“Sixty-five percent. I’ve read the contract. The distributor gets the rest. That would be us.”

“That would be Paramount.”

“No, that would be us,” McAdoo said, pleasantly. “You’ve donated your company’s services to the war effort, as per your terms of contract with the Division of Film. I’m sure you wouldn’t be violating those terms.”

“Certainly not,” Zukor said. “Are you questioning my patriotism, sir?”

“Do I sound like it? Gosh, I hope not.” McAdoo clapped his hands together, a man who knew things could be worked out. “Because withholding what belongs to the government during wartime would be treasonous, of course.”

Zukor pushed a button on a desk and called into his intercom, “Send in Miss Zoe Chambers.” The far door opened. McAdoo heard the sound of heels shuffling across the carpet, and then there appeared one of the ten most beautiful women he had ever seen, blushing with fear, and smoothing out her skirt upon her arrival at Zukor’s desk.

“Miss Chambers. Please fetch us the books relating to the Creel Committee films.”

She hesitated. “Which volumes, Mr. Zukor?”

“All of them. Of course.”

Miss Chambers’s eyes widened in anticipation that the slightest delay would have unspeakable repercussions. She was relieved that Zukor had not called her into the mauve room.

When she was gone, Zukor said, distractedly, “The Creel pictures haven’t earned a cent.”

“Excuse me?”

“They’ve been disasters.”

“They’ve earned hundreds of thousands, Mr. Zukor.”

“I’m afraid they haven’t,” he sighed. “When you strike the exhibitor’s cut, that leaves you with a much smaller percentage. After the studio expenses that are nonspecific to the films, we actually took a loss—a very small, to be sure, but a highly patriotic loss—on your films.”

McAdoo looked as if Zukor had slipped him a rubber penny. “I find that hard to believe.”

“It’s a complex business.”

“I’m paying for a war right now. That’s complex business.”

“That might not be as complex as making movies.”

McAdoo leaned back in his chair. The chair back was more distant than he had judged, and the angle he was sitting in an obtuse slouch, so he returned to hovering at the edge of his seat. “All right, then, Mr. Zukor. Explain how our handing you three free films, which brought in almost half a million dollars—and did I mention they were free?—cost you money.”