Financing Finnegan, F. Scott Fitzgerald

Finnegan and I have the same literary agent to sell our writings for us—but though I’d often been in Mr. Cannon’s office just before and just after Finnegan’s visits, I had never met him. Likewise we had the same publisher and often when I arrived there Finnegan had just departed. I gathered from a thoughtful sighing way in which they spoke of him—

“Ah—Finnegan—”

“Oh yes, Finnegan was here.”

—that the distinguished author’s visit had been not uneventful. Certain remarks implied that he had taken something with him when he went—manuscripts, I supposed, one of those great successful novels of his. He had taken “it” off for a final revision, a last draft, of which he was rumored to make ten in order to achieve that facile flow, that ready wit, which distinguished his work. I discovered only gradually that most of Finnegan’s visits had to do with money.

“I’m sorry you’re leaving,” Mr. Cannon would tell me, “Finnegan will be here tomorrow.” Then after a thoughtful pause, “I’ll probably have to spend some time with him.”

I don’t know what note in his voice reminded me of a talk with a nervous bank president when Dillinger was reported in the vicinity. His eyes looked out into the distance and he spoke as to himself:

“Of course he may be bringing a manuscript. He has a novel he’s working on, you know. And a play too.”

He spoke as though he were talking about some interesting but remote events of the cinquecento; but his eyes became more hopeful as he added: “Or maybe a short story.”

“He’s very versatile, isn’t he?” I said.

“Oh yes,” Mr. Cannon perked up. “He can do anything—anything when he puts his mind to it. There’s never been such a talent.”

“I haven’t seen much of his work lately.”

“Oh, but he’s working hard. Some of the magazines have stories of his that they’re holding.”

“Holding for what?”

“Oh, for a more appropriate time—an upswing. They like to think they have something of Finnegan’s.”

His was indeed a name with ingots in it. His career had started brilliantly and if it had not kept up to its first exalted level, at least it started brilliantly all over again every few years. He was the perennial man of promise in American letters—what he could actually do with words was astounding, they glowed and coruscated—he wrote sentences, paragraphs, chapters that were masterpieces of fine weaving and spinning. It was only when I met some poor devil of a screen writer who had been trying to make a logical story out of one of his books that I realized he had his enemies.

“It’s all beautiful when you read it,” this man said disgustedly, “but when you write it down plain it’s like a week in the nut-house.”

From Mr. Cannon’s office I went over to my publishers on Fifth Avenue and there too I learned in no time that Finnegan was expected tomorrow.

Indeed he had thrown such a long shadow before him that the luncheon where I expected to discuss my own work was largely devoted to Finnegan. Again I had the feeling that my host, Mr. George Jaggers, was talking not to me but to himself.

“Finnegan’s a great writer,” he said.

“Undoubtedly.”

“And he’s really quite all right, you know.”

As I hadn’t questioned the fact I inquired whether there was any doubt about it.

“Oh no,” he said hurriedly. “It’s just that he’s had such a run of hard luck lately—”

I shook my head sympathetically. “I know. That diving into a half-empty pool was a tough break.”

“Oh, it wasn’t half-empty. It was full of water. Full to the brim. You ought to hear Finnegan on the subject—he makes a side-splitting story of it. It seems he was in a run-down condition and just diving from the side of the pool, you know—” Mr. Jaggers pointed his knife and fork at the table, “and he saw some young girls diving from the fifteen-foot board. He says he thought of his lost youth and went up to do the same and made a beautiful swan dive—but his shoulder broke while he was still in the air.” He looked at me rather anxiously. “Haven’t you heard of cases like that—a ball player throwing his arm out of joint?”

I couldn’t think of any orthopedic parallels at the moment.

“And then,” he continued dreamily, “Finnegan had to write on the ceiling.”

“On the ceiling?”

“Practically. He didn’t give up writing—he has plenty of guts, that fellow, though you may not believe it. He had some sort of arrangement built that was suspended from the ceiling and he lay on his back and wrote in the air.”

I had to grant that it was a courageous arrangement.

“Did it affect his work?” I inquired. “Did you have to read his stories backward—like Chinese?”

“They were rather confused for a while,” he admitted, “but he’s all right now. I got several letters from him that sounded more like the old Finnegan—full of life and hope and plans for the future—”

The faraway look came into his face and I turned the discussion to affairs closer to my heart. Only when we were back in his office did the subject recur—and I blush as I write this because it includes confessing something I seldom do—reading another man’s telegram. It happened because Mr. Jaggers was intercepted in the hall and when I went into his office and sat down it was stretched out open before me:

WITH FIFTY I COULD AT LEAST PAY TYPIST AND GET HAIRCUT AND PENCILS
LIFE HAS BECOME IMPOSSIBLE AND I EXIST ON DREAM OF GOOD NEWS
DESPERATELY FINNEGAN

I couldn’t believe my eyes—fifty dollars, and I happened to know that Finnegan’s price for short stories was somewhere around three thousand. George Jaggers found me still staring dazedly at the telegram. After he read it he stared at me with stricken eyes.

“I don’t see how I can conscientiously do it,” he said.

I started and glanced around to make sure I was in the prosperous publishing office in New York. Then I understood—I had misread the telegram. Finnegan was asking for fifty thousand as an advance—a demand that would have staggered any publisher no matter who the writer was.

“Only last week,” said Mr. Jaggers disconsolately, “I sent him a hundred dollars. It puts my department in the red every season, so I don’t dare tell my partners any more. I take it out of my own pocket—give up a suit and a pair of shoes.”

“You mean Finnegan’s broke?”

“Broke!” He looked at me and laughed soundlessly—in fact I didn’t exactly like the way that he laughed. My brother had a nervous—but that is afield from this story. After a minute he pulled himself together. “You won’t say anything about this, will you? The truth is Finnegan’s been in a slump, he’s had blow after blow in the past few years, but now he’s snapping out of it and I know we’ll get back every cent we’ve—” He tried to think of a word but “given him” slipped out. This time it was he who was eager to change the subject.

Don’t let me give the impression that Finnegan’s affairs absorbed me during a whole week in New York—it was inevitable, though, that being much in the offices of my agent and my publisher, I happened in on a lot. For instance, two days later, using the telephone in Mr. Cannon’s office, I was accidentally switched in on a conversation he was having with George Jaggers. It was only partly eavesdropping, you see, because I could only hear one end of the conversation and that isn’t as bad as hearing it all.

“But I got the impression he was in good health… he did say something about his heart a few months ago but I understood it got well… yes, and he talked about some operation he wanted to have—I think he said it was cancer… Well, I felt like telling him I had a little operation up my sleeve too, that I’d have had by now if I could afford it… No, I didn’t say it. He seemed in such good spirits that it would have been a shame to bring him down. He’s starting a story today, he read me some of it on the phone…

“…I did give him twenty-five because he didn’t have a cent in his pocket… oh, yes—I’m sure he’ll be all right now. He sounds as if he means business.”

I understood it all now. The two men had entered into a silent conspiracy to cheer each other up about Finnegan. Their investment in him, in his future, had reached a sum so considerable that Finnegan belonged to them. They could not bear to hear a word against him—even from themselves.
II

I spoke my mind to Mr. Cannon. “If this Finnegan is a four-flusher you can’t go on indefinitely giving him money. If he’s through he’s through and there’s nothing to be done about it. It’s absurd that you should put off an operation when Finnegan’s out somewhere diving into half-empty swimming pools.”

“It was full,” said Mr. Cannon patiently—“full to the brim.”

“Well, full or empty the man sounds like a nuisance to me.”

“Look here,” said Cannon, “I’ve got a talk to Hollywood due on the wire. Meanwhile you might glance over that.” He threw a manuscript into my lap. “Maybe it’ll help you understand. He brought it in yesterday.”

It was a short story. I began it in a mood of disgust but before I’d read five minutes I was completely immersed in it, utterly charmed, utterly convinced and wishing to God I could write like that. When Cannon finished his phone call I kept him waiting while I