Merry hart with small possessioun

VOLUME 13 CHAPTER ELEVEN at his side – canine body language for I understand. Dogs understood misery.

“Whose party is it?” asked Angus. “Somebody at school?”

Bertie nodded again. “It’s a girl called Olive,” he said. “She’s very bossy. When I went to her last birthday party, it was full of girls, Mr Lordie. Hundreds of them. I was the only boy.”

“Oh, that’s bad luck, Bertie.”

“Yes. They played Jane Austen all the time – that’s all that they wanted to do. And I had to be Mr Darcy for the whole afternoon.”

Angus suppressed a smile. “That can’t be easy, Bertie.” And added, “Even for Mr Darcy himself, I imagine.” He paused. “Do you have to go, Bertie? You could always send your apologies.”

Bertie sighed. “My granny says I have to go. She said I had accepted the invitation, and we must always keep our promises.” wish I could … I wish I could go and live in Glasgow, Mr Lordie. That’s what I’d really like.”

Angus lowered himself onto the stair beside Bertie. “Listen,” he said, “the world often isn’t quite as we’d like it to be, Bertie. But it’s a mistake, you know, to think that things will be better somewhere else. It’s an old mistake.” He paused. Things were better, he thought, for this little boy now that his mother had decamped to Aberdeen, but obviously not everything was perfect just yet.

“Have you heard of the town mouse and the country mouse, Bertie?”

Bertie shook his head.

“Well, it’s a famous old Scottish poem by Robert Henryson. He got the story from Aesop. They both lived quite a long time ago.”

Bertie was listening.

“And the story’s quite simple really,”

“I don’t remember many of the lines,” Angus said. “But I do remember these. Henryson – he was the poet, Bertie – said: Thairfor, best thing in eird, I say for me/ Is merry hart with small possessioun. That’s in old Scots, Bertie, but I rather think you’ll understand it. Have a merry heart even if you don’t have much else.”

He watched the small boy struggle. And as he did so, he felt that urge we all feel when we see the young in their unhappiness. We want to reassure them, This will not last – it really won’t. It will get better. It will. But we don’t say that, and even if we did, the young would not listen, for the simple reason that they have not lived long enough to know what we, for our part, have learned.

Angus rose to his feet. “There’s another poem about a mouse, Bertie.”

He did not have time to tell him. “Toa mouse,” said Bertie. “Mr Burns wrote it, Mr Lordie. He disturbed a mouse when he was ploughing a field. He felt very sorry for it.”

“He did, indeed, Bertie,” said Angus. Bertie stood up. “I have to go,” he said. “Feeling better?” asked Angus. Bertie was silent, but his nod gave the answer.

“And some time soon I must tell you about a plan I’ve hatched.”

Bertie looked up enquiringly.

“I’m going to build a shed,” said Angus. “I’m going to build a shed in Drummond Place Gardens.”

Bertie drew in his breath. A shed! He looked up at Angus, who knew immediately what the look meant.

“Of course, you can,” said Angus. “Of course, you can use my shed.”

Olive’s party, and all the dread it entailed, receded. A shed would change everything. But then Bertie thought: what possible use could an adult have for a shed? Was Mr Lordie planning something?