Alexander Mccall Smith - Isabel Dalhousie 05 Read Free

this pass. And she had been right; he
was
condescending. “I just don’t agree with that,” she said. “Not in the slightest. Most people are reasonably happy. They may not be ecstatic over their lot, but they’re happy enough to carry on. Look at us in this room tonight. Do you think most people here are unhappy?”
    She looked around the table. The dinner party was in full swing and the noise level had risen as a series of animated conversations got under way. There was laughter, candlelight, and the glint of silver.
    The doctor followed her gaze. Then he turned to her, his head inclined to allow for a discreet aside, although there was no danger of being overheard amidst the general hubbub. “Happy?” he said. “Do you really think so? If I look round this table, I can identify three cases of extreme unhappiness. Yes. Three.”
    Isabel said nothing, and the doctor continued: “That man at the end of the table there is married to that woman over there. I take it that you don’t know them? Well, he’s having an affair with some younger woman down in London. His wife is furious and, naturally enough, very unhappy about it. He’s unhappy because he can’t go to London and live with his mistress because he has a business up here in Scotland. And a family. Bleak, I’d say.
    â€œAnd then,” he went on, “that poor woman on the other side of Colin…”
    Isabel glanced anxiously to her right. It occurred to her that the doctor had drunk too much wine and become disinhibited.
    â€œNo, don’t worry,” the doctor said. “Nobody can hear. She’s called Stella Moncrieff. And you may have noticed that she’s here by herself. She has a husband, though; they live in one of the flats down below. And right at this moment, I imagine, her husband is sitting down there by himself, thinking of what’s going on a few floors up.”
    â€œWhy isn’t—”
    â€œWhy isn’t he here?” the doctor interrupted. “It’s shame. She goes out by herself. He’s too ashamed to go anywhere. Nobody sees him anymore. Never shows up at the golf club—he used to play off a handicap of four. Never goes to the theatre, opera, what have you—nowhere. And all because the poor man’s ashamed of what he’s accused of doing.” He paused and reached for his glass. “Although I, for one, take the view that he’s entirely innocent. He didn’t do it. But that doesn’t make things any better.”
    Isabel was about to ask what it was that he had done when the conversation suddenly shifted. Colin, who had been busy with his neighbour, turned to Isabel and asked her about the journal she edited. “Do many people read it?” he asked.
    Pride made Isabel want to say that they did, but truthfulness intervened. “Not many,” she said. “In fact, sometimes we publish papers that I suspect next to nobody reads.”
    â€œThen why publish them?” asked the doctor.
    Isabel turned to him. “A simple utilitarian reason,” she said evenly. “Because it adds to happiness. In a very small way, but it does.” She paused. “And then, there are some conversations that may have very few participants, but which are worth having anyway.”
    The doctor stared at her for a moment, and then looked down at his plate. On the other side of the table, Jamie caught Isabel’s eye; his look flashed her a message, but she could not make out what it was. It might have been
Help,
but then it might equally have been
What are we doing here?
Of one thing, though, she was certain: it was not
I’m enjoying myself.
    The doctor, looking up, witnessed the exchange, and threw a quick glance at Isabel.
    â€œThat’s Jamie,” whispered Isabel. “He’s here with me. And I can assure you that if he’s unhappy it’s a purely temporary condition.”

CHAPTER TWO

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