Part 4 (1/2)

(December 27, 1922December 24, 1988)

A world-cla.s.s runner

with the bulls at Pamplona

BY JAMES A. MICHENER.

Tales of the South Pacific The Fires of Spring Return to Paradise The Voice of Asia The Bridges at Toko-Ri Sayonara The Floating World The Bridge at Andau Hawaii Report of the Country Chairman Caravans The Source Iberia Presidential Lottery The Quality of Life Kent State: What Happened and Why The Drifters A Michener Miscellany: 19501970 Centennial Sports in America Chesapeake The Covenant s.p.a.ce Poland Texas Legacy Alaska Journey Caribbean The Eagle and the Raven Pilgrimage The Novel James A. Michener's Writer's Handbook Mexico Creatures of the Kingdom Recessional Miracle in Seville This n.o.ble Land: My Vision for America The World Is My Home with A. Grove Day Rascals in Paradise with John Kings Six Days in Havana

About the Author.

James A. Michener, one of the world's most popular writers, was the author of the Pulitzer Prizewinning Tales of the South Pacific, the best-selling novels Hawaii, Texas, Chesapeake, The Covenant, and Alaska, and the memoir The World Is My Home. Michener served on the advisory council to NASA and the International Broadcast Board, which oversees the Voice of America. Among dozens of awards and honors, he received America's highest civilian award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, in 1977, and an award from the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities in 1983 for his commitment to art in America. Michener died in 1997 at the age of ninety.

Read on for an excerpt from Centennial A Novel by James A. Michener Available from Dial Press Trade Paperbacks THE.

COMMISSION.

ONLY ANOTHER WRITER, SOMEONE WHO had worked his heart out on a good book which sold three thousand copies, could appreciate the thrill that overcame me one April morning in 1973 when Dean Rivers of our small college in Georgia appeared at my cla.s.sroom door.

'New York's trying to get you,' he said with some excitement. 'If I got the name right, it's one of the editors of US.'

'The magazine?'

'I could be wrong. They're holding in my office.'

As we hurried along the corridor he said, with obvious good will, 'This could prove quite rewarding, Lewis.'

'More likely they want to verify some fact in American history.'

'You mean, they'd telephone from New York?'

'They pride themselves on being accurate.' I took perverse pleasure in posing as one familiar with publis.h.i.+ng. After all, the editors of Time had called me once. Checking on the early settlements in Virginia.

Any sophistication I might have felt deserted me when I reached the telephone. Indeed, my hands were starting to sweat. The years had been long and fruitless, and a telephone call from editors in New York was agitating.

'This Dr. Lewis Vernor?' a no-nonsense voice asked.

'Yes.'

'Author of Virginia Genesis?'

'Yes.'

'Had to be sure. Didn't want to embarra.s.s either of us.' The voice dropped slightly, as if that part of the discussion were ended. Then with crisp authority it said, 'Dr. Vernor, I'm James Ringold, managing editor here at US. Problem is simple. Can you catch a plane from Atlanta this afternoon and report at my office tomorrow morning at nine?' Before I could even gasp, he added, 'We cover expenses, of course.' Then, when I hesitated because of my surprise, he said, 'I think we may have something that would interest you ... considerably.' I grew more confused, which gave him time to add, 'And before you leave for the airport, will you discuss schedules with your wife and your college? We shall very probably want to preempt your time from the end of semester right through Christmas.'

I placed my hand over the mouthpiece and made some meaningless gesture toward Dean Rivers. 'Can I fly to New York on the late plane?'

'Of course! Of course!' he whispered with an enthusiasm as great as mine. 'Something big?'

'I don't know,' I whispered back. Then into the phone I said, 'What was your name again?' When he replied, I told him, 'I'll be there.'

In the next hour I called my wife, arranged for Professor Hisken to take my cla.s.ses and then reported to the president's office, where Dean Rivers had prepared the way with President Rexford by telling him that it sounded like the chance of a century for me and that he, Rivers, recommended that I be given the necessary leave.

Rexford, a tall southern gentleman who had accomplished wonders collecting funds for a college that badly needed them, was always pleased when one of his faculty received outside attention, because in subsequent meetings with businessmen he could allude to the fact that 'we're becoming better known all the time, something of a national force.' He greeted me warmly and asked, 'What's this I hear about US wanting to borrow our finest history man for the autumn term?'

'I really know nothing about it, sir,' I replied honestly. 'They want to interview me tomorrow morning, and if I pa.s.s muster, they want to offer me a job from term-end to Christmas.'

'When's your next sabbatical?'

'I was planning to spend next spring quarter in the Oregon libraries.'

'I remember. Settlement of the northwest. Mmmmm?'

'I thought that having started in Virginia and then done my study on the Great Lakes, it might be natural for me to-'

'Complete the cycle? Yes. Yes. You do that and you'll be a very valuable man to us, Vernor. A lot of foundations are going to be looking for projects dealing with the American past, and if we could offer you as a man who has done his homework, Virginia to Oregon ... well, I don't have to tell you that I could generate a lot of interest in a man like that.'

'So you think I should stay here and work on my Oregon project?'

'I haven't said what I think, Vernor. But I know for a fact ...' Here he rose and moved restlessly about his office, thrusting his arms out in bursts of energy. 'I know that a lot of these foundations would just love to place a project in Georgia. Get them off the hook of appearing too provincial.'

'Then I'll tell the editors-'

'You won't tell them anything. Go. Listen. See what they have to sell. And if by chance it should fit into your grand design ... How much do we pay you a quarter?'

'Four thousand dollars.'

'Let's do it this way. If what they have to offer is completely wide of the mark-bears no relation to American settlement-turn 'em down. Stay here the fall and winter quarters, then go out to Oregon in the spring.'

'Yes, sir.'

'But if it does fit in with your intellectual plans, say, something on the Dakotas. And'-he accented the word heavily-'if they'll pay you four thousand or more, I'll grant you fall quarter without pay, and you can take your sabbatical with pay spring quarter and head for Oregon.'

'That's generous,' I said.