Yes, as long as we got together before his wife gave birth to their first child, expected momentarily. We made it! During two-plus hours luxuriating in the August sun at the Asgard pub, I learned more about crossword puzzles than I will ever need to know. Our conversation went something like this:
AB: Are you expecting a boy or a girl?
BEQ: A girl. I have already created a backlog of puzzles for my website, sort of “In case of birth, break glass, extract puzzles’’ so I’ll still be publishing after she’s born.
AB: I have to tell you that I dreamed of meeting puzzlemakers Henry Rathvon and Emily Cox, who work for the Globe magazine. I love their style and wanted to write an article about them. They turned me down.
BEQ: Henry writes plays in iambic pentameter, and she’s an avid climber. They do their own thing. They’re the best writers of cryptic puzzles in America.
AB: Those are the impossible-to-solve British thingies, right?
BEQ: Correct. The Nation publishes one here in the US.
[Break for small talk. I praise his semi-legendary Sunday puzzle devoted entirely to sports reporter Peter King’s dream - thus fulfilled - of being mentioned in the Times crossword. We also discussed a famous puzzle, published the Monday before the 1996 election, in which “BOBDOLE’’ and “CLINTON’’ were possible solutions. “That came about as close to the Holy Grail of crosswords as possible,’’ Quigley said. Long pause. “Would you like to know what the Holy Grail of crosswords is?’’ Long pause. He explained. It’s complicated.]
AB: So how do the economics work for you? For instance, you give away two puzzles each week on your website.
BEQ: I was in a band for a few years, trying to make it, attempting to sell songs off our website, and then one day Radiohead releases a whole album, “In Rainbows,’’ for free! On the Internet! That was seismic. They were saying, “Here, just take it. We’ll find a way to monetize this later.’’
