Espresso Tales (3 page)

4. On the Way Back to Scotland Street

Pat left the Canny Man's and walked back up Morningside Road. She was accompanied, as far as Church Hill Place, by her father, who said goodbye to her and turned off for home, elated by the news she had given him. She toyed with the idea of a bus, but it was a fine, late August afternoon and she decided to walk all the way back to Scotland Street. She was in no hurry to be anywhere. In fact it occurred to her that between then–Saturday afternoon–and the coming Monday morning, when she was due at the gallery, it made no difference at all where she was. She had nothing planned. She was free.

It was the final week of the Festival, and of its burgeoning, undisciplined child, the Festival Fringe. In a corner of the Meadows, under the shadow of the University Library, a large tent had been pitched, hosting an itinerant Polish circus, the Great Circus of Krakow. A matinée performance was in progress and she heard a burst of applause from within the tent, and then laughter. As the laughter died down, a small brass band inside the tent struck up, playing at the frenzied pace that circus music seemed to like, a breathless, hurried march that accompanied what feats within? A troop of performing dogs? No longer allowed, she thought; frowned upon by protesters who had successfully lobbied the Council, although everybody knew that the one thing which dogs liked to do was to perform. Was it demeaning to dogs to be made to jump through hoops and stand on their hind legs and push prams? Making a lion jump through a hoop was one thing–that was undoubtedly cruel–but could the objectors not see the distinction between a dog and a lion? Dogs are in on our human silliness; lions are not.

She paused, standing underneath a tree, watching the sides of the circus tent move slightly in the breeze. To its side stood a row of large motor caravans and a small catering van. A door suddenly opened in the side of one of the vans and a man tumbled out, as if pushed from within. Or so it seemed to Pat, who saw him fall, as if to regain his balance, and then convert the fall into the most extraordinary gymnastic display. He rolled forward, somersaulted, stood on his hands, his legs pointed skywards, and then flipped over onto his feet. The entire manoeuvre took less than a couple of seconds, and there he was, standing only a few yards away from her, facing her. He seemed as surprised to see her as she was him, and for a moment they stared at one another, speechless. She saw that he was wearing what must have been his performing outfit–a body-hugging stocking that covered him, shoulder to toe, in a glittery, red material.

He smiled at her and she saw that he had perfectly regular teeth, polished high white. She was struck by this smile, and would have been less so had he opened his mouth to a vista of dental disaster. Somehow that was what one expected of the circus; external glitter, but decay and pain within.

The performer took a few steps back, still looking at Pat and holding her gaze. Then, reaching behind him, but still facing her, he opened the door in the van which had slammed shut behind his undignified exit.

“Please?” he said to her. “Coffee? Or maybe a glass of wine?”

He gestured to the interior, which was lit, but only faintly. Pat made out a table and a rail of bright outfits similar to the one he was wearing. At the side of the table were a pair of high-heel boots and a small side-drum.

He repeated his offer, bowing as he did so, the spandex outfit spreading obligingly to accommodate the rippling of muscles which the manoeuvre involved.

Pat hesitated. He had recovered from his bow and was standing straight, but was slightly shorter than she was, and she noticed that he now raised himself on his toes for the extra height, effortlessly, as might a ballet dancer, but spotted by her, and it was this that broke the sudden hypnotic spell which had fallen upon her.

She laughed. “No thank you,” she said, realising that the addition of the thank-you marked her out for what she was–and her Edinburgh origins.

He took her refusal in good spirit. “God be with you,” he said, and jumped back into the van. The door closed, and the moment was lost. Pat thought, as she walked away: I shall never be invited again into the living quarters of a Polish circus performer, and she laughed at the idea. Had she gone, then her life might have been different. She might have gone off with the circus, and married him in a dark church in Krakow, and borne the children of the gymnast, tiny, lithe children who would have been taught to leap from her lap and turn somersaults in the bath. And what was more, she thought: I might have become a Catholic.

It took her forty minutes to reach Scotland Street, as there were other Fringe performers to watch as she made her way down the hill. On the steps behind the National Gallery, she stopped for a moment while a group of students enacted a scene from
Macbeth
, a taster of their show that evening. There was an element of desperation in their performance, which suggested that they were at the end of an unrewarding stint on the Fringe. Lady Macbeth upbraided her husband, a tall young man with the residue of teenage acne about his chin. Pat watched for a few minutes, trapped in a small audience. But then her chance to leave came: she had spotted Domenica Macdonald, her neighbour from across the landing at Scotland Street, and she could slip away to join her. Domenica was on the edge of a growing crowd that was surrounding a man dressed as Punchinello and who was about to swallow a sword. The performer held the sword above his upturned mouth and it glinted in the afternoon sunlight.

“Domenica,” she whispered. “Is he really going to do that?”

Domenica turned and smiled warmly. “How nice to see you,” she said.

“I have always loved a spectacle, and there are spectacles galore at the moment. Of course he's going to swallow it. And then we shall all applaud. We are very vulgar at heart, you know. We love this sort of thing. All of us. We can't resist it. Behind us in the gallery are all the treasures of Western art, as assembled for us by Sir Timothy Clifford, and we choose instead to watch a man swallowing a sword. Isn't that peculiar?”

Pat nodded. It was very peculiar; of course it was; she began to say this, and then she stopped. Wasn't that Sir Timothy Clifford himself, on the other side of the crowd, watching the sword swallower? She nudged Domenica, who looked in the direction in which Pat was pointing, and inclined her head in affirmation.

“He appreciates a bit of a spectacle,” Domenica said. “And why not? He's put on such wonderful shows in the gallery. Besides, art is theatre, is it not–and theatre art?”

5. All Downhill from Here

The sword was swallowed, and regurgitated, as had been expected. There were gasps, and then applause. Many of those present expressed the view that they would not like to try that–no thank you!–and Sir Timothy was heard to mutter something about Titian before he retreated into his gallery. Domenica, who had seen considerably more entertaining spectacles during her time in India, turned to Pat and said: “Such feats, without a religious dimension, are less impressive, I feel, than those that allude to the sacred. What's the point of swallowing a sword if one gives the process no spiritual significance?”

Pat was puzzled by this remark, and as they crossed Princes Street to begin the walk back down the hill, she asked Domenica to explain.

“In India, we used to see such things from time to time,” Domenica said. “We lived in Kerala, in the Christian south, but Hindu holy men used to pop down from time to time to remind us of the old gods. Some of these were fakirs, who would walk across beds of hot coals or swallow fire, or whatever. They did this to show that spirituality could conquer the body–could overcome the material world. And you could offer the whole thing up to the glory of the gods, which gave it a religious point. But our sword swallower on the Mound won't have any of that in mind, I'm afraid. Mere spectacle.”

Pat felt that she could add little to this. She had never been to India, and she knew nothing about Hinduism, or indeed about many of the other topics on which Domenica seemed to have a view. And yet she was open-minded enough to know that she did not know, and she was a listener. That was her gift.

The streets were crowded with Festival visitors, and their progress down Dundas Street was slow, interrupted by knots of people standing in the middle of the pavement, some, their eyes glazed, in a state of cultural indigestion, some consulting maps and programmes. Domenica gave directions to a puzzled Japanese couple and bowed politely at the end of her explanation, setting off a sequence of further bows and inclinations of the head.

“They find us so rude, in general,” she said. “A few bows here and there serve to redress matters.” She paused for a moment. “And we smell a little rancid to them, you know. They are so hygienic, with their steam baths and so on. However much we wash it seems we have this slight smell, I understand, even Edinburgh people, would you believe? Heaven knows what they think of those parts of the country where they aren't too attentive to bathing requirements.”

Pat smiled. This was vintage Domenica. Nobody else of her acquaintance would speak like this, and she found it curiously refreshing. Her own generation was too timid–beaten into compliance with a set of imposed views.

She looked about her, almost furtively. “And which parts would those be?” she asked.

Domenica waved a hand in the air. “Oh, there are various parts of the country where people haven't washed a great deal. Probably because they didn't have enough taps and baths in the houses. It's all very well for the middle classes to go on about cleanliness, but people used to have a terrible battle.

“Mind you, I had an aunt who was an officer in the Wrens during the war. She used to tell me that some of the recruits were charming, just charming, but she could never get them to wash. She had to force them into the showers. But I suspect that she was exaggerating. She had a slight tendency to egg things up a bit.

“That aunt had wonderful stories, you know. When they sent her off to officer training school in 1940 she was in a batch of twenty women. They all slept in those long Nissen huts–you can still see some of them standing if you go up to Cultybraggen, near Comrie. Well, there they all were, all thrown together. And my aunt, who was from Argyll, was thrown in with people from all over the shop. The woman in the bed next to hers was terribly grand–her uncle was an admiral or something like that–and when she joined up she brought her lady's maid. Would you believe that? It sounds absolutely astonishing today, but that's what she did–and the Navy allowed it! The maid enlisted at the same time and was given a bed at the end of the hut. She cleaned her mistress's equipment, polished her shoes, made her bed, and all the rest. It was an absolute scream, but apparently nobody batted an eyelid. It was a different country then, you know.

“And apparently this grand person drank. Every night after lights were turned out in the hut, my aunt heard a bit of fiddling about in the next bed and then she heard ‘glug, glug…' as she downed the gin. Every night! But there was a war on, I suppose, and people had to get by as best they could. Which they did, you know. They did just that and they very rarely complained. Can you imagine how we'd behave today if we had to knuckle down and deal with another fascist monster on our doorstep? We'd fold up in no time at all. We couldn't do it–we simply couldn't do it.” She paused, and for a moment, just a moment, looked doubtful. “Or am I simply making that great mistake, which everyone of my age makes, I suspect, and which leads us to believe that things have got worse? Are they worse, Pat?”

Pat was glad to be given the chance to answer. “No, they aren't. If you look at it from the perspective of people of my age, things are much better now than they were then. Much better. Think of colonialism. Think of what was done to people at the receiving end of that. You couldn't do that today.”

“That's true,” said Domenica. “But since you mention these values–self-determination, human rights and the rest–my point is this: would we be able to defend them if push came to shove? Those young men who climbed into their Spitfires or whatever back then–many of them were your age, you know. Twenty. Some even younger. They knew the odds. They knew they were going to die. Would the boys you were at school with do the same thing, do you think? Would they do it now? Be honest. What do you think?”

Pat was silent. She was not sure. But then the thought occurred to her: some of the girls would do it. Maybe that was the difference. Yes!

6. Domenica Gets into Top Gear

Deep in conversation on the subject of the defence of values, and courage, Pat and her neighbour, Domenica Macdonald, had now reached the point where Heriot Row becomes Abercromby Place. Domenica glanced at the Open Eye Gallery on the corner; a private viewing was in full swing and for a moment she wondered whether they should drop in and look at the pictures.

“That's Tom Wilson's gallery,” said Pat. “He's been very good to Matthew. He's given him advice and helped him. He's a very nice man. And he can draw, too.”

“Well, that's something,” said Domenica. “Very few artists can. They've stopped teaching people how to draw at the art colleges, with the result that very few of their graduates can represent the world they see about them. They can arrange it, of course–they can install the world–but they can't represent it. At least not in any recognisable form. Do you think Mr Damien Hirst knows how to draw?”

“I have no idea,” said Pat, gazing at the knot of people who had spilled out onto the front steps of the gallery, glasses of wine in their hands. “He may–I don't know. But Tom draws very well. He does portraits of people by drawing the things they have. Bits and pieces that say something about their lives. Letters. Books. A favourite place. Things like that.”

“Very interesting,” said Domenica. “I wonder how my life would be represented? Perhaps by the bed in Scotland Street in which I happened to be born, and in which I propose, in the fullness of time, to die.”

“Or something from India? The house you lived in?”

Domenica thought for a moment. “Too sad. I have a picture of my late husband's electricity factory in Cochin. But I can't bring myself to look at it. I really can't.”

“Do you miss him badly?” asked Pat.

“Not in the slightest,” said Domenica. “I regret the hurt I caused him. And I regret his untimely electrocution–not that any electrocution, I suppose, can be considered timely. But I do feel a certain nostalgia for India itself, particularly for Kerala. For frangipani trees. For the sight of a man washing an elephant in the road. For the sight of a group of little boys sitting in an old Ambassador car, down on its springs, pretending to drive it. For overstated advertisements for hair products in lurid purple and green. For white-washed churches where they set off fireworks on saints' days. Little things like that.” She looked at Pat. “Do you think Tom Wilson would be able to draw those things for me?”

“I'm sure he could,” said Pat. “Ask him. There he is in the doorway. That's him.”

“I can't intrude,” said Domenica. “Perhaps later.”

They crossed the road, having decided that the opening at the gallery was too crowded to allow them a view of the fishing boats and pagodas.

“We can stop over there for coffee,” suggested Domenica, pointing to the café immediately opposite the gallery. “Do you go in there very much? I rather like it.”

Pat explained that she usually frequented Big Lou's coffee house slightly further down the hill. It being a Saturday afternoon, Big Lou's, of course, was closed. And on a Saturday afternoon in the Festival it was very closed, as Big Lou did not approve, in general, of Festival visitors: “Gey pretentious,” Pat had heard her muttering.

“One must stick to what one knows,” observed Domenica. “I shall try Big Lou's one day, but this is highly convenient for me and they have a very good range of olive oils. And as for their staff–well, you'll see what I mean.”

They found a table at the back–the café was very crowded–and Domenica glanced round at the other customers. A woman at a nearby table inclined her head slightly, and the man she was with nodded curtly in her direction.

“That couple over there,” whispered Domenica, returning the greeting. “They're very friendly with that awful woman downstairs, Bertie's mother. I think that they go to the floatarium together, or at least
she
does. I bumped into her on the stair one day and then I overheard their conversation while I was looking for my key–you know how sound travels on that stair. It was exactly what you would expect. Exactly. All about some plan to start an orchestra for five-year-olds. To be called the Edinburgh Junior Symphony. Can you believe it?

“And then, curiously enough, I met him when the two of them went to a talk at Ottakar's Bookshop. Willy Dalrymple had just written a new book about India and was talking about it. It was wonderful stuff, and he told a marvellously funny story about a misunderstanding he had had with an official somewhere in India or Pakistan about the pronunciation of the name of that English cricketer, Mr Botham. The official pronounced this ‘bottom', and this led to difficulties. Terribly funny.”

Domenica stopped, and for a moment there was a silence. Then she leaned forward and whispered to Pat, “I mentioned the staff here. Look at them. Look at this young man who's coming to serve us. Look at him. Doesn't he look like Rupert Brooke? They're all so tall–so willowy. But shh! Here he is.”

Pat felt embarrassed–the young man might so easily have heard what Domenica was saying; not, Pat thought, that Domenica would care too much about that. But she–Pat–did.

The waiter leaned forward to take their order, and Domenica smiled up at him.

“We're probably going to be really rather unadventurous and just order a couple of coffees,” she said. “Although some of those quiches over there look very tempting. Do you make them yourselves?”

The young man smiled. He glanced at Pat. “I don't. I just work here part-time. Someone else makes them in the kitchen back there.”

“You're a student?” asked Domenica brightly. “No, let me guess! You're a student of…No, you defeat me! You're going to have to help me. What are you a student of?”

The young man laughed. “English,” he said.

“I see,” said Domenica. “I should have guessed that. You see, I thought that you bore an uncanny resemblance to Rupert Brooke, the poet. I don't suppose anybody studies him any more. Too light. You've heard of him, of course?”

“Yes,” said the young man. “I've heard of him. I've not read him, though.”

“Well, let me lend you one of his books,” said Domenica quickly. “Come round and have dinner with us some time and I'll give you one. We live just round the corner–Scotland Street. You know it?”

For a moment the young man hesitated. He looked quickly at Pat, who lowered her eyes, and blushed.

“Yes, I know it. I live in Cumberland Street, you see.”

“Perfect!” said Domenica. “Well, if you give me your name, I'll leave a message for you here and we can arrange something. I'll get the book out to give to you.”