There was a brief pause down the line. “Thanks, Travis. I appreciate your understanding.”
“In the meantime, let me know if you need any help from me.”
“Thank you. Listen, I can’t stay on the phone much longer, because it hurts to talk because of the cuts and scrapes around my mouth, and I still have a few other clients to contact and let them know I can’t work for them for a while.”
“Understood. I won’t keep you. Stay in touch when you can and get well soon, Ruth. I’ll be thinking of you.”
They exchanged goodbyes and hung up. Travis stared at the phone for a long moment, absorbing what he’d just heard. Poor Ruth. He felt wretched for her. The road accident must have been incredibly traumatic and it sounded like her injuries were awful. Given the surgery she’d described, she had a long recovery ahead of her.
Although their relationship was purely work-related, and they communicated mostly by emails and only talked on the phone a couple of times a month, he’d grown to like Ruth a great deal during the year she’d worked as his assistant, and he hated knowing she was now going through such a terrible time.
“Mr Stone? Is everything okay?”
Travis looked up from the phone he’d been blankly staring at and saw both the librarian, Ellie, and the lady whose book he’d just signed, Olive, peering at him with concerned expressions.
“It looks like you just received some bad news?” Olive said, her frown deepening.
“I’m afraid so. That was my assistant, Ruth. It turns out she was involved in a nasty road accident a couple of days ago and is badly injured and now in the hospital.”
“Oh dear, I’m so very sorry to hear that,” Olive said.
“Me too,” Ellie said. “Will she be okay?”
“Yes, but unfortunately it sounds like she has a long recovery ahead of her. She had surgery to fix a broken arm and had pins put into her wrist. There are other injuries, too.”
“That’s awful,” Olive said, her expression still twisted in dismay. “What a horrible thing to happen. I will keep her in my thoughts.”
“That’s very kind,” Travis smiled.
Ellie gave him a questioning look. “Hmm, is that the reason why…?” She stopped suddenly, biting back the words before she could finish what she was saying. “Oh, never mind. Forget I said anything.”
Curious, Travis pressed her. “Is that the reason why… what? What were you about to say?”
“I feel bad even asking, considering what has happened to your poor assistant but… well, the thing is, I’d sent you a couple of emails over the weekend about today’s event here at the library, but didn’t get a response. Of course, itwasthe weekend, and I should have got in touch at the end of last week to clarify the details, but when I didn’t get a reply this morning either, I just assumed perhaps the email got overlooked. I’m sure you must get so many emails.”
Travis let out a wry laugh. “I do. I get alotof emails, which is why having Ruth as my assistant is so essential. What did I miss in the emails you sent? I hope it wasn’t something important.”
“No, I just wanted to check a few final details with you before your book talk, but it was nothing major. Like I said, I should’ve got in touch earlier, but I was on a library management training programme last week and it completely slipped my mind.”
“I’m sorry your email was overlooked. I think I might be in for a nasty surprise when I check my email inbox later. With Ruth out of commission for the last few days, and me only now finding out about it, I think there might be a bit of a backlog.”
Under the contract he’d agreed with Ruth, she worked on his author marketing tasks for eight hours each week, mostly on weekdays but including at least a portion of time on the weekends when his social media accounts often got a lot of interaction from readers. Although Ruth wouldn’t have spent much time on either a Saturday or a Sunday working on his email inbox, she would certainly have logged in to check for anything important he needed to see.
Such as a late email from the Hamblehurst librarian regarding the final details for the talk he’d just given.
If he hadn’t been so caught up over the last few days writing his new book, Travis would have logged in to his email at some point, because keeping track of correspondence wasn’t solely the responsibility of his assistant, and he had a duty to make sure important things weren’t missed. But with the writing going at full speed since the end of last week, he’d simply forgotten all about everything else.
It was a hazard of the author life.
“Will your assistant be able to find another member of staff to cover for her while she’s recuperating from her injuries?” Ellie asked.
“I’m afraid not. Ruth is a freelancer who works for herself. I’m sure she probably knows other people in her industry who could step in, but judging by how she sounded on the phone, she was in no fit state to start looking into anything like that on my behalf. What matters is that she rests.”
“That’s very considerate of you, Mr Stone,” Olive said.
“I’ll find the time somehow to deal with the emails and all the other tasks she took care of for me,” Travis said. “Well, at least until I can find a temporary replacement.”
His mind was already whirring at both prospects. Handling all his social media work by himself would take a huge chunk out of his writing time, which was the last thing he needed considering the deadline he was working towards.
