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Authors: Patricia Highsmith
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through two tapes.”
For a moment, Craig felt cut off, then glad it was over.
Prescott gave a laugh. “That bit about religion at the end. You thinking of writing a book, maybe? Might sell.”
Craig didn’t reply. He had decided in the last seconds that he didn’t like Prescott. He had met Prescott only once before, in the Monitor ’s office, knew he was highly thought of, but now Craig didn’t like him.
However, the article that Prescott wrote which appeared ten days later in the Monitor was top-notch. Craig’s words came out hardly changed, and they rang true, in Craig’s opinion. In Tom Buckley’s photos, Craig looked serious in one, agonized in the other. An excellent, if only one, picture of Lizzie Davis showed her seated in an armchair in her house, holding what the caption stated was a print of the photograph that had changed her life. Lizzie looked hopeful, modest and pretty, as she stared the camera straight in its eye.
The article brought Craig a few more invitations to lecture, one from a prestigious university in the east, which he accepted. He wrote to the Monitor saying that for the next few months he expected to be busy on his own, and so could not at once say yes to the staff photographer’s job they had offered, even with the augmented salary to which they had agreed. Craig had higher aspirations: he was going to write a book about it all. When he thought of Fate’s part in it, God’s part, his brain seemed to expand and to take wings of fancy. He might call his book Fate Took the Picture, or maybe The Lens and the Soul. The word conscience in the title might be a bit heavy. Craig gave a few more talks, and managed easily to bring his religious thoughts and pangs of conscience into his text. “Life is not fair sometimes—and it troubles me,” he would say to an awed or at least respectfully listening audience. “Here I am, lauded by so many, recipient of honors—whereas the poor girl victim, Lizzie, languishes . . .”
Craig’s book, Two Battles: The Story of a Photographer and a Girl, appeared four months later, after a rushed printing. The book was ghosted by a bright twenty-two-year-old journalist from Houston named Phil Spark, who was not given credit on the title page. Two Battles sold about twenty thousand copies in its first six months, thanks to aggressive publicity by its New York publisher and to a good photo of Lizzie Davis on the back of the jacket. This meant that the sales more than covered Craig’s advance, so Craig was going to have more money in his pocket due to royalties. He and Clancy got married, and moved into a house with a mortgage.
He had sent half a dozen copies of Two Battles to Lizzie Davis, of course, and in due time she had replied with a formal note of thanks for his having told “her story.” But she showed no sign of wanting to see Craig again, and he didn’t particularly want to see her again, either. She and Craig had met briefly with the ghostwriter to get some background in regard to Lizzie’s schooldays in Kyanduck.
Craig appeared on a few religious programs on TV, which did his book a world of good, and he dutifully answered almost all his fan mail—though some of it was pretty stupid, from teenagers asking how they could start out “being a newspaper photographer.” Still, contact with the public gave Craig the feeling that he was making new friends everywhere, that America was not merely a big playground, but a friendly and receptive one, which conflicted a bit with his playing the reflective and publicity-shy cameraman. Craig eased himself over this little bump in the road by convincing himself that he had discovered another métier: exploring God and his own conscience. This seemed to Craig an endless path to greater things. Craig decided to tour America with Clancy in his new compact station wagon, and to photograph poor families in Detroit and Boston, maybe some in Texas too; and fires, of course, in case he encountered any; rape
For a moment, Craig felt cut off, then glad it was over.
Prescott gave a laugh. “That bit about religion at the end. You thinking of writing a book, maybe? Might sell.”
Craig didn’t reply. He had decided in the last seconds that he didn’t like Prescott. He had met Prescott only once before, in the Monitor ’s office, knew he was highly thought of, but now Craig didn’t like him.
However, the article that Prescott wrote which appeared ten days later in the Monitor was top-notch. Craig’s words came out hardly changed, and they rang true, in Craig’s opinion. In Tom Buckley’s photos, Craig looked serious in one, agonized in the other. An excellent, if only one, picture of Lizzie Davis showed her seated in an armchair in her house, holding what the caption stated was a print of the photograph that had changed her life. Lizzie looked hopeful, modest and pretty, as she stared the camera straight in its eye.
The article brought Craig a few more invitations to lecture, one from a prestigious university in the east, which he accepted. He wrote to the Monitor saying that for the next few months he expected to be busy on his own, and so could not at once say yes to the staff photographer’s job they had offered, even with the augmented salary to which they had agreed. Craig had higher aspirations: he was going to write a book about it all. When he thought of Fate’s part in it, God’s part, his brain seemed to expand and to take wings of fancy. He might call his book Fate Took the Picture, or maybe The Lens and the Soul. The word conscience in the title might be a bit heavy. Craig gave a few more talks, and managed easily to bring his religious thoughts and pangs of conscience into his text. “Life is not fair sometimes—and it troubles me,” he would say to an awed or at least respectfully listening audience. “Here I am, lauded by so many, recipient of honors—whereas the poor girl victim, Lizzie, languishes . . .”
Craig’s book, Two Battles: The Story of a Photographer and a Girl, appeared four months later, after a rushed printing. The book was ghosted by a bright twenty-two-year-old journalist from Houston named Phil Spark, who was not given credit on the title page. Two Battles sold about twenty thousand copies in its first six months, thanks to aggressive publicity by its New York publisher and to a good photo of Lizzie Davis on the back of the jacket. This meant that the sales more than covered Craig’s advance, so Craig was going to have more money in his pocket due to royalties. He and Clancy got married, and moved into a house with a mortgage.
He had sent half a dozen copies of Two Battles to Lizzie Davis, of course, and in due time she had replied with a formal note of thanks for his having told “her story.” But she showed no sign of wanting to see Craig again, and he didn’t particularly want to see her again, either. She and Craig had met briefly with the ghostwriter to get some background in regard to Lizzie’s schooldays in Kyanduck.
Craig appeared on a few religious programs on TV, which did his book a world of good, and he dutifully answered almost all his fan mail—though some of it was pretty stupid, from teenagers asking how they could start out “being a newspaper photographer.” Still, contact with the public gave Craig the feeling that he was making new friends everywhere, that America was not merely a big playground, but a friendly and receptive one, which conflicted a bit with his playing the reflective and publicity-shy cameraman. Craig eased himself over this little bump in the road by convincing himself that he had discovered another métier: exploring God and his own conscience. This seemed to Craig an endless path to greater things. Craig decided to tour America with Clancy in his new compact station wagon, and to photograph poor families in Detroit and Boston, maybe some in Texas too; and fires, of course, in case he encountered any; rape
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