The Lost Art of Gratitude

The next letter was from the printers of the Review—a technical enquiry about the quality of paper. They had bought a supply of superior Finnish paper, they revealed, and would keep some of this for Isabel if she wished; a sample was enclosed. The offer reminded her of her obliging butcher, who from time to time would pull something out from under the counter and say that he had been keeping it for her; some delicious cut that he thought she would particularly appreciate; small acts of commercial friendship binding together customer and provider. She looked at the paper and held it up to the light. She rubbed it between her fingers, and thought of where it had come from, somewhere in those wide forests where … where the ports have names for the sea. The line of Auden came to her, and made her think of how typographical errors may lend a certain beauty to a line; Auden had written of sea-naming poets, in Iceland rather than Finland, but poets had been misread as ports. That was a creative misunderstanding, she considered, and it made the thought behind the line much better, much richer, as some of our mistakes will do.

Isabel had put the electricity bill to one side—not the same thing as paying it, she said to herself. The admission made her reach for the cheque book kept in the top drawer of her desk and write out a cheque for the requisite sum—an estimate, she noticed, based on what the electricity authorities had deemed a household such as hers likely to have used. That was not the same thing as what she had actually used; parsimony might have overcome her, for all they knew. Or its opposite might apply: she might have taken to growing cannabis and consumed those massive quantities of power that cannabis growers use to force their crop. It happened, she knew, but not in Edinburgh, not in this tree-lined street … which would be perfect cover, she realised, for just such a thing, or for a counterfeit currency operation, or for anything, really. And how the newspapers would revel in the unveiling of something like that in the very home of the Review of Applied Ethics. Perfect villains have to live somewhere, and even the most innocent-looking suburb can conceal its surprises. But they were so quiet and considerate, said one of the neighbours; who would have guessed that he had been a dictator?

She slipped the cheque into an envelope and put it to the side. Not the same as posting it, she thought; and put on a stamp. Now the next letter: a rather bland-looking envelope with her name written on a label that had then been stuck on. Miss Isabel Dalhousie, Editor, The Review of Applied Ethics. There were several things about this that made her pause. Firstly, she was addressed as Miss, which now had a dated sound to it in a professional context; most people who wrote to her in her editorial role called her Ms., or, if they knew, Dr., which she had never really got used to. The problem with Dr. was that it made her think of Dr. Dalhousie, her father’s brother. He had been such a large Dr. Dalhousie, such a suitable and entirely proper Dr. Dalhousie—a country doctor in East Lothian, breezy, much loved, avuncular to his patients—that it seemed to her there could not be another one. This correspondent, though, had chosen Miss, which might be a statement, an attempt to put her in her place. And then there was the emphasis with which the word Editor had been written, with heavy down-strokes of the pen, again suggesting some sort of hinterland of meaning—a sneer perhaps. Or was she imagining things?

Isabel thought for a moment of how somebody who was truly paranoid would view the morning’s mail—looking for signs on each envelope of possible slight or of a message beyond the clear meaning of the words. Ridiculous; absurd … But when she opened the envelope she immediately saw the letter-head: Professor Christopher Dove, Chair, Western Thought. She gasped. How could anybody, even a man like Dove, claim to chair Western Thought? She read on; the address of Western Thought was given, and then its telephone number, as if so great an intellectual movement should establish that it was always at hand, contactable by those who needed, by telephone or post, the reassurance of the Western philosophical tradition.