on a riff of his own and didn’t notice. “Ariel—Mrs. Durant—is still after me to get him the Nobel Prize,” Max said plaintively. “It’s not as if I haven’t tried , but of course she just doesn’t understand how difficult that kind of thing …” He paused and mopped his forehead with a handkerchief. “Ariel is very much part of the picture.… Did you know that Will was trained as a priest, and when Ariel made up her mind to marry him she was so young that she actually went to the marriage bureau on her roller skates? He renamed her ‘Ariel,’ and she called him ‘Puck.’ ” Max paused for breath again, eyes goggling. “Of course, all that was a long time ago. She’s no longer young. But they remain a very devoted couple, wouldn’t you say, Henry?”
Henry shrugged. “You bet,” he said glumly.
The two men sat for a few moments, apparently contemplating the state of marriage in a spirit of mutual gloom. Max, it was said, lived in fear of Ray Schuster’s piercing voice, while Henry’s bride was allegedlydisliked by everyone at S&S, as well as by the rest of the widespread Simon family. She was reputed to make small dolls of those whom she disliked and stick pins in them.
“Ariel sits by Will’s side and turns the pages as he reads,” Max said. He did not say it with envy. His own ambition, it was said, was to lock himself in the library with his favorite books where Mrs. Schuster couldn’t get at him. “Well, you get the idea. You have to include her, listen to her ideas, treat her as if she were Will’s partner. Walk on eggshells, yes?”
I got the idea.
“It’s a great opportunity for a young man like yourself,” Max went on, more upbeat. “This is a monumental project, you know. Each volume is a Main Selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club, and a guaranteed best-seller. Why, Harry Scherman often calls the Book-of-the-Month Club ‘the house that Will Durant built.’ … This is commerce, you see, as well as culture. You’ll be working with one of the great thinkers of our time.… I envy you. Of course, you’ll have to be careful not to take too much time away from the work you’re doing for Henry,” Max added hastily. “We have a contract with the Book-of-the-Month Club, and I promised Will and Ariel we’d have the book out in September, so you’ll have your work cut out for you. Come to me with any problem. My door will always be open to you.” He paused. “Within reason.”
Max’s buzzer was keening noisily before we were out the door. On his assistant’s desk was a huge stack of manuscript, neatly tied with string. It showed no sign of having been opened by Max. I looked at it with a certain degree of awe mixed with apprehension. It was almost unimaginable that any living human being could have written this number of pages without going blind. “If Durant is such a prize, why is he getting a junior editor?” I asked Henry.
Henry lit a cigarette and coughed. “The Durants are a little … ah … difficult ,” he said cautiously.
“How difficult?”
“On a scale of one to ten, ten. They won’t work with me because they hate academics. They feel that everybody in the academic world looks down on Will as a popularizer. Which, of course, he is . Nothing wrong with that, really, but it gives them a monumental inferiority complex, as well as a chip on the shoulder.… It’s not that Will’s books need a lot of editing, by the way—it’s just that he and Ariel are very fussyabout details. My advice is to keep them away from Max as much as you can.”
“I thought he liked them.”
Henry grimaced. “Oh, Max likes them all right,” he said. “He just doesn’t want to see them.”
F ULL AS S&S was of odd people, Max Schuster was far and away the oddest. Office legend had it that because of Max’s shyness when faced with a member of the opposite sex, he had married the wrong woman. Max had been a bachelor until well into his middle age, living a
Henry shrugged. “You bet,” he said glumly.
The two men sat for a few moments, apparently contemplating the state of marriage in a spirit of mutual gloom. Max, it was said, lived in fear of Ray Schuster’s piercing voice, while Henry’s bride was allegedlydisliked by everyone at S&S, as well as by the rest of the widespread Simon family. She was reputed to make small dolls of those whom she disliked and stick pins in them.
“Ariel sits by Will’s side and turns the pages as he reads,” Max said. He did not say it with envy. His own ambition, it was said, was to lock himself in the library with his favorite books where Mrs. Schuster couldn’t get at him. “Well, you get the idea. You have to include her, listen to her ideas, treat her as if she were Will’s partner. Walk on eggshells, yes?”
I got the idea.
“It’s a great opportunity for a young man like yourself,” Max went on, more upbeat. “This is a monumental project, you know. Each volume is a Main Selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club, and a guaranteed best-seller. Why, Harry Scherman often calls the Book-of-the-Month Club ‘the house that Will Durant built.’ … This is commerce, you see, as well as culture. You’ll be working with one of the great thinkers of our time.… I envy you. Of course, you’ll have to be careful not to take too much time away from the work you’re doing for Henry,” Max added hastily. “We have a contract with the Book-of-the-Month Club, and I promised Will and Ariel we’d have the book out in September, so you’ll have your work cut out for you. Come to me with any problem. My door will always be open to you.” He paused. “Within reason.”
Max’s buzzer was keening noisily before we were out the door. On his assistant’s desk was a huge stack of manuscript, neatly tied with string. It showed no sign of having been opened by Max. I looked at it with a certain degree of awe mixed with apprehension. It was almost unimaginable that any living human being could have written this number of pages without going blind. “If Durant is such a prize, why is he getting a junior editor?” I asked Henry.
Henry lit a cigarette and coughed. “The Durants are a little … ah … difficult ,” he said cautiously.
“How difficult?”
“On a scale of one to ten, ten. They won’t work with me because they hate academics. They feel that everybody in the academic world looks down on Will as a popularizer. Which, of course, he is . Nothing wrong with that, really, but it gives them a monumental inferiority complex, as well as a chip on the shoulder.… It’s not that Will’s books need a lot of editing, by the way—it’s just that he and Ariel are very fussyabout details. My advice is to keep them away from Max as much as you can.”
“I thought he liked them.”
Henry grimaced. “Oh, Max likes them all right,” he said. “He just doesn’t want to see them.”
F ULL AS S&S was of odd people, Max Schuster was far and away the oddest. Office legend had it that because of Max’s shyness when faced with a member of the opposite sex, he had married the wrong woman. Max had been a bachelor until well into his middle age, living a
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