“Shall I,” Forster began, licking his plump cracked lips, “keep it at my office?”
Georgy cleared her throat pointedly.
“Just for now,” Forster clarified, clearing his own throat as an answer to her gesture. “Until you decide what you shall do with it, Miss Hogarth. Then you may-well, you may throw the thing into the Thames if you wish!”
“Keep it for now,” Georgy agreed, at which point Forster eagerly plucked the
Chapter 15
IN THE MORNING, OSGOOD AND REBECCA HAD PLANNED TO SEP-arate, Osgood to try again at Chapman & Hall in London and Rebecca to continue the labors at Gadshill. At the last moment, Osgood called Rebecca back to the Falstaff's wagon. He looked at her with a curious air. “I think you ought to come to London with me this morning, Miss Sand. If Mr. Chapman does concede to see me, I should like you to take down notes.”
Rebecca hesitated. “This shall be my first time in London!” she exclaimed, then held in her excitement with her typically neutral air. “I shall get my pencil case.”
“Good thing,” Osgood said. “Your eyes could use a respite from reading over Mr. Dickens's papers, I'm certain.”
After arriving at the Charing Cross station in the Strand, Osgood and Rebecca, in the shadows of theaters and shops, walked through the astounding number of street performers and merchant booths on every corner, which made Boston seem quiet by comparison. Rebecca's eyes danced at all the sights. The shouting peddlers held up repaired shoes, tools, fruit, puppies, birds-anything that could be offered for a few shillings. The variety of accents and dialects made every English peddler's vocal promotions seem yet another different language to the American ear.
“Do you notice something strange about the peddlers?” Osgood asked Rebecca.
“The sheer noise they create,” she replied. “It is quite an astonishing thing.”
As they spoke, they passed a Punch and Judy show. The wooden marionettes pranced across the small stage, Judy hitting Punch over the head with a cudgel. “I'll pay yer for a throwin’ the child out the winder!” shouted puppet Judy at her puppet spouse.
“Look again,” Osgood said. “There is something stranger than the noise, Miss Sand, and that is that London businessmen do not seem to notice the roar of the streets at all! To live in London, one must possess an iron concentration. That is how it remains the richest city in the world. Here we are,” Osgood said, pointing to a handsome brick building ahead displaying the CHAPMAN & HALL sign in the window.
This time when Chapman marched through the anteroom, he paused and took a few small steps backward upon seeing the guests on the sofa. The ruddy-skinned English publisher, with his strapping deportment and sleek dark hair combed into a flashy split across his wide head, looked the part of a sportsman and man of leisure, far more than that of a bookman.
“Say, visitors I see,” said Chapman, though his eyes were fixed not on both visitors, but on Rebecca's slender form. Finally, he resigned himself to also noticing the gentleman.
“Frederic Chapman,” Chapman announced himself, extending a hand.
“James Osgood. We met yesterday,” Osgood reminded him.
Chapman squinted at the visitor. “I remember your face vividly. The American publisher. Now, this little woman is…”
“My bookkeeper, Miss Sand,” Osgood presented her.
He took her hand gingerly in his. “You are most welcome into our humble firm, my dear. Say, you will come in with us to my office for my interview with Mr. Osgood, won't you?”
Osgood and Rebecca followed a clerk who followed Chapman in the procession into his private office. The room displayed some expensive books but a greater number of dead, stuffed animals: a rabbit, a fox, a deer. The frightful artifacts emitted a stale, bleak odor and each one seemed to stare in dumb loyalty only at Mr. Chapman wherever he moved. The office had a large bay window; however, instead of looking out onto London, it overlooked the offices and rooms of Chapman & Hall. Periodically, Chapman would turn his head to make sure his employees were hard at work. One of his harried clerks delivered a bottle of port to the meeting with a bow that was more like a spontaneous wobbling of the knees.
“Ah, excellent. I presume you and Mr. Fields have a wine cellar back in Boston,” Chapman commented as two glasses were filled.
“Subscription lists and packing supplies fill our cellar.”
“We have an extensive one. A game larder, too. Thinking of adding a billiard room-next time we'll play It is always a pleasure to see a colleague from the other side of the water.”
“Mr. Chapman, I suppose you have already thoroughly investigated what else might remain of
“Investigated? Why, Mr. Osgood, you speak like one of the detectives in all the new novels. You tickle my belly with your American notions.”
“I don't mean to,” Osgood returned seriously.
“No?” Chapman asked, disappointed. “But what would be investigated about it?”
Osgood, flabbergasted, said, “Whether Mr. Dickens left any clues, any indications about where his story was to go.”
Chapman interrupted with a satisfyingly hearty laugh, proving the alleged tickling. “See here, Osgood, old boy,” he said, “you are a laugh in the real American fashion, aren't you? Why, I'm perfectly content with what we have
“They are superb, I agree. But if I understand correctly, you paid quite a sum for the book,” Osgood said incredulously.
“Seventy-five hundred pounds! The highest sum ever paid to an author for a new book.” This he pointed out boastfully in Rebecca's direction.
“I would think your firm would wish to do whatever were possible to protect your investment,” Osgood said.
“I will tell you how I see it. Every reader who picks up the book, finding it unfinished, can spend their time guessing what the ending should be. And they'll tell their friends to buy a copy and do the same, so it can be argued.”
“In America, its unfinished state will bait all the freebooters, as they are called,” Osgood said.
“That scoundrel Major Harper and his ilk,” Chapman said, tipping his glass high and ingesting his port with a predatory swiftness as he glanced up at the congregation of animal heads. His hunting eyes, always roving, paused back on Osgood. “That's the thing you're worried about, isn't it?” he finally added. He leaned in toward Rebecca-not exactly unfriendly to Osgood's predicament but entirely lacking in interest relative to the pretty bookkeeper sitting across. “Say, I suppose your employer fought bravely in your War of Rebellion, didn't be? Lucky. Why, here we haven't any wars to speak of lately-small ones, but nothing worth suiting up for. Nothing to show oneself to the world as a man or to impress the ladies.”
“I see, Mr. Chapman,” Rebecca replied, refusing to shrink from the intensity of his attention.
“Remind me which battles you fought in, then, old boy?” Chapman asked, turning to Osgood.
“Actually,” Osgood said, “I had suffered the bad effects of rheumatism when I was younger, Mr. Chapman.”
“Shame!”
“I am all better now. However, it prevented any notion of being a soldier.”
“Still, sir, Mr. Osgood helped publish those books and poems,” Rebecca interjected, “that contributed to the enthusiasm and commitment of the Union to persevere in the cause.”
“What a pity not to have soldiered!” Chapman responded. “You have my sympathy, Osgood.”
“Thank you, Mr. Chapman. About
