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lawyer himself.
    “Very wise,” said the lawyer. “Very wise to change your mind.” And then he added: “You know, I seem to recollect that my boy Jamie–he’s quite different these days–was a bit tough on you when you were boys. Sorry about that, you know.”
    Matthew nodded. “It’s fine,” he said. And he thought: yes, it is fine, isn’t it? You’re back. Back where you came from. The solid, cautious, Scottish mercantile class; among your own people. But for a moment, a brief moment, you had been about to do something yourself.

10. Does He Wear Lederhosen?
    That had been a Monday. Now it was Tuesday, and that, under the new arrangement with Pat, was one of the days on which she came into the gallery for three hours to help Matthew. He had hoped to have had more of her time, as he had grown accustomed to her presence, as she sat at her desk, or stacked paintings in the storeroom, and without her the gallery seemed strangely empty. But Pat was now a student and had the requirements of her course to consider–essays to write, pages of aesthetic theory and art history to plough through, although she skipped, she had to admit, rather than ploughed. With all these things to do, she was unable to get down to the gallery for more than nine hours a week, and these hours were divided between Tuesday, Thursday and Friday.
    Of course, Matthew could have employed somebody fulltime, had he wished to do so. Four million pounds is enough to finance a two-room gallery for which no rent had to be paid and which was not encumbered by any debt. But Matthew did not wish to have anybody else; he wanted Pat, because she knew the business, had a precociously good eye for art, and because…well, if he were to admit it to himself, Matthew wanted to have what one might call a closer relationship with Pat.
    On that Tuesday, Matthew left his flat in India Street dressed in the new clothes he had bought from Stewart Christie the previous day. He wore one of the expensive shirts, the spotted silk tie, the crushed-strawberry trousers and the cashmere sweater. The sweater, which was an oatmeal colour (“distressed oatmeal” was the official description of the shade), went well with the trousers and the tie, which had a dark green background (the spots being light green). Over all this he donned the covert coat, then examined himself in the hall mirror and set off into the street.
    By the time that Pat arrived in the gallery at ten o’clock, Matthew had dealt with the few letters that he had received that morning and had almost finished paging through a new auction catalogue. There were several paintings in this catalogue that he wanted to discuss with Pat–a Hornel study of a group of Japanese women making tea, a Blackadder of a bunch of peonies in a white vase, and a shockingly expensive Cadell portrait. Matthew reflected that he could afford any of these–indeed, he could afford them all–but he knew that he would have to be careful. The market had its price, and it was foolish to allow a personal enthusiasm for a painting to encourage one to pay more than the real market figure. What one paid in such circumstances was the market as far as that particular sale was concerned, but not the broader market. The real market was more fickle, and it was all very well having an expensive Cadell on one’s walls, but what if nobody else wanted it? So he ticked the Blackadder and put a question mark next to the listing of the Cadell.
    When Pat came in, he showed her the Cadell and she shook her head. “Not for us,” she said. “Remember who comes into this place. Our clients don’t have that sort of money.”
    “But if we had that sort of painting,” Matthew objected, “then we’d get that sort of person. Word would get out.”
    “Too risky,” said Pat. “Stick to the clients you have.”
    Matthew smiled. “But we have the means, Pat,” he said. “We have money. Plenty of it.”
    Pat said nothing. She had noticed the new