Seduction of the Innocent (3 page)

This got a nice laugh from the Strip Joint audience, and even the bloated Barray flashed a grin. Too bad Barray hadn’t done his homework
—Amazonia
had been created by a shrink. That might’ve provided him with a nice comeback.

But all he could muster was, “Maybe some of the dangers the critics see in these comics
are
in the eye of the beholder. But you can’t deny that this new trend of crime and horror is a disturbing one.”

“Is it?”

“Is it disturbing, you mean?”

“No. Is it
new?
I seem to recall, as a young girl, going to see Boris Karloff in
Frankenstein
and Bela Lugosi in
Dracula
...but I turned out all right, I think.”

This might not have been the best argument, since she’d also been stripping at Minsky’s when she was a “young girl.”

“And they teach Edgar Allan Poe in schools,” she reminded the disc jockey. “James Cagney and Edward G. Robinson are both still livening up our movie screens, and no one’s complaining. And isn’t
Dragnet
on NBC?”

Letting out more cigarette smoke as if emitting steam, Barray said, “Dr. Frederick says these so-called ‘crime doesn’t pay’ books use the capture or downfall of criminals as a means of glorifying violence and depravity.”

Now Maggie frowned, a rarity because she fought wrinkles as hard as she did pounds.

“I’d rather not have to defend those books,” she said, “or condemn them, either. It’s outside the realm of the Starr Syndicate.”

“Is it? Don’t you syndicate
Crime Fighter
to a growing list of papers?”

This was starting to feel less like a friendly chat at the Strip Club—a soiree, remember—and more like an ambush. But Maggie didn’t ambush easily.

“We do distribute
Crime Fighter,”
she said. “The hero is a costumed character not unlike Batwing...but, Dr. Frederick will be pleased to learn, without a young male companion.”

“Crime Fighter’s sidekick is a monkey.”

“That’s right.” She gave him a smile that was both wicked and flirtatious. “And if you find that objectionable, Harry, then maybe
you’re
the one showing the dirty pictures.”

What could Barray do but laugh good-naturedly at that?

But he seemed relieved to be able to tell the audience at home that he’d be “right back with Maggie Starr and another special guest,” after the commercial.

I went over, moving past a light on a tripod and around the massive camera, managing not to bump into the crew or stumble over the heavy cables. I leaned in and spoke to Maggie while a young male production assistant used a soft cloth to dab away the disc jockey’s sweat, a makeup girl waiting anxiously to touch up his makeup.

Whispering, I said, “You’re gonna take this bout on points.”

Barely audible, her smile frozen, she whispered back, “I wouldn’t mind scoring a knockout. I’ve been set up.”

“You’re doing fine. You don’t seem defensive at all.”

“How do I look? Nobody’s touching up
my
makeup.”

“Naw, you’re on your own. But you look swell. I liked that shrink joke. Nice job, cleaning it up.”

“Thanks.”

“Keep it light now.”

She gave my hand a rare squeeze and I made my way back to the bar, where Benny the bartender had held my ringside stool for me.

Meanwhile, the “special guest” Barray had referred to was being escorted through the tangle of cables into the waiting seat in the booth next to Maggie. He was a little guy with full head of dark hair parted in the middle, making two swooping wings out of the halves. He had an untrimmed mustache and tweedy sportcoat over a sweater and shirt— he’d pay for that under those lights—and carried the vaguely rumpled, absentminded demeanor of a Greenwich Village intellectual.

Which was exactly what he was. That and a minor celebrity locally, a professional expert who turned up on radio and TV, his specialty “the popular arts.” He would opine on the profundity of
Krazy Kat,
declare John Ford a “modern folklorist,” and Benny Goodman a musical genius.

Didn’t disagree with those views, but Lehman’s pomposity made irritating stuff out of them.

“Your book
The Velvet Fist
came out last year,” Barray (back on the air) was saying after introducing his new guest, “and you raised a lot of eyebrows.”

“Yes,” Lehman said, in a pinched, nasal voice, “and I even fought successfully against the United States Postal Service in court, to protect my rights as a citizen and scholar.”

“What was the fuss over, Garson?”

“My central
thesis
was the ‘fuss’—that graphic violence in the popular arts runs rampant while governmental censorship focuses exclusively on the depiction of natural, biological activities.”

Lehman knew not to use the word “sex” on the air.

Maggie, who was expected to just sit there and look swell and not interrupt, asked, “Are you recommending
more
censorship or
less
censorship?”

She seemed genuinely confused.

This threw the little man, and Barray had to pick up the slack, saying, “Well, now, Maggie, that may be a moot point ...two separate bills—one designed to ban crime and horror comic books, the other to regulate their contents prior to publication—have already been passed by the New York legislature.”

“That’s right,” Maggie said in her low purr, “and Governor Dewey vetoed both. He knew they were unconstitutional.”

Finally Lehman chimed in: “Even so, a
United States
Senate hearing on comic books, as they relate to juvenile delinquency, is scheduled to begin later this week, right here in New York City, if you didn’t know.”

Maggie was shaking her head, casting the pair an I-pity-you-in-your-stupidity smile that I knew all too well.

“Really, gentleman,” she said, “don’t you realize that opening this door will invite censorship into all forms of entertainment?”

“Personally,” Barray said, in his gravest radio-announcer voice, “I believe no man should be told by another what he is allowed to see.”

Lehman seemed to take the host’s pompous pronouncement as a betrayal, bristling. “Tell
that
to those who consistently ban material relating to human...”

He almost said “sexuality.”

“...biology.”

“With all due respect, Garson,” the disc jockey said, “Dr. Kinsey’s favorite subject is not the issue here.” He plucked the horror comic off the pile again and waved it like a flag. “It’s the violent garbage being foisted upon the youth of our nation.”

Now Lehman was back on board. “Absolutely! These periodicals are the worst kind of swill—a garish hodgepodge of clashing colors, atrocious artwork, moronic writing, all printed on the cheapest pulp paper pennies can buy—a very
celebration
of violence.”

I bet he wanted to say “orgy.”

Calm as still waters, Maggie said to Lehman, “And you would censor that?”

“Well,
something
must be done.”

“Yet you fought the post office over censoring
your
book.”

He stuck his nose in the air and it twitched like a rabbit’s. “My book was not cheap violent trash, glorifying crime and killing.”

Wasn’t killing a crime?

“Mr. Lehman,” Maggie was saying, with a gracious veneer, “I seem to recall you writing a letter on my behalf some years ago.”

The shaggy-haired intellectual swallowed, and his neck reddened. He was lucky this new color TV hadn’t hit the local broadcasts.

“I, uh, am afraid I don’t recall,” he said.

She gestured to her lovely decolletage. “When I was arrested, a, uh...
few
years ago...when Mayor LaGuardia shut down the burlesque houses and made my act illegal...you wrote a spirited defense of my art that appeared in several local papers...and, in greater detail, in an arts magazine you edited called
Erotique.”

The little guy’s face was bright red now—sort of like Yosemite Sam after Daffy Duck really got his goat.

Before his guest could have a stroke, however, Barray got back on track: “We have laws that forbid the sale of tobacco to minors. Why then can’t newsstand or candy store proprietors be held to a similar standard with these foul comic books? They should be stamped ‘adult.’”

Maggie said, “Is that where you’d keep Mother Goose— under the counter? In the nursery rhyme, the farmer’s wife cuts off the rat’s tail with a butcher knife. That’s fairly grisly. So is an old woman putting children in an oven.”

“She’s right!”
a voice from the audience cried out.

Startled, Barray looked past the lights into the relative darkness of the restaurant as a figure in a black-leather jacket, t-shirt and jeans moved through like a shark in choppy waters.

I could see Barray thinking quickly—
do I have this guy tossed out? Or make him part of the circus?

“We seem to have an opposing opinion,” Barray said. “Speak up, sir, so our audience at home can hear you!”

Just beyond the cameras, the young guy—he was maybe twenty—stopped, breathing heavily. He clearly hadn’t expected an invitation to speak. He had a hair-creamed black pompadour with sideburns, and was slender, almost skinny, the leather jacket giving him what little heft he had. But he was almost six foot and damn near as handsome as Brando in
The Wild One,
whose kid brother he might have been.

“I’m in the business! I’m an artist! You don’t know what you’re
talking
about!”

“Why don’t you come on over and join us,” the disc jockey said, his voice genial but with an edge. “I’m sure we’d like to be corrected if we’re wrong.”

Barray looked at Lehman, and said, “If you’d step out of the booth for a moment, Garson, we’ll make room for this representative of the comic book trade.”

Soon the artist who looked like a young hoodlum had taken Lehman’s place, the little intellectual standing just off-camera, looking annoyed and almost hurt to have been trumped by an interloper.

“First, your name, sir?” Barray asked his sudden guest. “And what comic book company do you work for?”

“Will Allison,” he said, suddenly shy on camera. If he’d spoken any softer, the microphones would’ve been out of luck. “I draw science-fiction stories for EF.”

“Entertaining Funnies!”
the host erupted, eyes glittering with the gold he’d struck.

“That’s right,” Allison said, sullen, defensive.

“Such a charming, wholesome name for a comic book line that includes...” And he reached for a fresh example from the stack nearby. “...
Tales from the Vault
, with a young woman being strangled by a walking, rotting corpse, and
Suspense Crime Stories,
which depicts a hanged man with his neck broken and...ladies and gentleman...”

He addressed the camera.

“...I can’t show these to you in close-up. They are simply too disgusting.”

Nervous, the young artist said, “I didn’t draw those!”

“Oh, but the company you work for did
publish
them.”

“Yes. But those are not intended for little kids.”

“Big kids, then?”

“We have tons of older readers like that, working stiffs, and college kids, too.”

“Really?” Barray shook the comic book as if trying to dispel dirt. “How heartening to know the leaders of tomorrow enjoy ...literature. What do
you
draw, young man?”

“I adapted a series of Ray Bradbury stories for
Weird Fantastic Science.
He’s a respected writer of science fiction!”

Maggie said, “Mr. Bradbury is indeed a very respected author. And I’m familiar with this young man’s work, as well. He’s a gifted illustrator.”

“If so,” Barray said, “then Mr. Allison is prostituting his talents working for Entertaining Funnies—perhaps the most reviled of all these comic book vultures. I risk no slander or libel in making that statement—I base it on the words of a scientist...Dr. Werner Frederick, in his new book,
Ravage the Lambs.”

Then the show was over, and Barray was all smiles where Maggie was concerned, ignoring the Allison kid, who shuffled away from the booth, stepping over cables and around the cameras, looking lost, and like he might cry.

He was walking right past me and I said, “Hey, Will.”

The handsome kid paused and frowned at me. “Do I know you?”

I held out my hand. “Jack Starr. With the Starr Syndicate. That’s my good-looking boss you were sitting next to.”

Right now, in front of the booth, Maggie was having a discussion with Barray, and she was doing all the talking. My stepmother looked placid but I could tell she was taking that clown to the woodshed.

“I’ve heard of you,” Allison said, shaking my hand, smiling shyly. Then he jerked a thumb toward the booth where technicians were tearing down. “It was nice of Mrs. Starr, defending me.”

“Call her ‘Miss Starr,’ if you ever want any more favors out of her.” I patted his shoulder. “You did all right up there, kid.” That was a lie.

“Thanks. Somebody had to stick up for what we do.”

“Comics are just the latest whipping boy. Used to be dime novels. Then it was pulp magazines. It’ll be something else soon enough.”

He nodded glumly but managed a smile. He said it was nice meeting me, then moved across the way to join a good-looking blonde girl about his age in a Peter Pan blouse with a scarf, shift skirt, bobby sox and saddle shoes. Maybe he got made a fool of tonight, but this kid was going home with something better than Barray or Lehman could ever wangle.

I hadn’t noticed Maggie coming up. I heard her before I saw her—asking Benny to fix her a Horse’s Neck (ginger ale, whiskey, lemon peel, some ice cubes, in a Collins glass).

“You straighten that prick out?” I asked.

“Barray?” she said, lifting her eyebrows an eighth of an inch, a big deal for her. “Yeah. Said if he ever sprang an on-air attack on me like that again, he and his show could find another restaurant to broadcast his bilge.”

“Bilge, huh? Pretty rough.”

“He’s an ass.”

“Why put up with him?” Knowing, but wanting to make her work a little.

“He builds business.”

Here at the Strip Joint, she meant; but she wasn’t leveling, not entirely.