“And I thought just the same,” said Bruce. “I thought, there’s only one Julia D. in Howe Street that I want to see again, and here you are, it’s you!”
He leaned forward and planted a kiss on her cheek. “Long time no kiss,” he said. “And here’s another one.”
“Brucie! You haven’t changed!”
“Why should I? No point changing when you’ve got things just right, is there?” He paused. “But you’ve changed, Julia.”
A shadow passed over her face. “Oh? Have I?”
Bruce smiled. “You’ve become more beautiful. More ravishing.”
“Brucie!”
“No, I mean it. I really do. Look at you!”
38
An Old Flame Flickers: as Well It May Julia led him into the living room. “I go to the gym, every day. Every single day.”
“And it shows.”
“Thank you. What about you? Do you still play rugby?”
Bruce did not. “Now and then. Not much really. Too busy.”
Julia nodded. “I know what it’s like. I almost got a job the other day, but I found I couldn’t. I was just far too busy.”
He looked about the living room. A large sofa, piled with cushions, dominated one wall. Opposite it was an ornate, gold-framed mirror above a large marble chimney piece. Bruce noticed, too, the expensive glass table piled with fashion magazines.
“You’re quite a reader,” he said, gesturing to the copies of Vogue and Harper’s.
Julia seemed pleased with the compliment. “I like to keep my mind active. I’ve always liked to read.”
Bruce, who had seated himself on the sofa, reached forward and flicked through one of the magazines. “No!” he said. “Would you believe it? I knew these people in London. That girl there, in the black dress, I met her at a party in Chelsea. And that’s her brother there. The tall one. Terribly dim, but a good chap once he’s had a drink or two.”
Julia joined him on the sofa. “I can’t wait to get to London,”
she said. “That’s why I’m selling this place. One of Daddy’s friends has arranged for me to work with a woman who cooks directors’ lunches in the city. You know, they make lunches for the boardroom. And they cater for dinner parties. Party planners, sort of.”
Bruce turned a page of the magazine. There was an advertisement for perfume, with a flap down the side of the page. He ripped open the flap and sniffed at the page. “Great,” he said.
“That’s the stuff. It really is. Sexy, or what?”
Julia took the magazine from him and sniffed. “Mmm. Spicy.
It reminds me of Mauritius.”
“Yes,” said Bruce. “Mauritius.”
An Old Flame Flickers: as Well It May 39
He laid the magazine back on the pile and turned to Julia.
“So. London.”
“Yes,” she said. “London.”
“When?” asked Bruce.
“Oh, I don’t know. After I sell this place. Or before. I don’t know.”
Bruce looked thoughtful. “Great place, London,” he said.
“But I’m pretty glad to be back in Edinburgh, you know. It’s great here too. And not so crowded.”
“No,” said Julia. “I’ve enjoyed myself here.”
“The important thing,” said Bruce, “is not to burn your boats.
Never make a decision in a rush.”
He rose to his feet, rubbing his hands together. “You going to show me around?”
Julia laughed. “Of course. I forgot. Where shall we start?”
“The kitchen,” said Bruce. “You’ve got a kitchen?”
Julia reached out and punched him playfully on the arm.
“Cheeky! It’s a great kitchen, actually. All the stuff. Marble tops.
Built-in wine racks. Everything.”
They moved through to the kitchen. Bruce ran his fingers over the marble surfaces. “Smooth,” he said. He looked at Julia.
“Are you hungry? Seeing the kitchen makes me realise that I haven’t had lunch. You had lunch?”
Julia had not, and Bruce offered to cook it for her, in her kitchen. “You’ve got pasta?” he asked. “And some butter?
Parmesan, yes? Well, we’re in business.”
“This is fun,” said Julia.
Bruce winked at her. “Better than selling a flat?”
Julia giggled. “Much better.”
Bruce found a bottle of white wine in the fridge and opened it. He poured Julia a glass and they toasted one another as Bruce cut a piece of cheese off the block of Parmesan.
“I went to the place where they make this stuff,” he said, breaking off a fragment of the cheese and passing it to Julia.
“Reggio Emilia. Near Parma. That’s where they make it. I knew an Italian girl. They lived in Bologna, but her father had some 40
An Old Flame Flickers: as Well It May sort of farm there. Big place, with white oxen. And this great villa.”
Had Bruce been paying attention to Julia’s expression, he would have noticed the trace of a frown. But she recovered quickly. “An Italian girlfriend? Very exotic.”
Bruce looked at her from the corner of his eye. He appeared to be concentrating on slipping the pasta into the water, but he was watching her.
“No more Italian girlfriends for me,” he said. “I’ve had enough of all that. It’s settle-down time now. Comes to us all.”
He watched her response. She had picked up her glass and was gazing at the rim. But he could tell.
“You? Settle down?” She forced a smile, but there was a real point to her question.
“I’m serious,” he said. “I want a bit of quiet. I want a bit of domesticity. You know . . . going out for dinner, coming back and putting one’s feet up on the sofa with a . . . with a friend.
Lazy weekends.” He paused. “Long lie-ins on a Sunday. Then brunch somewhere. Some jazz. The Sunday papers.”
Julia had closed her eyes, just momentarily, but she had closed them. It’s working, thought Bruce: she’s imagining what it would be like. And there’s no reason for me to feel bad, because it really would be like that. That’s exactly what we could do in this place. It’s ideal. And the other great attrac-tion of it all was that the need to find a job would be less urgent. Julia, as everybody in Edinburgh knew, was not impe-cunious. An indulgent father, the owner of three large hotels and a slice of a peninsula in Argyll, made sure that his daughter wanted for nothing. It was surprising, thought Bruce, that she had not been snapped up by some fortune hunter. If she went to London, there would be a real danger of that happening. And that was why he was doing her a good turn. That’s what it was: an act of pure selflessness – considerate and sympathetic, pure altruism.
13. Matthew Gets Ideas from a Blank Canvas After he had finished his cup of coffee at Big Lou’s, Matthew made his way back across Dundas Street to the gallery. It was always a bit of a wrench leaving Big Lou: he felt she was the most relaxing, easy company, rather like a mother, he thought –
if one had the right sort of mother. Or an aunt perhaps, the sort of person with whom one could just pass time without the need to say anything. Not that Matthew had ever had an aunt like that, although he did have vague childhood memories of an aunt of his father’s who lived with them for a time and who worked all day, and every day, at tapestry. Matthew’s father had told him an amusing story about this aunt’s older brother, a man who suffered from a mild mental handicap and who had been taken in by Matthew’s grandfather. Uncle Jimmy had been a kind man, Matthew’s father said, and although there was little other contribution he could make to the household, he had been adept at fixing clocks.
“During the war, Jimmy had been largely uninterested in what was going on,” Matthew’s father had said. “But he was in great demand as a fixer of clocks, and his war service consisted of repairing the clocks of naval vessels that came into the Clyde.