Read Online The Unbearable Lightness of Scones by Alexander McCall Smith - Free Book Online

woman with the shouty voice, the one who says she can trace her ancestry back to Julius Caesar or whatever. These people are bonkers, Lou.”
    “Robbie’s interested in history, Matthew,” Lou had replied. “The Stuarts are important for some people. There are plenty of people who find them interesting.”
    “Yes,” conceded Matthew. “But there’s a difference between finding something interesting and believing in it. He actually believes in the Stuarts. How can he do that? Prince Charliewas an absolute disaster from every point of view. And as for his ancestors …”
    Big Lou had changed the subject. At one level she knew that Matthew was right; Robbie was odd, but he was kind to her and he did not run off with other women. That, she felt, was all she was entitled to ask, and she was realistic too: there were not enough men to go round, not in Arbroath and certainly not in Edinburgh, and she knew that she was in no position to be picky.
    Now, opening up the coffee bar for the morning, she polished the stainless steel bar before the first customers arrived. These tended to be office workers, often employees at the Royal Bank of Scotland offices down the road. They would not linger long, but sit engrossed in the newspapers before glancing at their watches and rushing out again. Then there would be a quiet spell before her mid-morning regulars arrived, Matthew and Angus Lordie among them. Of course with Matthew away on honeymoon, she was not expecting him, which meant that Angus Lordie would sit closer to the bar and address all his comments to her.
    She could tell his mood immediately when he came in, and this would tell her how his work was going. A difficult painting, or one that was not turning out as expected, would give Angus a morose expression and make him stir his coffee rather more aggressively than necessary. His expression today, though, was thoughtful rather than morose, which suggested to Lou that he had something on his mind other than an unco-operative canvas.
    “I’ve been thinking about your situation, Lou,” Angus began.
    “My situation? Here?”
    “Not so much just here,” said Angus, waving a hand around to encompass the general area. “Everywhere. Your whole life.”
    “There’s nothing wrong with my life,” said Big Lou.
    “But there is, Lou,” said Angus. “You need a companion. That chap of yours, Robbie, is all very well, but …” He lookedat her cautiously, sensing that he was on dangerous ground. “What I thought, actually, is that you need a dog. A puppy. You need one, Lou. Maybe even a couple of puppies.”
    “I’d love one,” said Lou. “Even two. I really would.”
    Angus beamed. “Well, isn’t that a coincidence! As it happens …”
    “But I can’t,” interjected Lou. “I’m mildly allergic to dogs, Angus. Even your bringing Cyril in here makes me slightly wheezy. So I couldn’t have one in the flat. It’s impossible.”

15.
When Even Puppy Love Has Its Limits
    Angus, dispirited by the realisation that Big Lou could not reasonably be expected to accept one or more of his boisterous litter of puppies, looked down into his coffee cup. And a coffee cup, as we all know, is not something that it pays to look into if one is searching for meaning beyond meaning; coffee, in all its forms, looks murky and gives little comfort to one who hopes to see something in it. Unlike tea, which allows one to glimpse something of what lies beneath the surface, usually more tea.
    Although they had been in the flat for only a day and a half, the puppies were proving to be a waking nightmare for Angus. A flat without a garden is not the ideal place in which to raise a small dog, let alone six. To begin with, there was the problem of hygiene. A dog may be trained to restrain itself until taken outside, a fact which one would not have to be Ivan Petrovich Pavlov to discover, but this considerate view of the matter is not one which a puppy adopts until it has been conditioned to do