The Importance of Being Seven

by Alexander McCall Smith

  Angus nodded; becoming a cavaliere fifth class, he imagined, would be rather like getting the MBE.

  ‘These awards, of course, are not available for animals,’ continued the man. ‘However, the Italian state holds in high regard acts of animal heroism, of which, if I may say so, this remarkable act of your excellent dog here is a prime example.’

  Angus glanced at Cyril, who looked up at him with the look of one who does not quite know what is going on.

  ‘I cannot guarantee it, of course,’ said the man. ‘But suffice it to say that my department will be submitting the name of your dog to the Council of Ministers, with a strong recommendation – and I do mean strong – that he be made a cane-cavaliere. That is the order which is awarded principally to dogs who have provided good service to the Republic. It is given, for example, to sniffer dogs who have saved lives in earthquakes or avalanches – that sort of thing.’

  ‘And my dog …’

  The man raised a finger. ‘Indeed. Your dog.’

  Angus was at a loss as to what to say. Cyril had been in Italy precisely fifteen minutes before rendering a service to the Italian state and ensuring himself a recommendation for an award. It was, he thought, a good omen for the trip ahead. To arrive in a foreign country and be immediately recommended for decoration by the state was, he thought, a very promising beginning.

  65. The Impact of Italy

  This auspicious beginning to the trip put Angus in a particularly good mood for the journey from Pisa to the villa. Their hired car, a Fiat Venti Cavalli, was big enough for the entire party and all their luggage, but only if Cyril sat on Angus’s lap. This he was happy to do, sticking his head out of the window and sniffing with intense interest at the passing Italian air. The smells, of course, were quite different from those attendant on a comparable Scottish journey, and none of the human passengers had even the faintest inkling of how exciting was the olfactory tapestry that Cyril now enjoyed. The world as it reveals itself to the canine nose is far richer than we can possibly imagine, and includes not only that which is there – which is interesting enough – but also that which was there before. So, while the human eye may see signs of the impact of man – farm walls, grain towers, well-worked farms – the dog picks up much more: historic scents that have been layered upon the landscape and have not gone away. We, then, may look at a Tuscan field and see furrows, stones, dry white earth; this would be thin fare for the dog, who knows that those furrows were ploughed by oxen, that birds had pecked at the seeds sown by the farmer whose boots in turn left behind them a story quite of their own, of tramping upon a cellar floor, of walking among olive trees and of so much else. All this Cyril now picked up and relished, quivering with excitement at the intellectual challenge of interpreting and classifying this bewildering array of scents.

  Domenica was at the wheel. Nothing had been said about this; she had merely announced that she had arranged the car. Angus did not own a car and, although he possessed a licence, had more or less forgotten how to drive; Antonia, by contrast, would have driven had Domenica not been – in her view – so controlling.

  ‘I’ll be very happy to share the driving with you,’ she said as they left the suburbs of Pisa behind them. ‘Just let me know when you want a break.’

  ‘How kind,’ said Domenica. ‘But, alas, I appear to be the only driver listed on the car rental contract. How very unfortunate.’

  Antonia said nothing, but in her mind she filed this away as yet another example of Domenica’s taking-over. There had already been several incidents in the plane, when she had monopolised Angus and barely given her a look-in; that was bad enough, but if this were to be the pattern of the trip, then she would have to be dealt with. Angus was not here for the sole delectation of Domenica, thought Antonia, even if it was true that the older woman had met him first. The fact that one has met a person first does not confer any greater right to that person’s company; that would be absurd. Perhaps Domenica needed to be reminded that she, Antonia, was an artist – in that she was a writer – just as Angus was, and that this meant that there was a bond between the two of them to which Domenica, as a non-artist, could not hope to aspire.

  ‘I feel so … so exhilarated,’ she said. ‘Just to be here in Tuscany.’ She gestured to the countryside outside the car. ‘What artistic soul could be anything but quickened in such a place? Don’t you agree, Angus? As an artist?’

  Angus smiled. ‘Indeed,’ he said. ‘This is landscape to which one can hardly be indifferent.’

  Antonia now continued. ‘I suppose that even those of us who are not artists,’ and here she looked pointedly at Domenica, ‘must feel something too. Not as intensely, perhaps.’

  Domenica kept her eyes fixed on the road. ‘We have a long family association with this part of Italy,’ she said evenly. ‘My parents, in fact, met in Florence. My father, you see, was instrumental in setting up the British Library there. He was with the British Council for many years. They had many friends here. And I came for the holidays – quite often, in fact. My very first boyfriend was Italian, you know. I was sixteen and there was this delightful boy whose father was the Conte di something or other, and we played tennis—’

  ‘Such a dull game,’ interjected Antonia. She did not want to hear about this Italian boy and his father, the conte; a typical story, she felt, of upper-middle-class pretension. And what was this about visiting as a child? She thought that Domenica had lived in India when she was young, not Italy. Was she making the whole thing up?

  ‘Tennis?’ said Angus. ‘Tennis dull? Surely not. I’ll play tennis with you, if you like, Domenica. I’m a bit rusty, but I used to play quite a lot. Do we have a tennis court at the villa, I wonder?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ said Domenica. ‘But had we had one then we should certainly have played.’

  Antonia smiled grimly. Really, Domenica was the end. Had we had a tennis court then we should have played! Domenica was not unlike that Jane Austen character who announced that if she had learned to play the piano then she would undoubtedly have been rather good at it. Well, if this was the way Domenica wanted it to be, then she would not flinch from the prospect. If there was to be a direct battle for the attentions of Angus, then she, Antonia, had an advantage that no amount of clever verbal play on Domenica’s part would be able to deal with: she was younger than her. That brute fact gave her an inestimable advantage; she was younger, and any man was bound to be more interested in a younger women – that was how men were. They might pretend it to be otherwise, but such claims would ultimately always be shown to be hollow; Angus would be no exception.

  They continued with their drive until at last they saw the small hill town of Sant’ Angelo in Colle rise up from the plains. They were still some distance away when they saw it, and it was faded and attenuated in hazy outline, almost unreal, like a backdrop painted by an artist whose palette runs only to gentle shades of blue.

  ‘That’s where we’re going,’ said Domenica. ‘See? Over there.’

  Antonia and Angus were silent. The sight of such beauty can make us quiet with fear; fear that it might not be real, fear that it might be taken from us, as is everything that we love, that is only on loan to us.

  66. Pacta Sunt Servanda

  The return of Irene proved to be a low-key affair. On the day of her repatriation, Stuart took Bertie to school on the 23 bus and assured him that his mother would be there to collect him at the end of the school day. And indeed she was – as Bertie made his way to the school gate he saw Irene talking in an animated way to a small knot of raptly attentive parents, describing to them, he imagined, her remarkable ordeal.

  ‘There’s your mother, Bertie,’ said Olive as they approached the gate. ‘Nobody thought they’d see her again, but she’s back. My dad says it’s a great pity.’

  Bertie frowned. ‘What’s a great pity?’

  ‘That your mum was taken away in a container,’ said Olive. ‘Or I think that was what he meant. Of course he might have meant
that it’s a pity she’s come back. I’ve got no way of telling. But that’s what he said.’

  They returned to the flat on the bus.

  ‘I was worried about you, Mummy,’ said Bertie.

  ‘Of course you were,’ said Irene. ‘But we must put these little things behind us. I am, if anything, strengthened by the experience, Bertie. To be taken to Hungary in a container is but a small thing, Bertie. And I hear from Daddy that you were extremely brave about it all. As was Ulysses, I gather.’

  Bertie said nothing. He did not think it would help to tell his mother how cheerful Ulysses had been during her absence; how he had refrained from being sick and how his appetite had improved. Life, he realised, would return to normal, which it did almost immediately. Yet not everything was unchanged by Irene’s unfortunate experience; while Irene was away, Bertie had been comforted by his father, who had promised him that as soon the crisis was over and Irene was restored, he would take his son fishing in the Pentlands. It was a long overdue promise, and Bertie was not going to forget it quickly. A few days after Irene’s return, Bertie raised the topic with Stuart, reminding him of his undertaking.

  ‘You promised,’ he said. ‘And you have to keep your promises, you know. Pacta sunt servanda, Daddy.’

  Stuart looked at Bertie in unconcealed astonishment. ‘Where did you get that from, Bertie?’

  ‘It’s Latin,’ he said. ‘It means that you should keep your promises. I read it somewhere.’

  ‘Well, of course I shall.’

  Bertie pressed home. ‘When?’

  Stuart thought. He was still on compassionate leave, and in his view Bertie was entitled to a few days’ leave too. ‘Tomorrow,’ he said.

  Bertie’s eyes widened. ‘But tomorrow’s a school day, Daddy. I have to …’

  Stuart smiled. ‘That’s perfectly all right, Bertie. You can have the day off.’

  Bertie’s jaw dropped. ‘Just like that?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Stuart. ‘Just like that. You’ve had a very difficult time, with Mummy being away.’

  Bertie looked thoughtful. Yes, it had been difficult in that he had felt anxious and concerned, but in other respects … He did not like to admit it, of course, but it had been, in some respects, glorious. No yoga. No Italian. No psychotherapy.

  ‘So,’ Stuart continued, ‘we’ll go fishing in one of those lochs in the Pentlands.’

  ‘But won’t I get into trouble?’ asked Bertie.

  ‘No. Not at all. I’m your father, Bertie, and I take the view that you are quite sufficiently educationally advanced to take the occasional day off school. After all, there you were quoting Latin expressions to me – pacta sunt something or other – what exactly was it, Bertie?’

  ‘Pacta sunt servanda,’ said Bertie. ‘I read all about it, Daddy. It’s a principle of international law. It means that you must keep your word.’ He thought of Tofu. Tofu needed to have this rule explained to him. And Olive too. And Hiawatha, who had recently promised Bertie to give him a packet of crisps in exchange for a peanut-butter sandwich and had then reneged on the agreement on the grounds that he had been crossing his fingers at the time.

  Stuart nodded.

  ‘What is international law, Daddy?’ asked Bertie.

  Stuart raised an eyebrow. ‘It is, I believe, the system of rules that countries have to obey.’

  Bertie thought of this. ‘And do they?’ he asked.

  ‘When it suits them,’ said Stuart. ‘Otherwise no. Otherwise they say that the rules are all a bit vague.’

  ‘I see,’ said Bertie. He was now thinking about fishing. ‘Where will we go?’

  ‘We’ll try one of those lochs up there,’ said Stuart, pointing vaguely in the direction of the Pentlands. ‘I can borrow a couple of rods from somebody round the corner. I know a man who’s got all the necessary stuff, Bertie.’

  Bertie moved from foot to foot with excitement and pleasure. ‘And can we have sandwiches, Daddy?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Stuart. ‘We’ll take sandwiches. And I’ll buy some crisps from that garage opposite the ski slope. They have lots of crisps there, Bertie.’

  Bertie closed his eyes in sheer pleasure at the thought. And when he opened them, there was his mother, who had been in the kitchen when this conversation with his father had begun.

  ‘What’s all this, Stuart?’ Irene asked. ‘What’s this about crisps?’

  Stuart swallowed hard. Bertie noticed this, and looked away.

  ‘Bertie and I …’ Stuart faltered. Bertie felt his heart miss a beat within him.

  Irene kept her eyes on Stuart. ‘Yes?’

  ‘We’re going fishing, Mummy,’ Bertie blurted out. ‘We’re going fishing in one of those lochs in the Pentlands. Daddy’s going to get some crisps so that we can eat them while we’re …’ Now he, too, faltered. But he plucked up his courage. ‘Tomorrow.’

  ‘Tomorrow?’ said Irene. ‘But tomorrow’s a school day, Stuart. Bertie can’t …’

  Stuart closed his eyes. ‘Decision taken!’ he said firmly. ‘No school for Bertie tomorrow. Fishing. All decided!’

  Bertie looked at his father in sheer admiration. Then he looked at his mother. Her eyes were narrowed.

  ‘Stuart,’ she said quietly. ‘A little word with you in the kitchen, if you don’t mind.’

  Bertie held his breath.

  ‘No need,’ said Stuart breezily. ‘It’s all settled. I’ve told Bertie it’s all fixed up. End of story.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Bertie. ‘Pacta sunt servanda, Mummy.’

  Two against one, thought Bertie. Two against one. No, three, if you counted Ulysses.

  67. An Outing Begins

  They drove out of town in the Pollocks’ old Volvo, the same Volvo that had been so often mislaid and on one occasion had even been left in Glasgow by mistake. Or not quite the same, perhaps: a Volvo had been left in Glasgow and one had been returned to Edinburgh at the instance of the late Lard O’Connor (RIP), but while the car that Stuart had thoughtlessly left in Glasgow had five gears, the vehicle that had been returned to Edinburgh had only four. Stuart had felt uneasy about this, but had left the matter where it lay; a gear either way made no real difference in this life, he felt; most people got by with four, and only the self-indulgent or indeed the unashamedly selfish would insist on five. Bertie, however, remarked on the difference; this was not really their car, he thought, but again expedience triumphed and he made no further mention of his suspicions.

  Now, sitting beside his father, strapped into the passenger seat, he watched the well-set Edinburgh landscape go past. As they reached Holy Corner, he pointed to the Episcopal church where the First Morningside Cub Scout Troop met weekly under the watchful eye of their Akela, Mrs Rosemary Gold.

  ‘That’s cub headquarters,’ he said to his father. ‘We have so much fun.’

  ‘I’m sure you do, Bertie,’ said Stuart. ‘I had fun when I was in the scouts.’ He paused. ‘A long time ago now.’

  Bertie looked at his father with admiration. ‘You were a scout, Daddy?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Stuart. ‘I was, as it happens.’

  ‘And did you go camping with the other boys and girls?’ asked Bertie. He wanted his father to answer yes; he wanted his father to have had camping experience, as it meant that it was possible – just possible – that he might take him camping one day. Just the two of them.

  Stuart shook his head. ‘I went camping, but it was just boys,’ he said. ‘Not boys and girls in those days, Bertie.’

  Bertie turned in his seat and stared at his father with wide, solemn eyes. ‘You mean … you mean that there were no girls?’

  Stuart nodded. ‘The scouts were for boys, Bertie. Girls had brownies and guides. That was the way things were.’

  Bertie was silent for a few moments. In those days, then, Olive would not have been allowed to be a cub; she would have had to go to brownies. He closed his eyes and imagined cub scouts without Olive; it would be wonderful, he thought.

  ‘Why did th
ey start letting girls join cub scouts?’ he asked. ‘Especially since boys aren’t allowed to join the brownies?’

  Stuart looked thoughtful. No boy in his right mind would want to be a brownie, he thought, but he could not say that, not these days. ‘Perhaps they thought that it would be better for boys to have girls in the cub scouts, Bertie.’

  ‘It isn’t,’ said Bertie quickly.

  Stuart smiled. ‘Come now, Bertie. Girls just like to have fun, same as boys.’

  ‘Are you sure, Daddy?’ said Bertie, thinking of Olive and Pansy. ‘I think there are some girls who want to stop boys having fun.’

  Stuart swallowed; he could name one, and fairly close to home, too. ‘Oh, I don’t know, Bertie. Maybe you’ll look at things differently when you’re a bit older.’

  ‘When I’m seven?’ asked Bertie.

  ‘Well, possibly.’

  Bertie tried to imagine what the world would look like when he was seven, but his mind wandered. They were now going past the Braid Hills Hotel and the Pentlands were beginning to rise up on the horizon. He saw the ski slope at Hillend and the brooding summit behind it; he saw the line of green hills marching off to the west. In a few minutes they would be out of the city and in a hinterland of small glens and hidden lochs; in a few minutes, although he could hardly believe it, they would be catching fish.

  They stopped, as Stuart had promised, at the petrol station at Hillend. While Stuart filled the tank, Bertie was allowed to wander about the shop, looking at the chocolates, sweets, and racks of potato crisps that tempted the visitor. He chose two packets – one ready salted and one flavoured with tomato sauce. ‘A good choice, Bertie,’ said Stuart, as he came in to pay for the petrol. ‘And how about some chocolate?’