Seduction of the Innocent by Max Allan Collins Read Free Book Online

“How is that possible?”
    I glanced at Maggie and she nodded, and I said, “We offered him a syndicated column with Starr.”
    He had the shocked expression of a kid who just read the last panel of a Tales from the Vault horror yarn.
    “We offered him an advice column,” she said. “A psychiatric spin on Dear Abby. And he has said yes, at least tentatively.”
    Price’s eyes brightened, like a jack-o-lantern whose candle had just been lit, and he began to smile. The effect was not unlike a jack-o-lantern, either. He pointed a waggling finger at her. “You are a genius, Maggie Starr. An outright goddamn genius. You appealed to that outsize ego of his, and bought the son of a bitch off, without him even knowing it!”
    She raised a cautionary hand. “I wouldn’t put it quite that way...”
    “Of course you wouldn’t!”
    “...but it does potentially put the good doctor in an awkward position. He will find himself working for a firm that is financially tied to Americana Comics, and of course Starr has a history with you and your family as well, so...there are those who would interpret him as, I believe the Madison Avenue term is, selling out.”
    Bob was laughing now, so hard he was crying. He dug out a hanky and dabbed his eyes with it and blew his nose with a honk.
    I said, “It’s going to be in his contract that he can’t discuss comic books or even comic strips in his column.”
    Still laughing, Price put the hanky away and said, “Beautiful. So beautifully played. You’ll show everybody what a hypocrite he is.”
    Maggie frowned thoughtfully. “Is he a hypocrite? He appears sincere.”
    Price pawed the air. “Oh, he’s a hypocrite, all right. I’ve just come from my lawyers. We got an advance copy of this anti-comics Mein Kampf of his —Ravage the Lambs? He fills it with examples of panels from the comic books he criticizes, the most extreme and outlandish out-of-context stuff he could find. You know that story we ran about the midnight football team?”
    “I missed that one,” I said.
    “Well, the last panel reveals that they’ve been playing not with a football, but with their hated coach’s head.”
    “Ah. And that final panel is what Frederick used.”
    “That’s right. Wholly out of context! One of Craig Johnson’s Postman Always Rings Twice variations, where the husband strangles the wife? Guess what panel that bastard uses!”
    “Where the husband,” I said, “is strangling his wife?”
    “Bingo! Fills this ‘anti-violence’ book of his with the most violent images he can lay his grubby hands on. He’s exploiting comics to make a buck, far more than any comic book ever exploited anything or anybody!”
    Maggie said, “Why were you at your lawyers, Bob?”
    His grin was again Halloween-worthy. “That dippy doc never bothered getting permission to excerpt those panels. That’s copyrighted material, Maggie! I’m gonna sue his pants off. Then I’m gonna sue his ass off.”
    Thoughtfully, Maggie said, “Because it’s a scientific work, those examples from your publications may be fair use.”
    He pawed at the air. “That’s what my legal guys are looking into. But they think we may have a case, because this isn’t really a scientific work, not the way he’s promoting it on radio and TV, and selling excerpts to Reader’s Digest, Parents and Ladies’ Home Journal.”
    I glanced at Maggie. “Bob has a point. The doc’s going the pop psychology route. I mean, most scientific treatises aren’t called Ravage the Lambs.”
    She didn’t react to that, turning to her guest, moving on to a new topic. “Bob, why did you stop by? You didn’t come to complain about Frederick coming to see us—you didn’t even know about it.”
    The big man leaned back in the chair and loosened his tie; it wasn’t particularly warm in the office but he was perspiring, and his white shirt had the sweat circles to prove it.
    “You’re right,” he said, “but this is about Frederick,