* * *
She called from the table. “Hi, it’s me. We’re just finishing breakfast and I’ve got a couple of sticky points. You know where. He asked if I knew the status of Archer’s new book. I still don’t want to talk about that, for obvious reasons.”
She looked directly into my eyes while she talked. “I know what you said, Lee, I just don’t like it. He also wants to know what we’ll do if Archer continues to be unreasonable.”
After a short silence, she said, “I’ve got to tell you again, I wouldn’t advise that.”
She said, “If he gives his word, yes, I do think we could trust him.”
I nodded superseriously.
“That’s not the point,” she said.
Lee said something and she shook her head. “I’m against it.”
She frowned. “You’re the boss, but I don’t think we need to tell anybody, including Mr. Janeway, what we might or might not do. Especially what we
She shook her head. “Well, I knew you’d say that. But I still don’t like it.”
She handed me the phone.
“Hi, Lee,” I said.
“Cliff.” Lee sounded tired. “I’m sorry you’ve been put in the middle of this mess. But it sounds like Erin’s giving you what you need.”
“She’s great. She does have a couple of concerns, which are probably reasonable.”
“She’s being lawyerly, covering my flank. You know how it is. But she’ll talk to you now.”
For a moment I listened to the phone noise: all the distance between us.
“Erin said you wanted to talk to me too,” I said.
“Just to make sure you get what you need and to tell you not to worry. Whatever you have to do, I understand. Your cause comes before mine.”
“Thanks for that.”
“We’ll see you when you get back. And good luck with it.”
I hung up the phone.
“I’ll answer your questions now,” Erin said, “but you’ve got to respect our confidence. This can go no further.”
“I won’t tell a soul.”
“You asked about Archer’s new book. When he was in Denver he got drunk, cried on Lee’s shoulder, and told him some things he probably wishes he hadn’t. Turns out the great one is suffering from the granddaddy of all writer’s blocks. In the years since he won the Pulitzer he hasn’t written a publishable line. Or if he has, he’s second-guessed himself into fits of depression and destroyed whatever he’s done. If the prize has done anything, it’s given him a sense that nothing he does can ever measure up to his own…you know.”
“Legend,” I said sourly, loathing that dumbest of all modern buzzwords.
She looked sad, as if Archer’s plight had suddenly touched her. “I told you writers are screwed up. Archer took a lot of money from his publisher on a two-page plan to produce a groundbreaking work in a specified period of time. That time has passed. Viking has been more than sympathetic: they even came through with more money. The Pulitzer is a powerful wedge and they really do want to publish him. But their patience will run out sometime, and as of now, six years later, Archer has nothing to show them.”
All I knew about writers and their hang-ups was what I’d read here and there. But it seemed strange to get stuck over a work of nonfiction when most writer’s blocks seemed to come over some creative lack of faith. “I wonder if he promised them more than he’s got,” I said. “He may still be doing that, only now Lee is the mark, not the Viking Press.”
“Don’t think I haven’t thought of that. Lee doesn’t worry about that nearly enough, but this journal will have to be meticulously examined before I allow him to give Archer a dime.”
“Even then you won’t like it.”
She shook her head. “I think Lee is putting a lot of money at risk. What would you advise him, as his friend?”
“Check the provenance, six times over.”
CHAPTER 28
She leaned across the table and said, “Your turn, Janeway, talk to me,” and I had to tell her about Koko and Baltimore. Then, with deliberate understatement, I told her about Dante and what had brought us to Charleston: how stealth, not electronics, had given me such insight into her dealings with Archer. She shook her head and tried to look disgusted, but a small smile gave her away. The smile faded when I told her that Dante had burned Koko’s house.
