(1969) The Seven Minutes (16 page)

‘Hold it, Mike, listen, I -‘

‘Let me finish.‘saidBarrett sharply. ‘You do asltell you. Explain the situation to Ben Fremont. He’ll understand. He won’t want to go through all the pretrial preparations with the accompaying agitation and notoriety. He’s ten times better off if he pleads guilty. His fine will be paid for him. And the year in jail, well, it’s not fun, but it’s not the guillotine either, and you can compensate him for it in some way. Once you’ve had him plead guilty, you’ve pulled the tent down on Duncan’s circus and you’ve guaranteed some future to the book. The Fremont sentence will be kicked around for a while in the press, but with nothing new to keep it in the public eye it’ll sink out of sight forever. If there are other prosecutions elsewhere, at least they won’t be linked to rape. When you’ve dispensed with them, you can resume setting the book everywhere but in Oakwood. I’m sure you agree with me. It’s got to be a guilty plea. Will you let me call Duncan right now and notify him of our decision?’

‘Mike…’

‘Will you?’

There was what seemed an interminable silence. Barrett listened. He could hear only Sanford’s labored breathing three thousand miles away.

Sanford spoke at last. ‘It… it’s too late, Mike. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. It’s too late.’

‘What are you talking about ?’

‘I’ve made a public announcement of what we are going to do. I announced we are pleading not guilty. I announced we are going to court to defend Ben Fremont and - and The Seven Minutes. That’s it. It’s done.’

In an involuntary gesture of disbelief at what he had heard, Barrett took the receiver from his ear, glanced at it, and brought it back to his ear. ‘Did I hear you right ? You’re not kidding me, are you ? This isn’t exactly a laughing matter.’

‘I made a public announcement less than an hour ago. We’re going to court, Mike, and we need all the -‘

‘If you’re leveling with me, what you need is a strait jacket and a dozen psychoanalysts.’

‘Mike, you haven’t given me a chance to talk. You don’t know what’s been happening here, or you’d understand,’ Sanford complained. ‘After I hung up on you this morning, I was deluged by wires and phone calls from every corner of the country. It’s been snowing telegrams. From everyone. From most of our major bookstore accounts. From some of the biggest wholesalers - Baker and Taylor, A. C. McClurg, American News, Raymar, Dimondstein, Bookazine, you name them - and every one adding up to the same

question. What are we going to do about Ben Fremont? Nobody pulled punches. If we backed down on Ben, then it meant we were backing down on The Seven Minutes. If we admitted that Ben was guilty and deserved to be jailed without a fight, then it would look like we were admitting the book was obscene and did not deserve to be put on sale. In fact, our backing down on Ben Fremont meant we were exposing every bookseller, every bookman, to further arrests and yet offering nothing to support them. It was like the American Booksellers Association speaking to me in a single voice. Fight the censors here, and stop the censorship from spreading farther, or forget about the book. Because if Sanford House wouldn’t fight here, no one would dare handle the book.

‘Look, we know what’s happened in a similar situation before, Mike. I’ve been told that when Grove Press published Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer there were over sixty criminal and civil suits mounted against booksellers. And even though the publisher agreed to defend or assist in defending those booksellers, other booksellers were still sufficiently frightened to return - return, send back, you hear me ? - three quarters of a million of the two million copies that had been published. When Putnam published Fanny Hill, they made no guarantee of protection to booksellers. But once they saw the tidal wave of bannings and injunctions in the offing, they realized that few booksellers would handle the novel unless it was defended. So they selected three key cities where the book had been attacked - Hackensack, Boston, New York - and they fought the censors. As a result, their book, and the freedom to sell it and read it, survived. In a sense, we’re luckier, Mike. We have one instant censorship case mounted against our book, only one, to date, perhaps more difficult and sensational than the others, but one case which, if we fought and won it, would discourage any further criminal and civil actions. But not to try to fight it? Why, wholesalers and bookstores would immediately dump thousands and thousands of copies back into my lap. Our book would be dead before it was born. That was made clear to me today.

‘What choice did I have, Mike? I was desperate. I was so desperate that I finally returned Wesley R.‘s calls. You know what I got from him? You know why he’d called me after reading the headlines ? It was just to tell me he’d always known I was a fool, but now it was confirmed by others -I was not only a fool but a dunderhead for publishing the Jadway. And as for giving me any help, any paternal advice, you know what he gave me? A recipe. “Stew in your own juice,” he said. And after I was cooked, he said, he hoped there would be enough left of the firm to sell off to someone who’d know how to run it. So there I was, alone, in the pressure cooker and with the entire booktrade waiting for my answer. Well, I, stalled and stalled, hoping you’d make that compromise deal with the D.A., but knowing that even if you had, it was too late for that, too late to plead our book guilty of rape. So finally I called in everybody, and we drafted a statement to be wired to our major book accounts and wholesalers and also be released to the press. We reaffirmed our belief in the honesty and literary value of The Seven Minutes. We pledged ourselves to defend the book against the forces of comstockery. We announced that we were supporting Ben Fremont and Jadway’s book, and we were pleading not guilty, and we were going to court to prove our contention to the people of Los Angeles, of the country, of the entire world. I gave my word -we will fight this with every resorce at our command.’

‘That’s what the District Attorney just told me, the exact words he used.’

‘What?’

‘He’d fight you with every resource at his command.’

‘I expected that,’ said Sanford haltingly. ‘You didn’t mean that, before, about our not having a chance in court, did you, Mike?’

Barrett was suddenly sorry for his friend. ‘Perhaps I was exaggerating to make a point. What I should have said was, I hate to see anyone go to trial. Court trials are messy, costly, and they can become vicious. Sometimes, when they’re over, it’s hard to tell who won or who lost, because everyone looks like a loser. And this case is a particularly difficult one. The prosecution has got some big guns. Of course, between now and the trial date you may get some impressive weaponry, too.’ Weariness was beginning to overtake Barrett. ‘Well, I’d better phone the D.A. and let him know you want Fremont to plead not guilty. I hate to do it, but I guess you’ve left us no choice in the matter.’

‘I had no choice,’ Sanford persisted. ‘If I’d turned my back on this case, that would have opened the floodgate. That would have been the end of freedom of speech in this country.’

‘That was your principal concern, Phil - freedom of speech?’

‘All right, you bastard. And my own neck. That was also my concern.’

Barrett could not help smiling. “That’s more like it. Well, if it is your neck you are concerned about, let me give you one more piece of advice, and this time follow it. You’re on the firing line. You need the best shot there is. Meaning you need the best defense attorney in these United States. You see that you get him.’

‘I’ve already got him.’

‘You have? Good. Who?’

‘You, Mike. I retained you yesterday. Remember?’

‘Oh, no, no you don’t, Phil,’ Barrett said levelly. T was just a temporary fill-in for a publisher-in-distress. It was going to be a quick guilty plea and then run. A trial is another matter. It can take weeks or months and I’m tied up.’

‘You said you quit Thayer and Turner. I wouldn’t insist on this if you weren’t free.’

‘Phil, I’m not free,’ Barrett insisted with exasperation. ‘Didn’t

you hear me tell you, not once but twice, that I quit them to take a new job with Osborn Enterprises ? The chance of a lifetime. And a condition of the new job is that I start on it immediately. I told you that this morning.’

But then he saw that he would have to tell his friend about it again, and in greater, more convincing detail. Trying to hide his weariness, he recounted his entire adventure with Osborn and the opportunity that had been offered to him.

‘Now you know why I can’t be your legal counsel,’ he concluded.

Sanford remained adamant. ‘You can go to Osborn and say you’ll take his position after you’ve finished with the trial.’

T can’t see myself making any demands on Osborn. I’m fortunate to have any position with him at all. Look, Phil, there are three hundred thousand lawyers in the United States, and there are at least two hundred thousand of them who’d love to take on your case and who’d be better at it than I would. Hell, Phil, I’ve never handled a censorship case.’

‘You handled plenty of cases supporting the guarantees of the First Amendment when you were with the Good Government Institute. Well, this is a First Amendment case, no more, no less. What’s the difference if the issue is political or literary? What is still being defended is the right of freedom …’

He did know what was to be defended. He knew what was at stake. Fleetingly, the placard that had hung in his old office at the Institute, quoting a credo of the American Civil Liberties Union, passed before his eyes. It was a reminder that, in a living society, principles often come into conflict. About some things there could be no conflict. A man could not have the freedom to injure other people, to slander, to incite mob action, to create the danger of illegal sexual conduct or revolution or sabotage. But, and now he remembered exactly, ‘Within those limits, people should be able to say what they please, however unpopular, however irresponsible. Otherwise there’s no telling when the majority may decide that your ideas, too, are offensive.’ This had been his standard when defending those voicing political opinions, and Sanford was right. It was also the standard to be applied to the freedom to write and speak as one pleased, and to read what one wished. He had taken the wrong tack with Sanford and had made himself vulnerable.

‘Admitted, Phil,’ he said. ‘Let’s say I am qualified. The fact remains that I am not available. I repeat, I can find you an attorney, a battery of barristers, not only qualified but also available and eager to help. So be reasonable. Let me find you someone.’

‘No,’ said Sanford flatly. ‘You are the only one I’d gamble my whole future on. You alone know me. You know my stake in this. You’d care. You’d defend me as you’d defend your own life. You’d devote yourself to me as a friend, not as a mere client. You know New York publishing as well as California law. And you know

books. You’re the only attorney I’ve ever met who loves literature as much as law.’ There was a meaningful pause, and then Sanford added, ‘Mike, you owe this to yourself - and to me.’

Barrett hesitated. His friend had injected the word ‘owe.’ Barrett knew too well the definitions of the word ‘owe.’ ‘To be indebted … To have an obligation to someone…’ He had always been burdened by his unpaid debt to Sanford. The years had passed, but the memory and the obligation had not faded with time. When he had been desperate to save his mother, only one person had volunteered to help. He had long ago repaid Sanford the money owed him. But he had never repaid the interest, which was payable only in the currency of friendship, a favor for a favor. No one on earth aided another out of pure altriuism. Everyone on earth expected something back, be it love or loyalty - or legal counsel.

Still, Barrett could not bring himself to capitulate. Sanford had said he owed it to himself as well as to their friendship to take on the case. Meaning, perhaps, that he owed it to himself to fight a, good fight. Or meaning, more likely, he owed it to himself to support a friend who was cornered, a linguistic effort to soften a harsh demand. But Barrett also knew what he owed himself. He owed himself the right to be his own man, once and forever, to shed all guilts and disown the gouging interest levied on repaid debts. He owed it to himself to reject Sanford, as he had yesterday rejected Zelkin, and to go along with Willard Osborn II. He dared not jeopardize the position offered by Osborn. At the same time, he could not, at least not at this moment, break with a friend.

He realized that Sanford had been speaking to him, asking, ‘Are you still there, Mike?’

‘I’m here. I was trying to think.’

The New York voice had become hurt and wheedling. ‘Mike, you can’t let me down in a crisis like this. I need you.’

‘You’re putting me on the spot, Phil,’ he said. ‘But let me see what I can do. Let it stand this way. I’ll try what you suggested. I’m seeing Osborn tonight. I intend to tell him I’m taking him up on his offer of a vice-presidency. At the same time, I’ll ask him for a delay. I’ll explain about you and our friendship and the necessity for a trial, and then, well, then I’ll hope for the best. But, Phil, one thing. If he refused to give me a delay, I’ll still accept his job. I’ll try to find you a top attorney out here. If it has to be someone else, I know you’ll understand.’

‘Ill understand only one thing,’ said Sanford, invoking the tyranny of the weak. “That friendship comes ahead of anything else. If you were going under, and needing my helping hand, I wouldn’t think twice. I’d make any sacrifice to give you a hand.’

This got under Barrett’s skin. He tried to contain the resentment that he felt. ‘You know perfectly well I’d do anything to help you, within reason. I said I’ll try, and I shall, tonight. The only thing I can’t.do, if it comes down to it, is blow my whole future. If you don’t understand that, Phil, I’m sorry.’

‘I’ll be waiting to hear from you,’ said Sanford, and he hung up.

Angrily Barrett returned the receiver to the hook. He wanted to flee this booth, the scene of entrapment. But he had one duty left.

Depositing another coin, he dialed the District Attorney’s office. Apparently his call was expected. He was put through to Elmo Duncan almost immediately.