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Death by Publication

Page 11

by J. J. Fiechter


  “I would say nothing to Nicolas for the moment,” I advised him.

  “Edward, come right away. Immediately.”

  I told him I would be on the next plane for Paris.

  My Parisian colleagues were in an uproar. Word of Evans’s accusation had leaked. Employees were running in every direction, telephones were going off like alarms. In Millagard’s office a “crisis meeting” had been convened. The house solicitor was there, going over the article in the Times with a translator to make absolutely certain he understood the full meaning of every single word.

  Millagard greeted me as the Messiah. Instructing the secretary to leave them, he grabbed the copy of the Times the lawyer had been reading and begged me to translate the article out loud. He was clinging to the hope that my rendition might be different from the others. A religious silence prevailed while I read. Everyone in the room held their breath.

  When I had finished, I folded the newspaper, placed it on the table, and turned to Millagard with a look that I could only hope successfully masked the joy leaping inside me.

  “It’s a low blow,” I said lamely. “Does anyone here think for one second that Nicolas would be capable of such a thing?”

  “I—I can’t say. I honestly know absolutely nothing. The whole thing is so—so incredible! Edward, what are we going to do?”

  “A journalist like Marianne Evans can’t afford to make something like this up,” I replied evenly. “In any event, we have to get in touch with Nicolas right away.”

  “He’s already been told. But what can we do? What is to be done?” Millagard looked despairingly at the solicitor.

  “We should start by intimidating our adversary,” the solicitor, a man named Joly, replied. “Later we can offer our proof of Fabry’s innocence. We need to make it clear we will do everything we can to clear our name. Our reputation is at stake, after all.”

  If the miserable Millagard hadn’t been so shaken himself, he would have probably throttled Joly.

  “Thank you! I know that!” he roared. “But how can we attack this Evans without any facts? Only Nicolas . . .”

  Millagard had barely uttered his name when the author himself burst into the office. He was disheveled, unshaven, his face contorted by a rage so intense that it twisted his lips.

  This vision of him did me a world of good. I had never seen him so unraveled. He was sputtering with indignation and struggling for words.

  “Nicolas! What is all this about? Tell us!” demanded Millagard.

  Nicolas collapsed on the couch, mumbling incoherently. I thought it possible he might have a nervous breakdown right there.

  “I’ve—I’ve—I’ve been framed,” he managed.

  “By whom?” thundered Millagard.

  “By Evans! Who else? The bitch hates me. If this thing”—he couldn’t bring himself to say “book”—“exists, then she’s the one who wrote it. But it won’t work! No, by God!”

  He sat upright. Color came back to his face.

  “Have you filed suit?” asked Joly.

  “Of course I have! I’m asking that you take charge of the case immediately.” His voice was gaining back some of its authority.

  “Nicolas,” I said, “this is a very serious business for us all, and we must act in unison. You have to tell us honestly whether you knew about this book, and if, even unconsciously, it might have influenced you when you were writing.”

  He looked at me with the eyes of a condemned man being led to the scaffold. “No, I swear to you. Never.”

  He leaned over and covered his face with his hands.

  At that moment Millagard’s secretary stuck her head in to say that there were some journalists outside, insisting on an interview. Word was spreading fast.

  Publisher and lawyer looked at each other, then both began to shrug their shoulders—as the French do—but in such mechanical and rapid succession that they reminded me of characters out of Lewis Carroll. I could barely keep from laughing. Nicolas hadn’t moved and made no sound. He seemed to be in a different world.

  “Tell them to wait,” I said to the secretary, indicating that she should withdraw.

  I turned toward Millagard.

  “We need to get Nicolas out of here without anybody seeing him. He’s in no condition to talk to journalists. It would be best for him to lay low for a few days. At least until we have a clearer picture. You and I will face the press.”

  Monsieur Joly led—carried, really—Nicolas into a connecting office, and Millagard and I went out and called in the journalists who had been pacing impatiently in the hallway. They didn’t even bother waiting for the door to close behind them before they started shooting out questions. They knew the Times article by heart and demanded to know how we answered its charges. An auctioneer couldn’t have sifted through their shouts. Stunned by the verbal violence, Millagard went white. I had to come to his rescue and calm them as best I could.

  “Please, now, please, ladies and gentlemen, PLEASE,” I shouted. “I must ask you to listen carefully to what I am about to say. Before Ms. Evans’s article, I for one had never heard of C. Irving Brown, and I am something of an expert in contemporary British fiction, in addition to being the very proud publisher of the works of Nicolas Fabry. In England there is a catalog of the works of every British writer going back to the eighteenth century. I would be interested to know if the name C. Irving Brown appears anywhere in it. Before echoing any accusations about Nicolas Fabry, I strongly suggest you verify your sources and not assume that Ms. Evans’s vengeful article contains the truth. She might have made the whole thing up.”

  A cold silence greeted my words, but I pressed ahead. “At this stage, we know little more than you. As soon as we have any concrete evidence, Monsieur Millagard and I will organize a press conference, to which you will of course all be invited. I will only remind each of you that, starting this very moment, we will consider any accusation made against Monsieur Fabry—until there is any proof—as defamation, and act accordingly.”

  Realizing they would get nothing more from us, the journalists filed out and retreated back to their papers to begin writing their copy. It wasn’t every day that a scoop of this importance landed on their doorstep.

  I looked at Millagard. He was staring at his office door as if at any moment it might fly open again and the nightmare recommence. I asked his secretary to bring him a glass of water and dialed my solicitor, Sir Charles Vanderon.

  Vanderon’s advice was that before we could bring suit against Evans and the Times, we should obtain an expert opinion verifying that The Need to Love was a fraud. Once we had that, the panic would subside. There would be all the time in the world to bring a civil suit for libel and defamation of character.

  I told him to get on it immediately.

  Then Millagard and I together composed an announcement in the name of both Turner Press and Editions Millagard, unequivocally stating our support of Nicolas Fabry. It would, we knew, be picked up by every major newspaper in both London and Paris.

  Nicolas had rejoined us after the departure of the journalists and was pacing around the office, alternately silent and shouting. When I told him I was leaving for London that evening, he screamed, “I’m coming with you! I’m going to kill that slut!”

  He was nearly foaming at the mouth.

  “No, Nicolas,” replied Millagard, who had regained his composure. “You must stay here. Leaving would be interpreted as an admission of guilt.”

  “Laurent’s absolutely correct,” I chimed in. “The last thing you want to do is look as if they can make you run.”

  “But I’m innocent! Don’t you understand?”

  His tone carried the ring of sincerity, and that made it all the more pitiful.

  “This is precisely why you must not leave,” said Millagard, standing up. “Innocent people do not run. Save your strength, my friend. What we’ve just faced is nothing compared to what’s coming next. You’re going to have to confront them eventually.”
/>   Nicolas hung his head and was silent. Millagard gave him a look in which I thought I could read a bitterness that bordered on hatred.

  I left them there. I needed to get back to London to stoke the fire that, when it had burned out, would have reduced the life of Nicolas Fabry to smoldering ruins.

  Everything about my flight back seemed to augur well—the azure of the sky, the fluffy shapes of the clouds, even the pilot’s assured voice. I let myself become absorbed by the newspapers’ accounts of what was now universally being termed the “Fabrycation Affair.” The papers had no new information to provide, though some of them, not content with simply parroting the same news, elaborated on the myth of Nicolas Fabry, that successful writer of fiction whose career seemed threatened with scandal and disaster at the very moment when his latest work was enjoying enormous critical success. Some offered limited speculation about C. Irving Brown, unknown even in his native land.

  I savored every word and every line of every article, and with a delicious sense of vanity, because most journalists were repeating Marianne Evans’s estimation that the original English version was far better than the French fraud. The days ahead, I suspected, would bring me even more accolades. C. Irving Brown would be the uncrowned winner of the Goncourt Prize. I would be the only one to appreciate what I had achieved.

  I was already beginning to sense a new appetite for things. Dull roots were stirring. I felt less unprepossessing, as if my colorless soul were starting to flush with life.

  I asked the flight attendant for a Scotch and further indulged myself by giving her an undressing look. She acknowledged it and smiled coquettishly. Then I stretched out my legs and sipped the whiskey. How long it had been since I had felt such intoxication, such sweet euphoria!

  I got to my office in London still feeling ebullient. Doris was frantically fielding phone calls. They were coming in from all over—readers, reviewers, journalists, even authors. Everyone was getting the news, and as Fabry’s British publisher and longtime friend, I was the one they were calling for details. I ordered the switchboard shut down and gathered the entire staff in the large conference room.

  “We are not the principals in this business,” I declared. “It is true we have been Nicolas Fabry’s publisher since the beginning, but for the moment, and until there has been some resolution or further elaboration, we will remove his latest work from our forthcoming list. Each one of you must understand how critical it is that we keep our composure in the face of what is at best mere presumption of guilt. I am relying on all of you.”

  Not a memorable speech, but it had its desired effect in calming the troops.

  Two hours later I called Millagard to tell him what I had been able to discover. I confirmed that C. Irving Brown’s work had indeed not been cataloged in the British Museum, but added, trying not to sound malicious, that in England it was customary not to register a book until the moment it was shipped to booksellers. Given the date of publication, it was quite possible that the Marble Arch Press had been unable to register the book before their offices were destroyed by the German bombing. As for Brown himself, he was not to be found in the registry of authors at the British Library, and was thought to have published only one short piece in a defunct review called The Sorcerer’s Review.

  “That’s the only trace we have of his writing,” I concluded. “However, I’m afraid that it proves that he really did exist. I’m sorry, Laurent.”

  “We are in a shithole! A shithole!”

  “Do let’s keep our heads. We have to wait for the expert opinion being sought by John Holland.”

  “Our lawyers don’t agree on this, Edward. Nicolas has already filed suit.”

  “A regrettable mistake, Laurent. Extremely regrettable. But since both men seem sure of what they’re doing, we’ll have to wait for the trial.”

  In my heart of hearts, I was delighted by Nicolas’s decision to go to court. Wanting to take the initiative, solicitors would force the issue, and that would mean that everything would come to a head even faster than I had ever dreamed possible. The career of Nicolas Fabry was hanging by a thread.

  The following morning, the BBC invited me to appear on television. I took the opportunity to reiterate, very reasonably I thought, that there was a considerable difference between accusation and guilt. The Need to Love could still very well turn out to be a forgery, and we would simply have to wait for the experts’ conclusions. I requested that the British press not use this occasion to open old wounds with our friends the French.

  To the question, “Do you or do you not intend to publish the English translation of Il faut aimer?” I replied that only formal proof of Fabry’s guilt would keep me from doing so.

  There was nothing to do but wait.

  Chapter 11

  On the eve of the hearing, I went out to Heathrow to pick up Millagard and Nicolas. Both looked as if they’d aged ten years. I was pleased to note that Nicolas had developed a facial tic—a little muscle in his left cheek twitched incessantly, giving the impression that he was winking at you.

  From the same plane emerged numerous members of the French press corps—editors, reviewers, commentators of every ideological stripe. And among them was my pudgy conquest Margot Zembla, stuffed into a dress covered with spangles. Her hair was a brilliant red and her lips deep purple. She looked a horror. Persuaded that I had come expressly to welcome her, she launched herself directly at me, making a symphony of endearing noises. I recoiled in embarrassment. Once she realized that I had come to welcome Nicolas, I thought things might turn ugly, so I quickly invited her to dine with me the following day. Best to make no enemies, I thought. One never knows.

  It had been years since the Old Bailey had seen such a crowd. The press had done everything it could to create a sensation. Not a day went by in which at least one major article on Nicolas was not featured prominently. So far, denouncing him had brought nothing but glory to Marianne Evans. Indeed, it was impossible to talk about one without mentioning the other, particularly when the details of their brief affair were being recirculated and her notoriety had reached vertiginous heights.

  The court was packed. Literary celebrities, actors, journalists, and of course the entirety of the London press corps—plus hundreds of the simply curious. Nicolas’s arrival was greeted with exclamations. He looked superb, I must say, in his conservative pinstriped suit, but his expression was tense.

  Marianne Evans had preceded him into the room, sumptuously draped in a sort of beige dress-coat combination. Accused and accuser barely exchanged a glance. Nicolas took his place on the bench next to Millagard. Beside them an English solicitor nervously riffled through some documents. Soon enough, the bailiff announced that the court was in session, and all rose while the bewigged judge made his sweeping entrance up the stairs to his cathedra. He solemnly read the accusation of plagiarism and turned to Nicolas’s solicitor to ask how his client responded.

  “If it please the court, Your Honor,” replied the solicitor with animation, “I would remind you that we are defendants at a hearing, not respondents at an indictment. It is rather for Miss Evans to defend her reckless charges.”

  The judge’s face, already florid from years of sherry and port consumption, I suspected, reddened further, and he gave the solicitor a withering look, then turned his attention to Marianne Evans.

  “Miss Evans,” he said, peering down over his reading glasses. “Can you enlighten me as to on what basis you are bringing this accusation against Monsieur Fabry?”

  Marianne inclined her head, upon which was tilted a wide-brimmed silk hat, and waited before responding. It was clear she intended to savor her moment of glory to the fullest. She was well aware of the effect her appearance had on the spectators.

  “Your Honor, I have brought with me,” she said, “tangible proof that the novel by Mr. Fabry, recently published in France, is a plagiarism. I have handed over the work from which Mr. Fabry did his version for expert evaluation. The work in question is a n
ovel, entitled The Need to Love, written by C. Irving Brown. By making this known to the public I have only done my duty as a journalist, and not engaged, as Mr. Fabry’s lawyers would have you believe, in vindictive and defamatory behavior. These experts were agreed to by both parties, and I think it would be best if we turn to their testimony as quickly as possible.” “The experts will be heard in due time, Miss Evans,” replied the judge.

  “Certainly, Your Honor.”

  “You have not given the defendant the benefit of any doubt whatsoever, Miss Evans. The articles that have appeared in the Times I would characterize as little short of virulent.”

  “Your Honor, I have merely done my duty.”

  “So I am to understand. I meant merely that it is a matter of public record that Mr. Fabry’s literary efforts are regularly excoriated in your columns—”

  “Objection, Your Honor,” exclaimed Marianne’s solicitor. “We are here to decide upon the evidence, not to discuss the merits of my client’s literary tastes.”

  “Quite true,” the judge admitted. “Let us now hear from the experts.”

  A kind of shudder rippled through the audience. The case was entering the decisive phase. Sitting in the back of the room, I began to tremble at the thought that I had left out some detail in my work, that it would be seen through as a fraud. Everything now hinged upon two men dressed like morticians. I closed my eyes to listen to their opinion, like a patient waiting for the doctor to read the lab reports on a tumor.

  In language that was insufferably technical and unnecessarily precise, each gentleman in turn reviewed the history of printing beginning with Gutenberg. I was in agony waiting for them to come to their conclusions. Happily, the audience, which had begun by hanging on their every word, started to grumble and whisper, and though the spectators were summarily hushed by the judge, the experts got the point. They began to talk about the book.

 

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