“It is hard work,” he agreed, “and even so, it takes a great deal of talent. Not to mention a good deal of patience and experience. Take it from me, as I know something about the subject: The world doesn’t need another failed writer, Clifford.”
I stared at him, feeling punched in the gut. I couldn’t believe my ears. The poisonous words Like you? sprung to my lips but I held them in.
“Your mother and I are hoping that—if you refuse to finish your schooling—you will find practical employment.” He looked at me, and I could tell he was trying to muster some variety of fatherly encouragement. It didn’t flow naturally between us. “I have every confidence you can,” he finally finished. He gave a tight-lipped smile. “Now, I ought to be getting back to work, Clifford. Without Francine here, this place is an absolute zoo.” He paused and pulled a few greenbacks out of his wallet. “Your mother says you haven’t phoned her in well over a week.”
“You know I don’t have a telephone in my, ahem, new situation,” I said, glaring at him.
“Ah, yes,” he said, looking both irritated and embarrassed. “Well, here you are. That’s all I’ve got at the moment, I’m afraid.” He held out two fives and a ten.
He might as well have said Run along now, sonny for how crummy he made me feel. I knew as well as he did it was Friday afternoon and nothing ever happens in publishing on a Friday afternoon and the only work he was going to get done was to finish the bottle of scotch and maybe pick up the phone and yell at a few more people. I wanted to say something else but it wouldn’t come, so I snatched the dollar bills from his hand and charged out of his office without saying good-bye.
• • •
Later that evening I went looking for Swish but found Bobby and Pal instead. I had checked into all of our regular haunts and found them both leaned up against a pillar in the tiny underground triangle of space that made up a club called the Village Vanguard listening to musicians blow some jazz and waggling their heads in spastic syncopation. There was a funny asymmetry about the picture the two of them made: tall, towering Pal bobbing his head shyly, his long eyelashes shading his deep-blue eyes from the glare of the stage lights, and Bobby with his sleek silhouette and his sexed-up panther posture, winking at anyone and everyone who made eye contact with him. They were a study in contrasts; the introvert and the extrovert, like one of those science models that had been turned inside out in order to show you both sides of a human at once.
“Boy oh boy, could I ever use a drink,” I said when I approached. I was still sore about My Old Man.
“Here, have this,” Pal said, handing me a full beer. “I’ll go get another.” He moved across the room towards the bar and I thought, Leave it to a guy like Pal to give you the very beer in his hand and not think anything of it. Guys like Pal were worth their weight in gold and didn’t even know it and it was a shame the whole world couldn’t be populated with men like that.
I stood leaning against the pillar, drinking Pal’s beer and talking to Bobby as he surveyed the room the way he always did, deciding which girl he was going to ball that night. Just as I was beginning to relax and forget about My Old Man, I caught a glimpse of someone I had not seen on the other side of the pillar. I flinched because it was a surprise there was anyone there at all and it turned out the someone was Rusty.
“Say, I remember you,” Rusty said in greeting. “You’re the fella who’s going to be a big important writer,” repeating the thing Rex had said while we sat smoking on Rex’s roof. I recoiled at this. If he was going to mock me he could have the courtesy not to do it to my goddamn face. But then he straightened and looked at me with a sincere expression and said something that changed everything.
“Maybe you ought to give me some of your work to read sometime,” Rusty said. I stood there blinking stupidly because I had expected Rusty to taunt me like he had at the party but not to make an actual offer to do me any favors. He saw the surprise written all over my face and smiled, but it was a twisted smile because Rusty had a very unappealing manner of pursing his lips awkwardly when he was enjoying something. “Write down your address,” he said, handing me a little notebook and pencil from his pocket. “I’ll drop by sometime.”
I looked at Rusty with his big ears that stuck out too far from his head and his puckered smile and realized I did not especially want him coming by my apartment building and dropping in unannounced, but I also thought, What the hell?—because here was this guy who was the assistant to New York’s most famous literary agent and anyway I’d be a fool not to take him up on his offer. That had been my plan when I’d started the day, and now here I had come full circle back around. I took the notepad and scribbled down my address and handed it back.
“When do you think you’ll come?” I asked.
“Oh,” Rusty said in a vague tone, “sometime.”
EDEN
14
During my next chat with Miss Everett, I announced the good news. I knew she would be glad for me, and perhaps even take a little pride in my accomplishment. But as soon as the words—“I’ve been promoted to reader!”—left my lips, I realized I’d misjudged things. She simply froze, her expression utterly blank. Then, very slowly, tiny increments of adjustment took place. Her spine stiffened where she sat, and the arch of her left eyebrow floated upwards.
“My, but what an ambitious little thing you are,” she finally remarked. There was a perplexing quality to her voice, a slightly patronizing tone I hadn’t heard before, and a wide, closed-mouth smile spread across her lips. It was one of those expressions where you can’t tell at first if it is in fact a smile or a grimace; the whole of her face pulled at it, and I was suddenly reminded of a violinist tightening the strings of his instrument. “Reader, and in only a few months, Miss Katz. We had all better watch out; I suppose you’ll just make editor yet.”
I waited for her to comment further, but she abruptly returned her attention to the badly stacked pile of manuscripts lying on her desk. “Mabel!” she called in a loud voice. The door swung open and Mabel materialized, as if she had been lying in wait like a jack-in-the-box poised and ready for someone to turn the crank. “I don’t understand why I’m still looking at these manuscripts when I asked you to remove them and type up my editorial letters over half an hour ago,” Miss Everett said to a rapidly wilting Mabel.
“I thought you wouldn’t want me to interrupt your chat with Miss Katz,” Mabel said in a small voice.
“If I didn’t want that, I would’ve told you so,” Miss Everett said. “Besides,” she continued, “let’s not lose our heads and act like little fools. Miss Katz is not so important that we should neglect our work, even if she has been promoted to reader.”
“Reader! Oh, Eden—that’s just what you wanted! Congratulations,” Mabel said, turning in my direction with wide eyes.
“That’ll do, Mabel!” Miss Everett said, abruptly lifting the pile of manuscripts and heaving them into Mabel’s arms. Miss Everett had scooped up the pile with careless effort and now as Mabel took them a thick section of the bottommost pages escaped her grasp and slid to the ground. “Oh, for the love of Pete,” Miss Everett sighed as Mabel stooped to pick them up. She shook her head and glanced again in my direction. “Now, if you’ll excuse us, Miss Katz, we’re quite busy down here. I’m sure you have quite a lot of your own work waiting for you upstairs, and Mr. Turner will be wondering where you’ve gotten off to.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said. I nodded and smiled, then beat a hasty retreat, hopscotching over the papers strewn about the floor on my way out.
• • •
First one week, then two . . . then eventually four whole months went by and Miss Everett did not ring for me to come down to her office for one of our chats. I began to worry I’d lost the only champion I’d truly had. I figured her silence meant she had written me off as an ingrate.
But then one day the telephone on my desk buzzed and I answ
ered it to discover not Mabel but Miss Everett herself on the other end of the line.
“Hello, Miss Katz” came the cool lilt, sharpened and slightly tinny through the telephone. “I was wondering if you might have some time to dash downstairs. I have something for you.”
“Oh! Of course,” I said, nearly knocking over a paper cup of cold coffee with my elbow. “Right away.”
Miss Everett rang off. I quickly surveyed my desk. In front of me, the electric typewriter hummed a quiet whir. I had been in the middle of typing a letter for Mr. Turner, but I didn’t want to keep Miss Everett waiting. I switched the typewriter off, tucked some files away in a drawer, and headed for the elevator.
Once I reached the fifth floor, I made my way down the hall, past the row of gilt-framed sailboats and their maritime cheer, towards the familiar and increasingly strong odor of Russian dressing. Upon reaching Miss Everett’s office, no sooner had I touched the doorknob than the door flew open and Mabel emerged, charging forth with her usual harried speed.
“Oh!” Mabel exclaimed with affable surprise. “Gosh! I nearly ran right into you, Eden! Go on in; she’s expecting you.”
I stepped cautiously into the room and found Miss Everett waiting for me with her hands clasped neatly on the desk before her. This was unusual. Almost always when I entered Miss Everett’s office she was lost in a whirlwind of busyness. She had a habit of keeping me standing about awkwardly for several minutes before asking me to have a seat.
She smiled—not the violin-string smile but rather a much softer cousin to that smile—and waved a friendly hand to a chair. “Well, Eden,” Miss Everett began. “I must say you’ve made good use of your time here. I’ve thought some more about your promotion, and I’m really quite impressed.” Her face contorted and she managed to produce the soft smile again.
“Thank you, Miss Everett.”
“In the spirit of mentorship, I’ve decided to provide you an opportunity to keep that marvelous upward momentum of yours going here at Torchon and Lyle. During our last chat, Eden, you said you were not overburdened with your new responsibilities but were rather enjoying them. I take it that is still the case?”
I nodded. “Oh, sure. I’ve found I can get the extra work done easily if I just use some of my weekend time.”
“And you don’t mind that?”
“No. I shouldn’t . . . I mean, I suppose I figured that’s just what editors do, and if I want to be an editor I’d better get used to the hours.”
“Very mature, and you are quite right to take the long view. Now I’m even more certain I was right to pick you for what I’m about to suggest.”
“And what’s that?”
“Well, I’ve decided to let you take charge of some of these,” she said, pushing a stack of manuscripts towards me across the desk. Surprised by this sudden development, I eyed them with disbelief. “I think it’s safe to assume that Mr. Turner is a very busy man,” she continued. “Probably too busy to properly give you all the details about his opinion of your reports. How will you ever learn to write a tip-top report if you don’t have guidance? You see, this is how we can be of mutual help to each other, Eden. I’ll allow you to read and write up reports for a few of my manuscripts each week. And I’ll personally review your reports and tell you exactly what I think of them. You stand to learn a lot this way.”
I didn’t quite know what to say. The pile of manuscripts loomed large, and her words swam in my ears: I’ll allow you to read . . . I’ll tell you exactly what I think of them . . . I understood she was giving me more work, and I also understood that Miss Everett had managed to very neatly tie something important together in how she’d framed our discussion: She had bound my desire to become an editor to the additional pile of manuscripts that now sat before me. I’d said I wanted to be an editor—more than anything, I’d claimed. Here was my chance to prove to her I’d meant it.
“Thank you,” I finally said.
“Of course.” Miss Everett waved a hand. Her freshly lacquered nails flashed in the light like five tiny pools of crimson blood. “Don’t mention it. You’ve made your ambition plain, and I want to do whatever I can to nurture it and see you down your proper path.” She returned her attention to her desk and began shuffling various papers around. It was clear our meeting was over. I rose from my chair and reached to gather the manuscripts into my arms.
“Oh—one last thing, Eden. I only have two rules about the manuscripts I’ll be giving you. The first is that you let me know straightaway if there’s going to be a delay in finishing a report; that way I can take matters into my own hands and finish your reports for you, if need be. And second is that you never, under any circumstances, remove these manuscripts from the office. I had one girl who took them home and left them on a city bus—can you imagine? I simply can’t have them vanishing on me, and I need for you to work on them here.”
The stack Miss Everett handed me was sizable, and taking them home would allow me to continue working on them at night. I was about to mention that Mr. Turner allowed me to take manuscripts home overnight and even over the weekends, but I didn’t want to come off sounding rude or disrespectful. The manuscripts were very heavy in my arms and my stamina was already flagging when I thought of the long evenings of work that stretched before me, so I simply nodded.
15
I quickly became acquainted with the office rhythms in a new, more intimate way. Miss Everett’s decree that the manuscripts—her manuscripts, at least—should never leave the premises meant staying long after all the other secretaries, readers, and editors had packed up for the day. Coming back from the ladies’ room, I often encountered the sight of my desk lit up and looking like a lonely castaway amid a dark sea. I got a lot done during these evening sessions, but I can’t say I was ever one hundred percent at ease. There was something discomfiting in the atmosphere once the lights had been turned out. I would feel the echoing cavern of the sixth floor spreading out around me, the crinkling rustle of each manuscript page I turned growing louder by the minute. The best way to describe how I felt was haunted. I was acutely aware of being isolated and yet not alone. At nine o’clock each evening, an elderly Swede named Olaf came to empty the waste bins and wash the coffeepots. When I glimpsed the pupils of his eyes, milky blue with advanced cataracts, I understood how it was the glass coffeepots never seemed to get completely clean. There were often stirrings, too. Editors who came back to retrieve a bottle of scotch or to hang about their offices with the lights turned out while having a nightcap with a lady friend. These were the editors I thought of as the company’s “wolves”; they were lonely men who prowled about, using the office like it was some sort of private back room at Sardi’s or the Algonquin. But then I identified a species of even lonelier editors, too—the ones who worked too hard or had fights with their wives. These editors ultimately resigned themselves to sleeping on the scratchy upholstery of their office sofas for the night. Torchon & Lyle during the after hours was a place heavy with silence and yet thick with restless activity.
One night I was reading at my desk, when I looked up to see a blond apparition moving towards me. Recognizing the jaunty step, I realized it was Judy. As she drew nearer, I was astonished to note she looked every bit as fresh and perky at nine o’clock at night as she did at eight o’clock in the morning.
“I thought I’d find you here!” she exclaimed. As she stepped into the pool of light around my desk I noticed that the bright swipe of lipstick she habitually wore had been recently reapplied. “Mabel said Miss Everett had piled more work onto your shoulders.”
There was a pitying tone in her voice that irked me. “Oh, I don’t mind,” I said. “I take it as a compliment she trusts my taste. Would you know what, she doesn’t even bother to read the ones I say are bad? She trusts me that much.”
Judy nodded sweetly, still looking at me with the kind of expression one wears when trying to help a lost child. I
didn’t understand Judy; she never seemed to acknowledge that this was how I was going to make editor. But at that moment she appeared to detect my irritation with her sympathy, because suddenly her face relaxed and she laughed.
“Say, don’t look so glum; I’ve come to rescue you! Want to take a little break? I’m awfully thirsty myself.”
I looked at the pile of manuscripts, which somehow appeared every bit as mountainous as they had hours earlier when I’d set them on top of my desk with a plop. I realized in the course of the last couple hours my vision had gone a little blurry. “That might be nice,” I murmured, then brightened and looked at my watch. If we went very quickly for a cup of coffee, I could be refreshed and back at my desk in a little over half an hour. “What time is it? Is Schrafft’s open much longer?”
“Oh. I thought we might go somewhere else. I had something a little stiffer than coffee in mind.”
“Stiffer?”
• • •
Exactly two vodka martinis and one hour later, I reluctantly said good-bye to Judy and forced myself to return to the office. Going from the noisy, fusty warmth of the little Irish bar where we’d been drinking back into the echoing isolation of the office was like going from a steam room into an ice-bath. The fuzzy feeling that had come over me in such a comfortable and inviting wave at the bar now seemed more like a disjointed jangling in my head.
When the elevator doors opened on six, I stepped off but was immediately brought up short. From across the floor I could make out a dark figure hovering over my desk. As I squinted at the bulky shape, I realized I was looking at Mr. Frederick. His head turned, and as the alcoholic glisten of his watery eyes flashed, I understood he was looking in my direction.
Three-Martini Lunch Page 11