The Lost Art of Gratitude

“I would have kept him up for you,” said Jamie, “but he was ready to drop.”

They crept into Charlie’s room together, and she bent down and kissed him gently, imperceptibly, on the side of the head. His hair smelled of baby shampoo, and beside him was his stuffed fox staring up at the ceiling with the patience that only stuffed animals seem capable of. It made her think of Brother Fox, who must be better by now, she thought, unaware of why it was that his wound had stopped aching. That was the best way of doing good, she thought; do it when the person for whom you are doing the deed is under heavy sedation and will never remember. So might one leave presents for others—while they were asleep or otherwise unaware of what you were doing.

They went downstairs. Jamie had prepared an elaborate salad, which they would eat with wild Scottish salmon steaks and boiled new potatoes. She poured a glass of New Zealand white wine for both of them, chilled and dry. Then she told him what had happened that evening.

“That’s the end of that,” he said. “Odd ending, though.”

She found herself agreeing. It had indeed been an odd ending, but it was, she felt, exactly right. “If it had ended any other way I think I would have felt uncomfortable,” she said. “I just would.”

He thought about that, and after a few minutes he agreed. “You have done nothing wrong.”

“In fact, I’ve done virtually nothing,” she said. “Everything happened without my really doing anything. I was a complete pawn in Minty’s hands.”

“I suppose so,” he said. “But then you showed her something at the end.”

“Did I?”

He was quite sure. “I think you did. She may take no notice, but she may have learned something. May have.”

He took the salmon steaks from the fridge and prepared the pan.

“I love you in your apron,” she said, looking across the room at him from her chair at the kitchen table. “Why is it that men look so good in aprons?”

Jamie had no idea. He did not think of himself as looking good; he was without vanity.

“Oh,” he said, remembering something as he dropped the steaks on to the surface of the pan. “Guy Peploe phoned.”

She looked up. “About that portrait?”

Jamie nodded. “He left a message, since he was going to be in London tomorrow and might not be able to speak until he came back. He said his view of that painting has been confirmed. It’s not the lost one. It was done by an Italian, I think he said.”

“By Dupra. I see.” She felt a pang of disappointment. “He told me that was probably the case. I still like it, though. And I’m glad we bought it.”

“Well, there you are,” said Jamie. “I’ve often thought about the value that we give to things that are authentic. Does it matter if something is not made by the person we’d like it to be made by? If a violin plays like a Strad, does it matter if it’s by a lesser maker?”

Isabel was about to answer “Not really,” but then she realised that sometimes it did matter. “It matters if we’re interested in where things come from,” she said. “Maybe it doesn’t matter if it’s just utility we’re bothered about.”

“So if I composed something that sounded like Mozart, would it count for as much as the real thing?”

Isabel smiled. “It would to me,” she said.

He averted his gaze in momentary embarrassment, but soon turned round again and smiled at her. “Thanks,” he said.

Jamie returned to the stove and Isabel crossed over to the kitchen window. She stared out into the garden. A clump of valerian stood along the wall, a curious, light purple plant, a faithful returnee whom she had never had to encourage. It brought sleep, she knew, like the poppy. Baldrian, she thought; Baldrian in German. A German visitor, a professor of philosophy from Frankfurt, had seen it in her garden and called it Baldrian. She had asked why, and he had replied that it was named after a Norse god called Baldur—“so good and so true that the light shone forth from him.” There were people like that, not just gods—but only a tiny handful. How many in Scotland? Ten? Twenty?

Her thoughts returned to the picture and to Guy’s call. Things were not what they seemed to be; sometimes that mattered, while other times it mattered not at all. It was not important that the picture of Bonnie Prince Charlie was not what she had hoped it would be; the prince himself was probably not what so many people had hoped he would be. He was a military failure, he was proud and seemingly rather vain—as the later Stuarts tended to be. Minty was palpably not what she claimed to be; nor was George Finesk; nor Jock Dundas. She should not have taken any of these people at face value; she had been naive. But this conclusion, she realised, pointed unambiguously in the direction of cynicism, and she would not be a cynic. It was better to be naive—much better.