have loaded up with that stuff, anyway; you'd have seen at a glance that
it was rotten.

"Now, I've shown what I can do with those stories. I've taken your bad
bargain and put it into a money-making shape. As to the break I made in
getting those boys out here, you'll have to show me--that's all. They
seem, to have made good all right, judging from the way that film took
with the crowd. And if you ask my opinion as a director, they beat any
near-professional on the Acme pay roll. My work, and their work, goes
right along as it has started--or it stops. If you want those stories
worked up in a lot of darned, sickly, slush melodrama, you can set some
simp at it that don't know any better." Luck stopped and shut his teeth
together against some personal remarks that he would later feel ashamed
of having uttered. He turned to the door, swallowed hard, and forced
himself to a dignified calm before he spoke again.

"You know my phone number, Mart. By seven in the morning I'll expect to
hear from you. You can tell me then whether I'm to go ahead with these
stories the way I've started, or whether to pull out of the Company
altogether. One or the other. I'll want to know in the morning." Then
he went out.

"Dammit, who's running this company--you or I?" Martinson called
after him heatedly. But Luck was already standing on the steps and
hoisting his umbrella against the drizzle, and he did not give any
sign that he heard.