I tried to get going. I started telling him about the time I was shot down in the Western Desert and the plane had burst into flames.
The waitress brought two plates of smoked salmon. While we tried to eat it, I was trying to talk and Forester was trying to take notes.
The main course was roast duck with vegetables and potatoes and a thick rich gravy. This was a dish that required one’s full attention as well as two hands. My narrative began to flounder. Forester kept putting down the pencil and picking up the fork, and vice versa. Things weren’t going well. And apart from that, I have never been much good at telling stories aloud.
‘Look,’ I said. ‘If you like, I’ll try to write down on paper what happened and send it to you. Then you can rewrite it properly yourself in your own time. Wouldn’t that be easier? I could do it tonight.’
That, though I didn’t know it at the time, was the moment that changed my life.
‘A splendid idea,’ Forester said. ‘Then I can put this silly notebook away and we can enjoy our lunch. Would you really mind doing that for me?’
‘I don’t mind a bit,’ I said. ‘But you mustn’t expect it to be any good. I’ll just put down the facts.’
‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘So long as the facts are there, I can write the story. But please,’ he added, ‘let me have plenty of detail. That’s what counts in our business, tiny little details, like you had a broken shoelace on your left shoe, or a fly settled on the rim of your glass at lunch, or the man you were talking to had a broken front tooth. Try to think back and remember everything.’
‘I’ll do my best,’ I said.
He gave me an address where I could send the story, and then we forgot all about it and finished our lunch at leisure. But Mr Forester was not a great talker. He certainly couldn’t talk as well as he wrote, and although he was kind and gentle, no sparks ever flew out of his head and I might just as well have been talking to an intelligent stockbroker or lawyer.
That night, in the small house I lived in alone in a suburb of Washington, I sat down and wrote my story. I started at about seven o’clock and finished at midnight. I remember I had a glass of Portuguese brandy to keep me going. For the first time in my life, I became totally absorbed in what I was doing. I floated back in time and once again I was in the sizzling hot desert of Libya, with white sand underfoot, climbing up into the cockpit of the old Gladiator, strapping myself in, adjusting my helmet, starting the motor and taxiing out for take-off. It was astonishing how everything came back to me with absolute clarity. Writing it down on paper was not difficult. The story seemed to be telling itself, and the hand that held the pencil moved rapidly back and forth across each page. Just for fun, when it was finished, I gave it a title. I called it ‘A Piece of Cake’.
The next day, somebody in the Embassy typed it out for me and I sent it off to Mr Forester. Then I forgot all about it.
Exactly two weeks later, I received a reply from the great man. It said:
Dear RD, You were meant to give me notes, not a finished story. I’m bowled over. Your piece is marvellous. It is the work of a gifted writer. I didn’t touch a word of it. I sent it at once under your name to my agent, Harold Matson, asking him to offer it to the Saturday Evening Post with my personal recommendation. You will be happy to hear that the Post accepted it immediately and have paid one thousand dollars. Mr Matson’s commission is ten per cent. I enclose his check for nine hundred dollars. It’s all yours. As you will see from Mr Matson’s letter, which I also enclose, the Post is asking if you will write more stories for them. I do hope you will. Did you know you were a writer? With my very best wishes and congratulations, C. S. Forester.
‘A Piece of Cake’ is printed at the end of this book.
Well! I thought. My goodness me! Nine hundred dollars! And they’re going to print it! But surely it can’t be as easy as all that?