She puts down her spoon again and sits back, contemplating me. “Why?”
“Why? Well, it needs to be written now because it’s the right time in my career, and I want you to do it because of Sabine.”
Her eyebrows shoot up. “Who’s Sabine?”
“Sabine Montrechet. She’s a famous singer, retired now, and my mentor when I was just starting out. She took me under her wing when I was an unknown and awkward nineteen-year-old and made me into a name. I’m the same age now as she was then, so there is a nice synchronicity to it, do you see?”
All this is true, but I’m still holding back the main reason why it has to be now. This is not the height of my career. This is the end of my career. The end of my power and influence. If I want to help someone like Sabine helped me, then it has to be now. Any hint of a voice condition and you become a leper in the musical world. Damaged goods. If it gets out that—
But I mentally shake myself. It’s not going to get out because you’re not going to tell anyone, no matter who they are.
“And you want to do the same for me?” she asks, doubtful.
“Not precisely. I’m not a writer and I don’t have influence or expert knowledge of that world, but I can bestow an opportunity. Sabine coached me, but she also persuaded a director to cast me in my first lead role, and the rest, well...” I open my hands, palms up.
Evie still looks wary and I realize with a pang I’m not convincing her. What can I say, apart from the truth, to show her that I’m sincere?
I think for a moment. “Evie. It’s very important to me that I do this. I’ve thought about it a lot lately. I’m not a religious person but I feel that this is something I owe to a higher power, or the energies that cycle throughout the universe. That’s the best way I can explain it.”
I wonder if she’s going to laugh at me, but she says, “Sort of like you want to pay it forward, the chance she gave you?”
“Yes. That’s exactly it.” A young singer would have been the more obvious choice, someone like Mona. But I don’t like Mona. I like Evie, perhaps because she reminds me a little of myself at that age. What she needs most is some confidence and space to find out who she is. If I can give her that and finish my career with one more show, then I’ll slide into obscurity a satisfied man. Not a happy man. I don’t expect so much.
“All right,” she says slowly. “I believe you have sincere motivations. But I have reservations about the job itself. Questions.”
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I try not to look as smug as I feel as I pour the last of the water into our glasses. Details can be gotten around. I’ve already won the battle. “Tell me.”
She sits up a little straighter as if she’s on firmer ground now. “I don’t speak French. You’re Canadian. Surely you want it written in French first.”
“An English-language version can be written first and then translated into French. I imagine it will be translated into Russian, German and Czech too, at least for starters. Good markets and good royalties for you.”
“Ghostwriters don’t get royalties,” she points out.
“You wouldn’t be a ghostwriter. You’d be the biographer, your name would be on the cover and you’d get an advance and a percentage of sales. Worldwide sales.”
She bites the inside of her cheek as this sinks in.
“You look like you could use a brandy,” I say, smiling, and flag down a waiter.
When the brandy balloons are placed in front of us, she looks at the amber liquor for a long time. “I don’t want you to think I’m mercenary and it’s not that my family’s hard up, as you’ve seen. But I’ve been supporting myself independently for a few years now. It’s very important to me, and maybe you remember that being an independent student means being a poor student. I’ve been very worried about what happens next.”
“It’s not mercenary to want to support yourself.” I swirl the glass on the tablecloth. “Out of interest, do you plan on writing other people’s stories all your life, or some of your own?”
Her eyes flick up and something hardens in them. I seem to have hit a sensitive spot. Good. I’ll work on that later.
She ignores my question and says, “I’d ask you all sorts of personal questions. I’d go to people who know you and have known you and ask them to tell me about all the great and terrible things you’ve done. Are you prepared for that?”
“Yes.”
“Anything that’s off-limits?”
Yes. “For now, no. But I’ll wait to see what you dig up.”
She gives me an assessing look, but says, “All right. Those are my concerns about you. Now some more general questions. I have a month before I have to be back at university. I also have one client whose book I’m finishing. I estimate that it needs another ten or fifteen hours’ work.”
Ah yes, the Cold War book. “Do both. I won’t demand all your time.”