Alexander McCall Smith: Corduroy Mansions

James looked at her in astonishment. ‘You never said anything about an interview.’

Had it been an interview? She did not think so. ‘Actually, it wasn’t an interview - it was a lunch. Lunch with Tim Something, the photographer.’

James looked confused. ‘What’s he got to do with a job?’

‘He offered me one,’ said Caroline. ‘He’s expanding his photography business and he wants me to join him.’

She could tell at once that James was concerned. ‘You? A photographer? ’ But it was not her going to work for a photographer that worried him, she felt - it was the fact that the photographer was Tim Something. James was jealous.

She realised very suddenly that she had to say something; she could pretend no longer. ‘James, listen, I think we should be honest with ourselves. I like you an awful lot - you know that - but I really don’t think it’s going to work between us. We can still go to Paris. But it’s not going to work, is it?’

For a moment he said nothing, but stood quite still, holding his champagne glass in his right hand. The silence was such that she could hear the tiny bubbles of the wine bursting - an almost inaudible crackling sound. Then he looked at her, and his look was full of tenderness. ‘No, you’re right. It won’t. And I’ve been meaning to tell you something. I’ve met somebody else. Somebody . . . well, somebody who makes more sense for me - for the way I am.’

She felt immediate relief, mixed with pleasure for him. She wanted James to be happy.

‘What’s his name?’ she asked.

It was a misjudged question. ‘It’s a she, actually. Her name is Annette.’

Caroline looked into her glass. She could have forgiven him had it been Adam or Andrew, but not Annette. And why, she thought, should another woman get him? If any woman was going to get him, then it would be her. She was clear about that.

She would get him back. She was not going to take this lying down.

While this yo-yo of an encounter between Caroline and James was taking place in Corduroy Mansions, in the kitchen of the house owned by Terence Moongrove, mystic and seeker after understanding, a dinner was being prepared by Berthea Snark. Terence was giving his sister a certain degree of assistance, but not much, as he had already performed several of the tasks assigned to him incorrectly, with the result that they had had to be redone.

‘We don’t normally cut our potatoes into squares,’ said Berthea as she contemplated the results of his attempt to prepare roast potatoes. ‘Especially such tiny squares.’

‘Oh, I don’t know, Berthy,’ said Terence. ‘I really don’t think I’m much of cook. I know that a man should be able to cook these days; I know that. But even if I can’t cook, there are lots of other things I can do jolly well.’

Such as? thought Berthea. She could not think of a single thing at which poor Terence excelled; even his sacred dance had not been very impressive and at one stage she had seen him going widdershins when he should have been going deasil. That had almost caused the BBC cameraman to be knocked over, which Berthea thought would have been a rather satisfactory development given her unease about his presence in the first place. No, poor Terence really could do very little, if anything, and it would have been surprising had cooking been an exception to the rule.

‘So rather than do anything else the wrong way,’ Terence continued, ‘I’m going to pour us both a little drinkie-poo. How about a martini? That would be such fun.’

Berthea thought this a very good idea. ‘I’ll carry on cooking,’ she said. ‘You bring them through and we’ll have martinis in the kitchen. What a treat.’

Now as it happened, mixing martinis was another thing that Terence did not do very well. The result was two immensely strong gin martinis: tasty - perhaps by accident - but extremely potent.

‘Down the hatch!’ said Terence, raising his glass to his sister.

Berthea reciprocated the sentiment and sampled her martini. ‘Extremely good,’ she said.

‘Thank you,’ said Terence. ‘And when you’ve finished that one, I’ll make you another one - with the other bottle, this time.’

They continued to chat, the conversation becoming pleasantly mellow as they worked their way through their martinis.

‘I saw a crop circle today,’ said Terence. ‘In a field of wheat. A perfect circle. It was jolly exciting. I pointed it out to Monty Bismarck and he saw it too. He said that we should phone the newspaper and get them to take photographs.’

‘How strange,’ said Berthea. ‘Is there any rational explanation for these things? I assume that there is.’

Terence shook his head. ‘They are the product of energy forces of which we have no current inkling,’ he said. ‘Crop circles contain ancient wisdom. Either that, or they’re a warning from another planet. They’re a warning that we need to heed.’

‘What are they warning us about?’ asked Berthea, slurring her words slightly as the martini took effect.

‘This and that,’ said Terence airily.

‘But then why don’t they give the warning in English?’ asked Berthea. ‘Why use circles?’

Terence smiled. ‘Because the beings who make these circles,’ he explained, ‘are not linear. We are linear and our languages are linear. These beings are circular. That’s obvious.’

‘Mmm,’ muttered Berthea, draining her glass. ‘Terence, that martini was divine. Be an angel and get me another. Not too strong, of course. Just like that one. My, how quickly martinis vanish as you get older.’

Terence withdrew and soon returned with another two martinis.

‘Tell me about your book, Berthy,’ he said, his own words beginning to slur in the same way as his sister’s. ‘Your unauthorised biography of Oedipus. How’s it going? Have you had lots of interesting information from the chaps he knew at school?’

‘Bags and bags,’ said Berthea. ‘They didn’t like him, you know. They threw him into a pond once. Just as a joke, of course.’

‘He was such a horrible boy,’ mused Terence. ‘I often thought that I should throw him into something or other. I just didn’t get round to it.’

He looked slightly guilty after this remark, but then he saw that Berthea did not appear to have taken offence.

‘Oh, I thought that too,’ she said. ‘You know, as an analyst I should be prepared to reveal my inmost thoughts but I’ve never really discussed with anybody else these feelings I have about my own son.’

‘Negative feelings?’ asked Terence.

‘Very negative. In fact . . .’ she paused, and took another sip of her martini, ‘once or twice I’ve been visited by dreams in which I have done something terrible to him.’

Terence’s eyes widened. ‘What fun!’ he said. ‘Not that I think we should actually do this, not in real life, but it would be such fun to electrocute him. In the same way in which I jolly nearly electrocuted myself. We could invite him to come down for the weekend and he could sleep in that old brass bed in the spare room on the first floor - you know, the one that Uncle Edgar used. Oedipus could sleep in that and we could tie an electric wire to the frame. Then, when he was asleep, we could turn the switch on.’

Berthea drained her second martini. ‘Wishful thinking,’ she said.

‘Or here’s another idea,’ said Terence. ‘You know that lightning conductor on the roof? It has that funny flat wire that goes down the side. Mr Marchbanks told me that it was copper. Anyway, it goes past the window of the spare room, and so we could pass a wire from the conductor and connect it to the bed. When lightning comes, bang! It would go down that copper wire and into the room and give Oedipus a jolly big shock. But they couldn’t send us to prison because it would have been death by lightning and that’s an act of God, isn’t it?’