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of her views of the Scottish artist and had begun to
realise that she was playing with Alice in, possibly, a not entirely benign way. Rather like a cat with a mouse.
    ‘Yes, I do like figurative stuff, but I also like some of Eardley’s later works,’ Alice said, some random inspiration having come at last, ‘those wild ones, the stormy
ones . . . the ones painted at Catterline.’
    ‘Just figures or landscapes, then?’
    ‘Yes, I do like landscapes too . . .’
    Perhaps, Alice thought, she should just retire from the joust with her lance not yet broken. She had not wanted to enter this contest; it just seemed to have happened. As it always did with
Celia.
    ‘What do you think of Rothko’s aquarelles?’
    Now her lance had been well and truly bloody snapped! Alice took a deep breath. What the hell was an ‘aquarelle’? Before she had time to assemble her thoughts, or attempt to bluster,
Ian tried to throw her a lifeline.
    ‘Enough shop talk, painter talk, for the moment, I think. Alice, how did you get on at work today?’
    Looking into his eyes, it was obvious that he had forgotten all about the hearing. If he had remembered he would have chosen some other diversionary topic. He knew how she had been feeling about
it, how scared she was, how private the whole matter was to her.
    She told herself that his lapse did not matter, after all he was trying to help her. Anyway, nothing would have induced her to talk about this afternoon’s purgatory in front of Celia,
whatever the result had been. The very idea of Alice being subjected to any kind of disciplinary proceedings would have her salivating at the mouth, inciting her to pose a barrage of
ill-intentioned questions, each one designed to embarrass or elicit some further unflattering disclosure.
    ‘I spent this morning with the SART – the Search and Rescue Team at Gayfield Square,’ she said brightly, ‘and it was very interesting. Friendly men, a clever system
– they’ve got really close relationships with all the pawnshops in the city.’
    ‘Bloody hell!’ Celia expostulated, putting a hand across her mouth as if she was about to be sick. ‘You spent this morning in porn shops? Porn shops – how
horrible!’
    ‘Not porn shops, P.A.W.N. shops,’ Alice said, spelling the word out quickly. ‘Actually they’re quite respectable now. The manager of one of them told me that they now see
themselves as part of the Financial Services Industry. That may be going a bit far, but they’ve got customer charters and everything. They’re pretty tightly regulated nowadays, I
think.’
    ‘Still, I’m not sure that’s how I’d want to spend my day, or even a minute of it, sniffing around the detritus of other people’s lives, in and out of pawn shops,
mixing with irresponsible losers or thieving scum,’ retorted Celia, trying to catch Ian’s eye in search of agreement, a manufactured expression of pity on her face.
‘Someone’s got to do it, I suppose,’ she added, looking around for the crisps.
    ‘Alice enjoys it. Don’t you, darling?’ Ian said, holding out his hand for her to take. She took it, aware that he was trying to defend her in his loyal, uncomplicated way.
    ‘Yes, I do enjoy it. Not the “sniffing”, as you call it, Celia, or even the visits to the pawnshops, which was a first for me, incidentally, or the “mixing” with
thieving scum and “irresponsible losers”, whoever exactly they are. What I enjoy is very simple in its way. Corny, even. Putting things right, restoring order . . . helping people
out.’
    ‘Beware of kryptonite, then!’ Celia replied, taking another sip of her wine and laughing into her drink.
    Alice felt tired and unwilling to spar any more. It was like fighting with smoke. She got to her feet, taking with her Ian’s empty glass.
    ‘I’m going to get some food. What about either of you?’ she said, walking out of the room.
    ‘We’ve arranged to eat with two of our pals from the studio,