Part 48 (1/2)

”Nothing,” I answered shortly as I took it from him and drank it. I sat there for a minute feeling the bromo go down inside me and soothe my excited stomach. I belched. I began to feel better.

”Whut suit you want to wear today, Mistuh John?” Christopher's face looked concernedly at me.

I looked at him. Suddenly I was ashamed of myself for shouting at him. ”Any suit you say, Chris,” I answered. ”I'll leave it up to you.” I watched him walk to the closet and open the door. ”I'm sorry I shouted at you, Chris,” I apologized.

He turned to look at me. Suddenly his face broke into a wide smile. ”Why, that's all right, Mistuh Johnny,” he said gently. ”I knowed you didn't mean to, you got lots o' things in your mind, that's all.”

I smiled back at him and he turned happily back to the closet. I closed my eyes and leaned back. The pains in my head were subsiding slowly, leaving my mind cold and clear.

I almost spoke my thoughts aloud. It was my turn now. First it was Borden, then it was Peter. Now it was me. One after the other we had been forced out. Was there no way we could lick them? I clenched my fist on the sheet. The linen tore under my fingers. Well, they hadn't got me out yet. And they wouldn't. Not without knowing they'd been in a fight. Slowly I let my fingers relax. I could remember how it all had started.

It was early in '31 that it began. Peter was in New York on one of his semiannual visits and I was sitting in my office bulling with the boys. There was a good deal of smoke in the air besides other things, but, all in all, things weren't too bad.

We were losing money all right, but so was every other picture company except Metro, and they couldn't lose money. They had a pipeline to the mint.

We were still writing off that nine million bucks' worth of silent film we had in inventory when the big noise came in. Our new pictures were no better and no worse than any of the other companies'. We still hadn't got wise to the technique of sound.

But the future looked good. We had one picture under our belt that looked like money in the bank. It was a war story about a group of German soldiers and just about expressed everything a human being could say about the futility of war. And there were others coming. Peter had said so. I hoped so, though I privately doubted it.

I had to keep my mouth shut about production. When we had changed over to sound pictures I had insisted that we use sound on disks instead of sound on the film itself. Peter reluctantly gave in to me after I pointedly told him that I had been right about sound pictures in the first place.

Now it was costing us another million bucks to make the change to sound on film.

Peter had been decent enough about it. He didn't rub it in even though he made it clear enough to me that he wanted me to keep my hands off production.

I had been sore about it at first, but I calmed down after a while. I figured the whole argument would blow over once things got back to normal.

I don't remember who was talking when the interoffice communicator on my desk gave forth with a loud buzzing sound that was as good an imitation of the Bronx cheer as any I ever heard. A hush fell across the room as I pressed the answer lever down. ”Yes, Peter,” I said into it.

”Johnny, come into my office right away,” Peter's voice rasped through.

”Yes, Peter,” I said.

”And, Johnny,” he added chucklingly before he switched off, ”tell those loafers in your office to get back to work.” The box clicked off.

I got to my feet. There was a burst of laughter from them. ”You heard him, boys,” I said, smiling. ”Back to the salt mines.”

I watched them filing out of my office. They were a good bunch of men, as good as any in the business. Some of them had been with us since before the war. When the last of them had gone I walked to the door that connected Peter's office and mine. I opened it and walked through.

Peter was seated behind that big desk of his. He had a mania for big desks even though he was a small man himself. This was big enough to keep even him happy. It made him look like a midget. He looked up at me with a serious face. ”Johnny,” he said, ”I want we should lend Bill Borden a million and a half dollars.”

”A million and a half!” I choked on the words. That was all the reserve we had in case anything went wrong. And in this business it was peanuts.

Peter nodded his head slowly. ”I said a million and a half. You heard me.”

”But, Peter,” I protested, ”that's all the mad money we got. What if something should go wrong?”

There was a discreet cough behind me. I turned around. Bill Borden was sitting in a chair behind me. He had shrunk into his seat and I had not seen him as I walked by. Shocked, I noticed that his face was haggard and drawn. His hair was completely gray. I walked over to him and held out my hand. ”Bill,” I said embarra.s.sedly, ”I didn't see you.”

He stood up and shook my hand. ”h.e.l.lo, Johnny,” he said. I didn't recognize his voice. It had changed. There was a sound of uncertainty about it.

”I meant no offense, Bill,” I said quietly.

He smiled wanly at me. ”I understand, Johnny. I know how you feel. I'd feel the same way myself if I was in your shoes.”

I looked at him a moment, then turned back to Peter. ”Maybe I wouldn't seem like such a fool if I knew what this was all about.”

”Well, it's like this,” Peter began, but Borden interrupted him.

”Let me tell it, Peter,” he said, holding up a hand. ”After all, it's my problem.”

Peter nodded and I turned back to Borden.

He seated himself slowly in the chair and looked at me for a few seconds. Then he began to speak. His voice was bitter and from it I knew that he was ashamed.

”It must seem funny to you, Johnny,” he said slowly, ”that Willie Borden has to come to you to borrow a few dollars. That Willie Borden, who is the president of the biggest picture company in the world, can't go to the banks and get all the money he wants, just for the asking. But it's true. You people are my only hope.”

He leaned forward in his chair earnestly and I stared at him fascinated. The man was stripping himself bare before our eyes. We could see the gradual disintegration of his spirit and his pride.

”Before the market crashed in '29 I was sitting on top of the world. When I got those theaters from you, my dreams were complete. I had more theaters than anybody in the picture business, I grossed more each year than any other company. I was smart all right. Too smart.” He laughed bitterly. ”I forgot when you can do the biggest business, you can also lose the most money. And that's just what happened. I lost the most money. A year after the market crashed, our theaters were worth exactly half what we had paid for them. Even the theaters we bought from you. You don't know how lucky you were to sell them just at that time.”

I started to speak but he held up his hand. ”I'm not blaming you, Johnny,” he said quickly. ”You didn't know what was going to happen any more than I did. I wanted them and I bought them. We wound up '29 with an eleven-million-dollar loss. I thought '30 would be better, but it wasn't. It was worse. We lost close to sixteen million dollars and the first six months of this year didn't show much improvement. Our loss came to seven million.”

He looked at me. ”Maybe you think I'm crazy to come to you and expect you to lend me a million and a half after what I just told you?” He waited for a minute and then, when I didn't answer, he continued: ”I'm not asking the money for the business, Johnny, it's for myself.”

I looked puzzled. He read the expression on my face correctly. ”You see, Johnny,” he explained, ”it's not like it was in the old days, when Willie Borden was boss and could do what he wanted with his own business. Today it's different. Willie Borden doesn't own Borden Pictures any more. Sure, he's president of the company, but he doesn't really run it. A group of directors run it. Men elected by stockholders who don't know from nothing about the business give the orders and Willie Borden has to carry them out. And if he doesn't want to carry them out, he can quit.”

He stopped for a few seconds and rested his head wearily against the back of the chair; then he leaned toward me again. His tone was full of subtle irony. ”Even the great Borden Company cannot afford to lose thirty-four million dollars without being embarra.s.sed in some ways. Sure, they still got twenty million in cash and seventy million in other a.s.sets, but somebody has to be the goat. Somebody has to be held up before the stockholders and crucified so that they can say: 'See, it was all his fault. He was to blame!' And who is this goat going to be? None other than little Willie Borden, who started with nothing, from a pushcart on Rivington Street, and made all this great company possible. So they got the bright idea. They would arrange to issue new stock and call in the old. Certificates of equal value would be given for each share of old stock, only there was a trick in it. A hidden trick. Now they got over two million shares outstanding. They would give two million shares for the two million shares that were out, but they had an ace up their sleeve. Instead of issuing just two million shares, they would issue four million.”

He took a deep breath. ”They would put an additional two million shares on the market. It made no difference to them that the market could not absorb the extra shares, because they had a plan. There was an agreement between Willie Borden and the Borden Pictures Company to the effect that Willie Borden was ent.i.tled to own outright up to twenty-five percent of the stock outstanding and that he was to have first option on any new offerings that affect his percentage. If he did not exercise this option, then these shares would be offered on the market. Very clever.” He shook his head. ”Very clever. They knew that Willie Borden did not have the five million necessary to buy up to twenty-five percent of the additional stock offered. They knew just how much he had. They figured first to reduce his holdings to about half of what they were and then to start blaming him publicly for the debacle. His reduced holdings would not give him enough votes at the stockholders' meetings to carry any weight. Especially if almost all the other votes were proxied the other way. But they forgot one important thing. Willie Borden was in the picture business before they even heard about it and he has many friends. Friends who would not want Willie Borden to get a s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g.”

He looked at me. ”With the help of my friends, I managed to get together three and a half million dollars. And it is to you I turn for the rest. I know your position well, I know how precarious it is, how uncertain tomorrow can be, but I have nowhere else to turn.”

His voice faded out in the room and we were quiet. At last Peter s.h.i.+fted in his seat behind the ma.s.sive desk and said uncomfortably: ”Nu, Johnny, what do you say now?”

I looked from him to Borden and then back to him. I smiled slowly. ”Like you always say, Peter, what good is money if you can't use it to help your friends?”

Borden sprang from his seat and came toward us. He grabbed for our hands excitedly. There was a new life, a new brightness in his face. He smiled happily. ”I won't forget it, I promise,” he said. ”It's only a loan. I'll pay you back within a year!”

Borden left the office with our check in his pocket. After he had gone, Peter and I sat and looked at each other. At last Peter took his watch out of his pocket and looked at it and sighed. He put the watch back in his pocket and said to me: ”Got a date for lunch, Johnny?”

I had a date, but I could cancel it. ”No,” I answered. ”I'll be with you in a minute. I just have something on my desk to clean up.”

I went back into my office and made a phone call that killed my previous appointment, then went back and joined him.

Peter was very quiet throughout luncheon. I could see he was thinking. I did not disturb him. He didn't open up until we had reached our coffee and he had lighted up one of those big cigars of his. Then he looked at me thoughtfully. He spoke to me, but he was really thinking aloud.

”You know,” he said, pointing his cigar at me, ”what this means?” I shook my head and he continued. ”It means a new era is coming to the picture business. I saw it coming years ago when I warned Willie not to have anything to do with those people in Wall Street. You see, deep inside them they don't like us. Because we're new, because we made a big business without them, and because we're Jewish.” He pulled his eyebrows down and squinted at me to see the effect of his words.