Such flats were the breeding ground of lasting friendships—and lasting enmities too, she supposed

The Sunday Philosophy Club by Alexander McCall Smith. Page 87.

She reached Warrender Park Terrace and followed it round its slow curve. It was a handsome street, occupying one side of the road and looking out over the Meadows and the distant pinnacled roofs and spires of the old infirmary. The building, a high tenement in the Victorian manner, rose in six stories of dressed stone, topped with a high-raked slate roof. Some of these roofs were bordered with turrets, like the slated turrets of French châteaux, with ironwork devices at the point. Or the edge of the roofs had stone crenellations, carved thistles, the occasional gargoyle, all of which would have given the original occupants the sense that they were living in some style, and that all that distinguished their dwellings from those of the gentry was mere size. But in spite of these conceits, they were good flats, solidly built, and although originally intended for petit-bourgeois occupation they had become the preserve of students and young professionals. The flat she was visiting must have been typical of numerous such establishments rented by groups of three or four young people. The generous size of the flats made it possible for each tenant to have his or her own room without impinging upon the largish living room and dining room. It would be a comfortable arrangement, which would serve the residents until marriage or cohabitation beckoned. And of course such flats were the breeding ground of lasting friendships—and lasting enmities too, she supposed.