44 SCOTLAND STREET(ISBN=9781400079445)pdf/txt下载_在线阅读全文

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　　'It is hard to think of a contemporary writer more genuinely engaging...(his) novels are also extremely funny: I find it impossible to think about them without smiling' Craig Brown, Mail on Sunday 'A treasure of a writer whose books deserve immediate devouring' Marcel Berlins, Guardian

内容简介

　　Welcome to 44 Scotland Street, home to some of Edinburgh's most colorful characters. There's Pat, a twenty-year-old who has recently moved into a flat with Bruce, an athletic young man with a keen awareness of his own appearance. Their neighbor, Domenica, is an eccentric and insightful widow. In the flat below are Irene and her appealing son Bertie, who is the victim of his mother's desire for him to learn the saxophone and italian-all at the tender age of five. Love triangles, a lost painting, intriguing new friends, and an encounter with a famous Scottish crime writer are just a few of the ingredients that add to this delightful and witty portrait of Edinburgh society, which was first published as a serial in" The Scotsman" newspaper.

作者简介

　　McCall Smith is a Professor of Medical Law as well as an author who has written over 50 books on a wide range of subjects: from Forensic Aspects of Sleep to The Criminal Law of Botswana, The Perfect Hamburger (children's fiction) to The 2 1/2 Pillars of

媒体评论

　　“McCall Smith's assessments of fellow humans are piercing andprofound. . . . [His] depictions of Edinburgh are vivid andseamless." --San Francisco Chronicle
　　"[McCall Smith's] accomplished novels . . . [are] dependent onsmall gestures redolent with meaning and main characters blessedwith pleasing personalities. . . . .These novels are gentle probesinto the mysteries of human nature." --Newsday
　　"McCall Smith's writing . . . harks back to a more tranquil age,where gentle ironies and strict proprieties prevail. . . . Thepleasure of the novel lies in its simplicity." --The Independent(London)
　　“Utterly enchanting . . . It is impossible to come away from anAlexander McCall Smith ‘mystery’ novel without a smile on the lipsand warm fuzzies in the heart.” --Chicago Sun-Times

“McCall Smith's assessments of fellow humans are piercing and
profound. . . . [His] depictions of Edinburgh are vivid and
seamless." --San Francisco Chronicle 
　　"[McCall Smith's] accomplished novels . . . [are] dependent on
small gestures redolent with meaning and main characters blessed
with pleasing personalities. . . . .These novels are gentle probes
into the mysteries of human nature." --Newsday 
　　"McCall Smith's writing . . . harks back to a more tranquil age,
where gentle ironies and strict proprieties prevail. . . . The
pleasure of the novel lies in its simplicity." --The Independent
(London) 
　　“Utterly enchanting . . . It is impossible to come away from an
Alexander McCall Smith ‘mystery’ novel without a smile on the lips
and warm fuzzies in the heart.” --Chicago Sun-Times 
　　"McCall Smith's assessments of fellow humans are piercing and
profound. . . . [His] depictions of Edinburgh are vivid and
seamless." --San Francisco Chronicle 
　　"McCall Smith's generous writing and dry humor, his gentleness
and humanity, and his ability to evoke a place and a set of
characters without caricature or condescension have endeared his
books . . . to readers." --The New York Times 
　　"Pure joy. . . . The voice, the setting, the stories, the
mysteries of human nature. . . . [McCall Smith's] writing is
accessible and the prose is beautiful." --Amy Tan 
　　“[McCall Smith’s] accomplished novels . . . [are] dependent on
small gestures redolent with meaning and main characters blessed
with pleasing personalities . . . Not so much conventional
mysteries, [his] novels are gentle probes into the mysteries of
human nature.” --Newsday 
　　"Mr. Smith, a fine writer, paints his hometown of Edinburgh as
indelibly as he captures the sunniness of Africa. We can almost
feel the mists as we tread the cobblestones." --The Dallas Morning
News 
　　"Alexander McCall Smith has become one of those commodities, like
oil or chocolate or money, where the supply is never sufficient to
the demand. . . . [He] is prolific and habit-forming." --The Globe
and Mail (Toronto) 
　　"[McCall Smith] captures the cold, foggy, history-drenched
atmosphere of Edinburgh . . . with a Jane Austen-like attention to
detail." --USA Today

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　　1. Stuff Happens
　　Pat stood before the door at the bottom of the stair, reading thenames underneath the buttons. Syme, Macdonald, Pollock, and thenthe name she was looking for: Anderson. That would be BruceAnderson, the surveyor, the person to whom she had spoken on thetelephone. He was the one who collected the rent, he said, and paidthe bills. He was the one who had said that she could come and takea look at the place and see whether she wanted to live there.
　　"And we'll take a look at you," he had added. "If you don'tmind."
　　So now, she thought, she would be under inspection, assessed forsuitability for a shared flat, weighed up to see whether she waslikely to play music too loudly or have friends who would damagethe furniture. Or, she supposed, whether she would jar on anybody'snerves.
　　She pressed the bell and waited. After a few moments somethingbuzzed and she pushed open the large black door with its numerals,44, its lion's head knocker, and its tarnished brass plate abovethe handle. The door was somewhat shabby, needing a coat of paintto cover the places where the paintwork had been scratched orchipped away. Well, this was Scotland Street, not Moray Place orDoune Terrace; not even Drummond Place, the handsome square fromwhich Scotland Street descended in a steep slope. This street wason the edge of the Bohemian part of the Edinburgh New Town, thepart where lawyers and accountants were outnumbered - just - byothers.
　　She climbed up four flights of stairs to reach the top landing.Two flats led off this, one with a dark green door and no nameplatein sight, and another, painted blue, with a piece of paper on whichthree names had been written in large lettering. As she steppedonto the landing, the blue door was opened and she found herselfface-to-face with a tall young man, probably three or four yearsolder than herself, his dark hair en brosse and wearing a rugbyjersey. Triple Crown, she read. Next year. And after that, inparenthesis, the word: Maybe.
　　"I'm Bruce," he said. "And I take it you're Pat."
　　He smiled at her, and gestured for her to come into theflat.
　　"I like the street," she said. "I like this part of town."

1. Stuff Happens 
　　Pat stood before the door at the bottom of the stair, reading the
names underneath the buttons. Syme, Macdonald, Pollock, and then
the name she was looking for: Anderson. That would be Bruce
Anderson, the surveyor, the person to whom she had spoken on the
telephone. He was the one who collected the rent, he said, and paid
the bills. He was the one who had said that she could come and take
a look at the place and see whether she wanted to live there. 
　　"And we'll take a look at you," he had added. "If you don't
mind." 
　　So now, she thought, she would be under inspection, assessed for
suitability for a shared flat, weighed up to see whether she was
likely to play music too loudly or have friends who would damage
the furniture. Or, she supposed, whether she would jar on anybody's
nerves. 
　　She pressed the bell and waited. After a few moments something
buzzed and she pushed open the large black door with its numerals,
44, its lion's head knocker, and its tarnished brass plate above
the handle. The door was somewhat shabby, needing a coat of paint
to cover the places where the paintwork had been scratched or
chipped away. Well, this was Scotland Street, not Moray Place or
Doune Terrace; not even Drummond Place, the handsome square from
which Scotland Street descended in a steep slope. This street was
on the edge of the Bohemian part of the Edinburgh New Town, the
part where lawyers and accountants were outnumbered - just - by
others. 
　　She climbed up four flights of stairs to reach the top landing.
Two flats led off this, one with a dark green door and no nameplate
in sight, and another, painted blue, with a piece of paper on which
three names had been written in large lettering. As she stepped
onto the landing, the blue door was opened and she found herself
face-to-face with a tall young man, probably three or four years
older than herself, his dark hair en brosse and wearing a rugby
jersey. Triple Crown, she read. Next year. And after that, in
parenthesis, the word: Maybe. 
　　"I'm Bruce," he said. "And I take it you're Pat." 
　　He smiled at her, and gestured for her to come into the
flat. 
　　"I like the street," she said. "I like this part of town." 
　　He nodded. "So do I. I lived up in Marchmont until a year ago and
now I'm over here. It's central. It's quiet. Marchmont got a bit
too studenty." 
　　She followed him into a living room, a large room with a black
marble fireplace on one side and a rickety bookcase against the
facing wall. 
　　"This is the sitting room," he said. "It's nothing great, but it
gets the sun." 
　　She glanced at the sofa, which was covered with a faded chintzy
material stained in one or two places with spills of tea or coffee.
It was typical of the sofas which one found in shared flats as a
student; sofas that had been battered and humiliated, slept on by
drunken and sober friends alike, and which would, on cleaning,
disgorge copious sums in change, and ballpoint pens, and other bits
and pieces dropped from generations of pockets. 
　　She looked at Bruce. He was good-looking in a way which one might
describe as . . . well, how might one describe it? 
　　Fresh-faced? Open? Of course, the rugby shirt gave it away: he
was the sort that one saw by the hundred, by the thousand,
streaming out of Murrayfield after a rugby international. Wholesome
was the word which her mother would have used, and which Pat would
have derided. But it was a useful word when it came to describe
Bruce. Wholesome. 
　　Bruce was returning her gaze. Twenty, he thought. Quite
expensively dressed. Tanned in a way which suggested outside
pursuits. Average height. Attractive enough, in a rather willowy
way. Not my type (this last conclusion, with a slight tinge of
regret). 
　　"What do you do?" he asked. Occasions like this, he thought, were
times for bluntness. One might as well find out as much as one
could before deciding to take her, and it was he who would have to
make the decision because Ian and Sarah were off 
　　travelling for a few months and they were relying on him to find
someone. 
　　Pat looked up at the cornice. "I'm on a gap year," she said, and
added, because truth required it after all: "It's my second gap
year, actually." 
　　Bruce stared at her, and then burst out laughing. "Your second
gap year?" 
　　Pat nodded. She felt miserable. Everybody said that. Everybody
said that because they had no idea of what had happened. 
　　"My first one was a disaster," she said. "So I started
again." 
　　Bruce picked up a matchbox and rattled it absent-mindedly. 
　　"What went wrong?" he asked. 
　　"Do you mind if I don't tell you? Or just not yet." 
　　He shrugged. "Stuff happens," he said. "It really does."　　 
　　After her meeting with Bruce, Pat returned to her parents' house
on the south side of Edinburgh. She found her father in his study,
a disorganised room stacked with back copies of the Journal of the
Royal College of Psychiatrists. She told him of the meeting with
Bruce. 
　　"It didn't last long," she said. "I had expected a whole lot of
them. But there was only him. The others were away somewhere or
other." 
　　Her father raised an eyebrow. In his day, young people had shared
flats with others of the same sex. There were some mixed flats, of
course, but these were regarded as being a bit - how should one put
it? - adventurous. He had shared a flat in Argyle Place, in the
shadow of the Sick Kids' Hospital, with three other male medical
students. They had lived there for years, right up to the time of
graduation, and even after that one of them had kept it on while he
was doing his houseman's year. Girlfriends had come for weekends
now and then, but that had been the exception. Now, men and women
lived together in total innocence (sometimes) as if in Eden. 
　　"It's not just him?" he asked. "There are others?" 
　　"Yes," she said. "Or at least I think so. There were four rooms.
Don't worry." 
　　"I'm not worrying." 
　　"You are." 
　　He pursed his lips. "You could always stay at home, you know. We
wouldn't interfere." 
　　She looked at him, and he shook his head. "No," he went on. "I
understand. You have to lead your own life. We know that. That's
what gap years are for." 
　　"Exactly," said Pat. "A gap year is . . ." 
　　She faltered. She was not at all sure what a gap year was really
for, and this was her second. Was it a time in which to grow up?
Was it an expensive indulgence, a rite de passage for the offspring
of wealthy parents? In many cases, she thought, it was an expensive
holiday: a spell in South America imposing yourself on a puzzled
community somewhere, teaching them English and painting the local
school. There were all sorts of organisations that arranged these
things. There might even be one called Paint Aid, for all she knew
- an organisation which went out and painted places that looked in
need of a coat of paint. She herself had painted half a school in
Ecuador before somebody stole the remaining supplies of paint and
they had been obliged to stop. 
　　Her father waited for her to finish the sentence, but she did
not. So he changed the subject and asked her when she was going to
move in. He would transport everything, as he always did; the
bundles of clothing, the bedside lamp, the suitcases, the kettle.
And he would not complain. 
　　"And work?" he asked. "When do you start at the gallery?" 
　　"Tuesday," said Pat. "They're closed on Mondays. Tuesday's my
first day." 
　　"You must be pleased about that," said her father. "Working in a
gallery. Isn't that what most of you people want to do?" 
　　"Not in particular," said Pat, somewhat irritated. Her father
used the expression you people indiscriminately to encompass Pat,
her age group, and her circle of friends. Some people wanted to
work in a gallery, and perhaps there were a lot of those, but it
was hardly a universal desire. There were presumably some people
who wanted to work in bars, to work with beer, so to speak; and
there were people, plenty of people, who would find themselves
quite uncomfortable in a gallery. Bruce, for instance, with his
rugby shirt and his en brosse haircut. He was not gallery
material. 
　　That had been another interview altogether. She had seen the
discreet, hand-written notice in the window of the gallery a few
streets away. A bit of help wanted. Reception. Answering the phone
- that sort of thing. The wording had been diffident, as if it was
almost indecent to suggest that anybody who read it might actually
be looking for something to do. But when she had gone in and found
the tall, slightly lost-looking young man sitting at his desk - the
wording had seemed perfect. 
　　"It's not much of a job," he had said. "You won't have to sell
any paintings, I expect. You'll just be providing cover for me. And
you'll have to do the occasional other thing. This and that. You
know." 
　　She did not know, but did not ask. It looked as if he might have
found it tedious to give the details of the job. And he certainly
asked her nothing about herself, not even her name, before he sat
back in his chair, folded his arms, and said: "The job's yours if
you want it. Want it?" 
　　2. A Room with a Smell 
　　Bruce had shown Pat the vacant room in the flat and this had
brought home to him what a complete slut Anna had been. He had
asked her to clean the room before she left - he had asked her at
least t...

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