‘Ghosts?’ Was he testing my mettle, as a member of the fair sex?
‘Ghosts,’ he repeated. ‘For there is reputed to be a ghost of Holywell-street. Will you permit me to shiver your senses with the story?’
‘Please do.’ I stood by the back door and waited.
‘Once upon a time, a young man – let us call him Joseph – came up from the country – let us say, the wilds of Lincolnshire – to earn his living in the big city – let us say, he was a printer. Joseph was abandoned one night – perhaps he had been drinking with some other printers – in the darkness of Holywell-street, but knew it was a journey of only a few short yards back to the main thoroughfare of the Strand. He went one way, then another, then took a turn, then another turn, and found himself staggering down more and more winding alleys, and soon became lost.’
‘What became of him?’
‘Many have guessed, but none will confirm. You and I can only imagine what cruelty lies in these irregular alley-ways. His body was never found, but his spirit was unable to find the same freedom. It is said that his ghost still haunts Holy-well-street, still wanders round and about the narrow lanes, never quite reaching the Strand, and constantly going back to the beginning of his journey, where he has to start his quest over again. But you, Mrs Damage, seem skilled at finding your way out.’
Then he drew a small map of the back alleys on a scrap of lining paper. ‘Go here, then turn – here – and – here. Look sharp, head down, and quick pace.’ The route he was suggesting would take me out into the daylight of the Strand rather than back into Holywell-street. ‘You must return this way too. En cachette. Three sharp knocks only on the back door. It is preferable for you that way.’
I ran through the twisting lanes as instructed, and blessedly did not meet another soul, living or otherwise. I told Peter little of the day’s events on my return, only that Mr Diprose had decided to furnish us with more books. I did not wish to burden him with the details, for they troubled me, and I was stalked in my dreams that night, not by the rangy Sir Jocelyn and his stiff Mr Diprose, but by an animated, malevolent anatomy model. It chased me around the benches and presses of the workshop, its pink open throat cackling at me and issuing threats, until, at the door to the kitchen, I turned and stood my ground. The model became still and calm too, and let me stroke its painted skin, and I placed my hands inside onto the organs, which were not cold and hard, but soft, warm and wet. It giggled as I fingered them, weighed them in my hands, held them up to the light.
To know the inner workings, to understand the inside, to see within: I would put up with the cigar smoke, and the men who looked, and the animal heads, and the back alley-ways, for that. Or so I believed, in those days.
Chapter Seven
Speak when you’re spoken to,
Come for one call,
Shut the door after you,
Turn to the wall.
Dear Mrs Damage
These choice materials are not meant as a replacement for your creative eye, whose cleverness and ingenuity at selecting unusual yet appropriate couvertures has already been noted and appreciated. I bestow upon you the final freedom to choose, whether it be silk, skin, fur, feather, or que voulez-vous. I entreat you, notwithstanding, to select with care. Just as some colours flatter particular complexions, and some bonnet styles suit certain shapes of head, so too must you consider the colours and styles of your binding according to the nature of the book. Sometimes I will require the most excellent bindings, in hue, texture and execution, to arouse and induce a primitive – c’est à dire, carnal, rather than cerebral – reaction. Sometimes, on the contrary, I will command the most plain, unobtrusive binding to act as shackle and protector for the more mischievous literature, to prevent it leaping off the shelf at the less knowledgeable reader. I trust we have an understanding; that it is the responsibility of you, the binder, so to clothe the texts for me, the bibliophile, in suitably pleasing habillé, and that you will prove quick to instruct.
As an aside, it is with some ennui that I must inform you that our visitation to Berkeley-square did not go unnoticed by Lady Knightley, who labours under the illusion that her husband’s activities do not escape her. She has sent me word that she wishes to meet with the little lady bookbinder with an eye for sentiment and fingers for finery; my speculations are that this is an innocent invitation without any basis in that green-eyed mistrust a lesser woman might display for a less-adoring husband, but that you are female is evident to her, and I propose to you that it would be contra bonos mores not to attend to her request as soon as possible. She receives on Tuesday and Thursday in the afternoon.