ROBBINS Harold - The Carpetbaggers

Bernie ran out of breath suddenly and picked up the glass of water again and drained it. "Ain't that enough trouble for anyone?"

David nodded.

"So enough troubles I got when I walk into my office this morning, you agree? So who do I find waiting but Rina Marlowe, that courveh . 'Rina, darling,' I say to her, 'you look positively gorgeous this morning.' Do I even get a hello? No! She shoves the Reporter under my nose and says, 'What's this? Is it true?'

"I look down and see the story about Davis in Sunspots . 'What are you getting so excited about, darling?' I say. 'That's not for you, a bomb like that. I got a part for you that will kill the people. Scheherazade . Costumes like you never in your life saw before.' And you know what she says to me?" He shook his head sadly.

"What?" David asked.

"After all I done for her, the way she spoke to me!" his uncle said in a hurt voice. " 'Take your hand off my tits,' she says, 'and furthermore, if I don't get that part, you can shove Scheherazade up your fat ass!' Then she walks out the door. How do you like that?" Norman asked in an aggrieved voice. "All I was trying to do was calm her down a little. Practically everybody in Hollywood she fucks but me she talks to like that!"

David nodded. He'd heard the stories about her, too. In the year since she had broken up with Nevada, she seemed to have gone suddenly wild. The parties out at her new place in Beverly Hills were said to be orgies. There was even talk about her and Ilene Gaillard, the costume designer. But as long as nothing got into print, they'd looked the other way. What she did was her own business as long as it didn't affect them. "What are you going to do about it?"

"What can I do about it?" Bernie asked. "Give her the part. If she walked out on us, we'd lose twice as much as we're losing right now."

He reached for a cigar. "I'll call her this afternoon and tell her." He stopped in the midst of lighting it. "No, I got a better idea. You go out to her place this afternoon and tell her. I'm damned if I'll let her make it look like I'm kissing her ass."

"O.K.," David said. He started back toward his own office.

"Wait a minute," his uncle called after him.

David turned around.

"You know who I ran into in the Waldorf my last night in New York?" Bernie asked. "Your friend."

"My friend?"

"Yes, you know who. The crazy one. The flier. Jonas Cord."

"Oh," David said. He liked the way his uncle put it, reminding him of the earlier conversation they had had about Cord some years ago. He and Cord had never exchanged so much as a word. He even doubted if Cord knew he was alive. "How did he look?"

"The same," his uncle replied. "Like a bum. Wearing sneakers and no tie. I don't know how he gets away with it. Anybody else they would throw out, but him? Shows you there's nothing like goyishe money."

"You talk to him?" David asked curiously.

"Sure," Norman answered. "I read in the papers where he's making another picture. Who knows, I says to myself, the schnorrer might get lucky again. Besides, with prestige like we're stuck with, we could use him. We could pay a lot of bills with his money.

"It's two o'clock in the morning and he's got two courvehs on his arm. I walk over and say, 'Hello, Jonas.' He looks at me like he's never seen me before in his life. 'Remember me,' I says, 'Bernie Norman from Hollywood.' 'Oh, sure," he says.

"But I can't tell from his face whether he really does or doesn't, he needs a shave so bad. 'These two little girls are actresses,' he says to me, 'but I won't tell you their names. Otherwise, you might sign them up yourself. If I like a girl,' he says, 'I put her under contract to Cord Explosives now. No more do I take any chances and let them get away from me the way you signed that Marlowe dame.' With that, he gives me such a playful shot in the arm that for two hours I can't raise my hand.

"I made myself smile even if I didn't feel like it. 'In our business, you got to move fast,' I says, 'otherwise you get left behind the parade. But that's over and done with. What I want to do is talk to you about this new picture I hear you're makin'. We did a fantastic job for you on your last one and I think we should set up a meetin'.'

" 'What's the matter with right now?' he asks. 'It's O.K. with me,' I says. He turns to the girls. 'Wait right here,' he says to them. He turns back to me an' takes my arm. 'Come on,' he says, draggin' me off. 'Come up to my office.'

"I look at him in surprise. 'You got an office here in the Waldorf,' I ask him. 'I got an office in every hotel in the United States,' he says. We get on an elevator an' he says 'Mezzanine, please.' We get off and walk down the hall to a door. I look at the sign. 'Gentlemen,' it says. I look at him. He grins. 'My office,' he says, opening the door. We go inside an' it's white and empty. There's a table there and a chair for the attendant. He sits down in the chair and suddenly I see he's very sober, he's not smiling now.

" 'I haven't decided yet where I'm going to release the picture,' he says. 'It all depends on where I can get the best deal.' 'That's smart thinking.' I says, 'but I really can't talk until I know what your picture is about.' 'I'll tell you,' he says. 'It's about the fliers in the World War. I bought up about fifty old planes – Spads, Fokkers, Nieuports, De Havillands – and I figger on havin' a ball flyin' the wings off them.'

" 'Oh, a war picture,' I says. 'That's not so good. War pictures is dead since All Quiet on the Western Front . Nobody'll come to see them. But since I got experience with you and we was lucky together, I might go along for the ride. What terms you looking for?' He looks me in the eye. 'Studio overhead, ten per cent,' he says. 'Distribution, fifteen per cent with all expenses deducted from the gross before calculating the distribution fees.' 'That's impossible,' I says. 'My overhead runs minimum twenty-five per cent.'

" 'It doesn't,' he says, 'but I won't quibble about it. I just want to point out some simple arithmetic to you. According to your annual report, your overhead during the past few years averaged twenty-one per cent. During that period, The Renegade contributed twenty-five per cent of your gross. Deduct that from your gross and you'll find your overhead's up to almost thirty-six per cent. The same thing applies to the studio,' he says. 'Volume governs the percentages and if I supply the volume, I shouldn't be burdened with ordinary percentages. I want some of the gravy, as you picture people call it.'

" 'I couldn't afford it,' I says. 'The way the picture business is going,' he says, 'you can't afford not to.' 'My board of directors would never approve it,' I says. He gets up, smiling. 'They will,' he says. 'Give 'em a couple of years an' they will. Why don't you take a piss long as you're here,' he says. I’m so surprised I walk over to the urinal. When I turn around, he's already gone. The next morning, before I get on the train, I try to locate him but nobody seems to know where he is. His office don't even know he's in New York. He disappeared completely." Bernie looked down at his desk. "A real meshuggeneh , I tell you."

David smiled. "I told you he'd learn fast. His arithmetic is right, you know."

His uncle looked up at him. "Don't you think I know it's right?" he asked. "But is he so poor that I have to give him bread from my own mouth?"

"If you'll follow me, sir," the butler said politely. "Miss Marlowe is in the solarium."

David nodded and followed silently up the staircase and to the back of the house. The butler halted before a door and knocked.

"Mr. Woolf is here, mum."

"Tell him to come in," Rina called through the closed door.