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much too much for a book because, as I've told you before, once it becomes a bidding game, you want to win! That's how agents like Irving Lazar out in Hollywood can get fantastic prices sometimes--because he's a genius at persuading stupid heads to bid against each other. Very often you get a book by over-bidding, and the moment you get it, you suddenly realize what a fool you've been!

What about the split in paperback rights, the new fifty-fifty?

Let me finish with the stories of a few of our other books and then I'll go into that. I think that we're almost finished. Anyway, here's the story of one.

In 1965, we did a book called The Dirty Dozen, which was only a fair success as a book but is a box-office sensation as a movie. In July of the same year, right after The Dirty Dozen, we published a novel that in the long-run may well prove to be the most profitable book in our history. That's The Source by Jim Michener, who, as I think that I've told you, has got an uncanny genius for always being in the right place at the right time. The Source is all about the birth of three great religions--Christianity, Judaism, and Mohammedism. It's a wonderful book.

We discussed him and what a magnificent sense of timing he has.