Читать книгу Wickford Point онлайн

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"Now you and I who write," he said, and he had no reason to bracket himself with me except that we both used pen and ink.

There was certainly nothing in my own professional career that should have made me scorn his company. I had followed the usual path of one who makes a living by writing fiction. First I had been a correspondent on a newspaper; then I had contributed stories full of action and of local color to that type of magazine known in the trade as the "pulps." I had graduated with others from the "pulps" into that more desirable field of periodicals the "smooths," called so, presumably, because their pages had a glossy finish that could hold photographs and half-tone illustrations. The "smooths" required an added ability in that they demanded less plot and greater skill in character delineation. I had also written several novels, none of which had been successful, although the critics called them "competent." I had always wanted to do something better, but never had, and probably never would. All I could say for myself at best was that I could keep my place in my field as a technical craftsman if not as an artist, and, as a craftsman, that I could meet its competition.