Portuguese shoes

Stuart looked down at George’s shoes. He did not do this deliberately, but his eyes seemed inexorably drawn in that direction. George was wearing trainers, the expensive leather sort, and Stuart immediately thought: my suede shoes are wrong. But George was now gesturing for him to come in so that he could close the door, and Stuart obeyed. “I’ve heard a lot about you,” said George. Stuart nodded. “Oh yes.” It was an embarrassing thing to say – in any circumstances. People did not want to hear that others had been talking about them. George, obviously, was a bit gauche in these matters. Surely Katie would see that. And then Stuart asked himself what Katie could possibly have told George about him. She hardly knew anything about him because they had spent very little time together and he did not recall talking much about himself. For the most part, they had talked about poetry and literature in general. So how could George

“I was,” said Stuart, thinking: such an obvious, echt-edinburgh remark – so typical. What did it matter where you went to school? What possible relevance did it have to anything? But, out of politeness, Stuart said, “And you?”

“Fettes.”

Stuart looked away. Fettes was considerably above Heriot’s in the social pecking order. He made an effort to smile, and said, “Poor you.”

George laughed. “It wasn’t too bad, actually.”

“Not if you like cold showers.” George stopped laughing. “That all ended ages ago.” He paused. “My father’s time.”

Stuart pretended not to register the point of this remark, which was: my father went there too. That, again, was typically Edinburgh, establishing … What was it establishing? Prior rights? Longer roots? Snobbery, thought Stuart. And how odd that somebody of George’s He picked this up and opened it at random. He read the first two line of one of the sonnets, and then another couple of lines. These words, he thought, come from a long way away …

“The Sonnets?”

He turned round. Katie had come into the room through a different door, on the far side.

Stuart replaced the book. “I shouldn’t be snooping.”

She smiled. “It’s not snooping to look at somebody else’s books. If books are private, they should be kept in a cupboard.” “Oh.”

She gestured towards the book. “That has a fantastic commentary. Don Paterson. He’s a poet himself. Professor of Poetry at St Andrews. He’s written a commentary to each of them. He really brings them to life.”

Stuart sighed. “I know so little.” “What? About what?”

“About poetry. You know … well, you know so much. I don’t. I haven’t even read

The Sonnets. Not properly. One or two, I suppose – a few lines.”

“You could take that book,” she said, picking up the book and giving it to him.

“Yes, why not? Take that book and go through them. It’s really one long poem, all about love. A love affair, or two, although it’s difficult to disentangle. The one love affair shadows the other, if you see what I mean.”

“I’m not sure I do.”

“Read it, then. Read the commentary.” He suddenly noticed that she was looking at his shoes. Awkwardly, he shifted his feet and tried to draw her attention away.

“Was Shakespeare writing about himself?” he asked.

The question seemed to interest her, and her gaze left his shoes.

“Of course he was. All writers write about themselves – all the time.” She smiled. “Or their mothers. Although that sounds a bit Freudian, which it is, I suppose.”

Her eyes went back to his shoes. “They’re Portuguese,” Stuart blurted out. “My shoes … They’re Portuguese.” And then he added, “I shouldn’t have worn them. Sorry.”

He sounded so miserable. And he was.

© 2019 Alexander Mccall Smith