Chance Developments (3 page)

The lunch party was held in Marjorie's house in Great King Street. This was a Georgian town house, one room wide but with four floors and a basement. The dining room gave off a large drawing room, both with floor-to-ceiling windows into which light flooded from both north and south. On the walls of the drawing room were several Scots colourist paintings, lively to the point of exuberance, adding splashes of red and yellow.

The maid had wasted time polishing silver, with the result that the cooking was behind schedule.

“Look at us,” said Marjorie, glaring at the maid. “Completely unprepared.”

Helena and Flora both helped—Flora peeling potatoes for the salad while Helena arranged plates of cold meat and cheese.

“Five guests,” said Marjorie, reeling off a list of names to which Helena responded with a nod or a shake of the head. There were four men and one woman. “I like to keep the odds in our favour,” she continued. “I can't be doing with those occasions in which there are equal numbers of men and women. Why on earth do people do it? Can't they
count
?
”

“To give everybody a chance,” said Helena.

“Oh, nonsense,” said Marjorie.

Flora wondered whether her new friend said
Oh, nonsense
to everything with which she disagreed. How she would have loved to say that to Mother Superior or Father Sullivan. The occasional
Oh, nonsense
would have stopped them in their tracks, but nobody dared, of course. It was Protestants who said
Oh, nonsense;
they had been saying that since the sixteenth century.

They were ready just in time.

“You see what I mean about her,” whispered Marjorie, nodding in the direction of the kitchen stairs. “She had done nothing but polish the silver—of all things!”

“You'll have to get rid of her,” said Helena. “You can't be held hostage to that sort of thing.”

Marjorie looked at her watch. “Well, I'll think about it. The problem is: these people won't work.”

Flora turned away. There was something about this whispered conversation that she did not like. She had exchanged no more than a few words with the maid, but they had smiled at one another and there had been a current of unspoken fellow-feeling. She had noticed that the maid had a rash on her wrist—some sort of skin complaint, she thought. Doing the washing up would not help that, she decided. There was a saint for skin disorders—Saint Lazarus, was it not? She could light a candle to Saint Lazarus…but then she remembered that candles were a thing of the past, and that if they were to be lit it would be by others; she would miss them, of course, as she always loved the smell they made when extinguished—a smell that was redolent of childhood and mystery and the love of her late parents whom she missed so sorely, even now.

One floor below, a doorbell rang. Marjorie brightened. “Alan Miller,” she said. “I bet you ten shillings it's him. On the dot of one. He's like that German painter they used to set their watches by in Berlin. He always went for his walk at exactly the same time.”

“Actually, darling,” said Helena, “it was a philosopher. Immanuel Kant. And it was Königsberg, not Berlin.”

Marjorie brushed aside the correction. “Be that as it may, the point remains—it'll be Alan, and Geoffrey Inver with him.” She turned to Flora. “Alan is mid-forties, and so, I believe, is Geoffrey. They've been sharing a flat for a long time—much cheaper that way. Gloucester Place. They're both lawyers, but different sorts of lawyers, I think. Very charming.”

“They'd both make very good husbands,” said Helena. “It's a pity one could only marry one of them—otherwise you'd be able to get two for the price of one.”

Marjorie seemed shocked by this. “Helena, darling!”

“Just a joke,” said Helena.

“Isn't it strange,” said Marjorie, “how polygamy—where it's permitted—allows men to have multiple wives but does not allow women to have multiple husbands?”

“Would any woman want more than one husband?” asked Flora.

Helena laughed. “Good point,” she said.

They heard voices on the stair. A few minutes later, ushered in by the maid, two men appeared.

“Darling!” said the taller of the men, stepping forward to embrace Marjorie. He kissed her on both cheeks. “And other darling,” he said to Helena. “Every bit as lovely, of course.”

He stopped at Flora. “And
who
have we here?”

Marjorie made the introductions. “Flora, this is Alan Miller. And this is Geoffrey Inver.” The other man stepped forward and took Flora's hand. He inclined his head rather than trying to kiss her.

Marjorie continued. “Flora is from Glasgow.”

“Glasgow!” exclaimed Alan. “How brave!”

“So near and yet so far,” said Geoffrey, making a vague gesture with his right hand.

A further male guest arrived and then, shortly afterwards, another—accompanied by a woman. The man who came by himself was called Richard Snow. The other man was Thomas McGibbon, who arrived with a thin, rather nervous-looking woman in her forties who simply gave her name as Lizzie. “Lizzie is a sculptress,” explained Marjorie in an aside to Flora. “Hence the intensity.”

“Are they?” asked Flora, looking across the room at Lizzie.

“Are who what?”

“Sculptresses…are they intense?”

Marjorie looked at her as if she had asked the most obvious of questions. “But of course they are, dear.
Very
intense people, I've found.”

Flora thought:
I've never met a sculptress. Here I am, thirty-two, and I've never met a sculptress.
She wondered what Sister Frances would make of a sculptress: they would be chalk and cheese, she thought, with poor Sister Frances's complete lack of intensity.

Marjorie gave everybody a glass of sherry and then, fifteen minutes later, announced, “
Alla tavola!
”
Flora smiled: she could work out what that meant, although she had never heard it before. So that was what people said in sophisticated circles:
alla tavola
.

They sat down. She found herself with Richard Snow on her right and Geoffrey Inver on her left. Geoffrey spoke to her first, as they started the soup.

“So,” he said. “Glasgow.”

As he spoke, she noticed that a small rivulet of courgette soup dribbled down his chin; soup was a challenge to some people, she thought:
sent by the Lord to try us
, as Sister Beatrice was fond of saying of any irritation, from traffic lights to the more recalcitrant members of Senior Four.

She was not sure how to respond to Geoffrey Inver, but decided to say, “Yes.” It was not enough, she felt, for somebody simply to say “Glasgow” and leave it at that.

It was as if he realised that himself. “I must spend more time in Glasgow,” he said. “There it is, only forty miles away, and one spends so little time there. Perhaps next year. Who knows?”

“There's a lot going on in Glasgow,” said Flora.

Geoffrey nodded. “So they say.”

“There's the Citizens' Theatre,” she ventured. She had never been there. Nuns did not go to the Citizens' Theatre, but for a few moments she imagined Mother Superior sitting in the front row with Father Sullivan on one side of her and Sister Frances on the other. Poor Sister Frances would have difficulty understanding the play and would have to have it explained to her by Father Sullivan, who had a reputation for being able to make things understandable.

She continued a desultory conversation with Geoffrey, but realised that he was bored. At first she was discouraged, but then she thought:
What does it matter if he finds me boring? What does his own life amount to? Being a lawyer in Edinburgh, going to lunch parties like this? What's so special about that?

She was able to turn to Richard Snow once the soup plates had been taken away. He seemed keen to engage in conversation, beginning by asking her how she knew Marjorie. “Jenners,” she replied, without thinking much about it. She had not intended it to be taken as a witty answer, but it was.

He smiled. “That's the place to meet,” he said. “I can imagine people saying to themselves: ‘Oh, I need to go and buy a pair of socks and make a few new friends—I must go to Jenners.' ”

She laughed. “It wasn't quite like that.”

“Of course not.”

She looked sideways at him; a quick look of appraisal. He was forty-something, she thought, and he had weathered well. His complexion was tanned and healthy—as if he enjoyed hill-walking or sailing, or something else that took him out into the open air. Her gaze slipped to his left hand: there was no ring.

He asked her what she did.

“I used to teach,” she said.

“What a wonderful job.”

She was surprised, but pleased at his response. “Sometimes,” she said.

“I wouldn't have the patience,” he said.

“They can try such patience as one has,” she said, thinking of Senior Four, and of Natalie MacNeil in particular. She hesitated, and then continued, “There's a girl called Natalie MacNeil. She tried my patience more than any of the others. Dreadful girl.” It was strangely liberating to describe Natalie MacNeil in this way, even if it was distinctly uncharitable.

He laughed. “I think I can picture her rather well. But what was the problem?”

“Boys,” said Flora, feeling slightly daring. She had never before had a conversation like this with a man—Father Sullivan, of course, did not count. “Her mind was full of boys.”

“Ah,” said Richard Snow, smiling.

They continued their conversation through the main course and into the dessert. Then, when they left the table for coffee, Richard Snow said, “Let's go and sit by the window.”

He told her what he did. “I have a small shipping firm,” he said. “It's very small beer as these things go. We have five vessels—that's all.”

She asked him where they went.

“They're very unadventurous,” he said. “Glasgow to Hamburg. Leith to Stavanger. That sort of thing. We don't go far.”

“Do you suffer from sea-sickness?” she asked.

He laughed. “I don't actually go on the ships themselves,” he said. “I arrange the cargoes—that sort of thing.”

She noticed the colour of his eyes, which was an attenuated hazel. She liked them. For his part, he was taken with her nose. It was perfectly proportioned, he thought. Some noses were just right—they were the right size and in the right place. Flora's was such a nose.

He said to her, “It's Sunday tomorrow.”

“Yes.”

“Have you ever been to the Botanical Gardens here in Edinburgh?”

She shook her head. She had visited so few places.

“I wondered whether you might care to come with me there tomorrow? There's going to be one of their lectures. One of the keepers is going to be talking about cactuses.”

“Cactuses!”

He smiled encouragingly. “I know not everyone's interested in cactuses.”

“But I am,” she assured him. “They're fascinating plants.” Poor Sister Frances had kept a cactus in a pot near her window. It had never flowered, although Sister Bernadette had said it would. “Sometimes they flower only every ten years,” she had explained.

“Well, then, you might find it interesting.”

“Yes, I'd very much like to come with you. Thank you.”

“Not at all.” He looked up at the ceiling. “Half past eleven? Where are you staying?”

She thought quickly. “The North British Hotel.” It was directly above the station; she had seen it when she went up the steps. She would go back to Jenners, buy what she needed for an overnight stay, and then telephone her aunt to say that she was going to spend the night in Edinburgh. She had never stayed in a hotel before—not once—and the idea was strongly appealing. Why should she not? She had more than enough money to stay in any hotel she chose. She was free and she could do exactly as she wished. She liked Richard Snow and, she had decided, he showed every sign of enjoying her company. So it was not all that hard to find a man. On the contrary: she had come to Edinburgh and had found one within hours—a good-looking man with hazel eyes and an interest in cactuses. What more could anybody want?

“I could come and pick you up at the hotel,” he said. “We'll drive down there.”

“Thank you. You said eleven thirty?”

“Yes…” He hesitated. “I might be a little bit late—no more than five or ten minutes. I shall be at Mass, you see.”

She caught her breath, but only for the shortest moment. It was a sign, or perhaps an enquiry. Was he testing her for prejudice—or for suitability?
I'm not a Protestant
, she thought.
I never even reached the start line.
It was destiny, she thought, and one should never fight destiny. Go along with it, and with the tides that carry you through life. They know where you're going, and you do not. And then she thought: Some embraces last for life. Curiously enough, this realisation did not depress her; it was what she had rather expected.

“I could meet you there. What are the times?”

She saw the relief in his reaction.
Destiny
, she said to herself.

She went back to Jenners, bought what she needed, and then walked the short distance to the North British Hotel. They had plenty of rooms, and they gave her a suite overlooking Princes Street. She sat there, her feet propped up on a stool. She ordered a half-bottle of champagne, which was brought up to her room by a smartly attired young man. The young man opened the champagne bottle for her and gave her a look. It was not a look that she understood, but it had a flirtatious feel to it. Men, it seemed, were plentiful, once one started to search for them. Indeed, she thought, Marjorie was right: one had to fight them off—or at least some of them.

She sent him away. She closed her eyes. Such happiness, she thought; such happiness came from knowing who you were and where you came from. And from knowing, too, that you did not have to go back unless you really wanted to, and sometimes you did.