much-needed
renovations did make the local papers, and the original refusal to admit one of my publishing colleagues—a woman—as a member
broke into print as well, along with a few very proper names.
We climbed the marble stairs to the spacious second floor, and soon were seated around a low coffee table in a large foyer
adjoining the Member’s Bar and facing the spaciousEast Room, me with the usual vodka martini, Kay with a margarita, and Poole contenting himself with a club soda and lime.
I can be comfortable lunching with an abstainer, but I do prefer to feel that my guests, like me, are enjoying the quiet satisfaction
brought by that first drink of the day.
I was eager to get down to business, but mindful of the courtesies I owed my two guests, I made small talk for a while. Anyway,
the Century, like The Players, frowns on business discussions, which of course go on there all the time. As a consequence,
the club has had to admit women members, after a century of gentlemanly discrimination, though it had to be practically dragooned
into doing so. The sole ladies’ before “liberation” was on the ground floor somewhere near the coatroom. Several others have
since been constructed.
“Kay,” I said, “I have an author who’s looking for an agent, and I’ve already recommended you.” I told her then about Joe
Scanlon.
“Well,” she said, “I do have a fairly full stable of writers just now…”
“Couldn’t you squeeze in one more?”
“But, I was going to say, your man sounds interesting.”
“He is that, all right—and a good writer.”
“I’ll meet with him anyhow, and we’ll see what happens.”
While we were talking, I took the opportunity of looking over Herbert Poole, who showed a polite interest in the conversation
Kay and I were having. I made Poole out to be in his early or mid-thirties, just shy of six feet, lean, and good-looking in
a fashion-model way, the kind of looks I usually don’t pay much attention to. I like a face that shows more wear and tear,
a face that has been around the block a few times. His voice was deep and rather grave—with just a touch of the Old Dominion
in it—pleasing to my ear.
“Working with a real cop must be interesting for you,” he remarked when there was a brief silence.
“It is that,” I admitted, but I was thinking of Parker Foxcroft, not of Joe Scanlon’s book.
“It’s a novel?” said Poole.
“Yes, but not what you’d expect, a police procedural. It’s a novel about a criminal lawyer whose client is accused of murder—rather
like a latter-day Perry Mason.”
“As Kay has told you, Mr. Barlow,” Poole said, leaning in her direction, “I’m intrigued by the idea of writing a mystery.”
“It never ceases to amaze me how many mainstream writers are,” I said. “How many writers, period. What do you suppose the
fascination of the genre is?”
“I rather think that it’s the satisfaction of writing about something outside themselves and their egos, their ordinary or
extraordinary problems.” It was Kay who spoke, and I nodded in agreement. “In the straight novel, character is all-important;
in the mystery it’s story. There’s always a story, usually a strong one. It must always have a beginning, a middle, and an
end—and in the end, the criminal is caught, and the crime is solved. Q.E.D. Everyone is satisfied, the reader as well as the
writer.”
“That’s not to say that character isn’t important in a mystery,” I said. “What character in fiction is more memorable than
Sherlock Holmes, for example?”
“I wonder,” said Poole, “if anyone has ever written a mystery in which the criminal is
not
caught, and the crime has not been solved.”
“It’s been done,” I said, “and there are crime novels in which the criminal is sympathetic—the hero, in fact. Patricia Highsmith’s
hero Ripley, for one. Donald Westlake’s Dortmunder, for another. But it would
renovations did make the local papers, and the original refusal to admit one of my publishing colleagues—a woman—as a member
broke into print as well, along with a few very proper names.
We climbed the marble stairs to the spacious second floor, and soon were seated around a low coffee table in a large foyer
adjoining the Member’s Bar and facing the spaciousEast Room, me with the usual vodka martini, Kay with a margarita, and Poole contenting himself with a club soda and lime.
I can be comfortable lunching with an abstainer, but I do prefer to feel that my guests, like me, are enjoying the quiet satisfaction
brought by that first drink of the day.
I was eager to get down to business, but mindful of the courtesies I owed my two guests, I made small talk for a while. Anyway,
the Century, like The Players, frowns on business discussions, which of course go on there all the time. As a consequence,
the club has had to admit women members, after a century of gentlemanly discrimination, though it had to be practically dragooned
into doing so. The sole ladies’ before “liberation” was on the ground floor somewhere near the coatroom. Several others have
since been constructed.
“Kay,” I said, “I have an author who’s looking for an agent, and I’ve already recommended you.” I told her then about Joe
Scanlon.
“Well,” she said, “I do have a fairly full stable of writers just now…”
“Couldn’t you squeeze in one more?”
“But, I was going to say, your man sounds interesting.”
“He is that, all right—and a good writer.”
“I’ll meet with him anyhow, and we’ll see what happens.”
While we were talking, I took the opportunity of looking over Herbert Poole, who showed a polite interest in the conversation
Kay and I were having. I made Poole out to be in his early or mid-thirties, just shy of six feet, lean, and good-looking in
a fashion-model way, the kind of looks I usually don’t pay much attention to. I like a face that shows more wear and tear,
a face that has been around the block a few times. His voice was deep and rather grave—with just a touch of the Old Dominion
in it—pleasing to my ear.
“Working with a real cop must be interesting for you,” he remarked when there was a brief silence.
“It is that,” I admitted, but I was thinking of Parker Foxcroft, not of Joe Scanlon’s book.
“It’s a novel?” said Poole.
“Yes, but not what you’d expect, a police procedural. It’s a novel about a criminal lawyer whose client is accused of murder—rather
like a latter-day Perry Mason.”
“As Kay has told you, Mr. Barlow,” Poole said, leaning in her direction, “I’m intrigued by the idea of writing a mystery.”
“It never ceases to amaze me how many mainstream writers are,” I said. “How many writers, period. What do you suppose the
fascination of the genre is?”
“I rather think that it’s the satisfaction of writing about something outside themselves and their egos, their ordinary or
extraordinary problems.” It was Kay who spoke, and I nodded in agreement. “In the straight novel, character is all-important;
in the mystery it’s story. There’s always a story, usually a strong one. It must always have a beginning, a middle, and an
end—and in the end, the criminal is caught, and the crime is solved. Q.E.D. Everyone is satisfied, the reader as well as the
writer.”
“That’s not to say that character isn’t important in a mystery,” I said. “What character in fiction is more memorable than
Sherlock Holmes, for example?”
“I wonder,” said Poole, “if anyone has ever written a mystery in which the criminal is
not
caught, and the crime has not been solved.”
“It’s been done,” I said, “and there are crime novels in which the criminal is sympathetic—the hero, in fact. Patricia Highsmith’s
hero Ripley, for one. Donald Westlake’s Dortmunder, for another. But it would
Similar Books
