“Perhaps there’s a bug brewing,” suggested Isabel. Children of that age were walking reservoirs of infection, she felt, with microbes of every description passing like wildfire through schools and nurseries.
The teacher looked doubtful. “No, I don’t think it’s that. It’s more likely to be his friend’s departure.”
Isabel frowned. “Basil?”
“Yes. His mother’s taken him out. I don’t know what her plans are, but she’s withdrawn him. Somebody said that she’s moving back to Ireland. She had a partner here, but...”
A child’s scream distracted the teacher; one of the boys had pulled a girl’s hair and the teacher was needed to deal with the resulting fracas. “Excuse me,” she said hurriedly. “Peace-keeping duties.”
Light was to be thrown on that surprise by the second surprise. This was an email that Isabel opened on her computer later that afternoon. The screen revealed the sender as Basil Phelps, and Isabel stared at it for some time before opening the message. She wondered whether it would be further reproach—another rap over the knuckles for unwanted interference. But it was not that.
“I’m not sure if this is the right address,” Basil Phelps wrote. “I got it from a friend who knows you, but she said it could be out of date. Anyway, I’ll send this as a proper letter later on—I just wanted to get it off my chest right away. I have behaved badly—appallingly, really. When we spoke after the concert, my immediate reaction was to reject what you had to say. But then I gave the matter further thought, and I decided to face up to something I should have faced up to a long time ago. You were just the messenger—and like all foolish people I lashed out at the bearer of unwanted news. So please forgive me for that. You were right, you see, and I have acted accordingly. The issue is now settled—thanks to you. I wish I could have discussed this with you face-to-face, but I find these things difficult in the flesh, and so I hope you will not mind my writing to you about it. After all, sorry means sorry whether the words are uttered or written down on paper. Yours, Basil Phelps.”
At the bottom of the message was the usual request to consider the environment and not print out the email. It was advice that Isabel tried to heed, but now, applied ethicist though she was, she made an exception to her normal rule and printed it out so she could show it to Jamie later on. He was at a long rehearsal and would not be back, he said, until seven at the earliest. She would cook. She would prepare something special for him. They would sit and talk in the kitchen, then they would gravitate to Jamie’s music room and he would play something on the piano. She would listen. She would think, How lucky I am, how fortunate. Her day would close on that note—the best possible note for a day to close upon.
And yet there were doubts still to be addressed, self-reproaches still to be made. The issue is now settled, wrote Basil Phelps. Presumably that meant Patricia’s scheme had been exposed and Basil had extricated himself from the financial trap in which she had ensnared him. It was right that he should be able to do that, but there was still a small boy in all of this—an innocent small boy with freckles and a grin and all the hopes and plans that small boys had. Would Patricia be able to provide for him at the same level as she had been in a position to do with the support—admittedly ill-gotten—of Basil Phelps? Would the freckle-faced man step into the breach, or was he...Isabel stopped. She had not thought it through. The teacher had said, “She had a partner here, but...” and then the affronted girl had screamed and the teacher had been unable to finish the sentence. Isabel herself had then been distracted by Charlie and his demands, and she had not remembered the teacher’s unfinished words until now. She imagined what the end of the sentence was: “but that’s over” or “but they’ve split up.” Of course...of course. Leo had spoken to Patricia as well as to the freckle-faced man. Jamie had told her that, but she had paid no attention to that detail. Now what had happened became clear to her. Leo knew about the police photographs—she had told him all about her discovery. He had then mentioned them to Patricia, who was probably unaware of the unsavoury activities of her lover. That could well have ended the affair because few women, even those intoxicated with a man, would ignore the fact that he was a sexual predator. Some did, of course, but Isabel had a feeling that Patricia was not one of them.
So Patricia and young Basil would find themselves back in Ireland. She would be free of that troublesome man and have time to reflect on her dishonesty. Would she? Isabel tried to have faith in humanity, but she knew that there were people who did not behave as they should, and relatively few of those who were capable of serious wrong had the ability to see it for what it was and to regret it. Patricia might, she just might. Isabel remembered the conversation the two of them had had on their first meeting, when Patricia had expressed reservations about her country’s past conduct. She had disapproved of Mr. de Valera. That was something. The Irishwoman had a moral sense, and perhaps it would reassert itself.
Her thoughts moved to young Basil. He had been Charlie’s friend, and she had wrecked that. She had meant to do it, but her actions had resulted in Basil’s disappearance from Charlie’s life. It was another example, she thought, of how our actions have unexpected consequences: a big matter resolved, and a small matter ruined—if a child’s friendships were ever small. No, they were not; a child’s friendship was a subject for grand opera, with full orchestra, scored for passionate performance. Parents should venture into that territory with caution, and preferably not at all.
* * *
—
NOW, in the music room, their dinner over, Jamie said to Isabel, “What a relief.”
She said, “Yes.”
“It’s good of him to thank you,” said Jamie.
“Yes, it is.”
Jamie looked thoughtful. “And Patricia might too.”
Isabel could not imagine why that might happen. “I doubt it.”
“But can’t you see?” said Jamie. “You’ve probably saved her from him. I think she’s moved. Gone somewhere else because she split up with him—with Archie whatshisname.”
“McGuigan.”
“Yes, him.”
Isabel did not see it, but as Jamie explained it to her, she realised he could be right. “I did tell you, didn’t I, that Leo spoke to her as well as to that man? Well, did you tell Leo about the police photograph?”
She frowned. She had told him. And she had shown Leo the photograph taken in the restaurant; the photograph of the mirror.
“Then,” said Jamie, “there’s every chance that Leo passed on to her the fact that her lover had attracted the attention of the police. She probably felt that she had to do some rapid re-evaluating of her relationships.”
“Yes,” said Isabel. She had already reached the same conclusion.
“Perfect, isn’t it?” said Jamie. “Everything you thought needed to be put right has been put right. Complete success.”
She was still doubtful. “I don’t know.”
“We never know absolutely everything,” said Jamie. “But does it matter? When you get where you want to get, does it matter how you got there?”
“Sometimes it does,” said Isabel. “Sometimes it matters a great deal.”
Jamie grinned playfully. “You say that because you’re a philosopher.”
“No, you don’t have to be a philosopher to think that,” Isabel countered.
Jamie changed the subject. “Cat and Leo,” he said. “Shall we call them the Felines? An affectionate nickname?”
“We could.”
“Do you think they’ll stay together?”
Isabel thought for a short while before answering. “Her past performance doesn’t exactly fill one with confidence, but in this instance I think so. She has to settle down some time.” There was something else. “I think she’s happy. At last.”
Jamie agreed. “And as for Leo—will you thank him for...how did
he put it? For sorting things out?”
Isabel felt uncomfortable. There were too many question marks over what he had done for her to feel unqualified gratitude. Yet, he had done his best for her.
“I should, I suppose.”
Jamie looked relieved. “If the Felines are going to stay together, it would be best for you to be on good terms with him, I think.”
“I’ll thank him,” said Isabel. “Tomorrow.”
“Good,” said Jamie. “Now, how about some music?”
He sat down at the piano and warmed up briefly before he turned to Isabel and said, “I want to play you that song we heard at the Queen’s Hall. The Jacobean one. ‘Remember me, my deir.’ ”
She sat down as he selected a sheet of music from a small pile on top of the piano.
“Are you going to sing?” she asked.
“Yes, of course. The whole point of this song is the words.” He paused. “And they need to be sung very quietly—passionately, but quietly. Because...” He met Isabel’s gaze. “Because real passion is usually quiet. People think it will be loud, will proclaim itself, but it often doesn’t.”
“No,” she said. “It doesn’t.”
He began, and Isabel closed her eyes as she listened. Music tended to evoke images in her mind’s eye; now she saw a wooded hillside, a gentle slope. Deer grazed, and one looked up and stared in her direction, as deer will do. The sky was light. The land was Scotland.
Remember me my deir,
I humbly you requier,
For my request that loves you best,
With faithfull hart inteir.
My hart shall rest
Within your breast,
Remember me, my deir.
Remember me, deir hart
That of pains he’s my part,
Your word unkind
Sinks in my mind
And does increase my smart,
Yet shall ye find me true and kind,
Remember me, deir hart.
He finished, and the notes of the piano died away. He stood up, turned to her and embraced her. They held one another gently, as we should all hold those whom we love, as we should all hold the world.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Alexander McCall Smith is the author of the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency books, the Isabel Dalhousie books and a number of other series of novels. His books have been translated into more than forty languages and have been best sellers throughout the world. He lives in Scotland.
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The Quiet Side of Passion Page 26