Chapter Seven
It had taken Herculean effort and nearly a month of persuasion, but thankfully, not all of his ready money, for Hamish to prevail upon old Abel Prufrock to make him a partner of Prufrock & Company. What Abel Prufrock lacked in vision, he made up for with experience, and Hamish was happy to supply all the vision in the world for a chance to revive the company’s fortunes along with his own.
As soon as the ink was dry on the partnership agreement, Hamish turned his mind to implementing that vision. “What we need, Prufrock, are steady, sure things that are guaranteed to sell, and which we can publish in regular intervals—in small but profitable batches to keep the costs down—like the Otis book. No more of your slim volumes of poetry printed in only three presentation copies.”
“But we’re living in a great age for poetry, my lad,” Prufrock objected.
“That’s all well and good for art, dear sir, but poetry is not profitable. We have to think larger if we’re to survive.” And Hamish meant to do more than survive—he meant to thrive. He meant to increase his fortune as expeditiously as possible, so come Whitsunday, he could tell his father just what he could do with his talk of fillies and heirs and unsteadiness.
But first he had to revise the Otis book. And while he had written his fair share of exceedingly indifferent poetry, he had never yet taken his hand to prose.
Hamish’s attention was diverted from his problem by the sudden jangle of the bell over the door announcing the arrival of a wide-eyed female clutching a tight-wrapped parcel to her chest.
At a glance, she was exactly the sort of country mouse of a female—all modest, down-cast eyes peeping up from under a country cloak—who could be expected to offer them a slim volume of poetry to be printed in three presentation copies—one for herself, another for her grandmother, and the third for her cat. She’d be eaten up by Edinburgh’s rats if she didn’t mind herself.
But before he could shoo said female from the premises, she turned those wide, lethally innocent eyes upon Prufrock, who seemed to have little natural defense against predators of such a stealthy sort. “Mr. Prufrock?”
“Indeed, I am he.” Prufrock rose as swiftly as his creaking knees would allow, bowing his rosy, polished head in her direction. “How might I be of service?”
“Good afternoon, sir.” The lass nipped a wee dip of a curtsey. “I believe you to have been the publisher of—”
“If I may?” Hamish broke in before Prufrock could commit them to another money-sinking endeavor. “I take it you’ve a slim volume of sentimental but uplifting verse you should like to see published?” He smiled to ease the way to her disappointment. “Alas, Prufrock & Company are no longer in the market for poetry.”
The mousie blinked at him. “But I haven’t, sir. Got poetry, that is.” She gestured with the parcel held across her chest. “I’ve a novel.”
Hamish was not about to be diverted, even by the promise of a novel. Even by a novel offered with a wide-eyed, fetchingly fey smile. “A novel in three volumes, with a morally uplifting theme, and a worthy orphan for a protagonist?” The sort of tale meant to frighten young misses to keep quietly to their country mouse holes. “I’m afraid we’re still not interested. Good day.”
“Nay.” The wee mousie bit down on her soft lower lip. “Although I’m not exactly sure what a pro-tagonist is, sir, but if it’s the same as the h—”
Ye gods. Hamish held up his hand to stop her from saying another word. The sooner he got her out of there, the sooner he could return to the business at hand in reviving Prufrock & Company’s prospects.
“As I was saying—” He stepped toward the door so he could hold it open for her to leave.
But she whisked herself away, deeper into the space, to hold her ground. “It is a romantic novel. A very romantic novel.” She spoke quickly, in a rush to get the words out before he might stop her. “A new, very romantic novel by a man”—her voice grew firmer and more animated—“you published some years ago. Mr. John Otis.”
The mention of such a name—the very name that had been on the tip of Hamish’s tongue for weeks—brought even arthritic Prufrock around his desk. “New? By John Otis? Why, he’s been dead these twenty years.”
“The same John Otis who was the author of A Memoir of a Game Girl?” Hamish asked. The manuscript he was counting upon to make their fortune?
“Aye.” The wee mousie nodded. “The same. It’s a new manuscript, written some years ago, but only just come to light.”
Prufrock leaned on the large, two-sided desk for support. “Well, I’ll be.”
They’d be rich, is what they’d be, if the lass’s claim were true.
“A romantic story, you said?” Hamish asked. “How romantic?” John Otis’s work had been, at best, characterized as amatory, but never romantic.
“Highly romantic,” was her interesting answer.
Hamish pushed politeness aside to come straight to the point. “Erotic?”
The lass’s boldness went up in a flush of color so hot, Hamish was afraid her green velvet hood might catch fire. “Somewhat less than…that.” She swallowed and tried to stand tall—well, as tall as a willowy sort of lass who looked as if a stiff wind might blow her down could. “I can only assume that with this particular manuscript, Mr. Otis sought to avoid the scandal and trouble that the last book occasioned. One can’t sell a banned book, can one?”
It was so insightful an understatement, Hamish took a closer look at the wee slip of a lass. Under that country cloak were bright, clear blue eyes in a pointed, oval face. An intelligent face. A pretty face.
If one liked that curious country mouse sort. Which he didn’t. Because he had a business to run, a fortune to make, and a wedding to avoid.
But he could put up with a country miss for the sake of a publishable book.
“Do come in.” He swept her a more credible bow. “I take it you have this manuscript with you?”
“I have the first half of the volume,” the lass confirmed. “I was leery of…letting the whole of it out of my hands without a firm contract. I thought to…gauge the level of interest before I did so.”
“Very prudent,” Prufrock assured her.
“Give it here,” was Hamish’s more mercenary demand. “And we’ll see if there is anything worth giving a contract for.” Hamish was already cutting open the wrapping before he thought to kick a chair in her direction. “Have a seat.”
She did not sit—her glance flitted from the chair to the door, and then back at him, as if gauging how long she could bear to stay. “How long will you need to contemplate the pages?”
“No time a’tall.” He made her nervous, which delighted and bothered him, all at the same time, though he couldn’t tell why. But what he did know was that the pages looked well prepared, written in a clean, clear hand, which bothered him—the Otis manuscript in his possession was nothing so tidy. “If it really is by John Otis, as you say.”
“It is,” she assured him. But she bit her lip—more mousie and less confident now.
Hamish pressed his advantage. “And how did you come by this remarkable find?”
But the mousie proved less pliable than she looked. “And you are?” She looked away from him, toward his partner. “I had thought I would be dealing with Mr. Prufrock, as the prior publisher of John Otis’s book.”
Prufrock made the belated introductions. “Mr. Cathcart is my business partner. The newest partner of Prufrock & Company.”
“Oh, michty me!” The lass drew back as if she’d been scalded. “Cathcart like the earl? You’re the earl’s son? I beg your pardon, sir.”
Hamish took notice of her careful re-appraisal of him, and reckoned she was just like everyone else—wondering if, because he was in trade, he was the illegitimate son.
He let her wonder. “And you are?”
“Miss Elspeth Otis,” she finally supplied. “I’m John Otis’s daughter.”
Ye Gods.
Hamish sat before he could fall. Because, it seemed there was at least one illegitimate person in the room after all.