Plaintiffs appeal from summary judgments entered in these two consolidated antitrust actions in favor of the defendants Brunswick Corporation and A.B. Malouf.

In 1960 Malouf granted a 25 year lease of improved real property in Los Angeles, California, to Richard Dow and wife on a rental payable in monthly installments. The Dows immediately assigned the lease to Matador Bowl, Inc., a corporation which they had organized to conduct a bowling alley and restaurant on the premises. To that end Matador then purchased from Brunswick, on conditional sales contracts, the necessary bowling alleys, pinsetters, etc., and apparently purchased from third parties restaurant and bar equipment.

The business failed to prosper. On December 29, 1965, Matador was adjudged a bankrupt, and Curtis B. Danning, the plaintiff in No. 26,448 was appointed and qualified as trustee to administer the estate. At that time Matador was heavily in arrears in its installment payments on the lease and a substantial balance remained owing on the conditional sales contracts. The intervention of bankruptcy prevented Malouf and Brunswick from retaking their property, at least until Matador's trustee had been afforded the opportunity provided by Section 70(b) of the Bankruptcy Act to either continue the contracts in force or to relinquish them;1 but both were naturally anxious to salvage as much as they could from the venture and to protect their respective investments. So it was that Brunswick approached Malouf with a proposition that if Danning, the trustee, did not assert the right to assume the lease and conditional sales contracts that Brunswick would lease Malouf's property. Thus, Malouf would be assured of a solvent tenant and Brunswick would not have to remove its equipment and could and would continue the operation on the premises.2 Malouf agreed and, on January 27, 1966, approximately a month after Matador's adjudication, he executed a lease to Brunswick. This lease, however, was not to be effective unless the trustee rejected the existing lease between Malouf and Matador's assignors.

Emanuel Levy, the plaintiff in 26,449, was a shareholder in another Los Angeles bowling center. Shortly after Matador's adjudication, and within the 60 day period allowed by Sec. 70(b), Levy sought to negotiate with Brunswick for the bowling equipment. The details of the discussions are in dispute but it is clear from the record that Brunswick rejected all of Levy's proposals; although Levy also made inquiries of the trustee about the matter, it is equally clear that he made no attempt to deal with the trustee for either the lease or the bowling equipment.

The trustee did nothing to assume the lease or the contracts and in April 1966, more than 60 days following Matador's adjudication, conducted a sale of the bankrupt's remaining assets. These, of course, did not include the lease or the bowling equipment, because the trustee, by his nonaction, was deemed to have rejected the contracts and lease and to have relinquished whatever interest the estate had in those properties.

However, immediately before the sale was commenced, Levy and the trustee nevertheless demanded that Brunswick turn over both the leased premises and the bowling fixtures to the person making the highest bid for the property that was being sold.3 Brunswick refused. The sale proceeded, Brunswick was the sole bidder, and the sale was thereafter confirmed by the referee.4

Plaintiffs' claims, as reflected in the complaints, are essentially similar; each is vested upon Sections 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act and Section 7 of the Clayton Act. In substance the trustee and Levy contend that Malouf and Brunswick, by their lease, conspired to foreclose acquisition of the Matador business at the trustee's sale by anyone but Brunswick and enhanced Brunswick's monopoly in the bowling business.5

The basic defect in these contentions, briefly stated, lies in the fact that at the time of the sale the trustee had no business to sell. He had not seen fit nor taken the steps necessary to preserve the business as an integral unit, but had allowed the major components to revert to the creditor-owners.6 Thus, neither Malouf nor Brunswick were obliged to accede to the trustee's demands.

Nor do the antitrust laws make unlawful either Malouf's choice of tenant for his property, or Brunswick's refusal to allow Levy to take over the purchase contracts on which Matador had defaulted. After the trustee had rejected the lease and conditional sales contracts, Malouf and Brunswick were free to deal with each other or with anyone else, or not to deal at all, so long as their refusal to deal with Levy did not restrain trade. Compare Bushie v. Stenocord Corp., 460 F.2d 116 (9th Cir. 1972), Ricchetti v. Meister Brau, Inc., 431 F.2d 1211 (9th Cir. 1970), cert. denied, 401 U.S. 939, 91 S. Ct. 934, 28 L. Ed. 2d 219, and Jos. E. Seagram & Sons, Inc. v. Hawaiian Oke & Liquors, Ltd., 416 F.2d 71 (9th Cir. 1969), cert. denied, 396 U.S. 1062, 90 S. Ct. 752, 24 L. Ed. 2d 755, reh. denied, 397 U.S. 1003, 90 S. Ct. 1113, 25 L. Ed. 2d 415, with Poller v. Columbia Broadcasting System, Inc., 368 U.S. 464, 82 S. Ct. 486, 7 L. Ed. 2d 458 (1962), United States v. Parke, Davis & Co., 362 U.S. 29, 80 S. Ct. 503, 4 L. Ed. 2d 505 (1960), and Lessig v. Tidewater Oil Co., 327 F.2d 459 (9th Cir. 1964), cert. denied, 377 U.S. 993, 84 S. Ct. 1920, 12 L. Ed. 2d 1046. None of the facts appearing in this record permit an inference that Malouf and Brunswick conspired to restrain trade, or that Brunswick's operation of a bowling center at the Matador site would affect competition in the relevant market in the Los Angeles area.7

"While we recognize the importance of preserving litigants' rights to a trial on their claims, we are not prepared to extend those rights to the point of requiring that anyone who files an antitrust complaint setting forth a valid cause of action be entitled to a full-dress trial notwithstanding the absence of any significant probative evidence tending to support the complaint." First National Bank v. Cities Service Co., 391 U.S. 253, 290, 88 S. Ct. 1575, 1593, 20 L. Ed. 2d 569 (1968). We conclude that the summary judgments were properly granted.

The judgments are affirmed.