Who is Maud Dixon? Page 8

  “Where did the name come from, anyway?” Florence asked.

  Helen tapped the ash from her cigarette onto her plate. “The Tennyson poem, Maud. Have you read it?”

  Florence shook her head.

  “You should. It’s wonderful. It’s a love story with all these strange, dark undertones. He describes Maud as ‘faultily faultless, icily regular, splendidly null.’ I just love that.”

  “And Dixon?”

  “My college roommate. It was her middle name.” Helen shrugged. “Couldn’t stand her, actually.”

  “And did you keep in touch with Ruby after you left home?”

  Helen smiled a wide, closed-lip smile that Florence would come to recognize well. “Florence, it’s just a novel.”

  * * *

  It was past eleven by the time they finished their drinks. Helen waved off Florence’s offer to do the dishes. “Go get some sleep,” she said, stubbing out a lipstick-smeared cigarette.

  “Likewise,” Florence responded, pleased she’d found an opportunity to use the word. She’d admired its air of sophistication when Helen had used it at the train station.

  Florence walked to the carriage house slightly drunk. Halfway there, in the still darkness, she looked back. Every window was lit up, and Helen stood at the sink in the kitchen. She had turned the music back on and was conducting again.

  Florence smiled. Helen was everything she wanted to be, and she’d been handed the opportunity to study her at close range. She would not, she swore to herself gravely, waste it.

  15.

  Florence woke up at six. She showered and took a short walk in the woods behind the house as the sun rose. When she got back to the cottage, she discovered a new voicemail from her mother, which she ignored. At nine, she went over to the main house and found Helen reading the paper at the dining room table.

  “There’s coffee in the pot,” Helen said without looking up.

  When Florence returned with a mug, Helen pushed out the chair opposite her with her foot.

  “Alright,” she said. “Baptism by fire: I have over a hundred unread emails to respond to, and what that actually means is that you have over a hundred unread emails to respond to.”

  Most of them, she explained, were from Frost/Bollen—either from Greta or her assistant, Lauren. They were requests for interviews and appearances, responses to readers’ letters, and so on. Helen opened the laptop on the table and signed into the account maud.dixon.writer@gmail.com. Then she swiveled the keyboard toward Florence. “Here, we’ll do the first one together.”

  Florence opened the most recent email. It was from Greta:

  Hi M.

  How’s it working out with Florence?

  Florence laughed uncomfortably. “Maybe a different one?” she suggested.

  “You handle my correspondence now,” Helen said. “All of it.”

  “Okay…” Florence lifted her fingers to the keyboard, then stopped and said, “Wait. She called you M. Is that for Maud?”

  “Yes. We didn’t want anything hackable linking my real name to Maud Dixon’s agent. You can never be too careful. Anyway, it’s second nature by now.”

  “But I should sign my emails from me, right?”

  “Actually, I hadn’t thought about it. Yes, I suppose that’s fine. The important thing is just make sure to never use my real name. Now write.”

  Florence typed a reply in the same dispassionately professional tone Agatha had taught her to use:

  Hi Greta,

  Things are working out well. Thank you for your concern.

  Best,

  Florence

  She turned questioningly to Helen, who read it and rolled her eyes. She pulled the computer back toward herself and replaced what Florence had written with:

  We’re getting along like a house on fire.

  She hit Send and turned back to Florence. “Something you should know: I deplore moderation.”

  Beyond Helen’s correspondence, Florence’s duties would include assisting with research and typing up Helen’s rough drafts. Helen handed her a stack of pages covered in large, loopy scrawl. “I’ve been saving it up for you,” she said. “I find typing painfully tedious.”

  “No problem,” Florence said. She put the pages next to the laptop and tried not to look at them while Helen continued to talk.

  There was a woman who came in once a week to clean and buy the groceries, but the rest of the day-to-day management of her life would fall to Florence. That included paying Helen’s bills—credit cards, phone, Internet, mortgage, everything, as far as Florence could tell. Helen handed over her passwords and bank accounts with a nonchalance that suggested either profound naivete or profound trust. Florence chose to assume the latter.

  “I dislike entangling myself with the wider world,” Helen explained. “I’d be a true hermit if it weren’t so damn inconvenient. Besides, I’m hopeless with logistics. I once booked a flight not only on the wrong day but in the wrong year. I’ll leave the small print to small minds.”

  Florence glanced at her to see if she realized the insult she’d just volleyed at her new assistant, but Helen went on with the lesson.

  She had another Gmail account in her real name, which she showed Florence how to access in order to manage all her various online accounts. Florence took a quick glance through the inbox and saw mostly Amazon order confirmations, notifications from her bank, and daily digests from the New York Times.

  At ten, Helen took her coffee upstairs to her office and told Florence to start on the emails for Maud Dixon. Florence opened the most recent unread message. It had been sent by Greta the morning before.

  Hi M.

  Deborah is on my case again about book #2. What can I tell her? We really should give them a show of good faith. A first chapter. A more detailed outline. A timeline. Something. Let’s discuss. Call me.

  G.

  Florence glanced around guiltily. She had a feeling this was not an email Helen wanted her to see. She closed it quickly and marked it as unread. The next one was from Greta too, but it was more in line with what Helen had told her to expect.

  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:

  When she heard the word “forceful” being used in connection with herself, even though she knew it was perfectly true and not intended as derogation, she immediately felt like some rather ungraceful something animal, and the sensation did not please her.

  Florence tapped her lower lip with her finger. Predatory? Yes. She nodded definitively. She typed it into the manuscript and underlined it, praying that she’d picked the right word—not just because she was eager for Helen’s approval, but because, she realized, she was slightly terrified of her.

  16.

  Over the next few days, Helen and Florence fell into a rhythm. Florence went over to the main house around nine or ten. She and Helen usually had a cup of coffee together while they went over the plan for the day. Otherwise, Florence would find a note on the kitchen counter listing her projects. There was usually some typing to be done, along with keeping up with Helen’s correspondence. Helen also wanted Florence to read several books on Moroccan history and culture and write up a summary of her findings.

  Twice Helen lent Florence her car so she could drive to Hudson and pick up a book she needed or a few bottles of the Châteauneuf-du-Pape she liked to drink. Each time she told Florence to take her time and enjoy herself.

  Florence discovered that Hudson proper was actually just as charming and picturesque as she’d imagined; it wasn’t until you crossed the bridge heading back to Cairo that things started to go to seed. The town’s main street, which they’d bypassed on the drive from the train station, was filled with bakeries, home-decor shops, and sunny restaurants.

  On her second visit, however, Florence started to see something artificial in the town’s charm. It seemed designed for people who wanted to experience country living without feeling like they’d left Brooklyn. Plus, it wasn’t like she could afford the hand-dyed Shibori tablecloths and reclaimed driftwood objets d’art the boutiques sold. She could understand why Helen had settled in less fashionable Cairo.

  Helen rarely went into town herself. Most days, she didn’t leave the property. It wasn’t until Florence’s second week on the job that she found herself alone in the house for the first time. Helen hadn’t mentioned where she was going, just that she’d be gone for several hours.

  A few minutes after the car pulled away, Florence did something she’d wanted to do since she arrived: She crept up to the second floor and into Helen’s study. The sun streamed in from windows on two sides of the room, illuminating dust motes in the air. Florence sat down in Helen’s seat. The chair was made of ribbed, caramel-colored leather that had been worn down by use. She ran her hands across the desk’s scarred wood. She opened the top drawer and found a laptop in it. She glanced at the door, then took it out and opened it. The screen came to life but a dialog box appeared asking for a password. Florence quickly shut it and put it back where she’d found it. She leaned back in the chair and closed her eyes. She pretended that this was her study. That all she ever had to do was to sit in this beautiful room and write whatever she wanted.

  Suddenly she heard a bang downstairs and bolted from the room, sending the chair careening across the floor. Downstairs, she realized that it had only been the wind blowing the kitchen door shut. She hurried back up to make sure she left the room exactly as she’d found it.

  This aborted foray upstairs did nothing to allay her curiosity. If anything, it emboldened her. She sifted through Helen’s emails, looking for something personal. She finally spotted, three pages in, a message with the subject line Turandot? She opened it.

  Helen,

  What do you think about Turandot on April 5th? I know we just saw it last year, but this production is supposed to be spectacular. Let me know.

  Sylvie

  Florence Googled the name in the email address: Sylvie Daloud. She was an architect who lived in New York. Florence searched the inbox for more emails from her. There were dozens, nearly all of them concerning opera. Helen’s replies were just as polite and formal as Sylvie’s. So much for deploring moderation, Florence thought.

  Florence had to skim through emails back until November before she found a personal email from someone other than Sylvie.

  Helen!!! I hope this is actually you. I just ran into Daphne and she gave me your email address but said she hadn’t used it in ages. How are you?? Married? Kids? Where are you living now? I’m still in Jackson, married to Tim. We’ve got two great girls, and we’re waiting on a third. Let’s just say Tim knows more about Disney princesses than he ev
er thought he would lol. Anyhoo! I just wanted to say hi. I still see the gang pretty regularly and we all realized we hadn’t talked to you in forever. Do you ever come back to visit? We just built an extension on our house (don’t ask me about it—I’ve barely recovered!) so there’s a guestroom with your name on it…

  Xoxo Tori

  Florence searched the Sent folder. Helen had never responded, and Tori hadn’t tried again. Florence thought it was little wonder that Helen hadn’t wanted to keep in touch with someone who casually deployed “anyhoo!” in her correspondence.

  She looked in Helen’s search history and found a seemingly random collection of terms: Guerlain KissKiss Shaping Cream lip color in “Red Passion.” How to replace a lost passport abroad. Mississippi parole regulations. Someone named Lisa Blackford. A restaurant in a place called Semat, Morocco. Florence’s own LinkedIn page and Instagram account. She flushed when she saw that. Florence was mortified at the thought of Helen looking through her Instagram account, which had barely thirty followers and featured mainly pictures of dogs she saw on the street and quotes from books she was reading.

  But of course Helen had researched her before she’d hired her. Besides, Helen wasn’t in a position to ridicule the size of Florence’s social network; other than those emails from Sylvie and Tori, Helen didn’t seem to have any friends at all. The landline at her house had only rung twice while Florence had been there. The first time it had been a telemarketer. The second time it had been Greta, and Helen had asked Florence to tell her she wasn’t home.

  A few days after Greta’s failed attempt to reach Helen, she called Florence directly.

  “I’m glad to hear you two are off to such a great start,” she said.

  “We are, thank you,” Florence replied, still unsure why Greta had called on her cell phone.

  “And I appreciate your slogging through all those old emails from my team. I know it’s not exactly thrilling work, but it does need to get done.”