Are You Happy Now? (15 page)

Before Lincoln can bolt, the detective glances up from a document he’s reading and gestures for Lincoln to sit. Then Evinrude returns to the document. Lincoln waits for almost a minute, beating back the urge to squirm. There’s nothing in this tiny room to distract him—no family pictures, no framed diplomas, no sentimental calendar art, just sheets of printed matter
pinned to the pasteboard walls. It’s as if the officer exists as a concept, not a person. Finally, the detective takes off his glasses and looks up wearily. “Now, what’s this about?” he asks.

Lincoln is not sure where to begin. “You may remember, I was here a month or so ago, in the matter of the riot on the L train.”

Detective Evinrude frowns briefly, trying to bring the case back. “Oh, right, you’re the publisher, right?”

“Well, editor, yes.”

“I don’t think I’ve got too far on that case. It seems like it’s more a civil matter.”

“Well, yes,” Lincoln nods, “that’s sort of what I came to talk about.” As clearly and simply as he can, Lincoln explains that the man who has accused him of battery now seems to be promising to drop the claim if Lincoln will publish his manuscript.

Detective Evinrude frowns again as he takes this in. “You mean, you think he’s blackmailing you?”

Yes, the magic word. Lincoln had discreetly avoided using it himself. Just give the officer the facts and let him draw his own conclusions. “That’s what seems to be going on,” Lincoln says indignantly.

“And he’ll forget the whole thing if you publish his book of poetry?”

“Exactly.”

The detective studies Lincoln carefully, as if his face might hold a clue—a fingerprint, maybe; residue of a gunshot? After a while, Evinrude says, “Well, why the hell don’t you? It’s only a book of poems.”

Lincoln blurts: “But they’re really bad poems.” He regrets it immediately.

The detective chooses not to explore aesthetics. “How much can it cost?” he asks. “If you get sued for battery, a lawyer alone will cost you thousands of dollars, and who knows what you’ll be out if you lose. Who cares about a book of poems? If you can get rid of him, go for it.”

For a moment, Lincoln’s instincts push him to argue. After all, what does this career law-enforcement officer know about the agonizing intellectual nuances of the publishing business? But his presence, that commanding certainty, ricochets off the pasteboard walls of the office and almost knocks Lincoln out of his chair. The detective speaks with simple, practical logic. Probably experience, too. Lincoln smiles and stands. “Can I go out of town without permission now?” he asks.

“Do whatever you like.”

In the cab on the way back to the office, Lincoln chews on the Evinrude Doctrine, as he taken to calling it, and gives himself a pep talk. Amy’s novel, a job in New York, a resurrected marriage—he has goals and hopes, real aspirations that link directly to his life. Stop wasting good mental energy fretting about an insignificant book of poems that would vanish on publication—unseen, unremarked, unknown by the world, a sparrow fart. (Maybe that should be the title:
Sparrow Farts
.) Move on.

Back at his desk, Lincoln sends a short e-mail to Tony Buford: “On further consideration, I will submit your ms to the editorial committee.”

The response is almost immediate: “You’re the man. You can make it happen. TB.”

15

H
OW DO YOU
articulate the terms of a cop-out? In a cell phone conversation with Amy, Lincoln test runs the arguments that he will make to the depleted editorial committee (only Duddleston and Hazel now round it out). “You’re actually going to recommend that book?” Amy gasps when he tells her what he’s considering.

“Just hear me out.” Lincoln takes a deep breath. “To begin with, the book might find an audience. The poems are accessible and easy—you said so yourself. Once you start reading, it’s hard to stop.” Lincoln waits for a reaction. Nothing. He continues, “The language is clean and even witty in spots.”

“Sort of,” says Amy unhelpfully.

Lincoln aims higher. “You can even argue that Buford has confronted the narrow, faddish, textual analysis of today’s academy, lifting the gaze off the flat page and turning it on the real, three-dimensional materials that make up life.”

Amy laughs. “Are you on drugs?”

“Look,” Lincoln says, taking yet another tack, “Pistakee has a terrible record with diversity. We keep talking about bringing in more African American and Hispanic writers, but we never do. Let’s face it, we don’t have great connections in those circles.
So here we have a black author coming to us—a South Sider, no less—with a manuscript that would be simple and cheap to produce.”

“I agree,” Amy says, turning serious. “We’re a Chicago publisher. It’s pathetic we haven’t brought out more books by African Americans.”

“This may not be the greatest work of poetry, but sometimes you have to reach out to get things going.”

“You’re right. I’m sorry I teased you.” Amy’s voice turns fluty through the cell. “You know, John, sometimes I think you really see things better than other people. I guess that’s being a good editor.”

The next day, Lincoln gathers with Hazel and Duddleston in the small windowless conference room in the interior of Pistakee’s twelfth-floor suite. With the departure of Arthur Wendt and the rushed production for
Wrigley Field
, there are schedules to go over, backlogged book proposals to consider. The meeting drags endlessly. As noon approaches, Duddleston says at last, “Let’s wrap it up. I assume there’s nothing of interest in the slush pile”—a reference to the collection of manuscripts that have arrived unsolicited from agentless writers, the method of submission left to amateurs and wannabes.

“Actually,” Lincoln offers, “something came in that’s worth a gander.” (A gander? Lincoln’s anxious mind races: Where did that word come from? Endorsing this book is so beyond his nature that he’s slipped into an alternate personality, the foppish host of a children’s TV show.) For the next few minutes, he makes the careful arguments that he practiced on Amy, adding an emphasis (for Duddleston’s benefit) on Buford’s U of C masters. Lincoln passes out photocopies of one poem, “The Morning Paper,” to give a flavor of the work. And he concludes by repeating the heartening call for diversity in the Pistakee list, noting carefully that responsibility for the house’s negligence in that regard, if it is negligence, falls on him, as the executive editor (mustn’t let the boss think you’re calling him a racist slug).

The presentation is greeted with silence. Reading “The Morning Paper” a second time, Hazel squints as if she’s trying find her route on a confusing map.

Eventually, Duddleston points out in a tired voice, “I thought we decided to stay away from poetry. Before you got here, we published some, and the books always flopped.”

Lincoln has exhausted his lines of argument and can’t bear to repeat previous points just to keep the discussion going. (So this is hell, he thinks. Is it worse than getting sued for battery on an elderly black woman or just another circle on the descent?) “See, the book is so out of the mainstream, you really can’t compare it to anything we’ve published before,” he responds.

“I don’t remember you ever indicating any interest at all in poetry,” the owner continues.

“These are different times,” Lincoln says, hoping his ambiguous shrug is taken to stand for the collapsed economy, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, fractious politics, porous borders, weird weather, celebrity culture, and, above all, the continuing bad shake given black Americans.

Duddleston absorbs this dose of gloom and finally offers, “Well, why don’t you let me look at the manuscript, and then let’s talk.”

“Of course,” says Lincoln, and at last the meeting ends.

Several days go by without further word from the owner, and Lincoln gets increasingly agitated. It’s one thing to compromise your principles to avoid acute personal embarrassment, but what if it doesn’t work? To buy more time, Lincoln sends Buford a short, cryptic e-mail, saying that the book is “under consideration.” The poet responds immediately: “Do the right thing.”

Another day and then the weekend pass in uncertainty, but on Monday afternoon Mrs. Macintosh summons Lincoln: the boss wants to see him. Duddleston’s office feels clubby on this overcast day, and he greets Lincoln with a welcoming smile and waves him to a chair. Buford’s manuscript sits in a corner of the neat, expansive desk.

The owner’s sunny mood has nothing to do with the book of poetry. “I want you to know how much I appreciate what you’re putting in,” he tells Lincoln. “Crashing the Wrigley Field book and then taking on Arthur’s projects—well, you probably didn’t expect to carry a load like this.”

Lincoln shrugs modestly. “I want the company to do well, too.”

“I want to do something for you,” the owner continues, bathing Lincoln in a patriarchal glow. “When this push finally slows down, take an extra week’s vacation. I’ve alerted Matt—you normally get two weeks; this year you get three.”

“That’s very kind of you,” Lincoln says, though he would rather have a raise, a title change, the authority to green light books on his own.

“Just think of it as R & R.”

“Thanks!”

With the benefaction out of the way, Lincoln watches the warmth slowly seep from his boss’s face. “Now, about this book of poetry,” Duddleston says.

“Yes?”

The owner winces and slides his tongue around his mouth, as if searching for the right word among his teeth. “Is this stuff really any good?”

Lincoln hops right to it and waxes for several minutes on the play of language in Buford’s work, the animating humor, the clever and often counterintuitive choice of subject. But, no, as much as he wants to avoid being accused in court of committing a racist attack, he can’t bring himself to say the poems are good.

Duddleston listens patiently and then poses another fraught question: “You said in the meeting that this would be a step for us in adding diversity to our list, but when I look these over”—he gestures at the manuscript without touching it—“I find nothing that even hints of the African-American experience. I mean, it’s entirely pale-faced, as we used to say.”

“See, that’s it,” Lincoln says. “It’s post-Obama.”

Duddleston frowns. “And that title—
L
—there’s nothing in here about the elevated train. What’s that about?”

“Good question. We might want to work on that.”

Duddleston takes a deep breath and looks away. He holds the moment (hoping that Lincoln will capitulate?). “Well, what the hell,” he says at last. “You deserve a shot. I assume we can get it cheap?”

“Of course.” Lincoln realizes he has no idea—he and Buford never discussed money.

“Well, offer him five hundred dollars. And a small printing—say, a thousand.”

“I’m sure that will work.”

Duddleston slides the manuscript toward Lincoln. “It’s all yours,” he says.

Closing the deal is a snap. “Five hundred dollars,” Lincoln tells Buford in a phone conversation later that afternoon.

“Excellent!”

“We’ll put it on our spring list.”

“Excellent!”

“Now, about that title—
L
. I’m confused. There’s nothing in the poems about the train.”

“Oh, no, no, no,” Buford says with a laugh. “That’s the Roman numeral for fifty. There are fifty poems in the collection.”

“I didn’t realize. Nobody will realize.”

“It’s subtle, but it works.
L
is the most beautiful letter in the English alphabet—so elegant, so simple. Plus, it’s the beginning of
life
and
love
.”

“Also
loser
,
ludicrous
—”

“You’re thinking too hard. And just look at it—straight lines, stiff back, erect. The sexual component is just below the surface.”

“I tell you, no one will get it.”

“Well, I’ve written more poems. I suppose we could add ten and then call it
LX
—you know, sixty.”

“No,” says Lincoln. “Listen, we’ve got a month or so. Let’s agree to think about it.”

“Of course, whatever you say. And, by the way, don’t you want to edit anything in there—the phrasing, the imagery?”

“No, I think it’s fine as is.” Lincoln explains a few other details of publication and promises to send a contract.

Buford responds with a minute or so of gushing gratitude. “Oh, and I thought you’d like to know,” he adds in conclusion, “my mother is doing much better. Acupuncture. That seems to be doing the trick. Looks as if we can avoid surgery.”

“Excellent,” says Lincoln.

After he hangs up, he sits at his desk, staring at the closed door to his office. Beyond, the halls of Pistakee are silent. Outside in the alley, the Hispanic kitchen workers are chatting in their staccato Spanish while they smoke their cigarettes. Lincoln’s stomach feels a little queasy and his arm aches, but those are just the effects of the tense afternoon. Done.

FALL:

Still Life

16