“I paid for them with a generous donation,” Nelson said smoothly, eyes holding hers until she gave a thorny little smile. Then he asked Pearson for an update. Pearson pinkened at the attention and effused about the Westing space. “If we had time, we could go a lot higher,” he said. “But we’re running low on time.”

“It’s not going to happen. The shoes came yesterday,” Erik whined. “We’re so freaking behind.”

“We’ll get there,” said Pearson.

“Can we change the name to Shoe Lean-to?” said Erik.

Nelson regarded him. “I’ll tell you a story,” he said, turning to include me, to include all of us. His voice lowered but deepened in pitch. “One time, I was working with an artist who shall not be named, and her crew quit on her two days before the show. She was making a sculpture out of her own body fat mixed with makeup, and we couldn’t get the temperature in the room right. Too cold, and it was too hard to mold; too hot, and it would melt. She just ragged and ragged on her crew and blamed them, and they got sick of it and they all walked out.” He gave a humorless chuckle. “So there I was, with the media and collectors calling me. Do we cancel the show? Postpone it? I said to her, ‘You give me twenty-four hours. I’ll find you a new crew. You tell me what you want, make it really direct and easy to follow. You pay overtime and you let me talk to them and we’ll get your shit done.’ She throws up her hands and says okay,” he said. “So I went to every butcher at every market in East L.A. and said, ‘I have a job for you. Two days. Good pay.’ And they came and they pulled it off, everything she wanted. They had real skill with meat, with fat. It was their craft. And she worked with those same guys for ten more years. Her best sculptures came through them. One of them got his own career, too.” He nailed Erik with his eyes now. “You’ve got to recognize there’s a craft here and you are the craftspeople. You are not the artists. Not yet. You make Hal shine, and you never know where it will take you. You don’t, and guess what. He’s still the artist. He’ll go on without you.”

Layla nodded at this, but her face was expressionless, as if she hadn’t processed what he was saying. Erik turned away and went back to wiring shoes.

“Thank you for the lecture, Daddy,” said Zania. “We really needed to be told how insignificant we are.”

“Honey,” Nelson said, but his attention was still on Erik, on the younger man’s bowed, curly, oblivious head. The gallerist’s mouth twisted with dislike.