Your bride's a very pretty girl."
"You know her?"
"No," Rina answered quickly. "I saw the pictures in the papers."
"Oh," I said. "Thanks. But that isn't why you called."
"No, it's not," she said with her usual directness. "I need your help."
"If it's another ten you need, I can always let you have it."
"It's for more money than that. Much more."
"How much more?"
"Two million dollars."
"What?" I all but yelled. "What the hell do you need that much money for?"
"It's not for myself," she said. Her voice sounded very upset. "It's for Nevada.
He's in a bind. He's about to lose everything he's got."
"But I thought he was doing great.
The papers say he's making a half million dollars a year."
"He is," Rina said. "But- "
"But what?" I pulled out a cigarette and fished around for a match.
I knew Monica saw me but she kept her nose buried in the magazine. "I’m listening," I said, dragging on the cigarette.
"Nevada's hocked everything he has to make a picture.
He's been working on it for over a year and now everything's gone wrong and they don't want to release it."
"Why?" I asked.
"Is it a stinker?"
"No," she said quickly. "It's not that.
It's great.
But only talking pictures are going. That's all the theaters will play."
"Why didn't he make a talking picture to start with?" I asked.
"He started it more than a year ago. Nobody expected talkies to come in the way they did," she answered.
"Now the bank's calling his loan and Norman won't advance any more money.
He claims he's stuck with his own pictures."
"I see," I said.
"You've got to help him, Jonas.
His whole life is wrapped up in this picture.
If he loses it, he'll never get over it."
"Nevada never cared that much about money," I said.
"It isn't the money," she said quickly. "It's the way he feels about this picture.
He believes in it. For once, he had a chance to show what the West was really like."
"Nobody gives a damn what the West was really like."
"Did you ever see one of his pictures?" she asked.
"No."
A shade of disbelief crept into her voice.
"Weren't you curious to see what he looked like on the screen?"
"Why should I be?" I asked.
"I know what he looks like."
Her voice went flat. "Are you going to help?"
"That's a lot of dough," I said. "Why should I?"
"I remember when you wanted something real bad and he gave it to you."
I knew what she was talking about. Nevada's stock interest in Cord Explosives.
"It didn't cost him two million bucks," I said.
"It didn't?" she asked. "What's it worth now?"
That stopped me for a moment.
Maybe it wasn't yet, but in five more years it would be.