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god, I can’t watch,’ says Lauren. She has her hand up over her eyes, with two fingers parted to peer through.
    ‘It’s just cruel is that,’ says Pat.
    ‘There’s no point watching,’ says Lauren angrily. ‘She’ll be all week just trying to lift that neck.’ She turns to Ann. ‘Let’s talk about summat else. Have you brought the ewes down for tupping?’
    ‘Not yet,’ says Ann. ‘Next week or two.’
    ‘What’s tupping?’ asks Pat.
    ‘It’s when you put the rams in to serve the ewes,’ says Ann, grateful to be the keeper of some knowledge at last. ‘A tup is what we call a ram, you see, for breeding.’
    Ann’s last words are drowned out by a loud gasp, then another, deeper than the last, and then cheers and clapping as the room erupts, free and strong. Brenda Farley is smiling, though she has allowed her gaze to return floorward. Other team members pat her on the hump.
    ‘Well I never,’ says Lauren.
    ‘I don’t believe it,’ says Pat.
    ‘Just shows you,’ says Mo.
    ‘What? What happened?’ asks Ann.
    ‘Two doubles and a bully, that’s what happened,’ says Lauren. ‘I’d best congratulate Elaine.’
    ‘Don’t choke on it,’ says Ann.
    *
    ‘A gimmer,’ says Ruby. She takes a fulsome slug of pale ale. ‘Hang on, I know this: a gimmer is a female lamb, sold for breeding.’
    Bartholomew raises his pint to her. ‘Very good. And what’s a mule gimmer?’
    ‘Oooh, give me a minute. A mule gimmer is . . . a cross-bred lamb. Not a pedigree.’
    ‘And with Swaledales we cross with?’
    ‘The Blue-Faced Leicester!’
    ‘My work here is done,’ he says, clinking his pint glass against hers.
    ‘So that email was from your mum,’ she says. ‘Why didn’t you just say?’
    He shrugs. Takes another gulp of his pint.
    ‘She’s worried then,’ says Ruby.
    He nods. ‘Not the best time to be a farmer.’ He is looking out across the room: stripped-oak floors; tongue-and-groove bar painted ‘heritage’ green; industrial lights. The Three Kings on Cathedral Way is a pub with an eye firmly on itself. Not like the boozers back home.
    ‘So, you’re still working on that main bed,’ she says.
    ‘Yep.’
    ‘Run this by me again. You’re putting more plants in the ground.’
    He hasn’t told her how much this central bed – his new project – means to him. When his mind is idling, he thinks about it: sketching out the ribbons of oriental poppies, aquilegias and verbascum; the great drifts of alliums and tulipa ‘spring green’.
    ‘Just in case someone tries to do something crazy, like buy them?’ Ruby is saying.
    ‘I know it doesn’t make sense.’
    ‘Is capitalism ready for a visionary such as yourself?’
    ‘I often ask myself the same question.’
    ‘I suppose,’ she says, ‘you’ll be showing off plants to their best effect – showing what they look like in a border.’
    ‘It’s not just that. It’s what I’m into. Leonard thinks it’s pointless, too.’
    ‘Leonard thinks everything’s pointless.’
    ‘There’s something about plants in those mean little nine-centimetre pots. I want to see them expand.’
    ‘Can you afford it?’ she says.
    ‘Arh, businesses don’t expect to make much in the first couple of years. If I really want kerching, it won’t be from plants, anyway.’
    ‘What d’ye mean?’
    ‘It’s the other guff that makes money – your gazebos, those nasty solar lights, plastic toadstools.’
    ‘How depressing,’ she says, with feeling. Ruby says everything with feeling. ‘I mean, what you’re doing with that bed is so much more special.’
    He says nothing.
    Ruby says, ‘I think you should ditch the horrible knick-knacks and go for it on the main bed. Do what you love – find a way.’
    He drains his glass.
    ‘What about if you made it a destination – a place people visit and hang out in? So what you would become is a beautiful garden with a nursery attached.’
    ‘Beautiful gardens don’t make money.’
    ‘Why not? You