Second Chances (39 page)

The
gallery
still
had
to
be
sold
in
a
market
that
was
about
as
buoyant
as
a
punctured
air
balloon.
She
glanced
at
her
watch.
'Oh
hell,'
she
muttered.
She
began
to
half
run
through
the
jostling
crowd
on
the
pavement
towards
the
tube,
scrolling
down
on
her
phone
to
find
the
estate
agents
number.
Not
that
this
latest
buyer
was
going
to
be
anything
of
the
sort.

But
she
had
to
keep
trying.
The
one
thing
that
had
never
occurred
to
Alice
-
caught
up,
after
Harry's
death,
in
a
frenzy
of
breaking-up,
or
reconciling
with
Claude
-
that
the
threat
of
recession
and
a
depressing
dip
in
the
art
world,
had
been
pushed
aside.
How
could
she,
having
so
extravagantly
taken
her
eye
of
the
ball,
not
be
surprised
that
not
a
single
offer
to
take
her
gallery
off
her
hands
had
transpired?

During
the
awful
months
after
her
father'
death,
frightened,
nerves
stretched
to
the
wire,
Alice
could
only
recall
that
time
as
a
white
blur
of
tears
and
heartbreak
and
the
awful
reality
that
for
once
in
her
life,
she
had
allowed
her
practical
nature
to
be
hijacked
by
blind
passion
and
grief
which
had
knocked
her
sideways.
In
the
end,
exhaustion
with
overwhelming
guilt
over
her
last
conversation
with
her
father
had
won
and
she
could
take
no
more.
Or
maybe
it
had
been
Claude,
whose
opportunity
to
tell
Sylvie
he
planned
to
live
with
Alice
had
been
capsized
by
her
having
an
unscheduled
bout
of
flu,
which
had
-
at
the
insistence
of
his
mother
in
law
-
meant
that
he
stayed
away
until
Sylvie
had
recovered.
Neither
could
remember
when
the
full
force
of
reality
had
decided
to
visit,
but
visit
it
had
until
they
turned
on
each
other.

'It
was
me,'
Alice
had
sobbed.
'I
did
it.
I
made
things
worse.'

'Absurd,'
Claude
had
shouted.
'Stop
this.
Alice?
Think
what
this
is
doing
to
us.
All
this
-
this
beating
yourself
up.
It
has
to
stop.
I'm
going
crazy
with
it
all.'

They
were
standing
on
the
Rue
de
Rennes
at
the
exit
to
St.
Placide,
the
nearest
metro
to
Claude's
flat
on
Rue
de
Vaugirard.
Another
tiring
journey
for
Alice,
another
row.
Less
than
an
hour
she'd
been
there
and
instead
of
taking
her
in
his
arms
and
holding
her,
comforting
her,
he
was
instead
frustrated
that
she
couldn't
-
as
she
had
confidently
expected
-
sell
the
gallery
which,
whether
they
liked
it
or
not,
was
essential
to
setting
up
home
in
Paris
together.
Alice
was
running
ragged
between
her
work
in
London,
her
mother
in
Sussex
and
him
in
Paris
and,
in
his
view
he
shouted,
in
that
order.
Normality
was
now
even
further
away
than
either
could
have
imagined
caught
up
as
they
once
were
in
the
blissful
pleasure
of
planning
their
future.

'You
don't
understand,
do
you?'
he
had
fumed
as
commuters
pushed
them
aside
to
get
down
to
the
platform.
'I
can't
teach
here,'
he
had
waved
his
arm
vaguely
in
the
direction
of
Rue
Bonaparte
where
he
taught.
'See
my
children
in
Neuilly
and
then
you
in
London?
You
don't
have
children.
If
you
did
you
would
understand.
You
have
to
be
here,
we
agreed.
How
has
your
father
dying
changed
all
that?
It
hasn't
Alice.
You've
changed.
You
don't
want
any
of
this
anymore,
do
you?
Just
be
truthful.'

She
had
gasped.
The
injustice
of
it.
What
was
the
matter
with
him?
It
was
him
who
had
failed
to
tell
his
wife
about
her,
wasn't
it?
Him
who
had
said
they
were
all
on
such
an
emotional
high
it
was
not
the
moment,
it
would
all
end
in
tears.
When
things
had
calmed
down,
he
said.
Calmed
down?
She
almost
shrieked.
Such
drama,
such
obstinacy.
Hadn't
she
just
raced
all
the
way
here,
closing
the
gallery
early
-
not
that
that
mattered
there
were
no
customers
but
even
so
-
not
seeing
her
poor
grieving
mother
for
the
second
weekend
in
a
row,
to
be
accused
of
wanting
none
of
it?