The SF Hall of Fame Volume Two B (63 page)

The banning that occurred in the various states hurt the
gross receipts only a little, and we were vindicated in Johnson's mind. He had dolefully
predicted loss of half the national gross because "you can't tell the
truth in a movie and get away with it. Not if the house holds over three
hundred." Not even on the stage? "Who goes to anything but a
movie?"

So far things had gone just about as we'd planned. We'd
earned and received more publicity, favorable and otherwise, than anyone
living. Most of it stemmed from the fact that our doing had been newsworthy.
Some, naturally, had been the ninety-day-wonder material that fills a thirsty
newspaper. We had been very careful to make our enemies in the strata that can
afford to fight back. Remember the old saw about knowing a man by the enemies
he makes? Well, publicity was our ax. Here's how we put an edge on it.

I called Johnson in Hollywood. He was glad to hear from us.
"Long time no see. What's the pitch, Ed?"

"I want some lip readers. And I want them yesterday,
like you tell your boys."

"Lip readers? Are you nuts? What do you want with lip
readers?"

"Never mind why. I want lip readers. Can you get
them?"

"How should I know? What do you want them for?"

"I said, can you get them?"

He was doubtful. "I think you've been working too
hard."

"Look-"

"Now, I didn't say I couldn't. Cool off. When do you
want them? And how many?"

"Better write this down. Ready? I want lip readers from
these languages: English, French, German, Russian, Chinese, Japanese, Greek,
Belgian, Dutch and Spanish."

"Ed Lefko, have you gone crazy?"

I guess it didn't sound very sensible, at that. "Maybe
I have. But those languages are essential. If you run across any who can work
in any other language, hang on to them. I might need them, too." I could
see him sitting in front of his telephone, wagging his head like mad. Crazy.
The heat must have got Lefko, good old Ed. "Did you hear what I
said?"

"Yes, I heard you. If this is a rib—"

"No rib. Dead serious."

He began to get mad. "Where you think I'm going to get lip
readers, out of my hat?"

"That's your worry. I'd suggest you start with the
local School for the Deaf." He was silent. "Now, get this into your
head; this isn't a rib, this is the real thing. I don't care what you do, or
where you go, or what you spend—I want those lip readers in Hollywood when we
get there or I want to know they're on the way."

"When are you going to get there?"

I said I wasn't sure. "Probably a day or two. We've got
a few loose ends to clean up."

He swore a blue streak at the iniquities of fate.
"You'd better have a good story when you do—" I hung up.

Mike met me at the studio. "Talk to Johnson?" I
told him, and he laughed. "Does sound crazy, I suppose. But he'll get
them, if they exist and like money. He's the Original Resourceful Man."

I tossed my hat in a corner. "I'm glad this is about
over. Your end caught up?"

"Set and ready to go. The films and the notes are on
the way, the real estate company is ready to take over the lease, and the girls
are paid up to date, with a little extra."

I opened a bottle of beer for myself. Mike had one.
"How about the office files? How about the bar, here?"

"The files go to the bank to be stored. The bar? Hadn't
thought about it."

The beer was cold. "Have it crated and send it to
Johnson."

We grinned, together. "Johnson it is. He'll need
it."

I nodded at the machine. "What about that?"

"That goes with us on the plane as air express."
He looked closely at me. "What's the matter with you—jitters?"

"Nope. Willies. Same thing."

"Me, too. Your clothes and mine left this
morning."

"Not even a clean shirt left?"

"Not even a clean shirt. Just like—"

I finished it. "—the first trip with Ruth. A little
different, maybe."

Mike said slowly, "A lot different." I opened
another beer. "Anything you want around here, anything else to be
done?" I said no. "O.K. Let's get this over with. We'll put what we
need in the car. We'll stop at the Courville Bar before we hit the
airport."

I didn't get it. "There's still beer left-"

"But no champagne."

I got it. "O.K. I'm dumb, at times. Let's go."

We loaded the machine into the car, and the bar, left the
studio keys at the corner grocery for the real estate company, and headed for
the airport by way of the Courville Bar. Ruth was in California, but Joe had
champagne. We got to the airport late.

Marrs met us in Los Angeles. "What's up? You've got
Johnson running around in circles."

"Did he tell you why?"

"Sounds crazy to me. Couple of reporters inside. Got
anything for them?"

"Not right now. Let's get going."

In Johnson's private office we got a chilly reception.
"This better be good. Where do you expect to find someone to lipread in
Chinese? Or Russian, for that matter?"

We all sat down. "What have you got so far?"

"Besides a headache?" He handed me a short list.

I scanned it. "How long before you can get them
here?"

An explosion. "How long before you can get them here?
Am I your errand boy?"

"For all practical purposes you are. Quit the fooling.
How about it?" Marrs snickered at the look on Johnson's face.

"What are you smirking at, you moron?" Marrs gave
in and laughed outright, and I did, too. "Go ahead and laugh. This isn't
funny. When I called the State School for the Deaf they hung up. Thought I was
some practical joker. We'll skip that.

"There's three women and a man on that list. They cover
English, French, Spanish, and German. Two of them are working in the East, and
I'm waiting for answers to telegrams I sent them. One lives in Pomona and one
works for the Arizona School for the Deaf. That's the best I could do."

We thought that over. "Get on the phone. Talk to every
state in the union if you have to, or overseas."

Johnson kicked the desk. "And what are you going to do
with them, if I'm that lucky?"

"You'll find out. Get them on planes and fly them here,
and we'll talk turkey when they get here. I want a projection room, not yours,
and a good bonded court reporter."

He asked the world to appreciate what a life he led.

"Get in touch with us at the Commodore." To Marrs:
"Keep the reporters away for a while. We'll have something for them
later." Then we left.

Johnson never did find anyone who could lipread Greek. None,
at least, that could speak English. The expert on Russian he dug out of
Ambridge, in Pennsylvania, the Flemish and Holland Dutch expert came from
Leyden, in the Netherlands, and at the last minute he stumbled upon a Korean
who worked in Seattle as an inspector for the Chinese Government. Five women
and two men. We signed them to an ironclad contract drawn by Samuels, who now
handled all our legal work. I made a little speech before they signed.

"These contracts, as far as we've been able to make
sure, are going to control your personal and business life for the next year,
and there's a clause that says we can extend that period for another year if we
so desire. Let's get this straight. You are to live in a place of your own,
which we will provide. You will be supplied with all necessities by our buyers.
Any attempt at unauthorized communication will result in abrogation of the
contract. Is that clear?

"Good. Your work will not be difficult, but it will be
tremendously important. You will, very likely, be finished in three months, but
you will be ready to go any place at any time at our discretion, naturally at
our expense. Mr. Sorenson, as you are taking this down, you realize that this
goes for you, too." He nodded.

"Your references, your abilities, and your past work
have been thoroughly checked, and you will continue under constant observation.
You will be required to verify and notarize every page, perhaps every line, of
your transcripts, which Mr. Sorenson here will supply. Any questions?"

No questions. Each was getting a fabulous salary, and each
wanted to appear eager to earn it. They all signed.

Resourceful Johnson bought for us a small rooming house, and
we paid an exorbitant price to a detective agency to do the cooking and
cleaning and chauffeuring required. We requested that the lip-readers refrain
from discussing their work among themselves, especially in front of the house
employees, and they followed instructions very well.

One day, about a month later, we called a conference in the
projection room of Johnson's laboratory. We had a single reel of film.

"What's that for?"

"That's the reason for all the cloak-and-dagger
secrecy. Never mind calling your projection man. This I'm going to run through
myself. See what you think of it."

They were all disgusted. "I'm getting tired of all this
kid stuff," said Kessler.

As I started for the projection booth I heard Mike say,
"You're no more tired of it than I am."

From the booth I could see what was showing on the
downstairs screen, but nothing else. I ran through the reel, rewound, and went
back down.

I said, "One more thing, before we go any further read
this. It's a certified and notarized transcript of what has been read from the
lips of the characters you just saw. They weren't, incidentally, 'characters,'
in that sense of the word." I handed the crackling sheets around, a copy
for each. "Those 'characters' are real people. You've just seen a
newsreel. This transcript will tell you what they were talking about. Read it.
In the trunk of the car Mike and I have something to show you. We'll be back by
the time you've read it."

Mike helped me carry in the machine from the car. We came in
the door in time to see Kessler throw the transcript as far as he could. He
bounced to his feet as the sheets fluttered down.

He was furious. "What's going on here?" We paid no
attention to him, nor to the excited demands of the others until the machine
had been plugged into the nearest outlet.

Mike looked at me. "Any ideas?"

I shook my head and told Johnson to shut up for a minute.
Mike lifted the lid and hesitated momentarily before he touched the dials. I
pushed Johnson into his chair and turned off the Ughts myself. The room went
black. Johnson, looking over my shoulder, gasped. I heard Bernstein swear
softly, amazed.

I turned to see what Mike had shown them.

It was impressive, all right. He had started just over the
roof of the laboratory and continued straight up in the air. Up, up, up, until
the city of Los Angeles was a tiny dot on a great ball. On the horizon were the
Rockies. Johnson grabbed my arm. He hurt.

"What's that? What's that? Stop it!" He was
yelling. Mike turned off the machine.

You can guess what happened next. No one believed their
eyes, nor Mike's patient explanation. He had to twice turn on the machine again,
once going far back into Kessler's past. Then the reaction set in.

Marrs smoked one cigarette after another, Bernstein turned a
gold pencil over and over in his nervous fingers, Johnson paced like a caged
tiger, and burly Kessler stared at the machine, saying nothing at all. Johnson
was muttering as he paced. Then he stopped and shook his fist under Mike's
nose.

"Man! Do you know what you've got there? Why waste time
playing around here? Can't you see you've got the world by the tail on a
downhill pull? If I'd ever known this—"

Mike appealed to me. "Ed, talk to this wildman."

I did. I can't remember exactly what I said, and it isn't
important. But I did tell him how we'd started, how we'd plotted our course,
and what we were going to do. I ended by telling him the idea behind the reel
of film I'd run off a minute before.

He recoiled as though I were a snake. "You can't get
away with that! You'd be hung—if you weren't lynched first!"

"Don't you think we know that? Don't you think we're
willing to take that chance?"

He tore his thinning hair. Marrs broke in. "Let me talk
to him." He came over and faced us squarely.

"Is this on the level? You going to make a picture like
that and stick your neck out? You're going to turn that. . . that thing over to
the people of the world?"

I nodded. "Just that."

"And toss over everything you've got?" He was dead
serious, and so was I. He turned to the others. "He means it!"

Bernstein said, "Can't be done!"

Words flew. I tried to convince them that we had followed
the only possible path. "What kind of a world do you want to live in? Or
don't you want to live?"

Johnson grunted. "How long do you think we'd live if we
ever made a picture like that? You're crazy! I'm not. I'm not going to put my
head in a noose."

"Why do you think we've been so insistent about credit
and responsibility for direction and production? You'll be doing only what we
hired you for. Not that we want to twist your arm, but you've made a fortune,
all of you, working for us. Now, when the going gets heavy, you want to back
out!"

Marrs gave in. "Maybe you're right, maybe you're wrong.
Maybe you're crazy, maybe I am. I always used to say I'd try anything once.
Bernie, you?"

Bernstein was quietly cynical. "You saw what happened
in the last war. This might help. I don't know if it will. I don't know—but I'd
hate to think I didn't try. Count me in!"

Kessler?

He swiveled his head. "Kid stuff! Who wants to live
forever? Who wants to let a chance go by?"

Johnson threw up his hands. "Let's hope we get a cell
together. Let's all go crazy." And that was that.

We went to work in a blazing drive of mutual hope and understanding.
In four months the lipreaders were through. There's no point in detailing here
their reactions to the dynamite they daily dictated to Sorenson. For their own
good we kept them in the dark about our final purpose, and when they were
through we sent them across the border into Mexico, to a small ranch Johnson
had leased. We were going to need them later.