So I wrote the story of a little American boy, illegitimate son of a munitions-making father, living on the French Riviera with an adoring mother called Beauty.
Those lively scenes unfolded before my mind, and I was in a state of delight for pretty nearly a whole year. I began sending bits of the manuscript here and there for checking, and I found that other people were also pleased. How Lanny grew up and went out into the world of politics and fashion—there were a thousand details I had to have checked; and there may have been someone who ignored me, but I cannot recall him. Whatever department of European life Lanny entered, there was always someone who knew about it and would answer questions. That went for munitions and politics and the intermingling of the two. It went for elegance and fashion, manners and morals, art and war.
I have to pay tribute to several of these friends, new or old. There was S. K. Ratcliffe, journalist and man of all knowledge. I had met him in England, and once every year he came on a lecture trip to California; we became close friends. I asked if he would read a bit of manuscript, and he said he would read every page. Little did the good soul realize what that promise meant! I sent him chapter by chapter straight through that whole series, and I found him a living encyclopedia. The details that he knew, the little errors he caught—it was wonderful, and every time I tried to pay him, he would say no. He would be proud, he said, to have helped with the Lanny Budd books.
There was my old classmate, Martin Birnbaum. He had been in my class in grammar school and for five years in City College—I figure that meant six thousand hours. Then he became my violin teacher, and always he remained my friend. He made himself an art expert, and what he did and what he knew you can read in his book, The Last Romantic, for which I wrote a preface. It may have been his suggestion that being an art expert would give Lanny Budd a pretext to visit all the rich and powerful persons in both Europe and America. I knew, and still know, very little about art, but Martin would tell me anything I wanted to know—always exactly what my story required.
I put Martin himself into the story; he is of Hungarian origin, and gave me the Hungarian name Kerteszi, which means Birnbaum, which means “pear tree.” Armed with Martin’s vast knowledge, Lanny could become a pal of Hermann Goering and sell him wonderful paintings, or sell some of the wonderful paintings that Goering had stolen. Armed with that art alibi, Lanny could travel to every country in Europe, and come back to America when he became a “presidential agent.”
III
Incidentally, I actually knew a presidential agent, and he helped me with Lanny Budd. This was Cornelius Vanderbilt, Jr.—“Neil” to the thousands who know him. We met him early in California when he was trying to start a liberal newspaper and came to persuade the Gartz family to invest. I liked him, and what was more important, Craig liked him; we saw a great deal of him, and watched his gallant fight to finance a liberal newspaper in a reactionary community.
In 1943 when I had gotten volume four to the printers and was thinking about volume five, Neil happened along. I remember that two of Craig’s nieces were visiting us, and Neil had recently obtained one of his divorces. Maybe Craig had a certain notion in her head—I do not know, and would not tell if I did—but anyhow the two young ladies prepared a lunch of cold chicken and sundries, while I sat out by the little homemade swimming pool and listened to Neil’s stories about his dealings with Franklin Roosevelt during the Second World War.
Neil really was a Presidential agent. He traveled to Europe on various pretexts and came back and reported secretly to the boss. He had been able to go into Germany and into Italy. He had been taken for a long drive by Mussolini. The dictator did his own ferocious driving, and when they ran over a child and killed it, Il Duce did not stop. (When Neil published this story, Mussolini denied it, but that of course meant nothing.)
Neil told me of the secret door by which he had entered the White House, and what Franklin wore and how he behaved. Presently, I said with some excitement and hesitancy, “That would make a wonderful story for Lanny Budd.” Neil said, “That’s why I’m telling it to you.” It was a magnificent gift, and I here express my gratitude. Presidential Agent became the title of volume five of the series.