The Great Pursuit Read Free

slaughtered too. He should have had more sense

than to advise Pulteneys and Jamesforth to fight the case.'
    'Well it was innocent libel,' said Sonia. 'James didn't mean to malign the woman.'
    'Oh quite. The fact remains that he did and under the Defamation Act of 1952 designed to

protect authors and publishers from actions of this sort, innocent libel demands that they show

they took reasonable care '
    'Reasonable care? What does that mean?'
    'According to that senile old judge it means going to Somerset House and checking to see if

anyone called Desdemona was born in 1928 and married a man called Humberson in 1951. Then you go

through the Lupin Growers Association Handbook looking for Humbersons and if they're not there

you have a whack at the Women's Institute and finally the telephone directory for Somerset. Well,

they didn't do all that so they got lumbered for fifteen thousand and we've got the reputation of

handling authors who libel innocent women. Send your novels to Frensic & Futtle and get sued.

We are the pariahs of the publishing world.'
    'It can't be as bad as all that. After all, it's the first time it's happened and everyone

knows that James is a souse who can't remember where he's been or who he's done.'
    'Can't they just. Pulteneys can. Hubert rang up last night to say that we needn't send them

any more novels. Once that word gets round we are going to have what is euphemistically called a

cash flow problem.'
    'We're certainly going to have to find someone to replace James,' said Sonia. 'Bestsellers

like that don't grow on trees.'
    'Nor lupins,' said Frensic and retired to his office.
    All in all it was a bad day. The phone rang almost incessantly. Authors demanded to know if

they were likely to end up in the High Court of Justice, Queen's Bench Division, because they had

used the names of people they were at school with, and publishers turned down novels they would

previously have accepted. Frensic sat and took snuff and tried to remain civil. By five o'clock

he was finding it increasingly difficult and when the Literary Editor of the Sunday Graphic

phoned to ask if Frensic would contribute an article on the iniquities of the British libel laws

he was downright rude.
    'What do you want me to do?' he shouted. 'Stick my head in a bloody noose and get hauled up

for contempt of court? For all I know that blithering idiot Jamesforth is going to appeal against

the verdict.'
    'On the grounds that you inserted the passage which libelled Mrs Humberson?' the editor asked.

'After all it was suggested by the defence counsel '
    'By God, I'll have you for slander,' shouted Frensic. 'Galbanum had the gall to say that in

court where he's protected but if you repeat that in public I'll institute proceedings

myself.'
    'You'd have a hard time,' said the editor. 'Jamesforth wouldn't make a good witness. He swears

you advised him to jack Mrs Humberson up sexwise and when he wouldn't you altered the

proofs.'
    'That's a downright lie,' yelled Frensic. 'Anyone would think I wrote my authors' novels for

them!'
    'As a matter of fact a great many people do believe just that,' said the editor. Frensic

hurled imprecations and went home with a headache.
    If Wednesday was bad, Thursday was no better. Collins rejected William Lonroy's fifth novel

Seventh Heaven as being too explicit sexually. Triad Press turned down Mary Gold's Final Fling

for the opposite reason and Cassells even refused Sammy The Squirrel on the grounds that it was

preoccupied with individual acquisition and lacked community concern. Cape rejected this, Seeker

rejected that. There were no acceptances. Finally there was a moment of high drama when an

elderly clergyman whose autobiography Frensic had repeatedly refused to handle, explaining each

time that there wasn't a large reading public for a book that dealt exclusively with parish life

in South Croydon, smashed a vase with his umbrella and only