THE HUNDRED-AND-TWENTY-EIGHTH PAGE

The pole and lines were repaired in remarkably good time. In inclement weather, long delays in repair service often meant reading by candlelight. I don’t know if it was good or bad because the first phone call I got upon restoration of service was from the publisher of my book. He said My Editor had been sent a letter, though not a legal one from a lawyer, concerning plagiarized material that appeared in my book. Since the editor of my book was no longer there, the letter was passed along to the publisher for consideration.

All writers live in fear of unconscious appropriation, but I was comparatively certain that this was not my case. God knows, vast paragraphs from a life filled with fiction wallowed around in my brain. I protested.

He seemed satisfied with my response. And since there was no real documentation cited in the letter, he said he thought there was nothing to worry about unless a lawyer took up the case. His lawyers had seen no merit in the letter.

Were I back in my attack mode, this is just the kind of thing I would have done, and it occurred to me that having provided My Editor with a certain set of mind, he was running true to my form--writing a letter to himself that was certain to fall into hands and minds that would cast doubt on my integrity. Oh, once again I grieved that he had not applied such guile in publication of my book.