Dreaming Of The Bones

Vic gave him the sideways glance he remembered as she gestured towards one of the chairs she’d pulled up to an ironwork table. “Here, sit down. That’s a bit generous of you. My friend Nathan says the garden’s a disgrace, but I’m not a real gardener. I just like to come out and dig in the dirt on nice days—it’s my alternative to tranquilizers.”

“I seem to remember that you couldn’t keep alive a potted plant. Or cook,” he added as he examined the lunch she’d laid out on the table—cheese, cold salads, olives, wholemeal bread, and a bottle of white wine.

Vic shrugged. “People change. And I still can’t cook,” she said with a flash of a smile, “even if I had the time. But I can shop, and I’ve learned to make the most of that.” She filled their glasses, then raised hers in salute. “Here’s to progress. And old friends.”

Friends? Kincaid thought. They had been lovers, adversaries, flatmates—but never that. Perhaps it was not too late. He lifted his glass and drank. When he had filled his plate and tasted the potato salad, he ventured, “You haven’t told me anything about yourself, about your life. The photos …” He nodded towards the sitting room doors. The man had been thin and bearded, the boy fair and sturdy. He stole a glance at Vic’s left hand, saw the faint pale mark circling her fourth finger.

She looked away as she drank some of her wine, then concentrated on a piece of bread as she buttered it. “I’m Victoria McClellan now. Doctor McClellan. I’m a fellow at All Saints’, and I’m a Faculty teaching officer, specializing in twentieth-century poets. That gives me more time to pursue my own work.”

“Faculty?” Kincaid said a bit vaguely. “Poets?”

“The University English Faculty. You do remember my Ph.D. thesis on the effect of the Great War on English poetry?” Vic said with the first hint of sharpness he’d heard. “The one I was struggling with when we were married?”

Kincaid made an effort to redeem himself. “That’s what you wanted, then. I’m glad for you.” Seeing that Vic still looked annoyed, he blundered on. “But I’d have thought two jobs would have meant more work, not less. You’re saying you work for the University and for your college, right? Wouldn’t you be better off to do one or the other?”

Vic gave him a pitying look. “That’s not the way it works. Being a college fellow is a bit like indentured servitude. They pay your salary and they call the shots—they can stick you with a backbreaking load of supervisions and you have no recourse. But if you’re hired by a University Faculty, well, that gives you some clout—at a certain point you can tell your college to go stuff itself. Politely, of course,” she added with a gleam of returning good humor.

“And that’s what you’ve done?” Kincaid asked. “Politely, of course.”

Vic took a sip of her wine and settled back in her chair, looking suddenly tired. “It’s not quite that simple. But yes, I suppose you could say that.”

When she didn’t pursue the topic further, Kincaid ventured, “And your husband? Is he a lecturer as well?” He kept his voice lightly even, a friendly inquiry one might make to an acquaintance.

“Ian’s at Trinity. Political science. But he’s away on sabbatical just now, writing a book about the division of the Georgian states.” Vic put down her bread and met Kincaid’s eyes. “I don’t know why I’m beating about the bush. The thing is, he’s writing this book about Russia from the south of France, and he just happened to take one of his graduate students with him. Female. In the note he left me he said he thought he must be having his midlife crisis.” She gave him a tight smile. “He asked me to be patient.”

At least, Kincaid thought, he left you a note. He said, “I’m sorry. It must be difficult for you.”

Vic drank again and picked at a bit of salad. “It’s Kit, really. Most days he’s furious with Ian. Occasionally he’s angry with me, as if it were my fault Ian left. Maybe it is—I don’t know.”

“Is that why you called me? You need help finding Ian?”

She gave a startled laugh. “That would be bloody cheek! Is that what you thought?” When he didn’t answer, she said, “I’m sorry, Duncan. I never meant to give you that impression. What I wanted to talk to you about has nothing to do with Ian at all.”