Page 6 (1/2)

Enifying his eyes with particular intensity when he was aroused He said, in an intense whisper, "You brought an editor as your guest?"

James Drake&039;s train from New Jersey had arrived late and he had, in consequence, al late to his own hostship over the monthly banquet of the Black Widowers He was in an uncharacteristically snappish mood therefore and said, "Why not?"

He flicked the ash frouests, and even as members, Zeus help us, why not editors?"

Rubin, a writer, of course, said haughtily, "I wouldn&039;t expect a chemist to understand" He looked briefly in the direction of the guest, as tall and spare, with longish red - blond hair and with the kind of abbreviated ave him a Robin Hood air

Drake said, "I may be a chemist to you, Manny, and to all the world besides, but I&039;nally "I&039; a book"

"You?" said Rubin

"Why not? I can spell and, judging by your career, that&039;s the only requireuest thinks it is, he has about the ain?"

"Stephen Bentham"

"And what firarette "Southby Publications"

"A shlock outfit," said Rubin, with contempt &039;They&039;re a sex - and - sensation house What do they ith you?"

Drake said, "I&039; a book on recombinant DNA, which is a sensational subject these days - not that you know anything about it"

Mario Gonzalo had just entered, brushing at his brown velvet jacket to remove the city fly - ash He said, "Come on, Jim, all the papers are full of it That&039;s the stuff they&039;re going to erms with and depopulate the world"

Rubin said, "If Mario&039;s heard about it, Jim, you&039;ll have to admit I have, too - and everyone else in the world has"

"Good Then my book is what the world needs," said Drake

Gonzalo said, "The world needs it about as much as it needs air pollution I&039;ve seen two books on the subject advertised already"

"Ha," said Drake, "they&039;re talking about the controversy, the politics I&039; to talk about the chemistry"

"Then it will never sell," said Rubin

It was at this point that Henry, that paragon of waiters, without whom no Black Widowers banquet could endure, announced softly to Drake that the gentleht seat themselves

Geoffrey Avalon drifted toward Henry, having now had the pleasure of a sedate conversation with the guest - ho which, froht, he could not often do

"I detect a fishy aro?"

"A bouillabaisse, sir," said Henry "An excellent one, I believe"

Avalon nodded gravely, and Roger Halsted, se bouillabaisse is excellent, and with Henry&039;s encohted"

Avalon said, "I hope, Mr Bentham, that you have no objection?"

"I can&039;t say I&039;ve ever eaten it" Benthalish accent, "but I&039;o at it A French dish, I believe"

"Marseillaise in origin," said Halsted, looking as though he were co his chops, "but universal in appeal Where&039;s Toht here," came an exasperated voice from the steps "Damn taxi driver Thanks, Henry" Thomas Trumbull, his tanned forehead creased and furrowed into fifty lines of anger, gratefully took the scotch and soda "You haven&039;t started eating, have you?"

"Just about," said Gonzalo, "and if you hadn&039;t arrived, Roger would have had your share of the bouillabaisse, so it would have been a silver lining for someone What ith the taxicab?"

Tru sip of his drink, buttered a roll, and said, "I told the idiot to takeI kneas at sohty - sixth Street called the Milano We had to h four extra et here He claimed he had never heard of the Milano Restaurant, but he did know that flea dive It cost me three bucks extra in taxi fare"

Rubin said, "You&039;re pretty far gone, To northhen you wanted to go southeast"

"You don&039;t think I atching the streets, do you?" growled Truht"

Avalon said austerely, "You can&039;t rely on the local wisdoht to have said explicitly, &039;Fifth Avenue and Thirteenth Street&039;"

"Thanks a lot," said Trumbull "I shall instantly turn the clock back and say it"

"I presume there&039;ll be a next ti from experience," said Avalon, and received a scowl for his pains

After the bouillabaisse arrived, there was a lull in the conversation for a while as the banqueters concentrated on the evisceration ofof lobster shells

It was Drake who broke it He said, "If we consider recombinant DNA"

"We aren&039;t," said Rubin, spearing a scallop neatly

"then what it auers that no one can really pinpoint There are only blue - sky probabilities on either side, and the debaterstheir voices What I propose to do is to go into the cheenetics of the nificance of specific genetic change Without that, both sides are just searching in a dark room for a black cat that isn&039;t there"

Avalon said, "And all this for the general public?"

"Certainly"

"Isn&039;t that rather heavy going for the general public?"

"It isn&039;t for the coe the Scientific Ae Tell theness, "you&039;ve seen the sample chapters"

Bentham, who had tackled the bouillabaisse with a certain tentativeness but had grown steadily e by myself, to be sure, but I suspect that since I follow the line of arguht to"

"That still limits your audience," said Gonzalo

Bentham said, "We can&039;t say that It&039;s a very hot subject and, properly promoted"

"A Southby specialty," muttered Rubin

"It could catch on," Benthaht nevertheless buy it to be in fashion; and who knows, theyout of it"

Drake tapped his water glass as Henry doled out the brandy Drake said, "If everyone is sufficiently defishified and if Henry will rerill our guest, Mr Stephen Bentham Tom, will you do the honors?"

"Glad to," said Trumbull "Mr Benthauest may justify his existence In this case, I suppose we can allow the fact that you are involved with the production of a book by our esteeue, Dr Drake, to speak for you We will therefore pass on toHow old are you?"

"Twenty - eight"

"I have the feeling you have not been long in the United States A here for about five months now, but I have been here on brief visits before Three times"

"I see And what are your qualifications for your post; as editor, that is?"

"Not overwhel and rueful s with Fearn and Russell in London Rather happy with the generally is low - key"

"Why throw that over to take a job with an Areater? They are greater, I assuain the rueful smile, "but there&039;s no mystery as to why I came The explanation is so simple that it embarrasses me to advance it In a word - money I was offered three ti expenses paid"

Halsted intervened suddenly "Are you a married le, though not necessarily celibate However, single men can use money, too"

Rubin said, "If you don&039;t mind, Tom, I would like to add the reverse of the question you asked I can see why you&039;ve joined Southby Publications Money is a potent argument But why the hell did that shlock concern hire you? You&039;re young, without much experience, and they&039;re not the kind of fir men out of benevolence Yet they triple your salary and pay ot on them?"

Bentham said, "I met Mr Southby on one of my earlier trips and I think he was rather taken with me" His fair skin turned a noticeable pink "I suspect it was my accent and my appearance Perhaps it seemed to him I would lend an air of scholarship to the firm"

"A touch of class," murmured Avalon, and Bentham turned pinker still

Tru, "Manny calls Southby Publications a shlock concern Do you agree with that?"

Bentham hesitated "I don&039;t know What docs the expression mean?"

Rubin said, "Cheap, worthless books, sold by high - pressure ca at sex and sensationalism"

Bentham remained silent

Drake said, "Go ahead, Benthao beyond these walls The club observes complete confidentiality"

"It isn&039;t that, Jiht wound your feelings You&039;re an author of ours"

Drake lit another cigarette "That wouldn&039;t bother ive the firm a touch of class and you&039;ll do my book as another touch of class"

Bentharant you that I don&039;t think ht Mr Southby doesn&039;t object to good books if he thinks they will sell He is personally pleased hat he has seen of Dr Drake&039;s book; even enthusiastic Perhaps the firm&039;s character can be improved"

Avalon said, "I would like to put in my oar, Toist, or a tracer of h their expressions I am just a humble patent attorney However, it seems to me that you have looked distinctly uneasy each time youyou are keeping froht to knoant an unequivocal answer"

"No," said Bentha with Dr Drake&039;s book Provided he completes the book and that the whole is of the quality of the parts we have seen, ill publish and then promote it adequately There are no hidden reservations to that statement"

Gonzalo said, &039;Then what are you uneasy about? Or is Geoff all wrong about your feelings in the first place?" He was gazing complacently at the caricature of Benthaallery that lined the walls of theroom He had not htly sketched in a feathered hat in green, of the type one associated with the Merry Men

Benthaer, "You could say I&039; that I&039; out onnote

"That&039;s the rough one - syllable version of what I have just said"

"Why?" said Drake, in sudden concern

"I&039;ve lost a manuscript," said Bentham "Not yours, Dr Drake"

Gonzalo said, "In theto Southby Actually, I did every j ruddy thing I could do to get it back I don&039;t knoas in that man&039;s mind"

"Southby&039;s?"

"No, the author&039;s Joshua Fairheld&039;s his name"

"Never heard of him," said Rubin

Trumbull said, "Suppose you tell us what happened, Mr Bentha I don&039;t want to cast a pall over a very pleasant evening"

Trumbull said, "Sorry, Mr Bentha our questions was the price of the meal Please tell us exactly what happened"

Benthan said, "I suppose thehouse is to have soood that has not passed through the hands of a reputable agent and is not by a recognized author; so that has reached you by mail, written by someone whom no one has ever heard of

"Aside from the sheer pleasure of the unexpected windfall, there is the possibility that you have a new author who can be milked for years to come, provided the product is not that of a one - book author - which is not an unheard - of phenoaret Mitchell" and stopped when Truently

"Anyway," said Benthaht he had one One of the readers brought it to hiht, for readers don&039;t often get anything that&039;s above the written - in - crayon - on - lined - paper level

"He should have gone to an editor - not necessarily o directly to Southby I presuht be a deal of credit for the discovery and he didn&039;t want Southby to be unaware of the discoverer I can&039;t say I blame him

"In any case, Southby was infatuated with the manuscript, called an editorial conference, said he was accepting the book and had notified the author He explained, quite enthusiastically, that it was to get the full Southby treatnantly, "Up to and including cooking the best - seller lists Toain, I&039;ll break it off"

Benthaht, Mr Rubin, but this book deserved all it could get - potentially Southby said he thought it needed work and he gave it to n of confidence and I was rather gung - ho on the e to carry it off The other editors didn&039;t seeh One of the if this doesn&039;t work, because Southby&039;s never wrong&039;"

Avalon said gravely, "It someti tabbed to reverse the mistake is fired if he fails"

Benthaht occurred to ers sharpens the desire to be in at the kill, you know

"You can see, then, I went over the h it once at et a sense of the whole and was not displeased Southby&039;s description of it was not, on the whole, wrong It had a good pace and was rich in detail A long fa father, a s mother in a rather subtle battle over the sons, their wives, and their children The plot was interlocking, never halting, and there was enough sex to be suitable for Southby, but the sex worked It fit the story

"I turned in a favorable report ofits chief flaws, and how I proposed to handle theood&039; on it, so I got to work It had to be tightened up The last thing any beginner, however talented, learns is to tighten Some scenes were misplaced or misemphasized, and that had to be corrected

"I areat writer and could never be, but I&039;ve studied writing that is great sufficiently closely to be able to amend and improve what is already written well, even if, froood It took me some six weeks of intense work to complete the job I knew that my head was on the line and I was not about to lose the war for lack of a horseshoe nail

"It wasn&039;t till after I had done a thorough piece of work that I called in the author, Joshua Fairfield I thought it better that way Had I called him in en route, so to speak, there would have been bound to be acries, and much time would be wasted on trivial points If he could see the revisions as a whole, I felt he would be satisfied Any reements could be easily settled

"Or so I reasoned, and perhaps I had need of a little experience myself The author arrived and we met, actually, for the first time I can&039;t say I particularly liked his looks He was about e but he had a rather somber cast of countenance, small, dark eyes - alh the amenities We shook hands I told hi to do; the proive it; and so on

"I then said, rather casually, in order to ees - coed, you know - that I had taken the liberty of introducing soht and his sed He seized the manuscript, which was on the table before us, shook soes where I had es in a fine - point pencil, done quite lightly to allow of further changes, and shrieked

"He really did He screae and that he would have to get the whole thing retyped and that the bill would go straight to one I couldn&039;t stop him I swear to you, I couldn&039;t move, I was that thunder - struck