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intelligence.”
    “Nice to know.” She rocked back in her swivel chair. “I needed to find out if our disagreement on this subject would stand in the way of our doing business.”
    This clearly surprised him. “Business? Of what kind?”
    Now she sat forward and her tone became strictly professional. “We’re in the market for a self-help column, doctor, somewhat in the fashion of Dear Abby or Ann Landers.”
    Oh, she was good ....
    The doc’s eyes were wide as his integrity, ego and greed began an epic battle (integrity seemed outnumbered). “That’s hardly my calling, Miss Starr....”
    She flipped a hand. “The kind of questions asked and answered in those columns by these self-appointed experts... did you know Abby and Ann are sisters, and quite hate each other?...are of a rather tepid and ordinary nature.”
    “From what I’ve seen, I would agree.”
    “We at Starr believe that a column written by a psychiatrist, particularly a prominent, well-respected one, could be genuinely helpful to readers... and financially rewarding to columnist and syndicate.”
    I liked that “We at Starr” thing. Made me feel part of a team.
    The doc was saying, “It would perhaps be unethical for me to treat a patient through an advice column....”
    “You wouldn’t treat patients, nor would you handle any problems that couldn’t be simply answered with good common sense, enhanced by your impressive training as a doctor of the mind. For someone with a serious problem, you would recommend treatment by a fully accredited psychiatrist.”
    “I see.” He looked like a twelve-year-old who’d just been told the facts of life and was appalled yet intrigued. “Well, that is an interesting notion....”
    I gave Maggie a look that said: He’s hooked—reel him in.
    “Think of what you would do, doctor, for the science of psychiatry! Think of the millions of readers, many of whom are afraid of ‘head shrinkers,’ coming into daily positive contact with a kind, gentle, brilliant practitioner of the art.”
    I was afraid she was piling it on a little too high, but Frederick was caught up. He was sitting on the edge of his chair, his eyes wide and glittering, like a kid racing to the end of a horror comic.
    “You make a good case for this cause,” he said.
    Already his ego and greed had convinced his integrity that doing a syndicated column was a “cause.”
    “But,” he cautioned, waggling a professorial finger, “I have commitments that might prohibit my taking this offer.... Could it be a weekly column?”
    Well, she had him. He was flopping around the deck, unaware he was heading for the taxidermist and the cabin wall right over the fireplace.
    “I have my private practice to consider,” he went on, “my duties at the Harlem clinic, and right now, of course, I’m promoting my new book...and I’m thinking of doing a follow-up, on the harmful effect of TV on young minds....”
    I had told Will Allison comic books were only the latest whipping boy. Here comes TV as the next parental boogeyman!
    “If you like,” Maggie said, “we could find an assistant for you...”
    A ghost, she meant.
    “...someone who could deal with the many letters we’d receive daily, winnowing them into material for columns, and writing first-draft for you to revise and approve. You might only have to work on the column a few hours per week. And you would make five figures, easily, and more likely six.”
    Judging by his expression, he might have been Long John Silver viewing a treasure chest heaped with gleaming doubloons. “I could make as much as $100,000 a year for performing this service?”
    “Our top cartoonists make many times that.” She clasped her hands with a clap. “What do you say? Will you consider it?”
    He was nodding like I did the night Betty Jean Willis asked me if I wanted her to climb into the backseat of my Chevy.
    “I will,” he burbled. He actually burbled. “I’d want to meet and approve and interview any