A short mid-series 1 scene. Dr. Clarkson irons out one of Isobel's grievances.
He knew her well enough by now to know that something was wrong. Her movements were sharper somehow than they usually were; quicker and a touch more aggressive as she moved around the office- his office, well, it was rapidly becoming hers now, and he found he didn't mind. And because he knew her well enough to be able to tell that something was wrong, he supposed that he also knew her well enough to be allowed to ask what it was. She was apparently oblivious to him standing there awkwardly as she continued to move around the room quickly, hovering over her desk and distractedly sorting through a pile of papers.
"Mrs Crawley, is anything the matter?"
She looked up briefly, just for long enough to take him in, looking back down again just as quickly.
"Nothing at all," she replied shortly.
He exhaled deeply. It was foolish of him- what else had he expected when she was plainly in a bad mood?- but still he felt the pang of her so plainly pushing him away from her.
He had sighed more loudly than he'd thought, and now she was looking up at him, almost expectantly.
"What?" she asked.
He folded his arms across his chest, drawing his jacket more securely around himself, and said nothing. She continued to look at him questioningly.
"Well, there obviously is something the matter!" he surprised himself by exclaiming, "Otherwise you wouldn't be acting like that."
"Like what?" she enquired, tilting her head rather accusingly to one side.
"Like... that..." he pointed rather hopelessly to where she had been fussing irritably over her desk a few moments ago, unable to phrase her behaviour in a way that was not likely to exacerbate the situation.
She shrugged her shoulders and said lightly: "I'm afraid I haven't the faintest idea what you're talking about, Dr. Clarkson."
Consciously this time, he exhaled deeply.
She turned back to him.
"Do you really want to know what's the matter?" she asked him curiously.
"Yes!" he insisted, "If you want to tell me."
"Well, you might not like it, but if you want to know, then fine," she drew a deep breath, folding her own arms, and then said, with an air of great conviction, "I am beginning to believe that no one wants an intelligent woman."
He opened his mouth to dispute this fact, but she cut him off.
"I told you you wouldn't like it. But it's true, that's what I think. Oh, yes, of course you men will say that you find intelligence very attractive and maybe you do, but think about it. You are attracted to a woman first, you find her beautiful, and then if she's intelligent, well then it's like the cherry on the cake. It's never the thing you really love her for."
He was rather disconcerted by the way she kept saying "you" with a particularly vehement inflection to it, but he thought it was probably best not to address that at the moment.
"What's brought this on?" he asked her gently.
The softness in his tone apparently surprised her for a second and she looked up sharply.
"Oh, just this and that," she gesticulated vaguely, the wind somehow having been taken out of her sails, "Mainly Edith and, well, things..."
"Ah, poor Lady Edith," he nodded empathetically.
"Exactly, poor Edith," she agreed, "She tries so hard, the poor lamb, and she's just as clever as either of the other two, but she hasn't got their looks so no one's interested. It's painful to watch sometimes, and today it's made me angry."
There was a pause for a second. She continued to look down at her desk, and he had a feeling that she was deliberately avoiding his eye.
"To think," she continued after a while, her tone light and incredulous, "That when I was young I didn't want to be pretty. I never was, mark you, but I was glad of it because I didn't want to be. I thought a man would love me for my mind, in fact I expected no less. How naïve of me," she remarked sadly, finally looking up to meet his eye.
Not for the first time, the sight of the emotion written plainly across her face took his breath away. Simultaneously, though, it made him feel bound to speak.
"Oh, Mrs Crawley. Isobel," he tried out her first name, "I don't attempt to deny what you're saying; it's probably true, we men can be dreadfully shallow sometimes. But rest assured that even if you are right, you have nothing to worry about. I think you're beautiful anyway."
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