ROBBINS Harold - The Carpetbaggers

His sister came back into the room and handed him a sheet of paper. It was faded and yellow but the date on it was still bright and clear. September 7, 1912. That was fourteen years ago. How time had flown.

He looked at his sister. "It's against my policy to hire relatives," he said. "It looks bad for the business."

"So who's to know he's your nephew?" Esther said. "Besides, who will do more for you than your own flesh and blood?"

He stared at her for a moment, then got to his feet. "All right. I’ll do it. It's against my better judgment but maybe you're right. Blood is thicker than water. Over on Forty-third Street, near the river, we got a warehouse. They'll put him to work."

"Thank you, Uncle Bernie," David said gratefully.

"Mind you, not one word about being my nephew. One word I hear and you're finished."

"I won't say anything, Uncle Bernie."

Norman started for the door. But before he went out, he turned, the paper in his hand. He folded it and put it into his pocket. "This I'm taking with me," he said to his sister. "When I get back to my office, they'll send you a check for the five hundred dollars with interest for the fourteen years. At three per cent."

A worried look came over his sister's face. "Are you sure you can afford it, Bernie?" she asked quickly. "There is no hurry. We'll manage if David is working."

"Afford it, shmafford it," Norman said magnanimously. "Let nobody say that Bernie Norman doesn't keep his word."

It was a dirty gray factory building down near the Hudson River, which had fallen into disuse and been converted into lofts. There were two large freight elevators in the back and three small passenger elevators near the front entrance, scarcely large enough to handle the crowd of workers that surged in at eight o'clock each morning and out at six o'clock each night.

The building was shared by five tenants. The ground floor housed an automobile-parts company; the second, a commercial cosmetic manufacturer; the third, the pressing plant for a small record company; the fourth, the factory of the Henri France Company, the world's largest manufacturer of popular-priced contraceptives and prophylactics. The fifth and sixth floors belonged to Norman Pictures.

David arrived early. He got off the elevator on the sixth floor and walked slowly down the wide aisle between rows of steel and wooden shelves. At the end, near the back windows, were several desks, placed back to back.

"Hello," David called. "Anybody here?" His voice echoed eerily through the cavernous empty floor. There was a clock over one of the desks. It said seven thirty.

The freight-elevator door clanged open and a white-haired man stuck his head out and peered down the aisle at David. "I thought I heard somebody calling," he said.

David walked up to him. "I'm supposed to see the foreman about a job."

"Oh, are you the one?"

David was confused. "What d'yuh mean?"

"The new boy," the elevator operator replied. "Old man Norman's nephew."

David didn't answer. He was too surprised. The elevator operator got ready to swing shut the doors. "Nobody's here yet. They don't get in till eight o'clock."

The steel doors closed and the elevator moved creakingly down out of sight. David turned from the elevator thoughtfully. Uncle Bernie had told him not to say anything. He hadn't. But they already knew. He wondered if his uncle knew that they knew. He started back toward the desks.

He stopped suddenly in front of a large poster. The lettering was in bright red – Vilma Banky and Rod LaRocque . The picture portrayed Miss Banky lying on a sofa, her dress well up above her knees. Behind her stood Mr. LaRoque, darkly handsome in the current Valentino fashion, staring down at her with a look of smoldering passion.

David studied the poster. A final touch had been added by someone in the warehouse. A milky-white condom hung by a thumbtack from the front of the male star's trousers. Next to it, in neat black lettering, were the words: Compliments of Henri France .

David grinned and began to walk up the aisle. He looked into the steel bins. Posters, lobby cards, displays were stacked there, each representing a different motion picture. David looked them over. It was amazing how much each looked like the next one. Apparently, the only thing the artist did was to change the names of the players and the title of the picture.

He heard the passenger elevator stop, then the sound of footsteps echoed down the aisle. He turned and waited.

A tall, thin man with sandy-red hair and a worried look on his face turned the corner near the packing tables. He stopped and looked at David silently.

"I'm David Woolf. I'm supposed to see the foreman about a job here."

"I'm the foreman," the man said. He turned away and walked over to one of the desks. "My name is Wagner. Jack Wagner."

David held out his hand. "I’m pleased to meet you, Mr. Wagner."

The man looked at the outstretched hand. His handshake was soft and indecisive. "You're Norman's nephew," he said accusingly.

Suddenly, David realized the man was nervous, more nervous even than he was himself. He wondered why. It didn't make sense that the man should be upset because of his relationship to Uncle Bernie. But he wasn't going to talk about it, even though it seemed everyone knew.

"Nobody is supposed to know that but me," Wagner said. "Sit down here." He pointed to a chair near the desk, then took out a sheet of paper and pushed it over to David. "Fill out this personnel application. Where it asks for the name of any relatives working for the company, leave that one blank."

"Yes, sir."

Wagner got up from behind the desk and walked away. David began to fill out the form. Behind him, he heard the passenger-elevator doors open and close. Several men walked by. They glanced at him furtively as they walked over to their packing tables and began to get out equipment. David turned back to the form.

At eight o'clock, a bell rang and a faint hum of activity began to permeate the building. The day had begun.

When Wagner came back, David held out the application. Wagner looked it over carelessly. "Good," he said vaguely, and dropping it back on his desk, walked away again.

David watched him as he talked to the man at the first packing table. They turned their backs and David was sure they were discussing him. He began to feel nervous and lit a cigarette. Wagner looked over at him and the worried look on his face deepened.

"You can't smoke in here," he called to David. "Can't you read the signs?"

"Oh, I'm sorry," David answered, looking around for an ash tray. There wasn't any. Suddenly, he was aware that work had stopped and everyone was looking at him. He felt the nervous perspiration breaking out on his forehead.

"You can smoke in the can," Wagner called, pointing to the back of the warehouse. David walked down the aisle to the back, until he found the men's room. Suddenly he felt a need to relieve himself and stepped up to a urinal.

The door behind him opened and he sensed a man standing beside him. " Khop tsech tu ," he said.

David stared at him. The man grinned back, exposing a mouth filled with gold teeth. "You're Chaim Woolf's boy," he said in Yiddish.

David nodded.

"I'm the Sheriff. Yitzchak Margolis. From the Prushnitzer Society, the same as your father."

No wonder the word had got around so quickly. "You work here?" David asked curiously.

"Of course. You think I come this far uptown just to piss?" He lowered his voice to a confidential whisper. "I think it's very smart of your uncle to put you in here."

"Smart?"

The Sheriff nodded his bald head. "Smart," he repeated in the same stage whisper. "Now they got something to worry about. Too long they been getting way with murder. All you got to do is look at the tickets."