Nine months later, Lauren Holt hosted a private viewing at her gallery that caused a buzz of excitement in the press and in the art-world circles that Zach was trying desperately to gain access to. Simon d’Angelico never did come to his final show; there were no more articles mentioning Zach in any magazines or newspaper reviews. Zach paid Lauren’s gallery a visit, and walked around in increasing dismay as he absorbed the quality of the pieces on display, the perfect lighting, the buzz of conversation. Startling pieces by people he had heard of, being discussed by people who mattered. Lauren Holt came in through a back door in the white wall, dressed all in black with her red hair shining. Zach tried to hide behind a piece of wire sculpture, but she caught his eye and gave him a lopsided little smile, more wistful than gloating. Zach slunk away, too ashamed to ask her if she might still be interested in him. And that had been the closest he had ever come to having his work picked up by an influential gallery. In terms of his career as an artist, it was all downhill from there.
Why didn’t you ask her there and then if she’d still have you? The gallery was still quite new… if you’d groveled she might have been flattered enough to agree, even if it was just one piece-that final-year piece you did that she liked,” said Hannah as they trod through the straw to another ewe who had the front legs of her lamb protruding from her back end, sheathed in a gray and shiny membrane.
“I couldn’t. It was too humiliating…”
“You mean you were still too proud, even at that point?”
“I guess so.”
“Men!” Hannah rolled her eyes. “You never will stop to ask for directions.”
“I was still hoping for a miracle from elsewhere, I suppose. But that was it. My big chance, and I blew it.”
“Come on, I don’t buy that.” She wrapped her hands around the lamb’s slippery legs and when she saw the ewe heave, pulled steadily until its whole body slithered free with a rush of fluid and a grunt from the ewe. “Yes! Good sheep,” she said as she cleared the mucus from the lamb’s mouth and nose, then swung it gently a few times until it sneezed and snuffled and shook its head weakly. She laid it in the straw beside its astonished mother and wiped her hands on the seat of her jeans. Zach grimaced. Lambing was gorier than he’d imagined it would be.
“What do you mean?”
“What’s for you won’t go by you, as my old granddad used to say. Talent will out. If you were meant to make it as a professional artist, you would have made it,” she said. “It wasn’t meant to be.”
“Hmm. I’m not sure if that’s a better or worse thought, actually. Don’t we make our own luck, our own opportunities in life?”
“So, what are you telling me-that you just haven’t been trying all these years? That that’s why you aren’t a famous artist, and your gallery’s about to close, and now you can’t finish your book?”
“No, I suppose not. It’s certainly… felt like I’ve been trying. Makes me tired just thinking about it, actually.”
“Well, there you are, then. Don’t beat yourself up about one missed chance of an exhibition.”
“So you’re saying I was doomed to failure from the start?”
“Exactly. There now-doesn’t that make you feel better?” She grinned at him, punching him lightly on the shoulder.
“Oh yes. Much,” he said with a smile. Hannah sighed slightly and stepped forwards, grabbed him by his shirt and tipped up her chin to kiss him.
“Cheer up. I still fancy you, in spite of you being such a towering loser,” she said.
Zach slept until lunchtime the day after his long night in the lambing barns, and woke up ravenous. At two in the afternoon, he sat down to a plate of ham, eggs, and chips amid the drinkers and dog walkers sheltering from a steady, drenching downpour outside. Zach turned to stare out of the window at the rain, and saw Hannah. She was waiting at the bus stop, wearing her outsize checked shirt but nothing waterproof; jeans stuffed into her wellies, an old waxed hat pulled down low over her hair. Zach sat up and reached out to knock on the glass to get her attention, but he realized that she was too far away and wouldn’t hear him over the rain. He leaned back and started to wonder why on earth she would wait at a bus stop in the rain, when she could drive wherever she wanted to go. And if her jeep was out of action for some reason, he was sure she’d feel no compunction about asking him for a lift. So he frowned, and rested his chin on the back of the seat to watch her. She had her hands thrust deeply into her pockets, and her back fearfully straight. Her shoulders were high and set, and the more Zach studied her the more he realized that she looked extremely tense, even uneasy. Before long, the bus pulled up, wipers flailing, and two elderly ladies got out, wrapped up in clear plastic macintoshes. Hannah did not get in.
About two minutes later Hannah glanced at her watch, but even as she did so, a filthy white Toyota pickup swung to a halt in front of the bus stop, splashing muddy water from the gutter over Hannah’s boots. She stepped forwards and leaned down at the open window. Zach stared. There were two men inside the car, but he couldn’t make them out. They spoke for no more than ten seconds, then Hannah reached into her back pocket and handed over a crumpled, letter-size envelope. Through the windscreen, Zach could see the white of the envelope as the man in the passenger seat opened it and rummaged inside with his fingertips. Money, thought Zach. It had to be. Hannah gave a nod and stepped back, and the pickup pulled away. With her hands back in her pockets, she watched it go, and as it pulled around the corner near the pub, Zach saw the sleeve of the man in the passenger seat, resting against the window. A scruffy lilac sweatshirt sleeve. He saw the huge bulk of the man, and a rough, bearded neck. James Horne. Hannah stood for a moment longer, looking down at her feet with the tension still rigid in her frame. Then she walked across the road towards the pub.
Hannah crossed straight to the bar, and held up her debit card to Pete Murray with a wide smile.
“What, all of it?” the landlord said, sounding quite surprised.
“Oh ye of little faith. I told you I only needed a few more days.”
“I know. I just… figured it’d be a few more.” Pete shrugged.
“Hit me with it. And I’ll be in to start a new tab later this evening.” She waited, leaning on the bar and not looking around, while Pete processed her payment. Zach drew breath to call out to her, but something stopped him. Perhaps it was the way she did not turn to see if he was there, the way she kept her eyes fixed on the drip tray, tapping the brass impatiently with a beer mat. Perhaps it was the wealth of questions that mushroomed up inside his mind. He knew she wouldn’t answer them, and so he didn’t want to ask, but there was no way he could speak to her right then without asking. Why she was giving money to somebody like James Horne, and where that money had come from all of a sudden. But when she turned to leave, he was on his feet and after her before he knew he was going to move. Her expression when he caught her arm told him everything he needed to know. Her eyes were set and guarded, her mouth a resolute line, and over all of it, a fragile coloring of regret. All of his questions died on his lips, and he felt something almost like fear. He suddenly saw himself losing her.