‘Yeah, yeah,’ said Bruce, extracting a set of keys from his jacket pocket. ‘Let’s go and take a look. Bit gloomy, isn’t it? I can’t stand these big New Town places. Give me the creeps. Still, somebody likes living in them.’

‘It’s rather nice, actually,’ said Matthew. ‘And the garden …’

‘Yeah,’ said Bruce. ‘Cool.’

The back of Matthew’s neck felt warm. It was none of Bruce’s business; he was here to look at structural issues, at rot and damp and matters of that sort. He was not here to make aesthetic judgements.

‘Let’s go in,’ said Bruce. ‘Let’s go in and see what’s wrong.’

70. Supporting Walls

They stood in the hall.

‘Dark,’ said Bruce. ‘I can’t stand these dark entrance halls. It’s like entering a cave, isn’t it?’

Matthew said nothing. The hall was on the dark side, but no darker than many. And the flat was on the ground floor, which was always darker than the drawing-room floor and the floors above. What did Bruce expect? Mediterranean light?

‘Gloomeee!’ said Bruce, extracting his torch from his pocket. ‘I suppose it’ll be all right, though, if you carry a torch with you most of the time.’

Before Matthew could utter any refutation, Bruce had moved across the hall and was poking about in the corridor. ‘You know, it’s not usual to have the client with you as you do your survey,’ he remarked. ‘It could influence you. You don’t want to see the place through the client’s eyes – you want to see it through your own.’

‘I could wait in the garden,’ said Matthew.

Bruce reassured him. ‘No, don’t go. I quite like having somebody with me. You never know when the floor’s going to collapse. Especially in buildings like this …’ He stamped lightly on the floorboards. ‘Only joking, of course. Ha ha et cetera. Did you hear about that surveyor who looked up the chimney of some house in Perthshire and got stuck? Terrible story. Nobody knew he was doing the survey and he could have died. But somebody came in and heard him and they got him out. Poor chap. Too fat, I suppose. I go to the gym. You go the gym, Matthew?’

Matthew thought of his New Year resolution. ‘I try to. But you know how …’

‘Didn’t think that you were the gym-going type,’ continued Bruce. ‘No disrespect. It’s just that some people look like Mr Universe – others don’t. You know how it is?’

Not having seen Bruce for some time, Matthew had forgotten what it was in the other man’s manner that was so objectionable; now he remembered. It was his utter self-confidence, his breezy insouciance, his tactlessness, his lack of attention to anything that anybody said to him. And there were probably other failings, too, that would reveal themselves as one got to know Bruce better.