“Hello?” Vera trilled into the phone. She always answered unknown numbers, confident that the universe would bring only good things into her life.
“Mom, it’s Florence.”
Silence.
“Listen, I know you’re angry with me, but I need you to do something for me. Can you read me the text message you were talking about before—the one where I said I never wanted to see you again? And tell me when it was sent.”
Vera sighed. “Hang on, I’ve got to search for it.”
When she came back on the line, she said, “It was sent on Sunday, April twenty-first. I remember because I’d just left church when I got it, and I was so excited to see your number pop up. Then I actually read it. ‘Mom, I’m sorry, but this is the last time you’ll ever hear from me.’” Vera’s voice cracked, but she continued. “‘You have done nothing throughout my entire life but belittle me and hold me back. I’m done. I never want to speak to you again. If you try to contact me, I’ll simply change my number.’”
Florence felt the blood rush to her face. Even though she hadn’t written those words, she’d certainly thought them, and hearing them on Vera’s tongue made her feel guiltier than any of the things she’d actually done in the past two weeks.
April twenty-first. That was the day after the car crash. Helen must have been tying up loose ends before assuming the mantle of Florence Darrow.
For all the lip service Helen had paid to momentum and action, she had actually been incredibly careful about every contingency. Florence had appreciated that lesson while plotting Greta’s murder. It was, perhaps, just as important an inheritance as the house and the money.
“Mom,” she said, “I’m so sorry you had to read that, but you have to believe me—I didn’t write that message.”
Vera took a loud sip of coffee. “It came from your phone.”
“I know. It’s a long story.” Florence took a breath. “Let me start at the beginning…”
By the time they hung up forty-five minutes later, Vera knew the whole story—or at least the version of it that Florence had repeated over and over for the authorities: the murder plot against Florence; the desperate act of self-defense.
As with Idrissi and Massey, Florence did not mention that Helen Wilcox was actually Maud Dixon; she wasn’t sure her mother would even know who that was. Nor did she mention the name Greta Frost, whose death was just starting to cause ripples in publishing circles. There was no reason that Florence would have any connection to that.
Vera had lapped it up, desperate for confirmation that Florence hadn’t actually turned her back on her. “I knew you weren’t acting like yourself,” she insisted. “I said as much to Gloria. She agreed. You’re a good girl, Florence. The best.”
Florence smiled grimly. “Thanks.”
“Who loves you?”
“You do.”
She and her mother agreed to speak again in a week. Florence would never allow Vera the closeness she wanted, but she would keep her in her life. Her brush with death in Morocco had taught her that total isolation was its own form of vulnerability. It was dangerous to have nobody. Somebody needed to notice if you went missing.
Florence poured herself another coffee.
She had one more call to make, and then it was time to get to work. She’d finally gotten what she wanted—Helen Wilcox’s life and Maud Dixon’s audience—and she wasn’t going to squander them.
She’d started writing the second half of The Morocco Exchange the night Helen had died. When she sat down with a yellow legal pad on her lap, she’d been amazed by what she’d encountered: a torrent.
Under the cover of the Maud Dixon pseudonym, she’d found the freedom and confidence to just write.
And she finally had a story to tell.
She’d once read a biography of the artist René Magritte that Agatha had edited. It claimed that during his early years, when critics had scoffed at his odd, unconventional paintings, he’d supported himself by forging works by Picasso and Braque.
Perhaps it was a type of apprenticeship, Florence thought. Just like The Morocco Exchange would be for her. Helen had said it herself: If you pretend for long enough, anything can become natural. Truly natural.
Magritte did, after all, find success on his own.
Someday, she might be able to tell the world that Maud Dixon was none other than Florence Darrow. She would have been twenty-three when Mississippi Foxtrot came out. That was a plausible enough age. Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein when she was nineteen. And the timing worked out so that she would have been composing it toward the end of college and while living in Gainesville afterward, working at the bookstore. She thought how surprised Anne, the store’s cheerful owner, would be to discover that her employee had been writing a modern classic the entire time she’d known her. She imagined Simon’s face when he found out. And Amanda’s. What restraint, what dignity, they’d think—keeping it secret for all that time.
She looked at her watch. She’d waited long enough. She dialed another number.
A young woman answered in a chipper falsetto: “Hello, HMK.”
Harper Maston Khan was the biggest talent agency in New York. It represented not just writers, but actors, athletes, and musicians. Real celebrities.
“Hello,” Florence said, “I’d like to speak with Denise Maston, please.”
“May I ask who’s calling?”
Florence paused. “Tell her it’s Maud Dixon.”
Acknowledgments
My first debt of gratitude belongs to Jenn Joel—a brilliant editor masquerading as a brilliant agent. August 4th, 2019, will go down as one of the major turning points of my life. Many thanks also to the wonderful Tia Ikemoto and everyone else at ICM.
Thank you to Judy Clain for her early and continued enthusiasm for this book, along with the incredible team at Little, Brown: Miya Kumangai, Heather Boaz, Lena Little, Ashley Marudas, Pam Brown, Gabrielle Leporati, and many others.
Thank you to my lovely UK editor, Imogen Taylor, along with Felicity Blunt, Jake Smith-Bosanquet, and Savanna Wicks at Curtis Brown.
Thank you to Halsey Green and Evonne Gambrell for always keeping a seat warm for me, despite my middling work ethic and frankly appalling attitude. I wouldn’t have been able to write this book without it.
Thank you to Joan Truya in Paris and Koloina Andriatsimamao in New York for allowing me to take a break from caring for （and worrying about） Olive for long enough to write this book.
Thank you to Liz Campbell, Martha Campbell, Kathryn Doyle, Natalie Pica Friend, Molly Lundgren, Elizabeth Rhodes, Haven Thompson, Nell Van Amerongen, and Julia Vaughn for far too much to list here. I am beyond lucky to count you as my friends.
Thank you to my family, both the one I was born into and the people I’ve gathered along the way: Henry Piper Andrews; Lindsey Andrews Schilling; Palmer Ducommun; Bob Ducommun; Charlie Schilling; Jock Andrews; the Westcotts; the Laportes; Jim & Nancy Beha; Jim & Alyson Beha; and Len & Alice Teti. I love you all.
Thank you to my mother, Lynn Ducommun, who has certainly earned her own paragraph after thirty-seven years of endless love and support throughout my many, many zigs and zags. （And anyone who thinks Vera Darrow bears any relation to her is sorely mistaken.） But above all, this book—and my heart—belongs to Christopher Beha. Maud Dixon would not exist without his constant encouragement and keen editor’s eye. （Turns out marrying a world-class novelist was a pretty prescient career move.） There’s no one else I’d rather spend my life with.