McNally's caper
( McNally )
Lawrence Sanders
Lawrence Sanders
McNally's Caper
HOW IT ALL BEGAN
I was in bed with J. Mark Hamilton, my brother-in-law. We had spent the night together because my sister, Laura, was in Park Central, recovering from plastic surgery. She’d had her tits elevated.
So there we were in the morning, J. Mark and me, his unshaven jowls scraping at me. ‘Bon appetit,’ I murmured, and then the phone rang.
It was Sol Faber, my literary agent.
‘Morning, doll,’ he said brightly. ‘We got a meet with the man at tennish. Remember?’
That’s the way Sol talks.
‘I remember,’ I said. As a matter of fact, I had forgotten. I have that frailty: I lose the remembrance of unpleasant coming events.
Sol told me to meet him in the lobby of Binder Publications a few minutes before ten. Then we hung up. My brother-in-law raised his bald head to stare at me.
‘Who was that?’ he demanded.
‘Your wife,’ 1 said. ‘She asked me to remind you to pick up the drycleaning.’
His face went white before he realized I was ribbing him. J. Mark is not the fastest wit in the world. He does, though, possess certain skills, even if I don’t allow him between my sheets solely because of them. It’s a form of hostility directed against my sister. Laura is the pretty blond, petite one. I am constructed more along the lines of a Marine drill instructor, and I have a profile that belongs on postage stamps.
In all modesty, I am not a gorgon, but I am large. Five-ten, to be exact. J. Hamilton was my sister’s height: five-four. Like most tall women I inspire dreams of conquest in short males. Simply, I suppose, because we’re there.
1 am extraordinarily slender, but hardly fragile. My breasts are not as large as Laura’s, lifted or descended, but I have strength in my shoulders, arms, back, and legs. I work at it: jogging, yoga, swimming, sex. My health is indecently good.
I wear my hair quite short. It is a rather indeterminate shade of dark brown. My eyes are brown too.
1 am twenty-eight years old, and was born in Lima, Peru, where my father was serving as consul. Laura, who is three years younger, was born in Paris. Of course. She would be.
My father died when I was twenty-two, in a manner so ridiculous that I blush to mention it. A golf cart he was riding tipped over and fell on him, breaking his back. Near the sixth green. My mother waited a decent interval (five weeks) before remarrying. Juan, my stepfather, is two years older than I, very Spanish, and can’t decide whether to be Picasso, Manolete, or Cervantes. He and my mother live on the Costa del Sol in a seafront condominium. My mother’s name is Matilda. She is called Matty, and we-exchange Christmas cards.
I visited them only once, and fled after Juan made his interest clear. He is quite short.
I have never been married. I don’t live a celibate life, but neither do I sleep around. I like men better than women.
I think that concludes the vital statistics. Oh, one more thing: I have very long feet. I offer this only as proof of my intention of making this narrative as honest as possible.
I still feel I did nothing wrong. The New York Police Department and the Manhattan District Attorney’s office, of course, feel differently.
WHO AM I?
My name is Chuck Thorndike. My name is Mike Cantrell. My name is Buck Williams. My name is Pat Slaughter. And, God help us, my name is Brick Wall.
All pseudonyms, of course. My real name is Jannie Shean. But I am the author of hard-boiled mystery-suspense thrillers, and Aldo Binder, ‘the man’ at Binder Publications, is conviced that since men are the big buyers of this genre, the author’s name should also be male. And not only male, but ruggedly, toughly, two-fistedly masculine.
‘Like Mickey Spillane,’ he told me.
‘Like Raymond Chandler?’ I said. ‘Like Dashiell Hammett?’
But I was so anxious to sell my first novel that I agreed to be Chuck Thorndike. Then, when I got in the swing of things and began turning out four pot-boilers a year, along came Mike, Buck, Pat, and Brick.
I make no claim to creating literature, but I do strive for intelligent entertainment. My books are tightly plotted, with the required dollops of sex and violence, and they have found a faithful readership. I have had two movie sales, and last year I grossed almost a hundred thousand dollars. As Brick Wall might say, ‘That ain’t potato pancakes, sweetheart.’
I’m lucky and I know it. For every novelist able to support himself on his earnings, there are a hundred who must earn bread teaching Creative Writing in New Hampshire girls’ schools, writing ad copy on Madison Avenue, or slicing pastrami in an Orchard Street deli. Probably I made it because I found a formula I enjoyed writing and a lot of people enjoyed reading. Not that it’s a formula original with me. It’s called the Big Caper, and involves looting a bank vault, a kidnapping, hijacking an airliner, a raid on an armored truck — something large enough to require a gang of four to a dozen bad guys.
The first third of a Big Caper thriller is spent gathering the personnel: delineating their strengths, weaknesses, and their relationships to each other; and planning the caper. The second third of the novel describes the actual commission of the crime. In the final third, the whole thing falls apart through bad luck, clever police work, or from the personality defects, failure of brain or nerve, and antagonisms of the gang members. They are not the master criminals they fancied themselves. Justice triumphs.
How many Big Caper novels have you read? A dozen? A hundred? I hope some of them were mine. Or, rather, Chuck’s, Mike’s, Buck’s, Pat’s, or Brick’s.
Together, we turned out books like link sausage, until, about six months ago, it all began to come apart like … well, like a Big Caper. The final sales on Mike Cantrell’s latest, Mayhem on Mother’s Day, were down, way down. And the bookstores were returning unsold stacks of Pat Slaughter’s Massacre on Division Street.
Worse, I had recently turned in Chuck Thorndike’s new opus, Murder for Breakfast, and after three weeks of chilling silence from my publishers, Aldo Binder’s secretary called Sol Faber to set up an appointment with the great man himself. I fancied I heard, faintly, the sounds of a guillotine. Creak of pulley. Rasp of rope. Whistle of blade’s descent. Chonk!
EDITORIAL BULLSHIT
The offices of Binder Publications were in a seedy building overlooking Times Square. On a clear day you could see the massage parlors on Eighth Avenue. Our meeting was held in the Editorial Conference Room, which had all the ambience of a Central Park Comfort Station.
Besides me, the cast of characters included:
Sol Faber, my agent. Sol tried so hard with his California leisure suits and blow-dried hair. He was thin, jerky, with horn-rimmed glasses, a pinkie ring, and a habit of snapping his fingers to call a waiter.
Aldo Binder, my publisher. Aldo was the only man I knew who wore double-breasted vests. He was a big, lumpy man with gloomy eyes, much given to brooding silences. He smoked black cigars. It was said he got his start publishing porno. He was shrewd and knowledgeable. Had the same secretary for thirty-three years. There were stories about that too, with references to the spavined leather couch in his office.
Simon Lefferts, my editor. Lefferts was a shithead and a snotnose. He was supposed to have a PhD in American Literature, and he treated every manuscript that came across his desk like the first draft of Farewell to Arms.
So there we were, four nutcakes, sitting around an old oak table that must have been bought from a defunct fraternity house. The top was carved with names, class numerals, Greek letters, and one ‘Fuck you.’ Simon Lefferts had the manuscript of Chuck Thorndike’
s Murder for Breakfast in front of him, along with three pages of single-spaced notes. I figured I was in for a two-hour personal pogrom.
• Lefferts took charge immediately.
‘This,’ he said, pointing at the manuscript but forbearing to touch it, ‘is totally unacceptable.’
‘Now wait a minute,’ my agent said. ‘We’re convened here for a nice family get-together to consider ways and means — am I right? I mean, a little cutting here and there, a little rewriting here and there, a little-’
‘Totally unacceptable,’ Lefferts repeated. ‘Totally incompetent.’
‘Aldo!’ Sol said in anguished tones. ‘You read the book?’
My publisher’s round head nodded. I was afraid it might roll off that fat neck.
‘And …?’
‘Stinks,’ Binder said.
Then the editor got down to nuts-and-bolts. The plotting was juvenile, the dialogue jejune, the characterization banal, the motivation hackneyed, the description puerile, the exposition illogical, the transitions erratic, and so on, and so on …
I came close to stalking out. I can’t take criticism — who can? — and I couldn’t believe the novel could be that bad.
‘Let’s not talk generalities,’ I told Lefferts. ‘Give me specific examples, page and paragraph.’
‘Delighted to,’ he said maliciously. ‘Juvenile plotting: On page 54, you say the girl took a cab because it was raining heavily. Two pages earlier you describe the night as crisp and clear with a full moon shining. Jejune dialogue: On page 134, the muscle, the dumbest one of the gang, a real moron, says, “I have a feeling of deja vu.” How would he know what that means? Banal characterization: The cop is fat, Irish, and drinks. The bank president wears a pince-nez and is fussy. The gang leader is lean, dark, and cold-eyed. Stock characters all. Hackneyed motivation: On page 98, the gang moll doesn’t show up for a rehearsal of the caper because her daughter is having a Sweet Sixteen party. Oh my God. Puerile description: On page 52, quote, “The moon hung in the sky like a ripe melon.” How original! Illogical exposition: On page 162, you say-’
‘All right,’ I interrupted him, ‘you’ve made your point.’
‘Points,’ he said cruelly.
‘Roscoe,’ Aldo Binder said.
‘What was that, Aldo?’ Sol asked.
‘Roscoe,’ Aldo Binder repeated.
‘On page 211,’ Lefferts explained, ‘the safe-cracker fires his gun at the bank guard. You write, ‘Ka-chow went his roscoe.’ Handguns haven’t been called roscoes since Black Mask Magazine. And Ka-chow? Since when does a gun go Ka-chow? Bang, maybe. Or blam. A gun snaps, or pops, or roars, or thunders. But Ka-chow? Sounds like a sneeze.’
I try not to take myself seriously, but despite what I may have told you about running a sausage factory, I take my work very seriously indeed. So it was hard to sit there and hear my novel being put through the shredder. I was close to tears, and only the fact that I knew Lefferts wanted to see me blub kept me outwardly unshaken. Inwardly, I was figuring how I could nail his balls to a stump and push him over backward.
We all sat in silence after his lecture on the sounds of gunfire. Then Aldo Binder took a deep breath, so deep the buttons on his waistcoat seemed threatened. Then he exhaled. He took one of his black cigars from his breast pocket and began peeling it.
‘You and you leave,’ he said, jabbing the cigar in turn at Sol Faber and Simon Lefferts. ‘I’ll talk to Jannie in private.’
God had decreed: They filed from the room. I fumbled for a cigarette. Binder held a match for me before lighting his cigar.
‘I knew Lefferts hated me,’ I said, trying to laugh, ‘but I didn’t know how much.’
During his frequent silences. Binder had the habit of tipping back his fleshy head and opening his mouth wide. The entrance of the Lincoln Tunnel, with teeth. Not the most appetizing sight in the world.
Finally he snapped his mouth shut with a click that startled me. Then he regarded me gravely.
‘Simon doesn’t hate you,’ he said. ‘Simon resents you.’
‘Resents me?’
‘You’re a successful author.’
‘Oh,’ I said faintly, beginning to feel a little better, ‘I didn’t know he wanted to write. It’s a bad sign in an editor, no?’
‘All editors want to write,’ Binder said. ‘They see trash make a fortune, and it looks so easy. However, his personal pique doesn’t make his criticism wrong.’ He waved towards the Thorndike manuscript. ‘It’s a lousy novel, Jannie. I won’t publish it.’
‘A complete rewrite?’ I said, gritting my teeth.
‘No, I don’t think so. The plot’s preposterous.’
‘Well …’ I sighed, ‘then I guess this is the parting of the ways.’
He shifted his bulk round on his uncushioned chair, then settled down with fingers laced across his corporation. Corporation? That mound was a conglomerate!
‘Jannie,’ he said, ‘you’ve made a lot of money from Binder Publications.’
‘Oh sure,’ I said hotly, ‘and Binder Publications has made a lot of money from me.’
‘True,’ he said, nodding his head. ‘And that’s why I’d hate to see our relationship come to an end. Of course, under the terms of your contract, after our rejection you’re free to try the book elsewhere. Do you want to?’
The sudden question took me by surprise. I stalled by stubbing out my cigarette and lighting another.
‘You smoke too much,’ he said.
‘You eat too much,’ I said. ‘I don’t know what I’ll do with this thing, Aldo. I’ll have to think about it.’
‘Before you make up your mind,’ Binder said, ‘will you resent it if I tell you what’s wrong with the novel? And with your two previous books?’
‘No, I won’t resent it,’ I said, lying stoutly.
‘Jannie, novels in the detective-mystery-suspense field are essentially fantasies.’
‘All right,’ I said. ‘I’ll go along with that. But-’
‘Wait,’ he said, holding up a pudgy hand. ‘Let me finish. They’re fantasies. But when a man picks up a paperback by Brick Wall, he isn’t looking for Little Red Riding Hood. He wants a hard, tough, realistic, believable story. Oh, it’s all imagination. You know it, and I know it. It’s all a creation of the author’s mind. But the reader must believe the author is doing nothing but detailing actual events in familiar language. Reporting. One misstep, one flight of fancy too many, and the writer betrays the reader’s trust.’
‘And I’ve been betraying my readers’ trust?’
Binder tapped the ash from his cigar, blew gently on the glowing tip. ‘You’ve lost all contact with reality,’ he said. That “Ka-chow went his roscoe” may sound funny now, something easily eliminated in editing, but it’s symptomatic of what’s happened to your writing. You don’t seem anchored to the real world anymore. Your readers have sensed this. That’s it in a nutshell, Jannie: You’ve lost contact.’
We sat in silence again. I looked down, tracing with a finger tip that ‘Fuck you’ carved into the oak tabletop. I wasn’t ready to accept what Binder had said. Lost contact with the real world?
‘Well,’ I said finally, ‘what do you suggest?’
‘There are things you could do. Interview cops. Take a night tour in a patrol car. Such things can be arranged. Try to meet some criminals, active or behind bars. Read the reports of sociologists and penal officials. Read the tabloids. You’re a clever lady; you’ll find ways. All I’m suggesting is that you get your head out of the clouds and your feet back on the ground.’
‘If I wrote a sentence like that,’ I said. ‘Lefferts would blue-pencil it with a notation: “Unacceptable cliche.’”
‘Think about what I’ve said. I see no reason why, with a little effort, you can’t get back to the kind of novels your readers have enjoyed in the past.’
‘And bought,’ I reminded him.
‘And bought,’ he agreed. ‘Jannie, Binder Publications is not a nonprofit o
rganization. Not deliberately, it isn’t.’
FIRST STIRRINGS
Sol Faber ushered me from the offices of Binder Publications holding my elbow as if he expected me to collapse with the vapors. He snapped his fingers at an empty cab and, remarkably, it stopped. He told the driver to take us to the Four Seasons.
‘My treat, doll,’ he told me grandly. ‘We’ll have a few drinks to repair our egos and then we’ll have some of those little sausages and shrimps on darning needles.’
‘Thanks, Sol,’ I said gratefully, ‘but I’ll split the check with you.’
‘Okay,’ he agreed immediately. ‘Listen, don’t let what El Jerko said about the manuscript put you in the pits. He was just running off at the mouth. What did you and Aldo talk about?’
‘More of the same,’ I said. ‘He just doesn’t want to publish the book. Says we’re free to try it elsewhere.’
‘Uh-huh,’ he said, looking out the cab window. ‘Well, we’ll talk about that while we eat.’
Sol wangled a table in the Grill Room, a section that’s almost wholly occupied during lunch by the book publishing crowd. He snapped his fingers for the waiter.
I usually drink white wine, but at the moment I needed a martini. Sol had something pink with tequila and shaved ice.
We weren’t exactly in a festive mood, and exchanged only a few words while gulping down the first round. Sol knew some of the people at nearby tables. He smiled, waved, told me who they were.
‘You know a lot of people in the business, Sol.’
‘The name of the game, doll; that’s how an agent operates. Personal contacts.’
‘So you have contacts at other houses where we could send this Thorndike book?’
‘Well, uh, sure. Lots of places.’
We ordered another round.
‘Sol,’ I said, ‘I seem to detect a lack of enthusiasm for sending the novel somewhere else.’
‘No, no,’ he protested. ‘No, no, no. Where’d you get that idea?’
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