The Dream Merchants Page 5

  Peter’s attention came back to George with a snap. “An ice-cream parlor here?” he queried. “What for?”

  George was embarrassed. His face turned red. His inadequate English became even more unintelligible. “These poopuls,” he stammered, “good for business. Ice cream, candies, fruits, nuts.”

  Peter stopped smiling; he suddenly understood what George meant. His voice became serious. “It’s a good idea, George, but where can we put it? There isn’t enough room.”

  Magically George found the words for what he wanted to say. He spoke quickly, easily. He explained to Peter how little room they would need for it. But what clinched the argument was his offer to pay rent plus a share of the profits.

  ***

  While business at the nickelodeon was good, it was not without its problems. Under Peter’s agreement with Graphic he was given a new show every three weeks. This was all right until they had begun giving three shows a day. Then it seemed that the first week of the show everybody in the section would see it and business would fall off greatly in the following two weeks. He had spoken to Johnny about it and they had agreed to ask Joe Turner on his next trip up if there was anything that could be done about it.

  About two weeks after George had opened his little stand, Joe came up on his regular monthly visit. He stood in the small lobby watching George and his brother move busily behind the counter. After a while he went into the nickelodeon and spoke to Johnny.

  The afternoon show had just finished and Johnny was rewinding the film for the next show.

  “Whose idea was that?” Joe asked him.

  “Peter’s,” Johnny answered. “What do you think of it?”

  Joe nodded his head approvingly. “It’s a good ’un,” he said. “Makes me feel the idea will catch on in town when I tell ’em about it.”

  Johnny finished rewinding and set the reel in place so that it would be ready to run off for the next show. He clambered down from the little platform on which the projector stood. “C’mon out and have a Moxie,” he invited Joe.

  They walked out to the stand and ordered their drinks. Johnny introduced him to George and his brother. For a moment they sipped their drink reflectively, then Johnny spoke. “Haven’t you got any other films? People are getting tired of the same show for three weeks straight.”

  Joe shook his head. “There isn’t much to be had, but we just got a new one-reeler that we can send you.”

  “What the hell good is one reel when we need a whole show?” Johnny asked.

  Joe looked at him for a moment before he answered. “I got something that might help you out, but it’s gotta be kept quiet.”

  “You know me, Joe. I’m like a clam when I gotta be.”

  Joe smiled at Johnny’s expression. “I guess yuh heard about the big companies gettin’ together to form a combine and control the picture business.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, I guess yuh know one of the reasons for that is because a lot of small producers are makin’ pictures an’ cuttin’ into their time. They want you exhibitors to play their kind of show, which is a short one, and they want to make sure that you get your pictures from them, so they combine. That way they control all the picture patents between ’em and nobody can make pictures but them.”

  “So what?” Johnny asked. “I still don’t see how we’re gonna get more pictures.”

  “I’m gettin’ tuh that,” Joe said. “Graphic’s joinin’ the combine an’ I’m leaving them to go with one of the independents who plans to make enough pictures for a new show every week.”

  “Sounds good,” Johnny said, “but where do we come in?” He sipped some Moxie up through his straw. “According to our agreement we can only show Graphic pictures.”

  “A lot of exhibitors figure what the combine won’t know won’t hurt ’em.” Joe replied. “Look—you got to take their pictures for three weeks, but you don’t have to play them for three weeks if you can’t do business with them.”

  “I see,” Johnny said, finishing his drink. “Let’s go in and see Peter about it.”

  On their way into the hardware store Joe told Johnny all he had to do to get the film was to go down to New York and sign a rental agreement.

  “Who’s this guy you’re goin’ to work for?” Johnny asked.

  “Bill Borden,” Joe answered. “He’s the biggest independent in the field.”

  “What you gonna do?” Johnny lit a cigarette. “Sell pictures for him?”

  Joe shook his head. “Nope. I’m through with that. I’m gonna make the pictures. I tole Borden that what he needed was a man who knew what the exhibitors wanted, and since I knew what the exhibitors wanted, I was the man he needed.”

  Johnny laughed. “You haven’t changed a bit since we worked carny. You could still shoot the bull with the best of them.”

  Joe joined in Johnny’s laugh. “But seriously, kid, it’s gonna be a great racket some day. I’d like to see you get in it.”

  5

  Johnny stopped with his hand on the doorknob. He could hear Esther’s voice through it. She was talking to Peter.

  “Nu?” she was saying. “Aren’t you getting dressed yet? Doris and Mark you were going to take to the park today.”

  Johnny grinned to himself in the hall. He heard Peter’s voice indistinctly as he replied to his wife, but he couldn’t understand the words. Its tone was lazy and grumbling. Johnny grinned again. It was Sunday and he knew that Peter liked to spend the morning with his feet on a hassock reading the papers. He turned the knob and walked into the kitchen.

  Esther looked at him in surprise and then at the clock. “You’re up early, Johnny,” she said. There was a big pot bubbling on the stove behind her.

  He smiled at her. “I’ll only be a minute, I just wanted to ask Peter if he wanted me to pick up anything for him in New York.”

  “You’re going to New York today?” she asked.

  He nodded. She seemed a little peeved. He wondered what it was.

  Peter came to the door of the kitchen and looked in on them. “You’re going to New York?” he echoed Esther’s words.

  “Yeah,” Johnny answered laconically. He looked at Peter. Peter was in his shirtsleeves, the belt on his trousers loosened comfortably. Peter had put on a little weight lately, he thought. Well, why shouldn’t he? Things were going pretty good.

  “What for?” Peter asked.

  “I promised Joe I’d be down to see him and look over some of the new pictures,” he replied. “I’ll be back tomorrow in time for the evening show.”

  Peter shrugged his shoulders. “If you want to travel eight hours just to look at a couple of pictures, it’s all right with me, but I wouldn’t do it.”

  Johnny smiled. “If you did,” he thought silently, “maybe you’d understand what I’ve been trying to tell you the past few months—that this is growing into a big business.” Aloud he said: “I like to do it. You get an idea of what’s goin’ on that way.”

  Peter looked at him. A peculiarly fanatical light had come into Johnny’s eyes as he spoke. Moving pictures had captured Johnny’s mind. He ate, slept, and dreamed moving pictures. Since he had started to go into New York to buy them for the nickelodeon, he couldn’t stop talking about them. He remembered what Johnny had said one day when he had come back from the city:

  “This guy Borden’s got the right idea. He’s making two-reel films with a story in them. And there’s those other guys, Fox and Laemmle, them too. They say it’s gonna be a big business. They say some day there will be theaters that will show nothing but moving pictures, like they have now for plays.”

  Peter had sniffed at the idea, but secretly he had been impressed. All these men, maybe they had something. He had seen their pictures. They were certainly better than the combine’s; maybe they knew what they were talking about.

  He had wondered what it would be like to own a theater that showed nothing but moving pictures, but resolutely he pushed the thought from his mind. No, it was foo
lish to waste time even thinking about it. It would never pay off. He was better off the way he was.

  Doris came running into the kitchen followed by Mark. She looked up at Johnny, her face radiant. She had heard his voice in the other room. “Going to the park, Uncle Johnny?” she asked excitedly.

  He looked down at her, smiling. “Not today, sweetheart,” he said, “Uncle Johnny’s gotta go to New York on business.”

  Her face fell and a look of disappointment came over it. “Oh,” she said in a very small voice.

  Esther turned and looked meaningly at her husband. Peter caught the glance. He stepped forward and took Doris’s hand. “Papa’ll take you, liebchen,” he said. He turned to Johnny. “Wait for us, we’ll walk you down to the station.” He left the room to get his jacket.

  “Some coffee, Johnny?” Esther asked.

  “No, thanks,” he replied, smiling, “I had breakfast already.”

  Peter came back into the kitchen, buttoning his jacket. “All right, kinder,” he said, “let’s go.”

  In the street Mark tugged at Johnny’s hand.

  Johnny looked down at him.

  “Piggy-back!” Mark said in his little treble.

  Johnny grinned and swung the child onto his shoulders.

  “Whee!” shouted Mark as they walked along.

  It wasn’t until they had walked halfway down the block that Peter realized Doris had gone over to the other side of Johnny and was holding Johnny’s free hand. He smiled to himself. It was a good sign if children liked you.

  “How is Joe getting along?” he asked Johnny. He hadn’t seen Joe since he had quit the combine and gone to work for Borden.

  “Good,” Johnny answered. “He’s turning out some swell pictures. Borden says he’s the best man he’s got.”

  “That’s fine,” Peter said. “Is Joe satisfied?”

  “Joe likes it, but there’s one thing more he wants to do.” Johnny was trying to untangle Mark’s grip on his hair. Mark was laughing.

  Peter looked up at him. “Let go Uncle Johnny’s hair,” he said sternly, “or I’ll tell him to put you down.”

  Mark loosened his grip and Peter spoke to Johnny. “What is it he wants?”

  Johnny’s voice was elaborately casual. “He wants to go into business himself. He says there is a lot of money in it.”

  “What do you think?” Peter was interested, though he pretended not to be.

  Johnny stole a quick glance at him out of the corner of his eyes. Peter’s face was calm but his eyes gave him away. “I think he’s got something,” Johnny said slowly. “We figured it out.

  “A one-reeler costs about three hundred dollars, plus the prints. You make a hundred prints from each negative. You lease each print at least twice for ten dollars each time. That gives you two thousand for each picture. I don’t see how you can miss.”

  “Then what’s stopping him?”

  “Money,” Johnny answered. “He needs at least six thousand for cameras and equipment and he hasn’t got it.”

  They were at the station now and Johnny lifted Mark down from his shoulders. “You know, Peter,” he said, looking at him speculatively, “it wouldn’t be a bad business for us to go into.”

  Peter laughed. “Not me. I’m no schlemiel. I know when I’m well off. What happens if you can’t get rid of the film?” He answered his own question. “You go broke.”

  “I don’t think so,” Johnny said quickly. “Look at us. We buy film from every place we can get it and never have enough. I don’t see how it can miss.” He fished out a cigarette and put it in his mouth. “And all the other exhibitors I met in New York are in the same boat we are. Their tongues are hanging out for more pictures.”

  Peter laughed again. This time his laugh wasn’t as assured as before. Johnny could tell that he was intrigued by the idea. “I’m not greedy,” Peter said. “Let the other guy have the headaches. We’re doing all right.”

  A few minutes later the train pulled in and Johnny climbed aboard. He stood on the platform and waved to them as the train pulled out. They waved back to him and he smiled.

  He knew Peter well enough by now to realize he had planted the germ of an idea in his mind. Leave it alone for a while and every now and then say a few words more about it. In time the idea would catch on and begin to grow. The station was lost to his sight as the train turned round a bend and he went inside and found a seat. He took a newspaper from his pocket and opened it, still smiling. Maybe by the time Joe was ready, Peter would be too.

  Back at the station, Doris began to cry as the train pulled out. Peter looked down at her in surprise. “Why are you crying, liebchen?” he asked.

  She sniffled. “I don’t like to see anybody go away on a train.”

  Peter was puzzled; he scratched at his ear. As far as he knew, she had never seen anyone off on a train before. “Why?” he asked.

  She looked up at him, her soft blue eyes swimming in tears. “I—I don’t know, Papa,” she said in a small voice. “I just feel like crying. Maybe Uncle Johnny isn’t coming back.”

  Peter looked down at her. For a moment he stood there silently, then he took her hand. “Such nonsense!” he said gruffly. “Come on. Let’s go to the park.”

  6

  It was dark when Johnny awoke. He was in a strange room. His head felt logy, heavy. He groaned and stretched his arms.

  There was a stir in the bed beside him. He started in sudden surprise as his outstretched hand encountered warm, soft flesh. He turned his head.

  In the darkness he could barely see the face of the girl sleeping beside him. She was lying on her side, one arm under the pillow. He sat up slowly, trying to remember what had happened last night. He remembered Joe ordering more wine. They were all getting drunk. Painfully it began to come back to him.

  It had started when he came into the studio about five o’clock. Joe had told him they would be working because it was the only day some of the girls they had hired would be free. These girls worked in a burlesque show during the week and this was a chance for them to pick up a few bucks extra.

  When he got there, Joe was in the midst of a hot argument with one of the girls. She was screaming at him. At first Johnny couldn’t make out what it was all about, but then he gathered it had something to do with the clothes she was wearing.

  Bill Borden was standing near by, wearing a worried look that Johnny had come to recognize as customary for all picture men. Joe stood there calmly waiting for the girl to stop screaming. Johnny stopped near the door. No one even noticed his entering.

  At last the girl stopped yelling. Joe looked at her for a moment, then turned to Borden. “Give her her time, Bill,” he said calmly, ignoring the girl. “We can’t afford temperament in this business.”

  Borden didn’t answer. The worried look on his face grew deeper.

  The girl started to shout again. “You can’t do it!” she screamed at Joe. “I’m supposed to have the lead in this picture. My agent’ll sue you!” Her voice grew shrill.

  Joe looked at her calmly for a moment; then he suddenly exploded. “Who the hell do you think you’re gonna sue and for what?” he shouted back at her. “Why, for Christ’s sake, we pay you more here for one day’s work than you make all week hustling your ass on a burley line! Sue us an’ you get no work from any of the picture people!” He stepped close to her and shook an angry finger in her face. “Now, if you want to play the lead in this picture, take off your God-damn dress and show your chemise! And don’t give me any bull about being modest. I seen you on the stage of the Bijou without nothin’ on! Thass the reason I hired you!”

  The girl fell silent in the face of this sudden tirade. After a few seconds of looking at him thoughtfully, she said: “All right, I’ll do it. But there’s one thing!” With a sudden motion she stepped back from him, drew her dress off over her head, and threw it at Joe’s feet.

  A gasp rose in Johnny’s throat. The girl didn’t have a stitch of clothing on under the dress.

/>   Quickly Joe picked up the dress and rushed to cover her. Borden threw his hands over his face and groaned.

  The girl smiled as Joe reached her. “You’ll have to lend me a chemise,” she said sweetly. “It was too damn hot to wear one.”

  Joe began to laugh. “Yuh shoulda said so in the first place, baby,” he managed to say. “We would’ve saved ourselves a pack uh trouble.”

  A few minutes later the girl was dressed in a chemise, and the camera began to roll. Joe looked up and saw Johnny. He went toward him, a smile on his face. “See what I gotta go through?” he asked.

  Johnny grinned back at him. “Yeah. Pretty tough, isn’t it?”

  Joe laughed at Johnny’s answer. “No foolin’, though,” he said seriously. “These kids are crazy, you never know what to expect from them.”

  Johnny grinned again. “I didn’t see nuthin’ to complain about.”

  Joe shoved him gently by the shoulder. “Go on into the projection room an’ look at those pictures, you unsympathetic bastard,” he said in a friendly voice. “I should be through by the time you are. Then we’ll go to eat.”

  “Okay,” Johnny said, starting to turn away.

  Joe called him back. “I was just thinkin’,” he said with a smile on his face. “It might be a good idea if we took a couple of the babes along with us. The kinda life you been leadin’ up in Rochester ain’t too good for yuh.”

  “Decent of you to worry about me,” Johnny told him with a derisive smile on his face. “I suppose you can get along without dames.”

  Joe smiled comfortably. “I kin take ’em or leave ’em. But I remember the time when you were about sixteen an’ yuh got so randy over that contortionist, Santos had to take yuh over an’ get yuh fixed up.”

  Johnny’s face grew red; he started to reply to Joe’s statement, but just then Borden came up and hurried him off to the projection room. When he came out, Joe was waiting with two girls.

  Joe introduced them. One of them was the girl who had been arguing with Joe; her name was May Daniels and from the way she took Joe’s arm Johnny knew they were old friends. The other girl was a cute little blonde name Flo Daley.