Who is Maud Dixon?(25)

M—

NPR wants you on Fresh Air. You can do it from up there. We can try that voice modulator they use. What do you think? It would be great to keep Maud Dixon’s name fresh in people’s minds—especially since the second book is going to come out such a long time after the first. Let me know. G.



Florence thought Greta made a good point, but Helen had been clear: The answer was always no. She tried to channel Helen’s voice and forget everything she’d ever learned about professional courtesy. She wrote:

Greta,

The no-interview rule stands, no exceptions.



She hovered the mouse over the Send button but didn’t click it. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t send that email to Greta Frost. She erased what she’d written and typed instead:

Hi Greta,

Unfortunately, Helen won’t do the interview with NPR. I hope you understand.

Best,

Florence



She pressed Send. By the time she was redirected back to the inbox, Greta’s previous email—about Helen’s second book—was gone. Florence glanced up at the ceiling. Helen must have just erased it. Did she have another laptop up there?

For the next several hours, Florence waded through the backlogged Maud Dixon emails. She allowed herself just one diversion: logging in to Helen’s Morgan Stanley account. Her eyes widened when she saw the balance: just over three million dollars. She’d known that Mississippi Foxtrot must have made somewhere in that range, particularly after the TV rights were sold, but it was different seeing the actual number, made so concrete by the insignificant tally of cents tacked on the end. Florence tried to think about what she would do with that much money, but her imagination failed her. All she could think was that she’d do just what Helen had done: buy a house, retreat from the world, grow tomatoes.

By two in the afternoon, Helen had still not come back downstairs. Florence made herself a sandwich with some bread and turkey she found in the fridge, finished the coffee, and cleaned the pot. When she returned to her makeshift desk at the dining table, she finally allowed herself to pick up Helen’s handwritten pages.

Here it was. The next Maud Dixon novel.

At the top of the first page Helen had scrawled what Florence assumed was a chapter title: “The Age of Monsters.” She scanned the rest of it, and realized at once that she could barely read Helen’s handwriting. She squinted at the first sentence:

In the night the wind something and the weather something, bringing a something sky and…



She flipped to the next page. It, too, was rife with words she couldn’t decipher:

She listened, wondering if it had been a something noise which had something her back from sleep: she heard only the endless sound of the sea against the rocks, so far below that it was like a something being held to the something. She opened her eyes. The room was bathed in brilliant moonlight. It came in from the something, but on all sides she could see the glow of the something night sky out over the water. Slipping out of bed, she went and tried the door in the something, just to be positive it was locked.



Florence put down the manuscript and bit her fingernail. She wasn’t sure what to do. Transcribing this would be like doing a Mad Libs. She stood up and walked to the bottom of the stairway. Helen hadn’t invited her to the second floor yet. She went up halfway so that she could see into the hallway. All the doors were open except one. She guessed that was Helen’s office. She climbed the rest of the way up, cringing at every creak, and listened at the door. She heard nothing, until all of a sudden a crash sounded from within. Florence jumped. It sounded like something heavy had been hurled across the room. She stood for another moment or two, then turned around and started creeping back toward the stairs.

Just then the office door flew open, and Helen filled the frame. She looked furious.

“What are you doing up here?”

“I’m sorry. I—”

“I didn’t think I needed to articulate this, but apparently I do: Do not disturb me while I’m working. I find it very hard to regain focus.”

“I’m so sorry, I’ll just go back downstairs.”

“Well, you’ve already interrupted so you might as well just tell me what you want.”

“It’s your writing,” Florence said, holding out the stack of paper. “I’m having a little bit of trouble reading some of it.”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake.” Helen snatched the pages impatiently.

While Helen looked at them, Florence peeked into the room behind her and saw crowded built-in bookshelves and a worn Turkish-looking carpet.

“What can’t you understand?”

Florence pointed. “There, and there. And there.”

“That says luminous. And that—that’s just an ampersand.”

“And there?” Florence asked, pointing to another scribble.

Helen brought the page closer to her face and angled it toward the light. After a moment she exhaled and handed the sheaf of pages back to Florence. “I don’t know, Florence. Just try to figure it out on your own. Write down your best guess and underline it or something. I’ll figure it out later.”

Helen shut the door crisply on Florence’s repeated apologies.

Florence trudged back down to the dining room feeling foolish. She looked at the last word Helen hadn’t been able to read. It started with a P; that was all she could glean. She reread the sentence: