Four Days with Hemingway's Ghost (22 page)

“I’m saying we’ve
just about
sold it because it’s going up for auction next Friday.”

“Auction?
  What do you mean by auction, Amber?”

“Well, when we submit manuscripts to publishers, we usually don’t send just one out at a time.  I had so much faith in your book that I sent out six—to the six largest publishers in the industry.  Four of those have agreed to participate in an auction next week.  And that’s not all.  This is the best part, Jack.  Are you ready for it?”

For the first time in a long, long time, a small smile rose on my face.  Still struggling to fight back those tears, I could now feel my lips quivering.  Nodding at Blanche, I managed to say, “Sure, Amber.  Go ahead.  I’m definitely ready for the good part.”

“Okay.  I hope you’re sitting down because the bidding is starting
at
five-hundred-thousand dollars.
”

I couldn’t believe my ears.  With my eyes gone buggy and still glued to Blanche’s, I slowly said, “Half-a-million-dollars!  Amber, come on, please, don’t do this to me.  Don’t tell me this is some kind of joke.”

“It isn’t a joke, Jack.  I would never do that to you or anyone else.  But listen closely.  I said that the bidding is only
starting
at that number.  Mister Sheehan and I believe that
The Real Ernest Hemingway
will bring at least a million-two, maybe as much as a million-and-a- half.  Jack, your book is going to be big.  And remember, we’re only talking about the advance here.”

“A million-two at
least,
and that’s only the advance?” I said looking at Blanche’s beaming, tearful face.  “I don’t know how to thank you, Amber.  My God, you’re the greatest.  Don’t mind me.  I don’t know what else to say.  I am absolutely dumbstruck.”

“Why don’t I let you go now?  Go share the good news with Mrs. Phelan.  Enjoy the rest of the evening.  I’ll call you Monday and fill you in on all the rest of the details.”

When we hung up seconds later, Blanche had already started across the room. 
Clickity
-clack,
clickity
-clack, she worked her way toward me.

I just stood there staring at her and shaking my head in disbelief.  When she reached where I was standing, she took one hand off the walker, put it around the back of my neck and pulled my head forward.  Eye to eye now and just inches away, we looked at each other in silence.  Then she said in a tone slightly louder than a whisper, “You did it, Jack Phelan.  You did it.”

  For another moment we looked at the indescribable relief in each other’s eyes.  We savored it.  We bathed in it.  Our incredible dream had finally come true.  Then Blanche’s eyes widened like I hadn’t seen since the day I asked her to marry me.  They brightened so much I could no longer see the hint of dark rings I’d suspected.  She screamed, “YOU DID IT, JACKY! 
DAMNED IT, YOU DID IT!”  She then took her other hand off the walker and threw both her arms around me.  I supported her with mine, and we kissed long and hard.

I felt like we’d just risen from the darkest trench in the deepest ocean.  It felt as if we’d been anchored down there for months and had been fighting to hold our breaths.  And now, at the very last possible second, we’d broken from our chains.  It were as if side-by-side, hand-in-hand, and with a trail of bubbles flowing from both our mouths, we’d torpedoed to the surface.  We were now finally above water, and the air was sweet and delicious.

So elated were we that, after we kissed, we didn’t even go back to our comfortable recliners.  Right there next to the phone, we lowered ourselves onto the sofa.  And except to refresh our celebration drinks, we didn’t get up for well over an hour.  Facing each other with smiles that wouldn’t fade, we sat there and talked.

When I told Blanche we could pay off all the bills and get my missing tooth replaced, she only laughed.  Shaking her head she said, “Jack, we can have
anything
we want.  Even after the agency gets fifteen percent, we’re still going to get
a million dollars
.”  Then she slowly repeated, “A-million-dollars, Jack!  And that’s only the advance!  Sure, we’ll have to pay some steep taxes, but you know how we are.  We don’t spend much.  We’ll have more than enough to move up to New England like we’ve wanted to for so long.  We can get that little log house in Maine we’ve dreamed about.  We’ll have property and animals.  You can buy yourself a new truck.  You can work on another book.”

Pausing then, she put her hand on my knee.  One more joyous tear formed on her eyelash.  It tumbled to her cheek as she said, “My God, Jack, can you imagine?  For once in our lives we won’t have to worry.”

Later on when it came time to go to bed, I went to the kitchen and got two glasses of ice water like I always had.  With her cumbersome walker, Blanche made her way down the hallway toward the bathroom.  Slow as she was, I went around her on my way to the bedroom.

I put one glass of water on her nightstand, went around to the other side of the bed, and put the other on the small empty space in front of my lamp.  Then I walked back to the bathroom.

Blanche was spreading toothpaste onto our brushes.  As she handed me mine, she said, “Ernest is going to be so proud of you.”

“I hope so,” I said. “After all, that’s why I was allowed to come back . . . to write that book.  I can’t wait to tell him the good news.”

“Who knows?  He might already know.”

“Maybe, but I’m going to tell him anyway.”

I finished brushing before Blanche did and went back into the bedroom.  Standing at the foot of the bed and about to pull my tee shirt over my head to get ready to take a shower, I suddenly got a very strange feeling.  For some reason my eyes were pulled towards my nightstand.  Still holding the bottom of my shirt in both hands and squinting toward the lamp’s dim light, I noticed something there that minutes earlier hadn’t been.  I took one step closer, and I froze in my tracks.  At first I was stunned by what was lying in front of my water glass, but then I smiled.  It was a pencil.  It was small, almost sharpened down to a stub.  And it was green.