Matthew Pearl - The Last Dickens

With considerable strength, the woman dragged Dickens under her arms and out of the side door. Tom, meanwhile, rolled over to the other side of the carriage and popped that door open so he could observe them. They were in the massive shadow of Tremont Temple.

The assailant was walking Dickens gently toward the theater with one hand, carrying her pearl-handled switchblade in the other. She had on a pink sash and dazzling flame red gown, with dead geraniums dropping down from tousled hair.

Tom waited until they had entered the theater and then he went up the stairs to the main hall. He knew the building inside and out from the readings and knew that inside he'd have the best chance of separating Dickens from her long enough to get him free. He considered going for a policeman, but they'd surely be resistant to his story: particularly the part about the attacker being a woman from the upper classes of the city named Louisa Parr Barton.

Tom went through the side entrance where he had previously guarded against people trying to sneak into the readings. Now it was Tom doing the sneaking. He silently climbed the stairs to the balcony, peering over the railings to survey the scene. Louisa had placed Dickens, who had revived but was still in a state of confusion, on the platform in front of the podium. She sat at his feet on the platform with her wide gown flowing around her, like the ghostly image of a schoolgirl. The blade dangled in her hand.

Her intention was clear as it was bizarre: Dickens was to do a reading of her manuscript. Poor Chief. The lines on his face looked like they had deepened since he had arrived in America; without George's lighting and Henry's choice of a fashionable hat, straggly hair hung from his bald head down over his cheeks. He was a shadow of himself.

Dickens fumbled through her manuscript pages, and began to read. “They slain the servants with the edge of their swords-I only have escaped to tell the vulgar people that God is upon our city.” Louisa appeared to be enraptured with her words coming from her idol's mouth.

Tom raised himself just above the iron railings. He caught Dickens's eye and Dickens, without betraying Tom's presence, nodded. Dickens raised his voice and began to read her strange and discordant text louder, allowing Tom to descend the stairs and make his way along the side of the auditorium unheard.

But he reached a point where he could go no farther without risking detection. Dickens, recognizing Tom's dilemma, thrust aside the woman's pages and began to speak in an earthy growl. “ Let it be! There's enough light for wot I've got to do… ”

It was Bill Sikes and the murder scene from Oliver Twist! Dickens's teeth were clenched with fury, completely transforming into the savage killer-he looked right at Louisa Barton. He held his hand down to her as though he would seize her by the wrist.

She trembled with a thrill of fear. Her face flushed a fiery red.

“ You were watched to-night, you she-devil. Every word you said was heard! ”

The dramatic performance mesmerized Louisa, and Tom successfully crept to the side of the platform unseen. He could see her hand clenched the knife so tightly her knuckles were turning white. Tom could take her by surprise by coming through the dressing room onto the platform, but if he had to struggle, he feared Dickens's proximity to her weapon.

As he debated his best chance, Louisa seemed to sense something wrong. Her head whipped around.

“Why, you!” she screamed violently, as though infused with Bill Sikes's venom. She caught him with her hypnotic glare and cut the air with her blade. “You can't be here!”

Before Tom could move, she jumped up and put her knife to the soft flesh of Dickens's throat. “Keep reading!” she commanded him.

“ Every word you said was heard… ” Dickens tremulously repeated Sikes's warning.

“Yes, that's it-keep going,” she said to Dickens, and then to Tom, said, “Now you leave!”

Tom, eyes locked on the switchblade, backed away through the middle aisle. “I'm going, Mrs. Barton,” Tom said. “You see, I'm going.”

Then a different idea came over him, and he dropped into a seat with a loud thump. Tom dug himself into the cushion and reclined.

She looked back from Dickens to Tom but then, as though deciding she never wanted to leave the writer's side again, she said, “You're spiteful because we were never friends. Fine, stay! You wouldn't understand what you're about to see!”

Tom put his boots up onto the chair in front of him. “I think I do.”

Then understanding dawned and her mouth opened wide. “That's why, you're sitting-that seat's mine! ”

Tom was sinking deep into the seat from which she had watched the Christmas Eve reading, where she had carved a string of words about Dickens. Unloosed with rage, she ran through the aisle toward him, her knife held out.

“Run, Chief! Quickly!” Tom called out to Dickens.

“I won't!” Dickens cried.

“Chief, run!” Tom repeated, but to his astonishment Dickens did not move. “Fetch the police!”

To this urgency, Dickens thankfully seemed to assent. First, he threw up the pages of Louisa's manuscript in the air and then darted out of the theater.

“No!” she cried, watching her book's pages flutter in all directions. Tom used her distraction to swing the hook of Dickens's walking stick at her hand, the jutting-out screw landing right on her knuckles and creating a deep gash. Her switchblade went flying into the air. Tom staggered backward when she pulled up a pistol from her pocket, then pounced forward and knocked her down. They both rushed to where it landed and struggled over it. Tom drew his fist back but knew even in the rush of the moment that he could not strike a woman. She wrestled her hand free and threw her fist into his jaw again and again with surprising strength.

“There is an actress,” Tom said to her, fending off her blow with his arm. Even as he spoke, he could not help feeling as though he were betraying the Chief. He unconsciously switched to a whisper. “There is a young actress back in England whom the Chief loves. That is why he and his wife separated, not because of you.”

“No, you've invented it all!” Louisa wailed.

“The Chief told me, he told me himself. He's come here to earn enough money to buy her anything she wants-to buy her the crown jewels and the Tower of London and Buckingham Palace if that's what she desires!”

“No, he came for me!”

But the poisonous words had worked. Her face contorted into confusion, she began to sob and her grasp loosened. Tom wrapped her in his arms. Within minutes, Dickens returned with several policemen and citizens who had heard his call.

When she saw Dickens again, it was as though life returned to Louisa. She began softly singing to herself like a child. In a sudden movement, she pulled away from Tom's grip and drew a razor from inside the lining of her shoe.

“No!” Tom cried. “Chief, watch out!” He jumped in front of Dickens.

She stabbed the razor into her own neck and began to slice her flesh from right to left, dropping into a puddle of her own blood.

One of the policemen ran for a doctor and another kneeled beside the woman and tried to staunch the terrible gash in her neck with her sash. Dickens, watching in shock, fell to her side and dislodged the razor from her hand. She was trying to speak again but gurgled blood instead. Her arms flailed wildly until her hand sat on top of Dickens's, at once growing calm and still.

“Chief… our next book… what…?” she said, spitting shiny geysers of blood onto her chin, unable to go on.

Dickens leaned in to the woman's ear and whispered something. Tom could not hear what was said, but a strange and shrewd grin rose upon Louisa Barton's face, and as her life was slipping, she began to giggle hoarsely. Dickens, dismayed, backed away and allowed the police and a newly arrived doctor to attend her.