A Study in Drowning(47)

That was the end of the first page. Preston lifted his gaze from the book and up to Effy. It was the first time she had seen him completely slack-jawed.

“I can’t believe it,” he said. “This is Myrddin’s actual diary. Part of me hoped, of course, I could find some of his unpublished work, but I didn’t even dare to imagine it would be a full journal. Do you know how valuable this is, Effy? Even if we don’t discover any evidence of a hoax, this diary . . . well. Gosse is going to have a stroke—honestly, I think every academic at the literature college would amputate his left arm for it. As a museum artifact, it would be worth thousands. Maybe millions.”

“I think you’re getting a little ahead of yourself,” Effy said. But her voice was weak, heart spluttering. “Ianto must not have known it was there. Or else he would’ve tried to sell it himself.”

“Or,” Preston said, his face darkening, “there’s something in it he didn’t want anyone to know.”

They read on.

30 January 189

The Youthful Knight will be published. Greenebough appears cautiously optimistic, but I do not expect much success. The youths themselves may read it, but I think it is too dry a tome. What do youths these days care for chivalry and modesty? Not very much, as far as I can tell. When I visited Penrhos I saw Blackmar’s daughters again. The eldest is very fair, and took an interest in my work. But a woman’s mind is too frivolous, and though she was an unusually sober example of her sex, I could tell she was more preoccupied with dance halls and boys. She has written a few poems of her own.





Effy stared and stared at the line a woman’s mind is too frivolous. It stung her like a snakebite, a sudden whiplash of pain. Angharad was anything but frivolous. She was shrewd and daring, her mind always scheming, imagining, conjuring new worlds. She was strong. She had defeated the Fairy King.

If Myrddin really thought so little of women, why had he written Angharad at all?

“The Youthful Knight was Myrddin’s first effort,” Preston said, “but it was released to relative silence. Emrys Myrddin wasn’t a household name until—”

“Until Angharad,” Effy finished. Her chest hurt.

“Let’s see what Myrddin had to say about that.”

They flipped forward to 191, the year of Angharad’s publication.

18 August 191

Blackmar delivered Angharad to me in the dead of night. The rain and humidity this time of year is unbearable. I don’t take much stock in the fretting of the naturalists, but these summer storms are enough to make me mind their warnings about a second Drowning. Blackmar was happy to be free of her; she has been vexing him terribly of late.

Publication is set for midwinter. Mr. Marlowe is greatly excited for the reinvention of Emrys Myrddin.





Preston let out a soft breath. His brown eyes were shining. “Effy, I can’t believe this.”

It did seem damning. But even though the words a woman’s mind is too frivolous still gnawed at her, Effy wasn’t willing to relent. “Who is Blackmar?”

Preston blinked, as if to banish the awestruck look from his face. “Colin Blackmar,” he said. “Another one of Greenebough’s authors. You probably know his most famous work, ‘The Dreams of a Sleeping King.’”

“Oh. Yes,” Effy said. “That awful, tediously long poem we all had to memorize bits of in primary school.”

The corner of Preston’s mouth lifted. “Do you remember any of it now?”

“‘The slumbering King dreams of sword-fights and slaughter,’” Effy recited. “‘He feels the steaming blood of his enemies through his mail, and his dream-self dreams of cool river water. He sees the dragon’s long body uncoil, the flash of scales, the bright blades of its teeth, and oh, the sleeping King is foiled!—for he is both the knight and the dragon in the battlefield of his Dream-world.’”

She tried to make her recitation sound suitably dramatic, even though her head was spinning and her knees felt weak.

“You really do have the best memory of anyone I’ve ever met,” Preston said. There was no denying the admiration in his tone. “Your schoolteachers must have all been very impressed.”

“It’s drivel,” Effy said. “Surely you can’t think there’s any merit to it.”

“Blackmar has always been a more commercial author. He was never a critical darling like Myrddin. No one in the literature college is studying ‘The Dreams of a Sleeping King,’ that’s for certain.” When Effy gave him a dour look, he went on: “And no, I’ve never personally been a fan. I find his work to be . . . well, tedious.”

Finally, something they could agree on. “Did you know Myrddin and Blackmar were friends? Why was Blackmar bringing Angharad to him in August of 191?”

“I have a few ideas,” Preston said. “But this is something big, Effy. Even if you’re right and Myrddin was exactly who he said he was—an upstart provincial genius—there’s so much else this diary could prove. So many things other Myrddin scholars have only been able to speculate on. Gosse is going to choke on his mustache.”

“If it turns out Myrddin isn’t a fraud,” said Effy. But she was unable to imbue her words with the confidence she wanted. Her gaze kept darting back to the green chaise in the corner. She could imagine the girl there, robe flayed open like an oyster shell. “This proves that Myrddin was at least literate, but . . . it doesn’t quite read like the thoughts of a once-in-a-lifetime genius.”