The Last Heroes (Men at War 1)

‘‘Right,’’ Canidy said.

‘‘Arson?’’ Jim said, absolutely fascinated.

‘‘Arson and inflicting grievous bodily harm with an explosive device,’’ Canidy, smiling broadly, explained. ‘‘A kid named Fulmar and I stood accused of trying to burn down Cedar Rapids, and of trying to blow up a teacher. We were in jail about to undergo ‘rehabilitation’ for what a fat lady in charge called our ‘societal problem,’ when out of the west, on his white horse, comes Mr. Fine, who got us out. I stand forever in your debt, sir.’’

‘‘My pleasure, Mr. Canidy,’’ Fine said, smiling at the memory.

‘‘How did he get you out?’’ Jim asked. ‘‘How come I don’t know this story?’’

‘‘It was a painful memory,’’ Canidy said. ‘‘You should have seen the fat lady. It wasn’t the sort of thing one talked about.’’

‘‘It wasn’t all that difficult,’’ Fine said, laughing. ‘‘All it took was a new Studebaker.’’

He and Canidy laughed aloud.

‘‘A new Studebaker?’’ Chesty asked, confused.

‘‘To replace the one he and Fulmar blew up,’’ Fine said.

‘‘I want to hear about this in some detail, of course,’’ Chesty Whittaker said, chuckling. ‘‘But right now there’s not the time. Save it for later.’’

‘‘How is Dr. Canidy?’’ Fine asked.

‘‘Very well, thank you,’’ Canidy said.

‘‘Everybody’s staying here tonight, right?’’ Chesty said. ‘‘So we won’t have the problem of moving people around?’’

Everybody nodded.

"Then all Jim and I have to do is get dressed," Whittaker said.

The Mayflower Club Washington, D.C. 10:20 P.M., June 16, 1941

Stanley S. Fine, vice president, legal, Continental Studios, Inc., swung his gaze in some surprise around the dining room of the Mayflower Club. The club was not nearly as elegant as Fine would have imagined. Tables had uneven legs, and the wallpaper was peeling in spots. There were indeed far more elegant places in California, with food at least as good. But there was an ambience here that the more elegant places he knew simply did not have—an ambience born of white Anglo-Saxon money and power, an ambience that practically screamed at Stanley Fine: ‘‘You have no right to be here. You are to us an outsider forever.’’ But Stanley was equally aware that here he damned well was, and he was also certain that he was absolutely right about doing it.

When he returned to Los Angeles, he knew, he might have some explaining to do. He might even have some problems with some other people’s overly tender—but no less important—feelings. He would have to tell his wife, for instance, that he had managed to invade WASP heaven. And through his wife, news would reach his employer’s wife and in due course the ears of Max Lieberman.

‘‘Max,’’ his aunt Sophie would say to Max Lieberman, founder and chairman of the board of Continental Studios, Inc., ‘‘you wouldn’t believe what Shirley told me. When Stanley was in Washington, Mr. Chesley not only had him in his own house, but—would you believe it!—he took him to the Mayflower Club!’’

Not long ago (until the federal government broke its system up) Continental Studios had owned substantially all of its motion-picture theaters. And Whittaker Construction had designed and built virtually all of them.

In New York and in other large cities, these theaters were usually housed within office buildings. And these buildings were usually owned by corporations in which Continental Studios, Whittaker Properties, and other interested parties held a controlling interest. The government’s successful antitrust suit against the studios had affected the ownership of the theaters, but not the control of the real estate they were part of. Colonel William B. Donovan’s law firm had worked out an agreement with the Justice Department, which had softened somewhat the governmental edict that flatly forbade motion-picture studios to own or control motion-picture theaters. Thus, so long as real estate owned by Continental was managed by a third party (in this case, Whittaker Properties) which had no interests in motion-picture production, the studio would not have to sell its stock in corporations (in a Depression-lowered real estate market) which happened to own buildings which happened to house movie theaters.

It was an unlikely alliance, but Continental Studios and Whittaker Properties—and therefore Max Lieberman and Chesley Haywood Whittaker—were in business together.

Max Lieberman had met Chesley Whittaker a dozen times in Washington, D.C., but he had neither been in the house on Q Street nor a guest at the Mayflower Club. Money wouldn’t get you in the door. A German-Jewish accent would certainly keep you out.

Would Uncle Max be hurt that Stanley had made it where he himself could not go? Or would he conclude with his customary immodesty that it was one more proof that he’d been right to spend whatever it had cost to get Stanley into Harvard Law?

One of Uncle Max’s dozens of profound philosophical observations—‘‘It’s really a small world, isn’t it?’’— seemed to be proved again tonight. Stanley S. Fine was in Washington to deal with a problem involving Eric Fulmar.

As vice president, legal, of Continental Studios, Inc., Stanley Fine’s duties were rather simple. He actually practiced very little law himself. It was another tenet of Max Lieberman’s philosophy that ‘‘it was cheaper in the long run to go first class.’’ As applied to matters legal, this meant the retention of the best law firms available to deal with specific problems.

Donovan’s firm, for example, was retained by Continental to deal primarily with the federal government. Other firms handled labor relations, finance, artists’ contracts, libel and slander, copyright, and the myriad other specialized fields of law with which the production of motion pictures was involved.

Stanley Fine had two functions, and for these he was paid very generously: to have at his fingertips the status of whatever of Continental’s legal affairs Uncle Max had that moment wondered about; and, more important, to have a fast answer when Uncle Max looked over a document and demanded, ‘‘Stanley, what the hell does this mean?’’

It wasn’t as simple as it sounded. Max Lieberman was by no means the fool he often seemed to be. The questions he asked were often penetrating, and almost always demonstrated his uncanny ability to ‘‘look for the dry rot under the varnish.’’