But now, as the sun reached the mantelpiece, Sister Maria-Fiore handed a martini to Antonia. The nun was the one who mixed the drinks, using gin and dry vermouth, and adding, to Antonia’s glass, but not to hers, an olive and a small amount of olive brine, the key ingredient of a dirty martini.
“Dirty,” said Sister-Maria, raising her glass.
“Dirty,” replied Antonia. It was their private toast, one of the little things that cemented their friendship.
“Where did you learn to make martinis?” asked Antonia. “Did you have them in the convent?”
Antonia liked to get Sister Maria-Fiore to talk about her convent days, as she had fond memories of the time she had spent there herself, after the sisters had taken her in for recuperation. Antonia’s attack of Stendhal Syndrome had been towards the more serious end of the condition’s spectrum, and it was the kindness of the community of nuns in their remote Tuscan house that had brought about her recovery.
“It was one of the things we learned as novices,” replied Sister Maria-Fiore. “One of the senior nuns was in charge of our training in routine tasks. She had been a waitress in Harry’s Bar in Venice before she received the call. Many of the nuns brought with them the skills they had acquired in the outside world. Sister Beatrice, for example, was a very good mechanic, and there was another sister who had been a glass-blower in Murano. There was usually somebody for whatever task required to be done.”
Antonia sipped at her martini. “Do you have many regrets, Maria-Fiore?”
Sister Maria-Fiore frowned. “About what?”
“About leaving all that behind you.”
The nun looked into her martini glass. “Life,” she said, “is a bit like a martini. You take a sip – and then you take another sip.”
Antonia nodded. “I suppose so. But I just wondered whether you miss the routine of that other life you had. You know what I mean – getting up at the same time every morning, going to morning prayers, having the same breakfast. Going off to work in the dairy…”
“I never worked in the dairy,” Sister Maria-Fiore corrected her. “I mainly worked on the lettuce farm. And I helped with the bee-keeping.”
“Yes, but it was a routine, wasn’t it? And everything was provided. You didn’t have to worry about where your next meal was coming from.”
Sister Maria-Fiore looked thoughtful. “That’s true. But we weren’t passengers, you know. The convent earned its crust of bread.” She paused. “I valued the routine – yes, I did. But I felt a strong call to come to Scotland. I felt that there was a place somewhere, where I could realise my potential, if you see what I mean. And so when you suggested that I might come, it seemed to me that this was a message that I was destined to receive. You never know when a call will come. You might be doing something very ordinary – brushing your teeth, for instance – when a call arrives. The important thing is to receive those things that are sent to you. Do not send away things that are brought to your door. Embrace them. Nothing comes without first having been sent.”
“No,” mused Antonia. “That’s probably true.”
“Speaking of which,” said Sister Maria-Fiore, “I was on the 23 bus earlier today. I was coming back from a meeting at the National Gallery.” Sister Maria-Fiore had recently been appointed to the Board of Trustees of the Scottish National Gallery, and had attended her first meeting earlier that day. It had been an important meeting, at which the trustees had discussed a proposal that all the gallery’s paintings should be hung at a slightly lower level in order to ensure their accessibility to shorter people.
Antonia sipped at her dirty martini. “And?”
“And I found the most extraordinary thing. Somebody had left something on the bus – it looked like a skull of some sort.”
“A human skull?”
Sister Maria-Fiore nodded. “It couldn’t have been, though. You don’t find human skulls on Edinburgh buses – at least not on the number 23.”
Antonia laughed. “You’re a hoot, carissima!” And then, “So what did you do?”
“I threw it in the bin.”
“Our bin?”
“Yes.”
Antonia shrugged. “People leave all sorts of things on buses. Trains too.”
“What we leave behind, others find,” said Sister Maria-Fiore.
55
Getting Ready for Glasgow
The arrangements for the Glasgow Academy exchange were made jointly by Nicola and Ranald Braveheart Macpherson’s mother. Nicola did most of the negotiating with the school authorities and with the teacher with whom the boys would be boarding, while Ranald’s mother made lists of what would be required to support two boys for the four weeks they would spend in Glasgow. A clothing list was drawn up and lists of food preferences were compiled: Ranald was mildly intolerant of certain forms of Brie although he liked hard cheese, especially Parmesan. “It’s important to tell them,” said Ranald’s mother to her husband. “Ranald would probably be too polite to say anything.”
“I doubt very much whether they would be offering the boys Brie over in Glasgow,” said Ranald’s father, smiling. “Brie’s more of an Edinburgh thing.”
His wife looked at him disapprovingly. “I take it you’re joking,” she said.
He was unrepentant, and smiled again. “Just saying.”
A further look was flashed in his direction.
“At least don’t forget to tell them that he doesn’t like asparagus.” He paused. “Like me. Although, strictly speaking, I do like it – I like it very much, but there’s the issue of its side-effects.”
“I’ll tell them,” Ranald’s mother replied.
Bertie and Ranald could barely contain their excitement. Bertie had the advantage of Ranald Braveheart Macpherson in that he had been to Glasgow once before, when he and Stuart had gone there to retrieve the Pollock family’s car, inadvertently left behind when Stuart, having driven over for a meeting, had returned by train. That had resulted in their meeting with Lard O’Connor ( RIP), the well-known Glasgow gangster, who had taken a shine to Bertie and shown them round the Burrell Collection. This experience of Glasgow meant that Ranald turned to Bertie for guidance on what to expect of their Glasgow sojourn, and Bertie was only too pleased to give his friend the benefit of his knowledge.
“Do they eat the same food as us over there, Bertie?” Ranald had asked. “Or should we take sandwiches?”
Bertie assured Ranald that there would be no need for sandwiches. “The food in Glasgow is pretty good, Ranald,” he said. “They don’t have Valvona & Crolla, of course, but they have got a few shops of their own, I think.”
Ranald absorbed the information. “But what do they actually eat?” he asked.
“Pies,” replied Bertie. “They like pies over in Glasgow. I think they have pies every day.”
“They’re really lucky,” said Ranald.
“Yes,” agreed Bertie. “They often have a pie for breakfast, and then another for lunch. And they drink Irn-Bru too. They drink lots of that.”
Ranald Braveheart Macpherson’s eyes widened. “And we’ll be able to do that, too, Bertie?” he asked.
Bertie nodded. “Sure to, Ranald. You’re allowed to do lots of things in Glasgow that you aren’t allowed to do in Edinburgh.”
Of course, the joy that Bertie and Ranald felt over their impending trip was not unalloyed. In particular, they were both given pause to reflect by Olive, who had heard of the proposed exchange and was determined to do all that lay in her power to undermine the two boys’ delight in what lay ahead.
“I hear you’re going to Glasgow, Bertie Pollock,” she said in the playground at the Steiner School.
Bertie was guarded in his reply. “Maybe,” he said. And then he added, “How do you know that, Olive?”
Olive tapped the side of her nose. “Don’t think people don’t know what you do, B
ertie. I know all about your movements – and so does Pansy.”
Pansy, Olive’s faithful lieutenant, nodded knowingly. “Everybody knows what you’re planning, Bertie. Don’t think you can get away with anything…”
“Because you can’t,” supplied Olive. “We know all about your plans, Bertie. Everybody knows.”
“I don’t care if people know,” said Bertie defiantly. “I’m going with Ranald Braveheart Macpherson.”
Olive made a face. “Oh, that’s really sad, Bertie. In fact, it’s tragic.”
“Yes,” agreed Pansy. “It’s truly tragic, Bertie. You and Ranald going off to Glasgow together. It’s really tragic.”
“I don’t think so,” said Bertie. “I don’t see what’s tragic about that.”
Olive shook her head. “That’s because you’ve got no insight, Bertie. Most people who are tragic – like you – have at least some insight into how tragic they are. You don’t though. You seem to have none.”
“None at all,” said Pansy.
Olive changed tack. “Be careful that you don’t get head-butted,” she warned. “That’s what happens to people who go to Glasgow. They arrive at Queen Street Station and before they know it, somebody comes up to them and head-butts them. The hospitals in Glasgow are full of people who have come from Edinburgh and been head-butted.”
“Full of them,” said Pansy.
“And there’s not much you can do about it,” Olive went on. “Some people think you can reason with people from Glasgow, but you can’t, you know. People have tried, but nobody has ever succeeded.” Olive sighed. “I feel very sorry for you, Bertie Pollock. I wouldn’t be in your shoes for a hundred pounds.”
“Or even more,” said Pansy.
Bertie glowered at Olive, but this seemed to have no effect. Now crowing, Olive went on: “I could go to Glasgow if I wanted to, but I don’t. I have no need to go to Glasgow, Bertie, and so it doesn’t worry me at all that you are going. All I ask is that you remember that I warned you. I don’t want you to come crying to me afterwards and demanding why I didn’t apprise you. I have warned you. Glasgow is full of Campbells.”
Bertie waited.
“And you know what the Campbells did at Glencoe, Bertie,” Olive whispered. “Well, there are still plenty of Campbells about, and they’re planning to do something like that again. They love doing things like that. Over in Glasgow, mostly – that’s where they’re planning to do it.”
Bertie closed his eyes. In theory, he knew how to deal with Olive. In theory, he knew that it was best to ignore her, but she had a way of needling others that made that very difficult to do. He sighed deeply. It seemed to him that he had many burdens in this life that other boys did not seem to have. He had to put up with Olive, and with Pansy too. Then there was his mother who, although she was now in Aberdeen, was always there in the background, ready to make him speak Italian or go to psychotherapy or yoga or do any of the other things that she seemed to enjoy imposing on him. But now there was the prospect of Glasgow, and that thought made it much easier to bear all these vicissitudes: Glasgow, the shining city on the hill, that place of laughter and friendship, and something that he had once heard Glasgow was famous for: great craic. He thought that craic meant fun, and if it did, then there was plenty of craic in Glasgow, and in a matter of days he and Ranald Braveheart Macpherson, loyal Ranald, his friend, through thick and think, would soon be there for a whole wonderful, exhilarating month, enjoying all the great craic. A month in Glasgow! At long last. Glasgow! Glasgow! Glasgow! He intoned the name much as a Buddhist might say Om and it made him feel a current of sheer excitement. Rarely had Bertie felt such a thrill at the prospect of anything. This was the summation of his hopes: the gates of freedom, until now only imagined, were now before him, beckoning him to enter.
56
Ossian, etc.
Nicola offered to drive the boys over to Glasgow in her recently acquired beige estate car. She was keen to try the new vehicle on a long-ish run, and taking Bertie and Ranald Braveheart Macpherson over to Bearsden was a trip of just the right length. She had been meaning to get over to Glasgow anyway, as she had business interests there – or rather, one business interest – and it occurred to her that she could make her business call first and then go on to the home in which the two boys would be staying while on their exchange. This was the house of one of the teachers at the Glasgow Academy Primary, a Mrs Edwina Campbell, to whom Nicola had spoken on the phone several times and whom she was eager now to meet. Once Bertie and Ranald were settled, she could drive back to Edinburgh in time to help Stuart put Ulysses to bed.
She was worried about Stuart. She knew that he had been seeing somebody, and she had wholeheartedly encouraged him in that, even if she knew very little about Katie. But that did not matter: anybody – anybody at all – would be better than Irene, as far as Nicola was concerned. And yet she did not want to pry into Stuart’s private life – she was not that sort of mother – and so she refrained from asking him whether the fact that he was now down in the dumps, as he currently appeared to be, had anything to do with difficulties in his nascent romance. She suspected it was. She had overheard him talking to somebody on the telephone – she assumed it was Katie – and she could not help but hear him say, “Of all people to go off with – Bruce! How could you?”
Nicola did not have much trouble in working out what was happening there. Bruce could only be Bruce Anderson, whom she had met once and had immediately judged to be a card-carrying Lothario. And a conversation with Big Lou that she had had over coffee one morning had confirmed her assessment. Lou, who had known Bruce for years, was in no doubt as to his habit of making advances to other men’s girlfriends. “It’s happened so many times,” she had said. “And it always ends in tears. He’s like a tup that cannae leave the ewes alone.”
An opportunity to tackle Stuart about this tactfully would no doubt present itself in the future, but for the moment she could concentrate on the trip to Glasgow and getting Bertie launched on the exchange to which he had been looking forward with such relish. Now, at last, the day had arrived, and Bertie had woken up at five in the morning, such was his excitement. After knocking timidly at his grandmother’s door, he crept into her room and whispered into her ear, “I think it’s morning, Granny.”
Nicola looked myopically at her watch. “Is it, Bertie? I’m not so sure, darling – it’s only five o’clock. That’s not the real morning.”
Few parents or grandparents have the heart to send children back to the bed at that hour, and so Nicola lifted up a sheet and invited Bertie to try to get a further hour or so of sleep in her bed. He needed no second invitation, and soon she had her young grandson snuggled up to her, his breath upon her shoulder, his entire being shivering with excitement at the thought of what the day would bring.
“Try not to think too much about Glasgow,” Nicola murmured. “Glasgow always comes to those who wait.”
“I can’t help it, Granny,” Bertie said.
“I know, Bertie,” said Nicola. “But try to think about something else. Then, before you know it, it will be time for us to pick up Ranald and start our journey.”
“Will you tell me a story, then?” asked Bertie. “That will help me not to think about Glasgow.”
“A story?” said Nicola drowsily. “I’m not sure if I can think of a story at this hour, darling. You know how it is…”
“What about Fingal?” asked Bertie. “Could you tell me about Fingal?”
Nicola struggled. She was ready to slip back into sleep, and she had hoped that Bertie would do the same, but this unanticipated request for a story about Fingal, of all people, was having the opposite effect.
“Fingal?” she muttered.
“Yes,” said Bertie. “He was Ossian’s father, I think. Ossian wrote all those poems about him.”
Nicola was now wide awake. “Have you been reading about
him, Bertie?” She had ceased to be surprised by Bertie’s reading, which was as unpredictable as it was prodigious. There were few seven-year-olds, she imagined – no, there were no seven-year-olds in the length and breadth of Scotland who could converse on the subject of Ossian and Fingal. And yet Bertie was so modest, so innocent, that this extraordinary knowledge that he seemed to possess did not seem to be worn on his sleeve. Quite the opposite, in fact: Bertie wore his knowledge with a charming and completely inoffensive modesty.
“I’m not sure that Ossian actually existed, Bertie,” said Nicola. “And I don’t really know all that much about Fingal, I’m afraid.”
“Do you think that Mr Macpherson made him up?” asked Bertie.
Nicola stared up at the ceiling. I am so ignorant, she thought. And it’s too late, really, to do anything about it.
“I’m not sure,” she said. “Was he the man who collected the poems?”
“Yes,” said Bertie. “He said that he collected ancient poems from a very old man called Ossian. He had a long white beard, I think, and he sat on a stone up in the Highlands and recited poems about battles. Just like Mr Homer.”
“Men with long white beards,” muttered Nicola, and thought, for a moment, how convenient it would be – for some at least – if all male authors were, like Ossian, discovered to be imaginary. She did not think that way, of course, but she knew that there were some who did, who disapproved of men on principle, Irene being one, she suspected. How sad; how sad to feel antipathy towards half of humanity, whether male or female, simply because of what they were. How did this happen? How did misogyny and misandry come into existence? Was there a need to hate – some dark ally of an old malevolent god that drove people to this lack of charity towards others?
A Promise of Ankles Page 22
