James Cain - The Magician's Wife

“I wish I thought so.”

“You’ll see.”

Twenty-four hours later he was staring at the sea, from the depths of a rocking chair, on the porch of a small hotel at Ocean City, Maryland — having driven there in flight from the frustration the holiday forced upon him. He had spent a sleepless night in a passion of high intention, with all sorts of fine schemes spinning around in his head, finding himself in the morning helpless to carry them out or even to do anything about his wrecked apartment. For fear his morale might ebb, and perhaps to preclude any call to Sally, he had packed his bag in a hurry and driven across the bridge that spans the bay, at length winding up at the sea. Here, to his relief, high purpose didn’t recede, but gave way to dogged resolve, and so he had had a swim, in water just a bit cold, a dinner, and a nice, brooding sulk, and now was about to retire. However, he was joined by Mr. Reed, the hotel’s proprietor, who took his meat and rated a sociable chat. In a quiet, easy way he made a standard gambit: “Nice place you got here — nice town, nice house, nice ocean” — but was just a bit startled at Mr. Reed’s sour reply. “ Was nice,” he growled. “That’s all we can say, Mr. Lockwood — we had a nice place once. Now all we got is a mess — a roughhouse, nothing else but.”

“Oh? You mean this holiday thing?”

He was alluding to the problem at Ocean City, as at other summer resorts, of teenage boys swarming in, so police have a job on their hands.

“That’s the climax of it, yes.”

But there seemed to be more, and Clay knew he must listen. “You know what it puts me in mind of?” Mr. Reed went on. “California, during a brush fire. Fellow was telling me, guy that lives out there, what it’s like when they have one of them. It wasn’t threatening him — it was up the slope a ways, where it couldn’t possibly reach him. But his place was a short cut to it, so first comes it the bums, the extra help hired on by the state, to smack at it with their shovels, chop fire breaks, drag hose, squirt foam, and so on. Next comes it the bums’ girl-friends, and turns out they have quite a few, very noisy and not very well behaved. Then comes it the ice-cream trucks, the beer vendors, and the hot-dog brigade, ringing bells and sticking pennants up in the grass. Then comes it the Iowa tourists, who never saw a brush fire, out to take pictures of it. Then comes it the TV bunch, out to take pictures of everything, including the Iowa tourists. So what can this guy do? He didn’t start it — has nothing to do with it, really. But an Act of God is up there, a roaring, terrible fire. So maybe it does have beer cans around the edges, but if he squawks he’s a heel — maybe an atheist, yet. So all he can do is get tromped — and that’s how it is with us. We have an Act of God too — also with beer cans in front, an ocean that can roar as loud as a fire. And coming to see it are bums — not like in California, but bums just the same, in a way, boys. Not just a few, Mr. Lockwood, not just hundreds — thousands. And not only them but their girl-friends — what kind, I give you one guess. And not only them but the fly-by-nights, same as in California, with their ice cream, beer, and hot dogs. And tourists, and TV — giving the place a bad name. Three months from now, by Labor Day, when things come to a head, I don’t blame our cops for cracking down or our judge for getting tough. Why should it happen to us? Can you tell me, Mr. Lockwood? We weren’t doing nothing. We were just—”

“Hold on, Mr. Reed!” said Clay suddenly, taking his feet from the railing. “Hold everything! You’ve just given me an idea!”

“I sure hope so. What idea, Mr. Lockwood?”

“If you can’t lick ’em, jine ’em!”

“ Jine ’em? How?”

“ Sell ’em! Ice cream. Beer. Dogs.”

“Oh, I see what you mean. Unfortunately I’m in the hotel business — I sell a shore dinner, two-eighty-one with tax. And would those kids pay that? I give you one guess. On top of which, the way most of them dress, I wouldn’t let ’em in. So—”

“In my business I sell what sells.”

“You’re leading to something, Mr. Lockwood. What?”

“I don’t have the details yet — just a general idea, but as far as it goes, it’s clear. As I see it now, the kids tromp you, the fly-by-nights take their money, and all you get is beer cans out on the edge of the ocean.”

“That says it, that’s exactly it!”

“Why don’t you go for their money?”

“But how? I sell a shore dinner! I—”

“Wait! It’s beginning to come!”

He took Mr. Reed by the arm and led him out to the boardwalk, then down some steps to the beach and out to the thundering surf. Then, after staring, he led back up the steps to the town, now having the first gay night of its new summer season, with neon signs lit up and orchestras sounding off. He kept on to the town’s boat harbor, one much like Channel City’s, the long inlet called Sinepuxent Bay, where various craft were tied up, prettily reflecting the lights. And as he walked he dreamed out loud: “I see it now, Mr. Reed — a corporation, locally owned — locally owned, I said, by you and a few of your friends — a right little, tight little syndicate that’ll have a series of booths — awnings, pitched on the sand, with grills and freezers and counters where girls in candy-striped pants will wait on our teenage friends and throw the empty cans in a hamper. You sell ’em ice cream, hot dogs, and beer — while I sell you what you need, I and some of my friends.” Mr. Reed, after raising the question of cash, “the capital we’ll need,” and being told, “Don’t worry about it,” began to like the idea, and presently Clay went on: “I see something else, Mr. Reed: this thing has a civic angle. It’s going to help put an end to the trouble. Because, ‘stead of fighting these kids you’ll befriend them, and ‘stead of fighting you they’ll get with it! And on Labor Day what will it be? Just a sociable cookout, that’s all.”

The upshot of it was that when Clay drove back, early Tuesday morning, he took Mr. Reed along, and no sooner got to his office than he “set up” a lunch for that day, in the Chinquapin-Plaza Blue Room, for the two of them, with Mr. Lomack of Greenfield Dairies, Mr. Gordon of Gordon Bakeries, Mr. Katz of Restaurant Fixtures, and Mr. Heine of Chinquapin Brewery. By then, having it all clear in his mind, he was able to lay it out to these prospective purveyors in the briefest possible time, and almost at once to sell it, to Mr. Reed’s hypnotized wonderment. In fact, he took it for granted they would come in, “as it’s something that should have been started years and years ago.” When he knew he had them, he went on: “On prices, stock, deliveries, all that inside baseball — forget it. They’re nothing, and we’re all equipped for what’s to be done. So let’s keep our eye on the main thing — it’s a public-relations question, first, last, and all the time. We have to convince that town and everybody in it that this is their enterprise — it’s not run by the fly-by-nights. The money stays in the town. It’s new money, it comes to the town, it stays there! I would say, and I hope you concur, that before we set up one tent we should run a series of ads — in The Pilot of Channel City, which circulates down at the beach — laying the whole thing out, introducing ourselves, saying who we are, coming out in the open. Then we’ll be ready to go!”

All concurred.

“The thing is going to take dough. I’m putting Grant’s in for five thousand bucks — as a loan, Mr. Reed, repayable out of earnings, as, of course, I couldn’t claim stock without misrepresenting to those people in Ocean City. It’s their show, without strings. Are the rest of you guys in?”