“The society can press harder.” They were hollow words, but still he spoke them. “The publishers can do the right thing; compositors can retrain and find other work that will pay their bills.”
With time. The compositors could retrainwith time, but how much was needed? By what means would they do so?
An hour later, when their business was finally done and Andrew had gone, Peter opened the drawer of unsent letters and retrieved a blank sheet of paper.
Eleanor,
I knew there would be casualties in all this, but I never once questioned whether you’d be fine. You are intelligent and determined and talented and could be just as successful in anything you put your mind to. But even though you are not my problem, even though you made it clear that you want none of my assistance, I can’t help but wonder if my assumption was right. Are you, indeed, fine? or have I done more harm than I’d thought?
Peter
“This is a very sad business.” Lady Wharton drummed her fingers on the arm of her chair.
Eleanor traced the floral pattern of the cushion in her lap. It was a beautiful cushion. Just looking at it brought her a measure of joy. Lady Wharton had excellent taste.
“The book will still be published as planned, my lady. Sooner, in fact. Which is good news.” She managed a wan smile.
Agatha huffed, staring out the window for a long moment before returning her attention to Eleanor. “You’re having a run of it, my girl.”
Eleanor choked out a laugh and then pressed a hand to her lips. “I… Yes… I rather think I am.”
There was no smile in return. Instead, Agatha frowned rather disapprovingly, as though Eleanor wasn’t taking the reality of her circumstances seriously enough. What the dowager countess didn’t realize was that laughter, no matter how hollow, was all that was left. Eleanor had spent the week visiting every other publisher. None had been willing to take her on—either at her normal rates or for what they’d paid her lesser-performing colleagues. She had three months of living expenses saved, but that hardly felt like enough given the only type of work she knew was impossible to find and every other kind of work required more experience than Eleanor had.
“What will you do?”
Eleanor twisted the ribbon tied around her wrist, unable to meet her employer’s eye. “I do not know. Every time I feel as though my mind has grasped an idea, it slips.” Even her ever-dependable brain was failing her.
“And the boy? This Captain?” It had been weeks and Agatha’s displeasure had not waned. “Has the scoundrel returned to give an accounting for his absence?”
She hooked the ribbon with a fingernail and tugged it. “I think you should stop expecting a resolution there, my lady. I certainly have.” Her nails had grown long. She’d had no cause to trim them and now her hands were starting to look as pristine as her dresses.
“I’ve decided to kill him off, you know.”
Eleanor’s gaze jerked upward. Agatha was deadly serious. Her nails dug into the padded furniture, her lips puckered, and her narrowed eyes suddenly flared.Thiswas the dragon people whispered about.
“You cannot kill him when you do not know who he is,” Eleanor said. “But your desire to do so is kind. Thank you.”
“I can murder whoever I like, Miss Wright. It is my book. In fact, it will be easier to kill off your Captain than it will be to kill off Strafford because I’ve never seen him. There is no danger that my description will too closely resemble the source material.”
Eleanor smiled. The duke was unlikely to read Lady Wharton’s high-society mystery novel, but perhaps his sisters would and they would inform him of his demise.
Agatha’s sour mien did not change, even as her words softened. “You have a place with me until you get on your feet. When the season is over, you can read my chapters and give me your thoughts. I’m not sure what a service like that should pay, but you’ve been in the book business for a long time, and that is worth something.”
Eleanor wiped away a tear and Lady Wharton huffed. “Don’t get sentimental. Here.” She handed Eleanor the book she’d been reading. “My eyes are tired. Read this.”
Eleanor looked at the title and her heart twisted.
Dear Captain,
Has a familiar story ever suddenly felt foreign? As though you are reading it for the first time?Emmais hitting differently this time, and not just because it makes me think of you. I am beginning to fear that she and I are more alike than I thought. We are both prideful and naive.
Our endings will bear no resemblance, sadly. She was a work of fiction and reader expectations kept her safe. How I wish my life could be fiction and you would show up at my door with a good reason for your disappearance.
I wonder what you’re reading now. Jules Verne’s latest translation will be released this year instead of next, for complicated reasons. That brings me tempered joy, a sliver of a silver lining. You will not have to wait very long to have your cliff-hanger resolved.
The protests wore on but the mood of them had changed. The protesters’ worn and ratty signs suggested that the men and women who’d made them no longer had the desire to fix them. There was no chanting, no humor. There were as many people sitting in the gutter or slumped on crates and overturned rubbish bins as there were standing, marching, and facing off against the constabulary, who at this point looked bored.
Peter had thought that the crowd would have dissipated by now, that after the initial shock, things would have shifted, compositors would have picked up different work, the specter of change they’d fought against having not wreaked the damage they’d feared.
