Unusual Uses for Olive Oil by Alexander McCall Smith

Igelfeld had looked at him with icy disdain. ‘And shirts?’ he said. ‘Are they to be abandoned too? We would undoubtedly be more comfortable withouthaving to bother with things like sleeves and collars, would we not?’
    It was an unanswerable objection, a devastating point, but Unterholzer had seemed unmoved. ‘That may be the way we’re going,’ he said. ‘Perhaps we shall eventually see through the need for clothing altogether – other than in the winter, of course. But in summer we can all be children of nature again.’
    The conversation had ended there. Von Igelfeld did not feel it wise to encourage Unterholzer in these anarchic, unsettling sentiments, lest his colleague be tempted to start divesting himself of his baggy and badly cut shirt there and then. Children of nature indeed!
    And now, standing before his wardrobe, he reached inside and took out his best blue-fleck suit, a suit that he had bought in Cologne fifteen years previously and used only very occasionally – for major family gatherings, such as the seventy-fifth birthday of his uncle, when the entire extant von Igelfeld family – all forty-three members of it, including the Austrian branch – had gathered in Munich for a celebration. The suit had been expensive, made from Scottish tweed, and beautifully tailored. It would be just right, he considered, for an evening such as this; Frau Benz, as the proprietrix of the Schloss Dunkelberg, would undoubtedly appreciate good cloth, and would realise that … well – and he blushed at having to think inthese terms – she would realise that he was from the same
circle
as she was. That was delicately put, he thought. The landed gentry, to whom she belonged thanks to the inheritance of the Schloss Dunkelberg, did not like crude terms such as
class
– he blushed further; they made the easy assumption that people were either
possible
or
impossible
. It was not a judgement based on anything one could put one’s finger on, and it certainly had nothing to do with wealth. A poor man – a man without so much as a bean – could be perfectly possible, while a man of substance might be completely impossible. It was impossible to say how possibility – and impossibility – came about. Impossible. But von Igelfeld was in no doubt that he could not possibly be considered impossible.
    He dressed with care and made his way to the Prinzels’ house, arriving at the front door at exactly the time stipulated by Ophelia in her invitation. He knew there were people who arrived for dinner five or ten minutes late, claiming that this was not only fashionable but also considerate towards one’s host or hostess, however von Igelfeld did not subscribe to that view. If people wanted one to arrive at seven thirty-five, he thought, then they would invite one to do so. If they wanted you to arrive at seven thirty, then they would invite you for seven thirty. And the same applied to railways, he reflected. If the railwayauthorities wanted their trains to leave five minutes late, then they would specify that in the timetable. But they did not.
    Prinzel welcomed him at the front door. ‘You’re early,’ he said.
    Von Igelfeld pointedly looked at his watch. ‘I don’t believe I am,’ he said. ‘My watch is very accurate, and it says seven thirty precisely. And that I believe is the time for which your wife invited me.’
    ‘Oh, well,’ said Prinzel. ‘You’re not early, then – you’re prompt. Like Immanuel Kant. He used to go for his walks in Königsberg at the same time each day and the people of the town used to set their watches by him.’
    ‘That was very good,’ said von Igelfeld. ‘Things appear to have deteriorated since then. I imagine that there are very few philosophers today who keep regular hours.’
    Ophelia appeared in the hall. ‘You’re early, Moritz-Maria,’ she exclaimed.
    Von Igelfeld bowed politely. ‘I am not,’ he said. ‘But if you would prefer it, I can go away and then return