The Novels of William Goldman

by William Goldman

  Aaron reeled backward, slammed into the mirror, fell.

  Stagpole walked slowly after him, reached down, lifted him gently and, with his left hand this time, dealt another blow to Aaron’s throat. Aaron fell full length, gagging, his hands across his Adam’s apple. When Stagpole picked him up a third time Aaron whispered, “Don’t.”

  “Ah, but I must,” Stagpole said, and then he turned Aaron gently around, brought his knee up fast, slamming it into the small of Aaron’s back.

  Aaron gave a quiet cry. Then he lay sprawled out, very still.

  “Now we’ll have a little talk if we may,” Stagpole said, moving to the bed, taking off his shoes. He started to massage his feet. “You see, Aaron, you were quite right: I can do it myself.” Stagpole smiled. “But of course, the central question here is not one of manipulation but of obedience.” Stagpole removed his socks and started rubbing his little pink toes. “Pudgy fingers, pudgy toes,” he said, holding up his hands for Aaron to see. “Am I boring you?”

  Aaron lay still.

  “In a little you’ll be fine, don’t worry,” Stagpole said. “In the meantime, let me point out that you, according to your own biased reports, have written one novel which nobody published and one play which nobody saw. I, on the other hand, have written many novels and many plays; the novels sell, the plays run. I am not bragging, Aaron—”

  Aaron made a sound.

  Stagpole rubbed his toes harder. “I’m not, really. I’m just trying to indicate something to you: I am a master, Aaron. You could not begin to lick the shoes of an apprentice and I am a master!”

  “Your breath smells,” Aaron whispered.

  “Wonderful,” Stagpole applauded. “Not only stern but spunky.” He left the bed and pulled a chair over beside Aaron. Then he sat down, reached out, made a finger stiff and jabbed it at just below Aaron’s left ear.

  Aaron groaned.

  “What is a writer actually,” Stagpole asked, “but an exposer of nerves?” He pressed down again, and again Aaron groaned. “There are various places on your body, Aaron, which, when pressed will cause certain rather unpleasant reactions. I am going to press, from time to time, those places. Now hear me: if you suffer silently, I will let up. If you are audible, well, so much the worse for you.” He reached down quickly, jammed a knuckle into Aaron’s neck.

  Aaron yelled.

  Stagpole jabbed again, much harder.

  Aaron bit his lip.

  “Splendid,” Stagpole said.

  Aaron panted, color draining.

  Stagpole sat up and lit a cigarette, inserting it into an elegant holder. “Mustn’t have you fainting, Aaron,” he said. “Not before the ship has even sailed. I hate rushing things, don’t you?”

  Aaron managed to lick the perspiration from his lips.

  “Now what we have in you, Aaron,” Stagpole went on, “what you are is a writer and a sadist and a pervert. Well, small world, so am I. Except that I am a master of those crafts! I am unexcelled. And you ...” Stagpole shook his head. “Well, it’s just too bad about you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Would you like to know your future? I’ll tell you. If you’d like.”

  Aaron said nothing.

  Stagpole bent down, pressed a finger lightly on Aaron’s eye. “Say you’d like.”

  Aaron bit his lip. “Tell me.”

  “That one is almost too painful, isn’t it?” He pressed down again.

  Aaron bit his lip while perspiration sprang all across his forehead.

  “I must begin with myself, when I was your age, Aaron. I wrote a novel and suddenly I found myself famous. It was a book about people like us, Aaron, and with the money I made I determined to take a trip around the world. You see, what I didn’t know then was that people like us, we form a special club. We more or less take care of our own. And when I got to Europe, oh, Aaron, I was feted, believe me. I did such things as only a young man dreams. I met the mighty men of Europe, Aaron; I saw sights, kissed kings—oh God, it was a journey to remember. And the most memorable sight pertains to you.”

  Aaron lay still, panting.

  “I don’t remember quite the country. I’m terrible at geography, flunked it in the seventh grade, would you believe it?”

  Aaron said nothing.

  Stagpole pressed down with a finger. “That was a question, Aaron.”

  Aaron bit his lip, then muttered that he wouldn’t have believed it.

  “In the East it was,” Stagpole said. “In the East, a village square, at dawn. Dust rising. White buildings all around. People scurrying back and forth across the square. And then, at a signal—are you listening, Aaron?—the children appeared! Ten years old, some of them less, eight or nine, some of them perhaps thirteen. They appeared with their parents, and their parents pushed them into the middle of the village square, with the dust rising and the white buildings all around. The children stood huddled together. Panicked. Not a sound. And then, Aaron, then came the foreign legionnaires. Because that is what I was witnessing—a flesh sale. A flesh sale at dawn, human flesh. The legionnaires walked in among the children, they began to examine them. They checked their teeth and their calf muscles and they tested their arms and they carefully scrutinized their genitals, and all the while, Aaron, there was not a sound. The legion officers, you see, needed houseboys. Boys to cook and clean and dust and, on steamy nights, Aaron, other things. The head officers, they each had a boy all to themselves, while the lower ones had to share. And here before me at dawn, Aaron, the officers of the foreign legion tested these children and made their choices and paid the asking price to the parents and then led their prizes off into the day. That movement brought back the dust. The sun became blinding. Soon the square looked like a village square somewhere in the East. White buildings, dust, hot sun.” Stagpole stood.

  Aaron struggled to his knees.

  “And now, Aaron, we come to the pertinent part, the part that tells your future. Because I’m certain you’ve noted the parallel, so I assume you’re more than a little interested in what happens to the boys.”

  Aaron licked his lips. “Tell me.”

  “They disappear! They get used and used and used until they are all used up. Then they simply disappear.”

  “And that’s gonna happen to me?”

  Stagpole lifted him roughly. “By the time that I am done with you, there will be nothing left. I ... will ... use ... you ... up, believe me, trust me, trust my skill. I am a master. Do you believe that?”

  “I ... I believe ...”

  Stagpole smiled, then, gently, he patted Aaron’s face. “Prepare to live in splendor,” he said, leading Aaron to the cashmere-covered bed. “For a while. Now go anoint your body. I must make ready.”

  “What do you mean, ‘make ready’?”

  Stagpole shrugged. “Nothing, really. You’ll get used to it. Costumes, apparatus, various bits of paraphernalia. Here, a final gift for you,” and he opened a suitcase, removed a monogrammed silk robe. “Now go. Beautify yourself.” He escorted Aaron to the bathroom door. “I’ll call you when I’m ready.”

  As the door closed behind him, Aaron felt a momentary urge to scream for help, so he ran to the tiny porthole, fought it open, peered out. But the robe was purest silk and soft to the touch. Aaron closed the porthole and slowly undressed.

  The great ship began to move.

  Aaron opened the medicine chest. Stagpole had filled it with oils, and Aaron almost enjoyed bathing as he covered his gaunt body with first one sweet-smelling liquid, then another. He took a long time, but still there was no word from Stagpole, and as he waited Aaron felt the screaming urge again, and he ran back to the tiny porthole, throwing it open, staring out as the borough of Manhattan glided by. A young girl stood staring at the giant buildings as they glistened in the noonday sun.

  “You—” Aaron said. “You—listen.”

  She said, “Je ne parle pas.”

  “Of course you don’t,” Aaron said, and he thought, son
of a bitch, I’m gonna disappear, it’s enough to make you believe in God.

  The girl pointed to the glistening city. “Belle, oui?”

  “Oui,” Aaron agreed. “And the streets, les boulevardes, they are paved with shit.”

  “Oui?” the girl said.

  Aaron nodded. “Oui.”

  The girl smiled and was gone.

  “If you ask me you’re a lousy place to visit!” Aaron shouted.

  “I’m ready, Aaron,” Stagpole said from beyond, his voice different and strange.

  Aaron closed his eyes.

  “Aaron. I’m ready.”

  Aaron entered into agony.

  Marathon Man

  INTRODUCTION

  MARATHON MAN (The Events Leading Up To)

  I HAD BEEN A novelist for close to twenty years before I began Marathon Man, a story very different from anything I had ever tried before. The reason for the timing was that Hiram Haydn, my brilliant and beloved editor, had recently died. To this day I have no idea what my career might have been had he either (a) died sooner or (b) never been my editor at all.

  I wrote my first novel, The Temple of Gold, in 1956, when I was twenty-four, and when it was accepted for publication by Knopf, that became the seminal event of my creative life. Shortly after its publication, I began to hear of an editor at Random House named Hiram Haydn. He was by all accounts decent, real smart, a teacher, a scholar, a novelist himself, and pushing fifty. This last was crucial for me—

  —I have always been in search and in need of father figures.

  So I fantasized that someday I would have Hiram Haydn as my editor. I had no idea that “someday” was just around the corner. I believed during these years—and yes, I am aware how totally nuts this is—but I truly believed that to justify the fact that I didn’t have a real job, it was essential for me to publish a novel every twelve months.

  I wrote my second novel in 1957—Your Turn to Curtsy, My Turn to Bow—still my favorite title of all of my stuff—and submitted it to Knopf. What can I say about their reaction? Did they love it? No. Did they have problems with some of it? More than a few. Hate it? Don’t be an optimist. They loathed, despised, and detested it so much they denied it had ever been submitted to them.

  I was free to go to Hiram. I called his office, found he was on a long vacation. And so crazed was I to get published each and every year, I trudged through snow and sleet, like your favorite postman, to try and immediately find another publisher to accept me. I got a couple of quick rejections, natch, so in desperation, I gave it to a girl I knew from Oberlin who worked for an editor to give to her boss.

  She thought it was so terrible she wouldn’t dream of doing that. “You should learn to know your characters,” this secretary told me, and sent me on my way.

  Doubleday took it. And I will always be grateful. I became a little less grateful maybe when they told me they didn’t think much of my novel, but that perhaps someday I might write something commercial and they were willing to gamble a couple of thousand dollars—my advance—on my future.

  My next book, Soldier in the Rain, they also had zero faith in, but they would piss away the few thousand again in the event that the book after that was something they could sell. I told them I wanted to try elsewhere. They said fine, but don’t expect a whole lot.

  I gave Soldier in the Rain to Hiram Haydn who loved it, and the publishing relationship of my career began.

  Hiram had left Random House at this time to start, with two other publishers, a house of their own, to be called Atheneum. They brought out three books simultaneously to start things off, Soldier in the Rain being one of them. And no story I can tell you better explains what has happened to publishing over the last forty years than this one now.

  Because one of the tenets of Atheneum’s basic contract was that they did not and would not include an option clause. If they published you, and you weren’t happy, well, they didn’t want unhappy writers and you were free to go elsewhere.

  One weeps.

  I was with Hiram from 1958 through The Princess Bride in 1973 when he, alas, died. He was a great believer in my talent, and boy, do we all need that. He also liked the kind of stuff I was turning out during that period. Hard as it may be to accept now, if you think of me as a Hollywood writer, my novels at that time were seemingly charming but ultimately serious and depressing stories, in which the most sympathetic character always died horribly.

  Not wildly commercial stuff. (Though through some miracle, I always found an audience in paperback after the books all stiffed in hardcover.)

  Then I had maybe the dumbest idea of my life—to write a long novel, Boys and Girls Together. Took me three-plus years and in the middle of that, I stopped to work on Broadway for awhile.

  When I came back, I was blocked.

  No fun, that. I had six hundred pages done, no idea how to get back to it. I was living in a small apartment on Eighty-sixth and York in Manhattan and had taken the bedroom of a guy’s apartment on Eighty-eighth and York to write in. (Sounds nuts, I know, but it worked out.)

  The OJ crime of that period—we are back in ’63—was the Boston Strangler. And one morning, I read an article in the Daily News that stated that the newest theory in Boston was this: There were two stranglers, not one.

  That morning, on that short walk up York Avenue, a novel literally dropped into my head. Based on this notion: what if there were indeed two different stranglers, and what if one of them got jealous of the other.

  I sat down at my desk and in a few minutes, outlined the plot.

  The plot of what, though?

  Until coffee that morning, I had been trying to figure out how to return to Boys and Girls Together. Was this just another neurotic ploy to set me back further? I was totally capable of such nuttiness, I knew that. So I spoke to a couple of friends about this heffalump that had suddenly landed on my desk. We agreed that the important thing for my sanity was to get back to my half-finished novel.

  But if I could write the strangler book quickly—I think ten days was the time agreed upon—it couldn’t hurt me. If I could finish in that time, fine; if not, pitch it and try and finish the long book.

  I wrote the strangler book—eventually it would be called No Way to Treat a Lady—in the prescribed number of days. To make it seem longer, I wrote it with as many chapters as I could, each chapter beginning on a fresh new page, thereby cheating but adding bulk at the same time. (Some chapters were all of one word long.)

  The book finished, I gave it to Hiram. As a kind of a “look what I found,” surprise.

  He read it, said that he had no idea how to edit such a book. I should be at work on Boys and Girls Together, not this. He suggested that I publish it as a paperback original under a pseudonym.

  I did.

  Harry Longbaugh became the author (the real name of the Sundance Kid, proof that even though this was several years before I wrote that movie, I had been thinking about it for a very long time).

  No Way to Treat a Lady went into galley proofs, Cliff Robertson got hold of it, got hold of me, said these words I will never forget: “I read your screen treatment.” I remember thinking “Shit, that was no screen treatment, that was a novel.” (I had no idea what a screen treatment was. I had never, at that point, seen a screenplay, much less a treatment.) I always thought the reason Robertson might have been confused was the insane look of the book, all those weird and truncated chapters. The point being? Well, Robertson’s subsequent hiring of me to write a screenplay is what got me into the movie business.

  And totally changed my life.

  Through all my fifteen years with Hiram, I kept getting these ideas for stories that were different from what I was writing for him. (I remember I had Magic—about a ventriloquist and his dummy—for a very long time.) But I never considered writing any of them.

  And never would have had he lived.

  But now in 1973 he was gone, and when I next sat down to tell a story, it turned out to be a thrille
r, Marathon Man. If you love a genre (as I love thrillers and spy novels and hard-boiled detective novels), you’re stuck with your passion, and what you hope for is someday to be classed with those writers who moved you. My guy was Graham Greene. Of course you know you can’t reach that level, but hope is a thing with feathers and away you go.

  In a thriller you start with a villain. (Obviously, that’s not a rule, there are no rules, but it’s what I did and I bet if I ever write another one, I’ll do it again.) I started with Mengele, the most intellectually startling of the Nazis. (An M.D. plus a Ph.D.) And I knew this: I needed to get him to America. But why in the world would he come? (Mengele, when I began fiddling with this story, was either alive in South America or had been alive in South America, choose one. Living secretly or palatially; I chose palatially.)

  But this was one of the brilliant minds of his generation. Why would he be so dumb as to risk his world to visit America? I was reading the papers one day when the answer came. An American doctor, in I think Cleveland, had begun doing a then-revolutionary operation, heart sleeve surgery, and people were streaming in from all over the world. Mengele would be among the needy.

  From the start I have had an unerring brilliance when it comes to narrative and here was just another brilliant example. Mengele would come to Cleveland for surgery. Mengele had to come to America, the reasoning was rock-solid perfect. I had scored another coup.

  One day I was just walking around—I get a lot of ideas just walking around, also at the ballet, just sitting there drifting—when thank God reality thudded home. Schmuck, what kind of a villain is he if he’s so fucking frail he needs heart surgery? Asshole, what kind of thriller do you have if the villain is already dying? Ahhhhhhh.

  I don’t know if it’s true for other writers, but for me, when a piece of material becomes urgent, there is only a certain window of time in which it can be put down. If that passes, the window shuts, the material is dead, often forever. I had never tried a spy thriller, owned the standard lack of confidence, felt a certain sense of panic setting in.