The Penny Dreadful Curse (9 page)

“That’s
unusual, isn’t it?” pursued the Countess, shaking her head and
smiling graciously. “No tea for me. I mean that most writers of
dreadfuls are women since most of your readers are boys or young
men drawn from the labouring class, is that correct?”

“Yes, yes,
quite correct, but women have more time on their hands. Men are
busy earning a living, labouring with their hands, expending sweat,
taxing their brains, and so on. Women are sat at home all day,
bored, idle, romanticising, daydreaming. They have time to put pen
to paper.”

“That brings
me to the next point,” said the Countess, gritting her teeth. “Noms
de plume. Do you have a list of authors and their noms de plume
that may help us with our investigation?”

Mr Panglossian
shook his head emphatically, his glossy black helmet moved from
side to side in determined concert with him without a single hair
being displaced. “No, Countess, I do not, and even if I did I would
not give it to you. Penny dreadfuls are not like normal books. They
are a different beast altogether. The authors of dreadfuls put a
high value on anonymity, hence the use of pen names by the vast
majority. As I mentioned earlier, a lot of my authors are
respectable people who move in exalted circles, they do not wish to
have it known by all and sundry that they are writers of dreadfuls.
They may be eminent persons of society: lords, ladies, barristers,
professors, churchmen, and the like, they do not want it made
public they pen stories for barrow boys and factory hands and the
great unwashed. Besides, and this is the crux, a nom de plume adds
to the curiosity and novelty value of the dreadfuls. What I call:
the not-knowingness factor. If the barrow boy knew that the local
schoolmaster wrote about the dangerous assignations of a
highwayman, or worse, that the lonely old spinster who lived next
door wrote about the derring-do of a brave knight or the
swashbuckling exploits of a cut-throat pirate, well, it would kill
the excitement, the mystique, the intrigue, the whole adventure of
the thing. It would be less believable, less credible, and destroy
the entire penny dreadful industry in one go. No, Countess, you may
not have a list of authors and their noms de plume. Even if I kept
such a list it would be over my dead body to see it handed it over
to anyone for any reason whatsoever.”

“How can you
deny such a list exists?” challenged Dr Watson. “It stands to
reason that you must have such a list, otherwise how would you pay
your authors?”

“I will
reiterate again. It is a matter of confidentiality and trust. I
refer to my authors by whatever name they choose to give me. I do
not ask for particulars such as birth certificate, occupation,
address or circumstance. If I happen to recognise them, I keep that
recognition to myself. They come in personally, every three to six
months, depending on prior agreement, and receive their royalties
direct from my own hand. It is always on a Sunday morn when most
folks in York are at church and the streets are quiet. Privacy is
paramount, you see. That is my way, always has been and always will
be. I started out that way and that is how I mean to go on.”

“You’re an
atheist?” posed Dr Watson in a non-judgemental tone, aware that the
numbers of disbelievers was growing, though most were not so open
about their views.

“Not at all! I
am a Jew. Now –”

“Do you not
wish to see the murderer of the authors you say you know personally
brought to justice?” interrupted the Countess. “Five authoresses so
far and who knows if that may be the end of it.”

Mr Panglossian
sighed heavily and gestured toward the large Georgian window that
framed him in a fiat of grey light. His hand was like a slab of
meat and his five fat fingers like pork sausages mounted on
skewers. “I do not wish to sound callous or disrespectful of the
dead, Countess, but the world outside that window is full of
undiscovered talent. The world is not short of dreadful authors
waiting for their chance to be published. As one author is struck
from our list another is waiting in the wings to take their place.
Now, if there is nothing more I can help you with, my secretary, Mr
Thrypp, will show you out.”

“Thank you for
your time,” Dr Watson offered stiffly, moving to the door where the
Countess caught him by the arm.

“Oh, Dr
Watson,” she trilled, a glint in her eye – always a sign that she
had something up her stylish sleeve – “did you not profess a desire
to see the modern printing presses of Panglossian Publishing as we
travelled to York yesterday.” She turned to the Jewish publisher.
“I’m sure you are aware, Mr Panglossian, that you are in the
presence of the eminent author Dr John Watson, chronicler of the
adventures of the world famous detective, Mr Sherlock Holmes. He is
apt to hide his light under a bushel but let me assure you of his
renown in London’s literary circles. Why, just the other day the
doctor received a letter from the Prince of Wales, professing how
much he enjoyed his detective novels. And,” here she lowered her
voice as if imparting a great secret, “he is on the lookout for a
modern publisher, someone who is in tune with his creative
disposition and who understands the importance of confidentiality.
And can you believe he has never even seen a modern printing press
in action! Remarkable, is it not!”

“Well! I had
no idea I was in such exalted company! I will be honoured to show
you around personally, if you will follow me.”

They stepped
into the outer office.

“Thrypp,” the
publisher advised curtly, “I will be giving Dr Watson and Countess
Volodymyrovna a tour of our new printing presses. See to it that
there is some morning tea on hand upon our return. Some buttered
crumpets to go with the Souchong. And refill the decanter of sherry
while you are at it. It is almost empty.”

The Countess
had deliberately left her reticule in Mr Panglossian’s office. They
had reached the basement where the new presses hummed and whirred
and clanged when she suddenly remembered it was missing. Mr
Panglossian offered to send someone to fetch the little bag for her
but she insisted on doing it herself and suggested he continue the
tour of the new presses that Dr Watson was so keen to see. She
remembered the way, she assured him, and would rejoin them
momentarily.

Splendid! Mr
Thrypp was not at his post. She presumed he was busy brewing
Souchong and buttering crumpets. As soon as she was back in the
office of Mr Panglossian she raced to the right-hand armoire and
began checking the names of the manuscripts awaiting publication.
Most of the names she was already familiar with, and of those, only
one nom de plume came close to matching BB. It was Baroness du
Bois, author of
Crimson Cavalier
. Disappointed, she was
about to rejoin her sleuthing companion when she decided to look at
the rejects as well. And it was here that she struck gold. Sitting
on top of the miserable pile was a small booklet separated into
months of the year. Someone, presumably Mr Thrypp, had very
efficiently recorded the authors’ names, the dates the manuscripts
had been submitted, and the titles.

A quick scan
revealed that someone known as Baron Brasenose submitted at least
one and sometimes two manuscripts each month. BB! The Baron penned
stories about knights and dragons and damsels in distress.

A further scan
revealed the name Roman Acle. This unfortunate author had the
dubious honour of submitting the greatest number of rejected
manuscripts this calendar year. He had at least two and sometimes
three manuscripts rejected every single month. In April he had four
rejections. The Countess replaced the booklet on the stack of
rejects and began ferreting through the manuscripts, trying to find
those belonging to Baron Brasenose and Roman Acle. There were none
belonging to the former but several belonging to the latter. She
had them in her hands and was wondering how she was going to
smuggle them out unnoticed when she heard a voice.

“Well, well,
what have we here?”

Startled, she
whirled round and dropped the rejects belonging to Mr Acle. They
fanned out in an arc on the floor. She expected to see the
efficient Mr Thrypp with a tea tray in his hands, but the man in
the doorway was imposingly tall and scrutinising her in a way that
would have been quite unnerving had she been less vain. She
recognized him instantly from his distinctive, coarse, grizzled,
grey, bushy beard.

“You must be
Panglossian’s new secretary,” he said, sizing up the elegant cut of
her cloth and the sparklers on her fingers. “A huge improvement on
that weedy dullard, Thrypp. I’m Mr Charles Dicksen and you
are…”

“Countess
Varvara Volodymyrovna.” Her exotic, aristocratic, multi-syllabic
name never failed to impress. It rendered most people mute for a
few seconds, some for as long as a minute. He recovered his wits
quicker than most.

“Well, well,
the titan of publishing has certainly stepped up in the world,” he
praised obliquely. “If the penny-pinching mountebank ever sacks you
make sure you come straight to me. Here is my card.”

Mr Dicksen was
immaculately attired in frock coat, silk vest, silk cravat, top hat
and trousers with a razor-sharp crease that looked lethal. His
calling card came with the faint scent of roses.

“Gladhill.”
She smiled luminously. “
Quelle jolie
!”

“Ah! You speak
French. You will be wasted here. Panglossian is a contradiction in
terms – a Jewish Philistine. If you work for me your
accomplishments will be recognized
and
rewarded.”

She slipped
his card into her beaded reticule. “
Je suis désolée
. I am
sorry to disabuse you, Mr Dicksen, but I am not Mr Thrypp’s
replacement. I am paying a visit to Mr Panglossian with my
travelling companion, Dr John Watson, who is being given a tour of
the new printing presses as we speak and will return any moment for
morning tea. My feminine curiosity got the better of me when I
returned for my reticule and I’m afraid I simply had to take a peek
inside the armoire at the manuscripts.” She bent down to collect
what she had spilled.

He crouched
beside her, his knee brushing up against her thigh. “These are the
rejects,” he sneered at a glance. “Roman Acle is an illiterate
buffoon. He drives poor Panglossian mad with his submissions. Every
story suffers from the same fatal flaw that all failed writers
share.”

“And that
is?”

“Lack of
voice.” He straightened up and indicated the other armoire with a
tilt of his hirsute glory. “In yonder cupboard you will see what I
mean if you peruse the manuscripts that have won favour with the
wily Jew of York. They strike a chord with the reader. They are not
works of art. They are not original. They are not grammatical. They
are not even very clever. But they have that vital ingredient -
voice.” He swung himself into the nearest leather wing chair with
remarkable sinuosity and crossed one knee over the other with
elastic elegance. “Now, did I hear you correctly? Did you say: Dr
John Watson?”

Carefully, she
replaced the rejected manuscripts in the armoire and folded herself
with equal elegance into the adjacent wing chair. “You have heard
of him?”

“Certainly! I
have read all of his work. A prodigious output. The prose suffers
from verbosity. A touch over-written. The main character is
incredibly pompous but his innate cleverness saves him from
becoming a frightful prig. Dr Watson comes across as slow-witted. I
wondered if that was perhaps a literary conceit. I am keen to meet
him face to face and see for myself if he is really as stupid as he
seems. All in all, his stories are quite entertaining if you are
after something that will not prove too taxing to the brain. Did
you just describe him as your travelling companion? So, does that
mean –”

The remainder
of his conjecture was cut off by the arrival of Mr Thrypp,
clutching an unopened bottle of Spanish sherry. Hot on his heels
came two under-secretaries carting trays laden with tiered plates
of buttered crumpets and all the accoutrements necessary for that
quaint English ritual known as morning tea which no-one revered
more than a foreigner.

Mr Thrypp
seemed momentarily flustered. “Oh, Mr Dicksen, I, er, I wasn’t
expecting you until half past eleven. Mr Panglossian is occupied at
present.”

“Yes, yes,
stop blathering on, Thrypp. You remind me of my wife. I decided to
come early and just as well I did. I have had the pleasure of
acquainting myself with the exquisite Countess Volodymyrovna and
quite soon I will get to meet Dr John Watson and enjoy one of
Panglossian’s crumpet extravaganzas. Is that a new amontillado?
Pour two glasses before you adulterate its virginal sweetness with
the dregs of that sour oloroso in the decanter.”

They watched
as the acolyte procured two tiny red crystal glasses from inside
the sideboard and measured out a thimbleful of libation. Mr Dicksen
sneered at the miserly offering but refrained from comment when the
Countess forced his concentration.

“I heard an
unfamiliar term this morning by way of conversation with an old
bookseller,” she said, “and it has baffled me ever since. I think
you might be the perfect person to enlighten me, Mr Dicksen. What
is mudlarking?”

He gave an
uncensored laugh of genuine amusement, full and throaty. “I do like
a lady who takes me by surprise! Mudlarking! There’s a term one
does not expect to hear fall from the lips of a foreign Countess.
To be a mudlark is to scour the banks of rivers for anything that
might prove valuable – lumps of coal, buttons, buckles, rags,
pennies and so forth. It is generally undertaken by young
starvelings who have no other means of earning a living. Mudlarking
is a precarious and pitiful existence.”