A photograph on a smaller side table caught her eye. There were two people in it—Iain and his wife, she assumed. Iain was wearing a kilt and the woman was in jeans and a green waxed Barbour jacket. Their hair was ruffled by the wind. There was a mountain behind them. That was Argyll, she thought, and that was his happiness.
He saw her looking. “Yes,” he said. “That was taken about six years ago. You’ll see the hill behind us.”
Isabel, permitted now to stare, took a closer look at the photograph.
“The section off to the left is forested now,” he said. “We did a big planting a few years ago. We’ve put in broadleaf trees. There were some generous grants available.”
He offered the tea, which was already in the room, on a tray near the window. Then they sat down and Isabel exchanged a glance with Jamie.
“I’m sorry to eat into your Saturday afternoon,” Isabel began, “but I wanted to…” She hesitated, but then continued, “I wanted to ask you to release me from what I agreed to do.”
Iain did not seem surprised. He inclined his head slightly, and then put down his teacup. “I can’t say this comes as a shock,” he said. “In fact, would you believe me if I said I was going to make the same request of you?”
It took Isabel a few moments to take this in. “You mean, you don’t want me to do it?”
“Yes, I do mean that,” said Iain. “I feel that I should never have asked you in the first place. It was grossly presumptuous.”
Jamie cleared his throat. “Actually,” he said, “you’d be surprised how often Isabel gets asked to do this sort of thing.”
Iain smiled. “Her reputation precedes her.”
“Jamie says I agree too readily,” said Isabel. “And perhaps I do. Then I become overwhelmed and it all gets a bit much.”
“Well,” Iain said, “this is one occasion when that won’t happen. And I really am sorry for burdening you.”
Isabel wondered whether he had made alternative arrangements. “Have you managed to sort it out?” she asked.
Iain shook his head. “No. I shall be having a word with the lawyers on Monday. They’ll come up with something.”
There was a brief silence. Then Iain said, “I hope you enjoyed meeting Jack the other night. I liked the exhibition.”
“We both did,” said Isabel. “Jamie likes his work—as do I.”
“He’s very talented,” said Iain.
“I’m sorry I didn’t meet your other cousins,” said Isabel.
“Sarah and John?”
“Yes. She’s the property person, isn’t she? You did say that was what she did, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” said Iain. “She’s actually a builder by trade. It’s unusual—even today—to find a woman builder, but that was her background. Then she started to do flats up and keep them for rental purposes. She has quite a number of them now—ten or twelve, I believe. But she still does renovations.
“And you didn’t meet John either,” Iain went on. “He’s the accountant. He’s the one I know the least well, I suppose, although we occasionally play golf together. He has a passion for history. He loves the Portrait Gallery. He knows the background story of just about everyone depicted in the portraits there. He’s a quiet man. Not particularly happy, I think.”
Isabel waited. She had come here to extricate herself, not to engage, but already she felt the draw.
“I shouldn’t be speculating,” said Iain, “but when you’re in my position, as it were, you feel you can speak more freely.”
“Of course,” said Isabel.
“John’s probably not interested in women, but doesn’t care to advertise it. That’s his prerogative, in my view. Do we need to know about everybody’s private affairs? Not in my view.”
“Nor mine,” said Jamie.
“I think he’s one of those people who could have been either,” went on Iain. “It just so happened that at an important time in his life he fell for one person rather than another. He had a friend when he was a teenager and I think he never really got over him. It was a David and Jonathan friendship, and Jonathan went off and got married and moved to Glasgow and David, well, he never felt that way about anybody else. Ever. It’s very sad.”
“Yes,” said Isabel. “And there are lots of lives like that, I think. Lives of all sorts—people who’ve loved somebody and it hasn’t been reciprocated and yet they’ve carried on loving them from a distance all their lives.”
“A real shame,” said Jamie. “It’s a pity we can’t do something to equalise things, in a way.” He paused. “Isabel and I sometimes talk about utilitarianism, you know. That’s about happiness and spreading it to the maximum number of people.”
Iain smiled and turned to Isabel. “I suppose that’s what it’s like to be married to a philosopher.”
Jamie took a sip of his tea. “But we did meet Jack and Hilary, didn’t we?”
Iain frowned. “You did, yes. At the gallery.”
Jamie looked quickly at Isabel, who seemed uncertain as to what to expect. She gave him a quizzical look, which he did not return.
“Isabel had met Hilary before,” he said.
Iain was listening. “Oh yes?”
“On jury service,” said Jamie.
Isabel interrupted him. “Jamie, I don’t think we should talk about that.”
But Iain’s interest was aroused. “About what? About being on a jury together?”
“That’s meant to be confidential,” said Isabel. “What happens in the jury room shouldn’t be discussed outside.”
“Yes, but this is important,” said Jamie.
Isabel tried again: “Jamie…”
“She saw Hilary with the man who was on trial,” Jamie continued. “Later—after he had been acquitted.”
Iain sat quite still. “I’m dismayed to hear this,” he said.
“There could have been an innocent explanation,” Isabel protested.
“Unlikely,” Jamie said quietly.
“Jack’s all right,” Iain said, as if to himself. “But he’s putty in her hands.”
“What about Sarah?” Jamie suddenly asked. “Do you like her?”
“It’s not a question of whom I like,” said Iain. “That’s not the point here. It’s a question of who’s best.”
“Is she greedy?” asked Jamie.
Iain was taken aback by the question. “You mean—at the table?”
“No, not that. Is she selfish? Sometimes these property developers are a bit, how shall one put it…Well, greedy might be the word.”
Iain laughed. “She probably is. In fact, yes, she is. She seems determined to build up her property portfolio.”
“She’s a businesswoman,” Isabel pointed out. “That’s what they do.” She fixed Jamie with an intense stare. “And anyway, none of this is any of our business now.”
But Jamie seemed to have the bit between his teeth. “Have you spoken to her tenants?” he asked.
“Jamie,” said Isabel. “This is nothing to do with us.”
Iain shook his head. “No. I haven’t.”
“Because that might tell you everything you need to know,” said Jamie. “And if they say that she’s a good landlord, responsive to their needs and so on, then that gives you one answer. But if they say that she seems determined to get as much rent out of them as possible with minimum input on her part, you have your answer there.”
“Perhaps,” said Iain.
Isabel was looking at Jamie with frank astonishment. Turning to Iain, she said, “We didn’t come here to tell you what to do.”
“But since we’re here,” interjected Jamie, “we may as well give you our views. And would you like to know who I think should get this? Would you?”
Iain smiled. “It looks as if you’re going to tell me.”
&n
bsp; “John,” said Jamie.
* * *
—
THEY GOT INTO the car in silence. Then, as she pulled out of the drive, Isabel half turned to Jamie. “What possessed you?” she asked.
Jamie kept looking fixedly out of the passenger window. “I don’t know,” he said. “I really don’t. It just all welled up. I suddenly felt sorry for him, I suppose. There he is—he’s dying—and he wanted our help.”
“Which you told me—”
He cut her short. “I know, I know. I said you shouldn’t get involved. But then, when we were actually there, sitting with him, with his things around us…that photograph of him and his wife…that funny stuffed leather pig for putting your feet on…all of that, I thought, here he is faced with a decision that he couldn’t seem to get his head round, and we knew something that was relevant, and…”
Isabel drew into the side of the road. She stopped the engine. They were under a tree, and the shadow of its branches moved across the windscreen. It was warm, and they could see the tops of the Pentlands in a light haze of heat.
“I know what you mean,” Isabel said quietly.
Jamie bit his lip. “You can’t be in this world without feeling something,” he said. “You have to feel it.”
Her tone was resigned—a tone of sadness. “I’m afraid that’s true. And once you start to feel the pain of the world, then, oh God, it’s hard to stop feeling it.”
Jamie turned to face her. “And people—people like me—don’t make it any easier if they come along and tell you not to get involved.”
“But you have to,” said Isabel. “Because I get myself into these terrible spins if you don’t.”
He knew that was true—it was what he had argued for a long time. But he had just acted contrary to that position—and he was glad that he had.
“I don’t know what we’ve done back there,” he said. “I think we’ve sown some seeds.”
Isabel was more certain. “We’ve decided it,” she said. “Hilary is a spent force—and she wrecks it for Jack, whatever his claims might be. Sarah is put under suspicion of being a grubby developer—the last person you’d want to give a sensitive estate to. And that leaves John, whom we’ve never met, but whom you seem to have identified as the one to choose.”
“I had a feeling he was,” said Jamie. “Somebody who loves another person all his life when he knows it’s impossible. Someone who likes the Scottish National Portrait Gallery. Somebody who doesn’t say very much. What’s wrong with him?”
“Nothing, as far as I can see,” said Isabel. “But we’re hardly basing our views on any substantial evidence.”
“Don’t you think,” asked Jamie, “that he already knew? That at some level Iain knows what the right decision is, but just needed somebody to help him see that.”
Isabel thought that quite likely. She looked at her watch. “Grace,” she said. “We’d better go and relieve her.”
“She doesn’t mind how late we are,” said Jamie. “We could go for a walk on Braid Hill. Just you and me, and the wind.”
“We could.”
“And we could think about how lucky we are. Because neither of us is signing off from this world—just yet—and we have the boys and music and philosophy.”
“And Brother Fox.”
“Yes,” agreed Jamie. “And Brother Fox.”
“And he has us.”
Jamie shook his head. “I don’t think he knows that. I suppose you can have people—and things—but not know that you have them.”
Isabel switched on the engine. “Like guardian angels? Some people are convinced they have a guardian angel watching over them.”
“I’m not,” said Jamie. “And I imagine you aren’t either.”
“True,” said Isabel. “It’s a nice idea, of course, but…”
They began to move off slowly. Something made Isabel turn her head, though, and she saw that a car was coming up fast behind them. She depressed the brake quickly and firmly, and avoided a collision. She looked at Jamie.
He had not felt the unseen hand that had touched her.
“Orlando Gibbons,” mused Jamie.
Isabel was distracted. She was thinking about what had just happened, but said, “What about him?”
“He wrote a lovely anthem for when James VI came back to Scotland for the first time after taking the English throne. There are a couple of lines in it that I rather like. The choir at school sang it the other day—really rather well. Oh, send thine angels to his blessed side / And bid them there abide. It sounds like a request for reinforcements.”
Isabel liked the metaphor. We all needed reinforcements, she thought. We wanted others to think the way we did, to protest the values we held dear, to keep at bay the things we thought needed to be kept at bay. If imaginary beings could help to keep our courage up, then there was no harm in that.
“I think we should go for that walk,” she said. “Tell me where to go.”
“Straight ahead,” said Jamie. “Then turn right when you get to the place where you have to turn right.”
She smiled, and slipped a hand across to put on his knee. She squeezed it gently.
“Driving under the influence of love,” she muttered.
They parked the car at the foot of Braid Hill and were soon up on the high moor, overlooking the city. Edinburgh stretched before them—rooftops, church spires, the crouching lion of Arthur’s Seat, the craggy spine of the Castle and the descending High Street. The wind was from the east, fresh from the iron-blue fields of the North Sea, the tiniest hint of salt in its eyes.
Isabel held Jamie’s hand as they walked. “I’ve been thinking of something,” she said. “Will you let me at least raise it with you without your jumping down my throat?”
He put an arm about her. “When did I ever do that?” he asked.
“Never,” she said. “But there’s always a first time.”
“Tell me what it is.”
She told him, and he understood.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“I SUPPOSE,” said Hamish MacGeorge, “that we should be formal. Or at least, we should formally constitute the meeting.” He busied himself with a sheet of paper. “I shall be secretary, if Gordon is all right with that.”
“I’m happy for you to be Grand Panjandrum,” said Gordon MacGregor. “If that’s what you want.”
“Secretary will suffice,” said Hamish. And then, turning to Isabel, he said, “I shall record Jamie’s presence with us, although technically, since he isn’t a trustee, he shouldn’t perhaps speak—if you don’t mind my saying so.”
“He can speak, but not participate in decisions,” said Gordon. “There’s a distinction there. He can give the trustees his views, but may not actually vote on anything. That’s not to say that his views will not be taken fully into account.”
Bemused by the pedantry of the two lawyers, Jamie grinned broadly. “I’m fine with just sitting here,” he said. “I don’t mind.”
“Of course, many people who wield power have advisers in the background,” said Gordon. “Mary, Queen of Scots, was apparently very attentive to what Rizzio had to say.”
“Not that that did him much good,” said Hamish. “And there are times when it’s a good thing that people don’t listen. I like reading political history, and I’ve just been reading about President John F. Kennedy.”
“A terribly nice man,” said Gordon, shaking his head. “That was a tragic business in Dallas.”
“Oh, it certainly was,” agreed Hamish. “But the interesting thing is this: President Kennedy stood up to people, apparently. He wouldn’t be pushed around. And so when General Curtis LeMay tried to persuade him to attack Russian sites in Cuba, he resisted. LeMay wanted a war with the Soviet Union. Fortunately, Kennedy refused to be browbeaten.”
“We were a
lmost reduced to dust,” said Gordon. “The whole world was almost incinerated.”
“And that was not the only time,” Hamish said. “There was the time that Russian colonel overrode the radar warning systems. If he had acted according to the book, he would have pressed the button for a response to what was coming up as a missile attack from the United States, and we wouldn’t be here today.”
“Two men who saved the world,” said Isabel. “But I suppose we should get on with the business in hand.” She thought: The trust was paying for every minute of Hamish and Gordon’s time. Every excursus on Scottish country dancing or nuclear politics was recorded on the time sheets, not as idle chatter or reminiscence, but as professional consultation.
Hamish said, “We have the Land Rover matter on the agenda. We’ve acted on that as instructed.”
“Yes,” said Isabel. “But there’s more.”
She told them about her conversations with Cat and Leo and the plan to market the deli. At the end of that, Hamish shook his head vigorously. “The Land Rover request is out of order now, I think.” He looked at Gordon for support. Gordon nodded. “If she’s selling the business, then she does not need a Land Rover. We should retract our agreement.” He turned to Isabel. “Would you not agree with that, Isabel?”
She did not reply immediately. A case could be made out, she thought, for regarding the vehicle as pertaining to the next business—the boat charter concern. Support for that would be within the scope of the original trust purposes, she imagined. The founding deed had referred to “any business” in which Cat was engaged, and the boat would clearly fall within that definition.
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