44 Scotland Street (15 page)

Irene’s mind wandered. It was completely quiet within the tank, and the absence of sensory distraction induced a profound sense of calm. One did not feel confined by the walls of the tank; rather, one felt weightless and without boundary, independent of any physical constraint, freed of the attachment that came with gravity. I could lie here forever, thought Irene, and forget about the world and its trials.

Her sense of detachment was suddenly interrupted by a knocking on the side of the tank.

“Bertie?”

A muffled voice came from outwith. “Irene?”

“Yes, I’m here, Bertie. In the tank, as you know. I’m relaxing. You can have a little go at the end.”

“I don’t want to float. I’ll drown.”

“Nonsense, darling. The specific gravity of the water is such that you can’t sink. You’ll like it.”

“I hate floating.”

Irene moved her hands gently in the water, making a slight splashing sound. This was rather irritating. Bertie was ruining the floating experience.

“Let Mummy float in peace a little longer, Bertie,” she called out. “Then we’ll go and have a latte. You can float some other time, if you want to. Nobody’s
forced
to float.”

There was silence for a moment and then a sudden shout that made Irene start.

“
Non mi piace parlare Italiano!
”

“Bertie?” called out Irene. “What was that you said?”

“
Non mi piace parlare Italiano! Non mi piace il sasofono! No! No!”

Irene sat up, banging her head on the top of the chamber. Pushing open the lid, she looked out, to see Bertie standing defiantly in the middle of the room, a ripped-up magazine on the floor before him.

“Bertie!” she exclaimed. “What is this? You’re behaving like a little boy! What on earth is wrong with you?”

“
Non mi piace parlare Italiano
!” shouted Bertie again. “I don’t like speaking Italian!”

Irene climbed out of the chamber and reached for her towel.

“This is complete nonsense,” she said. “You’re upset – quite understandably – about what happened. That’s all. You’ll feel better once we’ve had a nice latte. Italian’s got nothing to do with it. And I can’t understand why you should say you don’t like the saxophone. You love your saxophone.”

“
No! No!
” shouted Bertie, stamping his feet on the ground. His face was red with rage now, and his fists were clenching and unclenching.

“Bertie, just calm down,” said Irene. “If you want to talk, we can do so over latte. You mustn’t make a noise here in the Floatarium. There are other people floating.”

“I hope they sink!” shouted Bertie.

Irene took a deep breath. “That’s a very, very nasty thing to say. What if somebody did sink? How would you feel then? You’d feel very bad, wouldn’t you?”

Bertie did not reply. He was looking down at the ground now, and Irene noticed that his shoulders were heaving. Bertie was sobbing, but in silence.

She reached forward and embraced him, hugging the little boy to her.

“You’ll feel better soon, Bertie,” she said. “That smelly nursery must be very boring for you. We’ll send you somewhere better. Perhaps St Mary’s Music School. You like their Saturday mornings, don’t you? There are some nice boys and girls there. And you might even get into the choir and dress up, like the rest of the Episcopalians. That would be nice, wouldn’t it?”

“No,” sobbed Bertie. “No.”

38. Mother/Daughter Issues

Barely a mile from the Floatarium, where Bertie was protesting, Sasha Todd, wife of Raeburn Todd ,was sitting down for morning coffee with her daughter, Lizzie. Sasha had chosen Jenners’ tea-room for this meeting, because Jenners made her feel secure, and had always done so. Other shops might come and go, and one or two parvenus had indeed recently set up in the city, but she, quite rightly, remained loyal to Jenners. There was nothing unsettling about Jenners, as she had cause to reflect whenever she approached Edinburgh on a train from the west and saw the satisfying sign Jenners Depository. This signalled to the world that whatever one might find on the shelves of Jenners itself, there was more in the depository, round the back. This was reassuring in the most fundamental way.

There was nothing reassuring about Lizzie. She was twentythree now, and had done very little with her life. At school she had been unexceptional; she had never attracted negative attention, but nor had she attracted any praise or distinction. Her reports had been solid – “might get a B at Higher level, provided she puts in more work”; “almost made it to the second team this year – a solid effort” and so on. And then there had been three years at a college which gave her a vague, unspecified qualification. This qualification had so far produced no proper job, and she had moved from temporary post to temporary post, none of which seemed to suit her.

Both Sasha and Todd thought that marriage was the only solution.

“We can’t support her indefinitely,” said Todd to his wife. “Somebody else is going to have to take on the burden.”

“She’s not a burden,” said Sasha. “All she’s doing is looking for herself.”

“She should be looking for a husband,” retorted Todd.

“Possibly,” said Sasha. “But then, it’s not easy these days. These young men one meets don’t seem to be thinking of marriage.”

Todd shook his head. “Yet marriages take place. Look at the back of
Scottish Field
. What do you see? Wedding photographs. Nice fellows in their kilts getting married in places like Stirling and Balfron.”

Sasha sighed. What her husband said was true. Such a world existed – it had certainly existed in their time – but their own daughter seemed not to be part of it. Was there anything wrong with her, she wondered. There had been no signs of anything like that – no
unsuitable
friends with short-cropped hair and a tendency to wear rather inelegant jackets – so at least that was not the problem. Thank heavens they did not have to face the problem faced by friends in the Braids whose daughter, an otherwise reasonable girl, had brought home a female welder. What did one talk to a female welder about, Sasha wondered. Presumably there was something one could say, but she had no idea what it might be.

Now, in the tea-room at Jenners, scene, over so many years, of such rich exchanges of gossip, Sasha fixed Lizzie with the maternal gaze to which her daughter was so accustomed.

“You’re looking thin,” Sasha said. “You’re not on one of those faddish diets, are you? Really, the damage those people do! Doctor what’s-his-name, and people like that. I’m not suggesting that one should over-eat, but one wants to have something to cover one’s poor skeleton.”

She pushed the plate of iced cakes over the table towards her daughter.

Lizzie pushed them away. “No thanks. And I don’t think I’m looking particularly thin. In fact, I’d say I’m about the right weight for my height.”

Sasha raised an eyebrow. Lizzie was flat-chested in her view, and a judicious coating of plumpness might help in that respect. But of course she could never raise the issue with her daughter, just as she could say nothing about the dowdy clothes and the lack of make-up.

Taking a cake, Sasha cut it in half. Marzipan: her favourite. Battenberg cakes were hard to beat, particularly when dissected along the squares; she had little time for chocolate cake – sticky, amorphous, and over-sweet substance that it was.

“You know,” she said, discreetly licking at her fingers, “you could do rather more with yourself than you do. I’m not being

critical, of course. Not at all. I just think that if you paid a little bit more attention to your clothes …”

“And my face,” interjected Lizzie. “Maybe I should do something about my face.”

“There’s nothing wrong with your face,” said Sasha. “I said nothing about your face. You have a very nice face. I’ve got nothing against your face.”

“In fact,” said Lizzie, “people say that I look quite like you. In the face, that is.”

Sasha picked up the second half of her cake and examined it closely. “Do they?” she said. “Well, isn’t that nice? Not that I see it myself, but perhaps others do. Surprising, though.”

“You don’t sound very enthusiastic,” said Lizzie.

Sasha laughed lightly. “Now,” she said, “that’s enough about faces. I’ve got something much more important to talk to you about.”

39. The Facts of Life

“Something important?” asked Lizzie. There was doubt in her voice: what was important to her mother was usually rather unimportant to her.

“Very,” said Sasha, glancing about her, as if those at neighbouring tables might eavesdrop on some great disclosure. “You will have heard that the ball is coming up. Soon.”

“The ball?”

“You know,” said Sasha. “The Conservative ball. The South Edinburgh Conservative Ball.”

Lizzie looked bored. “Oh, that one. That’s nice. You’ll be going, I take it. I hope that you enjoy yourselves.”

“We shall,” said Sasha, firmly. “And we’d very much appreciate it if you would come in our party. Both Daddy and I. We’d both appreciate it. Very much.” She fixed her daughter with a stare as she spoke. A message was being communicated.

Lizzie looked at her mother. She was so sad, she thought. Imagine living a life in which the highlight of one’s existence was a political ball. How sad. “Depends,” she said. “Depends when it is.”

“Next week,” said Sasha. “I know I haven’t given you much notice, but it’s next Friday, at the Braid Hills Hotel. It’s such a nice place for it.”

Lizzie pursed her lips. She was in a difficult situation. She did not want to go to the ball, but she was realistic enough to understand her position. Her parents paid her rent and gave her an allowance. She accepted this, in spite of her pride, and she understood that in return there were a few duties that she had to discharge. Attendance at the Conservative Ball had always been one of these. This was what her mother’s look meant.

“All right,” she said. “I’ll come.”

Sasha looked relieved. “That will be very nice.” She picked up her table napkin – paper! – and removed a crumb of marzipan from the edge of her lower lip. She would have liked to have licked her lips, and would have done so at home, but she couldn’t in town. “We’ll make up a small party. Daddy’s arranged that.”

Lizzie, who had been looking out of the window, turned to face her mother. “A party?”

Sasha smiled. “Yes, of course. A small party. Just the three of us and …”

“That’s fine. The three of us. That’s fine.”

“And a fourth.”

Lizzie said nothing. She tried to meet her mother’s gaze, but Sasha looked away.

“A young man,” said Sasha. “A very charming young man from the office. He’s called Bruce. We thought it would be a good idea to ask him to join us.”

Lizzie sighed. “Why? Why can’t we just go by ourselves?”

Sasha leaned forward conspiratorially. “Because there’s hardly anybody going,” she whispered. “Nobody has bought a ticket – or virtually nobody.”

Lizzie looked at her mother in frank astonishment. “Nobody?”

“Yes,” said Sasha. “Even the people on the committee have found some excuse or other. It’s appalling.”

“Well, then, why don’t you cancel it? Surely that would be simplest?”

Sasha shook her head. “No, it’s not going to be cancelled. Imagine if people heard about that. We’d be the laughing stock. The ball is going ahead. Your father has made up his mind.”

Lizzie thought for a moment. “And Bruce? What about him?”

Sasha answered quickly. “Very charming. A good-looking young man too. He lives down in the New Town somewhere.” She paused, and then added: “Unattached.”

For a moment there was a silence. Then Lizzie laughed. “So,” she said. “So.”

“Yes,” said Sasha. “So. And it’s about time, if I may say so, that you started to think of finding a suitable man. It’s all very well enjoying yourself, but you can’t leave it too late.”

Lizzie closed her eyes. “I’m on the shelf, am I?”

Sasha picked up her coffee and took a sip. She would remain calm in this conversation; she was determined about that. “You know very well what I’m talking about. There are some people who just miss the bus. You may think that you’ve got plenty of time, but you haven’t. The years go by. Then you suddenly realise that you’re thirty-something and the men who are interested in getting married aren’t interested in you any more – they’re interested in girls in their mid-twenties. Oh yes, you may laugh, but that’s the truth of the matter. If you want a husband, don’t drag your feet – just don’t drag your feet.”

Lizzie waited until her mother had finished. Then: “But you’re assuming that I want a husband.”

Sasha stared at her daughter. “Of course you want a husband.”

Lizzie shook her head. “Actually, I don’t have much of a view on that. I’m quite happy as I am. There’s nothing wrong with being single.”

Sasha put down her coffee cup. She would have to choose her words carefully. “All right. You’re single. Where does the money come from? You tell me that. Where does the money come from?”

Lizzie did not respond, and after a few moments Sasha provided the answer herself.

“Money comes from men,” she said.

40. In Nets of Golden Wires

Carried down on the Jenners escalator, mother and daughter, one step apart, but separated by a continent of difference.
I
must be patient with her
, thought Sasha; and Lizzie, for her part, thought exactly the same.
She’ll come round to our way of thinking –
it’s just a question of time,
thought Sasha; and Lizzie said to herself:
God help me from ever, ever becoming like her. She actually said it. She
said: money comes from men!
She felt herself blush at the thought, a warm feeling of shame, mixed with embarrassment, for Sasha. If her mother thought this, then what did her parents’ marriage amount to? An agreement as to property? That would make her the by-product of an arrangement of convenience; no more than that.