Read Online The Dream Merchants by Harold Robbins - Free Book Online Page A

from a chair, laboriously got into it. After a few unsteady steps toward the bathroom, he turned back toward the bed. He looked down at the girl for a few seconds, then he leaned forward and picked up the end of the blanket.
    The girl stirred and turned toward him. “Johnny,” she murmured softly, still asleep. She had nothing on.
    Memories of her body, warm against him, flooded through his mind. He let the blanket fall and staggered to the bathroom.
    He shut the door and turned on the light. It hurt his eyes. He went over to the washbowl and turned on the cold water. The basin filled rapidly. He leaned over it, hesitated a second, then plunged his head into the cold water.
    At last he began to feel better. He picked up a towel and dried himself. He looked in the mirror over the washbowl and ran his hand over his face. He needed a shave, but there wasn’t time for it.
    He went back to the bedroom and dressed, then silently left the house without waking anyone. The morning air was clean and invigorating. He took out his watch and looked at it. It was six thirty. He’d have to hurry if he wanted to make the early train to Rochester.

7
    Johnny came into the kitchen. It was warm and cozy in there, the big stove throwing off waves of heat. “Where’s Peter?” he asked.
    Esther put the cover back on the pot of soup and turned to look at him. “He went out for a walk,” she told him.
    He looked at her in surprise. “In this weather?” he asked, going to the window and looking out. The snow was still coming down heavily; the street was already covered with drifts. He turned back to her. “There must be almost three feet of snow out there.”
    She made a helpless gesture with her hands. “I told him,” she said quietly, “but he went anyway. He’s been so restless the last few days.”
    Johnny nodded his head understandingly. He had noticed Peter’s restlessness himself ever since they had to close down the nickelodeon three days ago because of the heavy snowfall. The summer had been profitable, but now the first snow of winter had closed them up.
    Esther looked at him. Her mind was still on Peter. “I don’t know what got into him lately,” she said half to herself. “He was never like this before.”
    Johnny dropped into a chair in front of her. His brows knitted together puzzledly. “What do you mean?” he asked.
    Her eyes looked directly into his as if the answer to her problem lay there. “Since the nickelodeon opened, he’s changed,” she said slowly. “A little business more or less never bothered him before; now every morning he stands at the window and curses the snow. ‘It’s costing us money,’ he says.”
    Johnny smiled. “It ain’t that bad,” he said. “In the carny we knew that the sun can’t shine every day. It’s all in the business.”
    “I told him we shouldn’t complain, we were lucky so far; but he only ignored what I said and went out.” She sat down in the chair opposite Johnny and looked down at her hands folded in her lap. When she looked up at him again, her eyes had filled with tears. “It seems almost like I don’t know him any more. Like he’s a different person, a stranger. I remember back in New York when Doris was a baby and the doctor told us the only way she would get back her health was if we took her out of the city. Peter sold the business there and came out here without a second’s hesitation. Now I’m beginning to wonder if he would do a thing like that again.”
    Johnny shifted uncomfortably in his seat. He was embarrassed by the sudden flood of her confidence. “He’s been working pretty hard lately,” he said, trying to comfort her. “It isn’t the easiest thing in the world trying to run two businesses at once.”
    A sudden smile at his poor attempt to console her broke through her tears. “Don’t tell me that, Johnny,” she said softly. “I know better. Since you come back he hasn’t had to do a thing in the nickelodeon.”
    Johnny’s