Dodd laughs into his handkerchief at his own joke. He has a rasping, dry laugh; it makes his shoulders shake and his chest rattle. Waiters break their stride, carefully arranging expressions of concern on their faces, until they realize that what Dodd is doing is laughing.
“Of seven estates, which together formed an elongated ellipsis of faded gingerbread, rickety widow’s walks for the vigilant Dutch wives of popular antiquity, and pale erosive land, ours is the last remaining. Now, beyond the dunes and the wayward pickets demarcating their perilous swollen rises, there are evenly laid-out cottages, newly made, of aluminum and plastic. Built, I imagine, to capitalize on the attractions the place holds for the newly affluent, which I would characterize as a perception of stolid ‘authenticity’ and ‘char — acter’ on the part of its year-round people — qualities which I can assure you are entirely mythical — and a desire to passively partake of the xenophobia historically to be found in such a place.”
The waiter arrives with two fresh martinis and a steaming appetizer. Dodd laughs as he sets them down.
“Now, on my part of the Island the sights are magnificently decrepit, void of utility, void of any trace of this century, white hot and peeling in the sun: the church, the jetty, the seawall, the lighthouse. These places exist solely as monuments to averted catastrophe, of— ferings to the angry gods of the elements, and they now creep with the most primitive of organisms. Jellyfish, the wives of Jewish businessmen, and so on.”
Dodd seems nearly about to shake himself apart with the cannonade of laughter this provokes, and the restaurant’s din hushes for a moment as he comes to himself. Guy is still and very quiet.
“You said something about the muse?”
“Oh, yes. I work when I can, indeed I do. Oh yes yes yes. Not as often as I’d like; the editorial work is so demanding. Nothing terribly elaborate, mind you. Good old-fashioned stuff. A beginning, an end. A man, a woman. A conflict, a resolution. It seems to me that so much contemporary writing resembles the sort of undertaking that dark intent little persons should be working on in laboratories in Massachusetts and California even as we speak. Thoughtful little intent dark persons doing thoughtful things, with the aid of blackboards and slide rules. And yet I see myself as a writer who happens to pass the time as an editor. The thing is, I enjoy helping people. I enjoy it a great deal. I love to wrest rough, promising work from the hands of an arrogant young writer and mold it into a sleek piece of salable work. It just isn’t any fun otherwise.”
An unnerving clatter issues from Dodd, and the table shakes lightly. He focuses on Guy.
“Now. Your proposal. The most exciting thing to cross my desk in three or four months. A very exciting-sounding project. Oh yes yes yes. But I’m assuming you’re looking for top price. And Dearstyne, Harbottle has never let anything like money stand in the way of its reputation as the most prestigious literary publisher on the block. That is, we don’t pay out much of it.”
Dodd laughs into his handkerchief.
“And even if we were to do so in this case — saying so, mind you, merely for the sake of argument. Well. As captivated as I am by the story you propose to tell, I am beholden to superiors, sales staff, and shareholders; to Mr. Dearstyne, who, though he lies abed in a state of enfeebled senility, still ratifies each acquisition so that this clubby little world we all live in knows that the list under the imprimatur of his name is still decisively reflective of his singular vision; and to CBS, which is looking to acquire us for tax purposes, though it’s safe to assume that they are interested in losing only so much money if you get my drift.”
“Do you think you’re going to lose money on this book?”
Here they pause for a moment as Dodd laughs.
“But of course! It would be — oh, too tedious to explain the arithmetic, the accounting involved, but I think I can state categorically that we lose money on every book Dearstyne, Harbottle and Company publishes.”
“How do you stay in business?”
“Well, it’s a matter of prestige. We have it; the other fellows don’t. Nordic used to, but their list’s far too big now. Oh, yes yes yes. Rommel, Mays and Croix likes to pretend. But in reality, there’s only us. And so they settle for vulgar profitability. Though, truth to tell, the others all are losing money as well. Schlock or not, it is a tough market out there. Tough, tough market. Yes yes yes. I know, I know: it seems healthy, robust. Every time you turn around someone has sold a million copies of this book or that. But it’s tough, believe me. Just keeping abreast of the trends must be difficult. If you’re the sort of publisher who feels he has to do that. Last year it was dolphins. This year it’s sharks.”
Dodd hacks his mirth into his handkerchief.
“So, really, I don’t think I can make an offer. Or, rather, any offer I’d make would be insultingly small.”
“Try me,” says Guy.
“Oh, no. No no no. I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. You deserve a publisher who can get behind this project both emotionally and finan — cially.”
Guy leaves him laughing into his handkerchief, unfolded and spread to cover the lower part of his face, as if he were afraid of infecting the world with his rueful self — deprecation.
PART FIVE — Nice, Normal Revolutionaries
“it seems very pretty,” she said when she had finished it; “but it’s rather hard to understand!” (You see she didn’t like to confess, even to herself, that she couldn’t make it out at all.) “Somehow it seems to fill my head with ideas — only I don’t exactly know what they are! However, somebody killed something; that’s clear, at any rate—”
— THROUGH THE LOOKING CLASS
THE PRESS WAITED EXPECTANTLY under its canopy. The strange lingering season of waiting was about to expire, and there was nothing to do except continue to wait until the end. Tomorrow each’d turn up at work and be assigned to the Hall of Justice or to a supervisors’ meeting or to hang around plaguing tourists at the turnaround on Powell and Market.
Two long moving vans (“One just for the paintings and sculpture,” went the rumor) came up the driveway. It was hard for the press to believe that this was that very last thing they’d been waiting for: two trucks slowly filling with cartons and furniture. It messed with their sense of narrative. It was supposed to be hugs, kisses, John Wayne framed in the narrowing space of a closing door, isolated and cast off as Natalie Wood returns home from her prolonged sojourn among the savages.
Instead, Hank and Lydia had put their spread up for sale and were moving to a deluxe apartment on Nob Hill. Their public statements concerning the move were elliptical — irritatingly so. Clearly the couple was attempting to say goodbye, to break things off.
But the press had its questions. The public had its needs. How big was the new place? Did it have superb views? Did they look forward to having all the amenities of the world’s greatest city right outside their front door? Would the family keep the same staff? Would some of those faithful retainers have to go? Would the couple miss the home in which they’d raised a family? How did the children feel about the move? Were they supportive, or had they raised objections? (And) did this move suggest that they had given up on Alice? That was the big question, the one they wanted to shoehorn in. There was no one to ask it of, however. No sign of Lydia or Hank (They were staying “in a six-room luxury suite at the Fairmont,” went the rumor).