny in territory terms. When the air force takes off, it has to take a sharp right turn or it ends up flying over Malaysian airspace, which they’re not allowed to do. So it somewhat hampers their style.’

  Angus smiled. ‘I see.’

  ‘So they keep the air force elsewhere,’ went on Domenica.

  Angus raised an eyebrow. ‘One would hope that they don’t forget where they put it,’ he said. ‘It would be a terrible shame if one put one’s air force somewhere and then forgot where it was. I’m always doing that with my keys . . . Easily done.’

  Domenica laughed again. ‘I think they have a book in which they write it all down,’ she said. ‘Actually, they keep their air force in Australia.’

  ‘Well, at least Australia’s got the room,’ said Angus.

  Domenica agreed. ‘Yes, but it’s a bit strange, isn’t it? Rather like the Bolivians and their navy.’

  ‘No sea?’

  ‘Not any more. And the tragedy is that they really want a navy, the Bolivians, poor dears. They’ve got a lake, of course, and they keep a few patrol boats on that and on the rivers, but what they want is a pukka navy . . . like the one we used to have before . . . Anyway, Navy Day in Bolivia is the big day, and everybody gives money for the cause. And they have numerous admirals, just like we have now. No ships, alas, but bags of admirals. And then there was the Mongolian navy, of course. They only had one boat and seven sailors, only one of whom could swim!’

  ‘Interesting,’ Angus began. ‘But . . .’

  ‘But the point is this: the Uruguayans, to their credit, let the Bolivians keep a real ship in Montevideo. It’s rather like the Australians allowing Singapore to keep its air force in Darwin or wherever it is. So kind.’

  ‘There’s not enough kindness in the world,’ said Angus.

  With that the subject changed, and now Angus remembered it as he went over in his mind possible themes for what he hoped would be his masterpiece. Kindness, he thought – there’s a subject with which a great painting might properly engage! But how might one portray kindness? There were those Peaceable Kingdom paintings, of course, in which all animal creation stood quietly together– the wolf with the lamb, the lion with the zebra, and so on. But that was not kindness; that was harmony, which was a different thing. Angus wanted to paint something which spoke to that distinct human quality of kindness that, when experienced, was so moving, so reassuring, like balm on a wound, like a gentle hand, helping, tender. That was what he wanted to paint, because he knew that that was what we all wanted to see.

  91. Angus Receives a Visitor

  Angus Lordie was still thinking of kindness, and of the great painting he would execute in order to portray that theme, when the doorbell sounded. Cyril, half asleep on a rug on the other side of the room, lifted his head and looked at his master. He knew he should bark, but what was the point? Whoever it was on the other side of the door would not be deterred by his barking, and if he continued, and barked more loudly, God (as Cyril thought of Angus) would simply get annoyed with him. So he glanced towards the door, growled briefly, and then lowered his head again.

  Angus looked at his watch. It was just before ten in the morning, and he was still seated at the kitchen table, the detritus of his breakfast on the plate before him: a few crumbs of toast, a small piece of bacon rind, a pot of marmalade. He was dressed, of course, but had not yet shaved, and he felt unprepared for company.

  He rose to his feet, crossed the hall and opened the front door.

  ‘Mr Lordie?’

  There was something familiar about the face of the woman who stood on his doorstep, but he could not place her. There were new neighbours several doors down; was she one of them? No. The Cumberland Bar? No, she was the wrong type. Perhaps she was collecting for the Lifeboats; they had plenty of women like that who raised money for the Lifeboats – so much, in fact, that the Lifeboats were in danger of positively sinking under all their money.

  He nodded. ‘Yes.’

  The woman’s lips were pursed in disapproval. Surely I can go unshaven in my own house, thought Angus. Surely . . .

  ‘You may not recall our meeting some time ago,’ she said. ‘It was in the gardens. At night.’

  Angus smiled. ‘Of course. Of course.’ He had no recollection of meeting her, but she was one of the neighbours, he assumed. There would be some issue with the shared gardens; keys or benches or children breaking branches of the rhododendrons.

  ‘Good,’ said the woman. ‘So you’ll remember that your dog . . . your dog paid attention to my own dog. You’ll remember that, then.’

  It came back. Of course! This was the owner of the bitch whom Cyril had met in the gardens. It had been most embarrassing, but it was hardly his fault – nor Cyril’s, for that matter. One could not expect dogs to observe the niceties in these matters when a female dog was in an intriguing condition. Surely this woman . . .

  ‘And now,’ said the woman, staring at Angus, ‘and now my own dog is experiencing the consequences of your dog’s . . . your dog’s assault.’

  Angus stared back at her. Cyril had not assaulted the other dog. They had got on famously, in fact, and this woman must know that.

  ‘But I don’t think that my dog—’ Angus began, to be cut short by the woman, who sighed impatiently.

  ‘My dog is now pregnant,’ said the woman. ‘And your dog is responsible for it. There are six, the vet says.’

  ‘Six?’

  ‘Six puppies, Mr Lordie. Yes, the vet has performed an ultrasound examination of Pearly, my dog, and has found six puppies.’

  Angus swallowed. ‘Well, well. That really is . . .’

  ‘Most unfortunate,’ snapped the woman. ‘That’s what it is. There are six puppies for whom I cannot be responsible. I live in a small flat and I cannot keep seven dogs. Which means that you are going to have to shoulder your responsibilities.’

  For a few moments, Angus said nothing. He did not doubt that the puppies were there, and that Cyril was the father, but was he really responsible for them? He knew all about the Dangerous Dogs Act (after Cyril’s unfortunate brush with the law), but were the laws of paternity and aliment of puppies the same as those that applied to humans? Surely not.

  The woman broke the silence. ‘And so what I’m proposing to do is to pass the puppies on to you the moment they are ready to leave their mother. That will be . . .’ She consulted a small red diary which she had taken out of her handbag, and gave a date. ‘I take it that that will be convenient.’

  Angus stared at her in astonishment. ‘No,’ he said. ‘We can’t have six puppies here. This is . . . this is my studio as well as my flat. I simply can’t have six puppies.’

  ‘You should have thought of that before you allowed your dog to . . . to approach my dog,’ said the woman. ‘You should have thought of the consequences of your dog’s actions.’

  Angus felt a wave of annoyance come over
him. He had been polite to this woman, but she had been hectoring and imperious. Had she spoken to him courteously and sought his assistance, he might have made some proposals about sharing the care of the puppies until they were found a new home, but she had not done that, and now he felt like digging in.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘From my point of view, you took the risk when you took a bitch in heat out into the gardens. You should have known better. You cannot blame my dog for behaving as he did. In fact, you should count yourself lucky that the puppies will have good blood. Cyril, I would have you know, is a pedigree dog, while yours, if I may say so, is undoubtedly a mongrel of some sort. Cyril lowered himself when he consorted with her . . .’

  ‘How dare you!’ hissed the woman. ‘You . . . you impossible man!’ She paused, as if to summon up further insults, but there were none; instead: ‘The puppies will be brought on the appointed day. I shall leave them at the bottom of the stairs, in a box, if you are not in. And that is all there is to it.’

  She turned round and began to walk down the stairs. Angus watched her for a moment. He wanted to call out, to shout out some final, resounding comment that would stop her in her tracks, but he did not. He was incapable of being rude, just as his father before him, and his grandfather, had been incapable of rudeness, particularly towards a woman. So he closed the door behind him and went back into the flat.

  Cyril watched him. He knew, in some extraordinary, non-conceptual way, that the events at the door concerned him. But what had he done wrong? He could think of nothing. All he had ever done was to be a dog, which deserved no blame – and perhaps no praise either. But the ways of the gods were arbitrary, as in Greece of old, and the manner in which Angus was looking at him now made Cyril realise that this was serious – extremely so.

  92. The Drawing of Fibs

  When it was announced to the class that Miss Harmony was to be replaced, there was a sudden, shocked silence. For a few minutes, the children were left alone, waiting for the arrival of the new teacher, and it was in this period that recriminations were fervently aired.