Chapter Twenty-Nine #3
Henrietta—Petra saw with a sinking heart—was making a beeline for her: “You’ve seen the pre-empt then?” she asked Petra coldly.
“I take it we can proceed with the formalities?”
“Actually, Ross and I were discussing it earlier,” said Petra, relieved to hear her voice coming out sounding cool and collected.
“I have recommended, and Ross has agreed, to proceed with a best bids auction,” she told Henrietta. “We have interest from
a number of publishing houses, as I am sure you can imagine.”
Henrietta’s eyes bulged, making her look rather like a cod fish, Petra decided, suddenly realizing she was staring, fascinated.
Coughing into her fist to distract, she looked away as Henrietta collected herself, freezing Petra with an icy stare. “In
that case, my pre-empt is withdrawn,” she said, dangerously quietly. “You have just lost your client a superlative deal. I
do hope you know what you’re doing,” she spat, making it perfectly clear that she was certain Petra did not.
And maybe she didn’t, to be fair, thought Petra as she scuttled off, trying not to whimper audibly, seeking a quiet place
where she could put a call in to Alistair.
“Hold your ground,” he told her. “We’re busy here, just about to send out the instructions for the best and finals.”
“How many?”
“Six,” Alistair told her. “All the big ones, plus Hamilton House, plus a couple more.”
Petra made him list them, and her spirits rose as he went through. The biggest publishing houses in the world had all taken
the bait. Ross’s book had gone right to the top echelons. And now—by the end of the day, when the bids had to be in—they would
see the result. One thing was already for certain: This was a book that was going to sell, and sell wide. For agents and editors
across the industry, it would be one of those “it was this big” tales they told each other at parties.
Petra nearly smiled, in spite of it all, remembering the immortal line from Dustin Hoffman’s agent in Tootsie, informing his client that his job was not to find work for his client but to “field offers.” If this was the “fielding offers”
end of submissions, then Petra liked it. If only all agenting work was like this. If only it wasn’t Ross. If only Ross wasn’t
being so weird, she reminded herself, the boulder in her chest returning,
Petra duly introduced Jemima to Ross, and she could tell Jemima found him hard work. She hoped it wouldn’t put her off from
trying to acquire the book. Jemima and her team would provide a good home for him, and they would care for him too. Or was
it just that she desperately wanted the gig to go to absolutely anyone else in the world but Henrietta? That could also be
it. Partly.
In the flurry of mini-problems requiring solving, along with the in-person, phone, and email chats with the editors who were planning to bid, and the journalists who were rushing to cover the story, the day flew by without Petra having time to sit down, eat, or even go to the loo.
She welcomed the distraction but was constantly refreshing her email inbox for updates.
With her pre-empt declined, Henrietta had disappeared in a huff, and Ross seemed to have disappeared too. Petra assumed he
was in the cottage. Possibly not alone. She did not feel confident enough of her role in his life now to just turn up there
at the end of the day. Instead, she went back to the flat and collated a professional email to him, listing the bids received—they
were all in, every single one—and sketching out what needed to happen next.
Surprisingly and depressingly, Henrietta had rallied from her pre-empt rejection and submitted a bid too. Rather than putting
in a lower offer, punishing them for declining the pre-empt, Petra was disturbed to see that she had now bid even higher.
As promised, all the other publishing houses, including Jemima’s, had submitted punchy bids as well. Jemima’s came with a
full and detailed marketing and publicity commitment. It was impressive. But Henrietta’s bid was the highest by some margin.
These were telephone number figures, extraordinary for the UK market, thought Petra.
She dithered over how to sign off her email. “Love” felt presumptuous. Even “yours” was problematic. Petra settled on “best
wishes” and deleted the kisses that appeared after her name without her volition.
Petra pressed send on the email and then spent another long, lonely, largely sleepless night, mainly sitting in the little window seat reading nook, resting her head against the glass.
For hours she gazed up the darkened street, toward his cottage at the top of the hill.
She couldn’t see it, of course, but she could imagine him there, restless, like her.
Or maybe he was fast asleep, thrilled to go for the highest bid, with the bonus that Henrietta was back in his life.
He was, as Petra sat there, probably dreaming happily of working together with Henrietta to make his book so brilliant it would surpass his first.
She kept her phone against her heart so she could not miss a text from him.
There was nothing.