 CHAPTER V. A BREACH IN THE CITY WALLS. During these weeks of waiting outside the gate the little woman beyond the window had continued to be friendly but not encouraging to the aspirant for screen honors late of Simsbury, Illinois. For three weeks he had waited faithfully always within call, struggling and sacrificing to give the public something better and finer, and not once had he so much as crossed the line that led to his goal. Then on a Monday morning he found the waiting room empty and his friend beyond the window suffering the pangs of headache. It gets me something fierce right through here, she confided to him, placing her fingertips to her temples. Ever use Iso-pain wafers he demanded in quick sympathy? She looked at him hopefully. Never heard of him. Let me get you some. You, dear thing, fly to it. He was gone while she reached for her purse, hurrying along the eucalyptus-lined street of choice-home sites to the nearest drugstore. He was fearing someone else might bring the little woman another remedy, even that her headache might go before he returned with his. But he found her still suffering. Here they are. He was breathless. You take a couple now and a couple more in a half an hour if the ache hasn't stopped. Bless your heart. Come around inside. He was through the door and in the dimly-lit little office behind the secretive partition. And here's something else he continued. It's a menthol pencil and you take this cap off, see, and you rub your forehead with it. It'll be a help. She swallowed two of the magic wafers with the aid of water from the cooler and applied the menthol. You're a deer, she said, patting his sleeve. I feel better already. Sometimes these things come on me and stay all day. She was still applying the menthol to throbbing temples. Say, don't you get tired hanging around outside there? How'd you like to go in and look around the lot? Would you like that? Would he? Thanks! He managed it without choking. If I wouldn't be in the way. You won't. Go on. Amuse yourself. The telephone rang. Still applying the menthol, she held the receiver to her ear. No, nothing to-day, dear. Say, Marie, did you ever take easel-pane wafers for a headache? Keep them in mind. They're great. Yes, I'll let you know if anything breaks. Goodbye, dear. Merton Gill hurried through a narrow corridor past offices where typewriters clicked and burst from gloom into the dazzling light of the Holden lot. He paused on the steps to reassure himself that the great adventure was genuine. There was the full stretch of green-sward of which only an edge had shown as he looked through the gate. There were the vast, yellow brick, glass-topped structures of which he had seen but the ends. And there was the street-up which he had looked for so many weeks, flanked by rows of offices and dressing-rooms, and lively with the passing of many people. He drew a long breath and became calculating. He must see everything and see it methodically. He even went now along the asphalt walk to the corner of the office building from which he had issued for the privilege of looking back at the gate through which he had so often yearningly stared from across the street. Now he was securely inside looking out. The watchman sat at the gate bent low over his paper. There was it seemed more than one way to get by him. People might have headaches almost any time. He wondered if his friend the casting director were subject to them. He must carry a box of the easel-wafers. He strolled down the street between the rows of offices and the immense covered stages. Actors in costume entered two of these and through their open doors he could see into their shadowy interiors. He would venture there later. Just now he wished to see the outside of things. He contrived a pace not too swift but business-like enough to convey the impression that he was rightfully walking this forbidden street. He seemed to be going someplace where it was of the utmost importance that he should be and yet to have started so early that there was no need for haste. He sounded the far end of that long street visible from the outside gate, discovering its excitements to wane gently into mere blacksmiths and carpenter shops. He retraced his steps, this time ignoring the long row of offices for the opposite line of stages. From one dark interior came the slow, dulled strains of an orchestra and from another shots rang out. He met or passed strangely attired people, bandits, priests, choir boys, gentlemen in evening dress with blue black eyebrows and careful hair. And he observed many beautiful young women, variously attired, hurrying to or from the stages. One lovely thing was in a bridal dress of dazzling white, a veil of lace floating from her blonde head, her long train held up by a colored maid. She chatted amably as she crossed the street with an evil-looking Mexican in a silver-corded hat, a veritable snake levasquez. But the stages could wait. He must see more streets. Again reaching the office that had been his secret gateway to these delights, he turned to the right, still with the air of having business at a certain spot to which there was really no need for him to hurry. There were fewer people this way and presently as if by magic carpet he had left all that sunlight and glitter and cheerful noise and stood alone in the shadowy, narrow street of a frontier town. There was no bustle here, only an intense stillness. The street was deserted, the shop doors closed. There was a ghost-like chilling effect that left him uneasy. He called upon himself to remember that he was not actually in a remote and desolate frontier town from which the inhabitants had fled, that back of him but a few steps was a bounding life that outside was the prosaic world passing and repassing a gate hard to enter. He whistled the fragment of a tune and went further along this street of uncanny silence and vacancy, noting as he went the signs on the shop windows. There was the Busy B Restaurant, Jim's Place, the Hotel Renone, the Last Dollar Dance Hall, Hank's Pool Room. Upon one window was painted the terse announcement, Joe, buy or sell. The happy day's bar adjoined the general store. He moved rapidly through this street. It was no place to linger. At the lower end it gave insanely upon a row of three-story brownstone houses which any picture patron would recognize as being holy of New York. There were the imposing steps, the double-doored entrances, the broad windows, the massive lines of the whole. And beyond this he came to a many-coloured little street out of Baghdad, overhung with gay balconies, vivacious with spindled towers and minarets, and small reticent windows out of which veiled ladies would glance, and all was still with a stillness of utter desertion. Then he explored farther and felt curiously disappointed at finding that these structures were to real houses what a dicky is to a sincere genuine shirt. They were pretentiously false. One had but to step behind them to discover them as poor shells. Their backs were jutting beams carried but little beyond the fronts, and their stout appearing walls were revealed to be fragile contrivances of button-lath and thin plaster. The ghost quality departed from them with this discovery. He left these cities of silence and came upon an open space and people. They were grouped before a railway station, a small red structure beside a line of railway track. At one end in black letters on a narrow white board was the name Boomerville. The people were plainly western, a dozen cowboys, a sprinkling of bluff ranchers and their families. An absorbed young man in cap and khaki and patis came from a distant group surrounding a camera and readjusted the line of these people. He placed them to his liking. A wagon drawn by two horses was driven up, and a rancher helped a woman and a girl to a light. The girl was at once sought out by the cowboys. They shook hands warmly under megaphone directions from a man backed by the camera. The rancher and his wife mingled with the group. The girl was drawn aside by one of the cowboys. He had a nobler presence than the others. He was handsome and his accoutrements seemed more expensive. They looked into each other's eyes a long time, apparently pledging an eternal fidelity. One gathered that there would have been an embrace but for the cowboys' watchful companions. They must say good-bye with a mere handshake, though this was a slow, trembling, long-drawn clasp while they steadily regarded each other, and a second camera was brought to record it at a distance of six feet. Merton Gill thrilled with the knowledge that he was beholding his first close-up. His long study of the photodrama enabled him to divine that the rancher's daughter was going to Vassar College to be educated but that, although returning a year later a poised woman of the world, she would still long for the handsome cowboy who would marry her and run the bar-ex ranch. The scene was done. The camera would next be turned upon a real train at some real station while the girl, with a final look at her lover, entered a real car which the camera would show moving off to Vassar College. Thus conveying to millions of delighted spectators the impression that a real train had steamed out of the station which was merely an imitation of one on the Holden lot. The watcher passed on. He could hear the cheerful drone of a sawmill where logs were being cut. He followed the sound and came to its source. The saw was at the end of an oblong pool in which logs floated. Workmen were polling these toward the saw. On a raised platform at one side was a camera and a man who gave directions through a megaphone. A neighboring platform held a second camera. A beautiful young girl in a print dress and her thick hair in a braid came bringing his dinner in a tin pail to the handsomest of the actors. He laid down his pike pole and took both the girl's hands in his as he received the pail. One of the other workmen, a hulking brute with an evil face, scowled darkly at this encounter and a moment later had insulted the beautiful young girl. But the first actor felled him with a blow. He came up from this, crouchingly, and the fight was on. Merton was excited by this fight even though he was in no doubt as to which actor would win it. They fought hard and for a time it appeared that the handsome actor must lose for the bully who had insulted the girl was a man of great strength, but the science of the other told. It was the first fight Merton had ever witnessed. He thought these men must really be hating each other so bitter were their expressions. The battle grew fiercer. It was splendid. Then, at the shrill note of a whistle, the panting combatants fell apart. �Rotten!� said an annoyed voice through the megaphone. �Can't you boys give me a little action? Jazz it! Jazz it! Think it's a love scene? Go to it now! Plenty of jazz! Understand what I mean?� he turned to the cameraman beside him. �Ed, you turn ten. We got to get some speed some way. Jack, to the other cameraman. You stay on twelve. All ready? Get some life into it now, and lay this to the handsome actor. Don't keep trying to hold your front to the machine. We'll get you all right. Ready now? Camera!� Again the fight was on. It went to a bitter finish in which the vanquished bully was sent with a powerful blow backward into the water, while the beautiful young girl ran to the victor and nestled in the protection of his strong arms. Merton Gill passed on. This was the real thing. He would have a lot to tell Tessie Kerns in his next letter. Beyond the sawmill he came to an immense wooden structure like a cradle on huge rockers supported by scaffolding. From the ground he could make nothing of it, but a ladder led to the top. An hour on the holden lot had made him bold. He mounted the ladder and stood on the deck of what he saw was a sea-going yacht. Three important looking men were surveying the deckhouse forward. They glanced at the newcomer but with a cheering absence of curiosity or even of interest. He sauntered past them with a polite but not too keen interest. The yacht would be an expensive one. The deck fittings were elaborate. A glance into the captain's cabin revealed it to be fully furnished with a chart and a sextant on the mahogany desk. �Where's the bedding for this state room?� asked one of the men. �I got a prop rustler after it,� one of the others informed him. They strolled aft and paused by an iron standard and geniusly swung from the deck. �That's Burke's idea,� said one of the men. �I hadn't thought about a steady support for the camera, of course, if we stood it on the deck it would rock when the ship rocked and we'd get no motion. So Burke figures this out. The camera is on here and swings by that weight so it's always straight and the rocking registers. Pretty neat, what? �That was nothing to think of,� said one of the other men in apparent disparagement. �I thought of it myself the minute I saw it.� The other two grinned at this, though Merton Gill, standing by, saw nothing to laugh at. He thought the speaker was pretty cheeky, for, of course, any one could think of this device after seeing it. He paused for a final survey of his surroundings from this elevation. He could see the real falseness of the sawmill he had just left. He could also look into the exposed rear of the railway station and could observe beyond it the exposed skeleton of that New York street. He was surrounded by mockeries. He clambered down the ladder and sauntered back to the street of offices. He was, by this time, confident that no one was going to ask him what right he had in there. Now, too, he became conscious of hunger and at the same moment caught the sign, Cafeteria, over a neat building hitherto unnoticed. People were entering this, many of them in costume. He went idly toward the door, glanced up, looked at his watch, and became to anyone curious about him a man who had that moment decided he might as well have a little food. He opened the screen door of the cafeteria, half expecting it to prove one of those structures equipped only with a front. But the cafeteria was practicable. The floor was crowded with little square polished tables at which many people were eating. Arrailing along the side of the room made a passage to the back where food was served from a counter to the proffered tray. He fell into line. No one had asked him how he dared try to eat with real actors and actresses and apparently no one was going to. Toward the end of the passage was a table holding trays and napkins, the latter wrapped about an equipment of cutlery. He took his tray and received at the counter the foods he designated. He went through this ordeal with difficulty because it was not easy to keep from staring about at other patrons. Constantly he was detecting some remembered face. But at last, with his laden tray, he reached a vacant table near the center of the room and took his seat. He absently arranged the food before him. He could stare at leisure now. All about him were the strongly marked faces of the film people, heavy with makeup, interspersed with hungry civilians, who might be producers, directors, cameramen, or mere artisans for the democracy of the cafeteria seemed ideal. At the table ahead of his he recognized the man who had been annoyed one day by the silly question of the Montague girl. They had said he was a very important director. He still looked important and intensely serious. He was a short, very plump man with pale cheeks under dark brows and troubled-looking gray hair. He was very seriously explaining something to the man who sat with him and whom he addressed as Governor, a merry-looking person with a stubby gray mustache and little hair who seemed not too attentive to the director. You see, Governor, it's this way. The party is lost on the desert. Understand what I mean? And Kempton Ward and the girl stumble into this deserted tomb just at nightfall. Now here's where the big kick comes. Merton Gill ceased to listen, for they are now halted at his table, bearing a laden tray, none other than the Montague girl, she of the slangy talk and the regrettably free manor. She put down her tray and seated herself before it. She had not asked permission of the table's other occupant, indeed she had not even glanced at him, for cafeteria etiquette is not rigorous. He saw that she was heavily made up and in the costume of a gypsy, he thought, a short, vivid skirt, a gay waist, heavy gold hoops in her ears, and dark hair masked about her small head. He remembered that this would not be her own hair. She fell at once to her food. The man at the next table glanced at her, the director without cordiality, but the other man smiled upon her cheerfully. Hello, Flipps, how's the girl? Everything's Jake with me, Governor, how's things over at your shop? So-so, I see you're working. Only for two days I'm just atmosphere in this piece. I got some real stuff coming along pretty soon for Baxter. Got to climb down ten stories of a hotel elevator cable, and ride a brake-beam and be pushed off a cliff and thrown to the lions and a few other little things. That's good, Flipps. Come and see me some time. Have a little chat. Maul working? Yeah, got a character bit with Charlotte King in her other husband. Glad to hear it. How's Paul Montague? Pause in bed. They've signed him for Chamelea of the Cumberlands, providing he raises a brush, and just now it ain't long enough for whiskers, and too long for anything else, so he's puttering around with his new still. Well, drop over some time, Flipps. I'm keeping you in mind. Thanks, Governor. Say! Merton glanced up in time to see her wink broadly at the man, and looked toward his companion, who still seriously made notes on the back of an envelope. The man's face melted to a grin which he quickly erased. The girl began again. Mr. Henshaw! Could you give me just a moment, Mr. Henshaw? The serious director looked up in quite frank annoyance. Yes, yes, what is it, Miss Montague? Well, listen, Mr. Henshaw, I got a great idea for a story, and I was thinking who to take it to, and I thought of this one, and I thought of that one, and I asked my friends, and they all say take it to Mr. Henshaw, because if a story has any merit he's the one director on the lot that can detect it, and get every bit of value out of it, so I thought—but of course you're busy just now. The director saw it ever so slightly. Of course, my girl, I'm busy, but then I'm always busy. They run me to death here. Still, it was very kind of your friends, and of course—thank you, Mr. Henshaw! She clasped her hands to her breast and gazed raptly into the face of her coy listener. Of course I'll have to help on the details, but it starts off kind of like this. You see, I'm a Hawaiian princess. She paused, gazing aloft. Yes, yes, Miss Monogue, a Hawaiian princess. Go on, go on. Oh, excuse me, I was thinking how I'd dress for the last spool in the big fire scene. Well, anyway, I'm this Hawaiian princess, and my father, Old King Mauna Loa, dies and leaves me twenty-one thousand volcanoes and a billiard queue. Mr. Henshaw blinked rapidly at this. For a moment he was dazed. A billiard queue, did you say? He demanded blankly. Yes, and every morning I have to go out and ram it down the volcanoes to see they are all right and—tush, tush—interrupted Mr. Henshaw scowling upon the playwright and fell again to his envelope, pretending thereafter to ignore her. The girl seemed to be unaware that she had lost his attention, and you see the villain is very wealthy. He owns the largest ukulele factory in the islands, and he tries to get me in his power, but he's foiled by my fiancé—a young native by the name of Herman Schwartz, who has invented a folding ukulele, so the villain gets his hired Hawaiian orchestra to shove Herman down one of the volcanoes and me down another, but I have the key around my neck, which father put there when I was a babe, and made me swear always to wear it, even in the bathtub, so I let myself out and unlock the other one and let Herman out, and the orchestra discovers us and chases us over the cliff, and then along comes my old nurse who is now running a cigar store in San Pedro and she—here she affected to discover that Mr. Henshaw no longer listened. Why, Mr. Henshaw's gone! she exclaimed dramatically. Boy, boy, page, Mr. Henshaw! Mr. Henshaw remained oblivious. Oh, well, of course I might have expected you wouldn't have time to listen to my poor little plot. Of course I know it's crude, but it did seem to me that something might be made out of it. She resumed her food. Mr. Henshaw's companion here winked at her and was seen to be shaking with emotion. Merton Gill could not believe it to be laughter, for he had seen nothing to laugh at. A busy man had been bothered by a silly girl who thought she had the plot for a photodrama, and even he, Merton Gill, could have told her that her plot was impossibly wild and inconsequent. If she were going into that branch of the art, she ought to take lessons the way Tessie Kearns did. She now looked so mournful that he was almost moved to tell her this. But her eyes caught his at that moment, and in them was a light so curious, so alive with hidden meanings, so eloquent of some iron restraint she put upon her own emotions, that he became confused and turned his gaze from hers almost with the rebuking glare of Henshaw. She glanced quickly at him again, studying his face for the first time. There had been such a queer look in this young man's eyes, she understood most looks but not that one. Henshaw was treating the late interruption as if it had not been. You see, Governor, the way we got the script now, there in the tomb alone for the night. Understand what I mean, and that's where the kick comes for the audience. They know he's a strong fellow, and she's a beautiful girl and absolutely in his power. See what I mean? But he's a gentleman through and through, and never lays a hand on her. Get that? Then later along comes this Ben Ali Ahab. The monogue girl glanced again at the face of the strange young man whose eyes had held a new expression for her. But she and Mr. Henshaw and the so-called Governor and all those other diners who rattled thick crockery and talked unendingly had ceased to exist for Merton Gill. A dozen tables down the room and nearer the door sat none other than Bula Baxter. Alone at her table she gazed raptly aloft, meditating perhaps some daring new feat. Merton Gill stared and tranced, frozen. The monogue girl perfectly understood this look and traced it to its object. Then she surveyed Merton Gill again with something faintly like pity in her shrewd eyes. He was still staring, still wrapped. Bula Baxter ceased to look aloft. She daintily reached for a wooden toothpick from the bowl before her and arose to pay her check at the nearby counter. Merton Gill arose at the same moment and stumbled a blind way through the intervening tables. When he reached the counter, Miss Baxter was passing through the door. He was about to follow her when a cool but cynical voice from the counter said, �Hey Bill, ain't you forgetting something?� He looked for the check for his meal. It should have been in one hand or the other. But it was in neither. He must have left it back on his tray. Now he must return for it. He went as quickly as he could. The monogue girl was holding it up as he approached. �Here's the little joker, kid� she said kindly. �Thanks� said Merton. He said it haughtily, not meaning to be haughty, but he was embarrassed and also fearful that Bula Baxter would be lost. �Exit Limpine� murmured the girl as he turned away. He hurried again to the door, paid the check and was outside. Miss Baxter was not to be seen. His forgetfulness about the check had lost her to him. He had meant to follow to find the place where she was working and look and look and look. Now he had lost her, but she might be on one of those stages within the big barns. Perhaps the day was not yet lost. He crossed the street forgetting to saunter and ventured within the cavernous gloom beyond an open door. He stood for a moment his vision dulled by the dusk. Presently he saw that he faced a wall of canvas backing. Beyond this were low voices and the sound of people moving. He went forward to a break in the canvas wall and at the same moment there was a metallic jar and light flooded the enclosure. From somewhere outside came music, principally the low leisurely moan of a cello. A beautiful woman in evening dress was with suppressed emotion kneeling at the bedside of a sleeping child. At the doorway stood a dark, handsome gentleman in evening dress regarding her with a cynical smile. The woman seemed to bid the child farewell and arose with hands to her breast and quivering lips. The still-smiling gentleman awaited her. When she came to him, glancing backward to the sleeping child, he threw about her an elaborate fur cloak and drew her to him, his cynical smile changing to one of deceitful tenderness. The woman still glanced back at the child but permitted herself to be drawn through the doorway by the insistent gentleman. From a door the other side of the bed came a kind-faced nurse. She looked at first at the little one, then advanced to stare after the departing couple. She raised her hands tragically and her face became set in a mask of sorrow and despair. She clasped the hands desperately. Merton Gill saw his nurse to be the Montague mother. All right, said an authoritative voice. Mrs. Montague relaxed her features and withdrew while an unkempt youth came to stand in front of the still-grinding camera and held before a placard on which were numbers. The camera stopped, the youth with the placard vanished. Save it, called another voice, and with another metallic jar the flood of light was turned off. The cello ceased its moan in the middle of a bar. The watcher recalled some of the girl's chat. Her mother had a character bit in her other husband. This would be it, one of those moving tragedies not unfamiliar to the screen enthusiast. The beautiful but misguided wife had been saying good-bye to her little one and was leaving her beautiful home at the solicitation of the false friend in evening-dress, forgetting all in one mad moment. The watcher was a tried expert, and like the trained faunal naturalist could determine a species from the shrewd examination of one bone of a photo play. He knew that the wife had been ignored by a husband who permitted his vast business interests to engross his whole attention, leaving the wife to seek solace in questionable quarters. He knew that the shocked but faithful nurse would presently discover the little one to be suffering from a dangerous fever, that a hastily summoned physician would shake his head and declare in legible words, not but a mother's love can win that tiny soul back from the brink of eternity. The father would overhear this and would see it all then, how his selfish absorption in Wall Street had driven his wife to another. He would pursue her and would find her ear yet it was too late. He would discover that her better nature had already prevailed and that she had started back without being sent for. They would kneel side by side, hand in hand at the bedside of the little one, who would recover and smile and prattle and together they would face an untroubled future. This was all thrilling to Merton Gill, but Bula Baxter was not here, her plays being clean and wholesome things of the great outdoors. Far down the great enclosure was another wall of canvas backing, a flood of light above it and animated voices from within. He stood again to watch, but this drama seemed to have been suspended. The room exposed was a bedroom with an open window facing an open door. The actors and the mechanical staff as well were busily hurling knives at various walls. They were earnest and absorbed in this curious pursuit. Sometimes they made the knife penetrate the wall. Oftener it merely struck and clattered to the floor. Five knives at once were being hurled by five enthusiasts while a harried-looking director watched and criticized. You're a clumsy bunch, he announced at last. It's a simple thing to do, isn't it? The knife-throwers redoubled their efforts, but they did not find it a simple thing to do. Let me try it, Mr. Burke. It was the monagu girl still in her gypsy costume. She had been standing quietly in the shadow observing the ineffective practice. Hello, flips. Sure you can try it. Show these boys something good now. Here, Al, give Miss Monagu that stickery of yours. Al seemed glad to relinquish the weapon. Miss Monagu hefted it and looked doubtful. It ain't balanced right, she declared. Haven't you got one with a heavier handle? Fair enough, said the director. Hey, pickles, let her try that one you got. Pickles, too, was not unwilling to oblige. That's better, said the girl. It's balanced right. Taking the blade by its point between thumb and forefinger, she sent it with a quick flick of the wrist into the wall a dozen feet away. It hung there quivering. There, that's what we want. It's got to be quivering when Jack shoots at Ramon who threw at Adam as he leaps through the window. Try it again, flips. The girl obliged and bowed impressively to the applause. Now come here and try it through the doorway. He led her around the set. Now stand here and see can you put it into the wall just to the right of the window. Good! Some little knife thrower I'll say. Now try it once with Jack coming through. Get set, Jack. Jack made his way to the window through which he was to leap. He paused there to look in with some concern. Say, Mr. Burke, will you please make sure she understands she isn't to let go of that thing until I'm in and crouched down ready to shoot? Understand what I mean? I don't want to get nicked and or nothing. All right, all right, she understands. Jack leaped through the window to a crouch, weapon in hand. The knife quivered in the wall above him as he shot. Fine and dandy, some class I'll say. All right, Jack, get back. We'll gun this little scene right here and now. All ready, Jack? All ready, Miss Montague? Camera. One, two, three. Come in, Jack. Again the knife quivered in the wall above his head even while he crouched to shoot at the treacherous Mexican who had thrown it. Good work, Flips. Thanks a whole lot. We'll do as much for you some time. You're entirely welcome, Mr. Burke. No trouble to oblige. How you coming? Coming good. The thing's going to be a knockout. I bet it'll grow some million. Nearly done, too, except for some chased stuff up in the hills. I'll do that next week. What are you doing? Oh, everything's Jake with me. I'm over on number four. Toys of destiny. Putting a little pep into the mob stuff. Layed out for two hours waiting for something. I don't know what. Merton Gill passed on. He confessed now to a reluctant admiration for the Montague girl. She could surely throw a knife. He must practice that himself some time. He might have stayed to see more of this drama, but he was afraid the girl would break out into more of her nonsense. He was aware that she swept him with her eyes as he turned away, but he evaded her glance. She was not a person, he thought, that one ought to encourage. He emerged from the great building and crossed an alley to another of like size. Down toward its middle was the usual wall of canvas with half a dozen men about the opening at one corner. A curious whirring noise came from within. He became an inconspicuous unit of the group and gazed in. The lights were on, revealing a long table elaborately set as for a banquet, but the guests who stood about gave him instant uneasiness. They were in the grossest caricatures of evening dress, both men and women, and they were not beautiful. The gowns of the women were grotesque and the men were lawless appearing, either as to hair or beards or both. He divined the dreadful thing he was stumbling upon even before he noted the sign and large letters on the back of a folding chair. Jeff Beards' Buckeye Commodies. These were the buffoons who with their coarse pantomime, their heavy horse-play, did so much to debase a great art. There, even at his side, was the arch- offender, none other than Jeff Beards himself, the man whose regrettable sense of so-called humor led him to make these low appeals to the witless. And even as he looked, the cross-eyed man entered the scene. Garbed in the weirdly misfitting clothes of a waiter, holding aloft a loaded tray of dishes, he entered on roller-skates to halt before Beards with his uplifted tray at a precarious balance. All right, that's better, said Beards. And, Gertie, listen, don't throw the chair in front of him. That's out. Now we'll have the entrance again. You other boys on the rollers there. Three other basely-comic waiters on roller-skates came to attention. Follow him in and pile up on him when he makes the grand spill. See what I mean? Get your trays loaded now and get off. Now, you other people, take your seats. No, no, Annie, you're at the head, I told you. Tom, you're at the foot and start the rough house when you get the tray in the neck. Now, all set. Merton Gill was about to leave this distressing scene but was held in spite of himself by the voice of a newcomer. Hello, Jeff, Attaboy. He knew without turning that the monogue girl was again at his elbow. He wondered if she could be following him. Hello, Flipps. How's the kid? The producer had turned cordially to her. Just in time for the breakaway stuff. See how you like it. What's the big idea? Swell reception at the Maison de Glu with the waiters on roller-skates in honor of rich Uncle Rallo Glu. The headwaiter starts the fight by doing a fall with his tray. Tom gets the tray in the neck and soaks the nearest man. Banquet goes fluey. Then we go into the chaste stuff. Which is Uncle Rallo? That's him at the table with the herbaceous border under his chin. Is he in the fight? I think so. I was going to rehearse it once more to see if I could get a better idea. Near as I can see now everybody takes a crack at him. Well, maybe, monogue girl seemed to be considering. Say, how about this, Jeff? He's awful hungry, see, and he's begun to eat the celery and everything he can reach and when the mix-up starts he just eats on and pays no attention to it. Never even looks up. See what I mean? The fight spreads the whole length of the table right around Rallo. Half a dozen murders are going on and he just eats and pays no attention. And he's still eating when they're all down and out and don't know a thing till Charlie or someone crowns him with the punch-bowl. How about it? Ain't there a laugh in that? Gild had listened respectfully and now padded the girl on a shoulder. Good work, kid. That's a gag, all right. The little beans sparking on all six, ain't it? Drop around again. We need folks like you. Now listen, Rallo. You there, Rallo. Come here and get this. Now listen, when the fight begins— Merton Gild turned decisively away. Such coarse foolery as this was too remote from Bula Baxter who, somewhere on that lot, was doing something really, as her interview had put it, distinctive and worthwhile. He lingered only to hear the last of Baird's instructions to Rallo and the absurd guests finding some sinister fascination in the man's talk. Baird then turned to the girl who had also started off. Why the rush? Got to beat it over to number four. Got anything good there? Nothing that will get me any billing. Been waiting two hours now just to look frenzied in a mob. Well, say, come around and see me some time. All right, Jeff, of course I'm pretty busy when I ain't work and I've got to think about my art. No, this is on the level. Listen now, sister. I got another two-reeler to pull off after this one. Then I'm going to do something new. See? Got a big idea. Probably something for you in it. Drop into the office and talk it over. Come in sometime next week. If I ain't there, I'll be on the lot some place. Don't forget now. Merton Gild, some distance from the buck I set, waited to note what direction the Montague girl would take. She broke away presently, glanced brazenly in his direction, and tripped lightly out the nearest exit. He went swiftly to one at the far end of the building, and was again on the exciting street. But the afternoon was drying in and the street had lost much of its vivacity. It would surely be too late for any glimpse of his heroine, and his mind was already cluttered with impressions from his day's adventure. He went out through the office, meaning to thank the casting director for the great favor she had shown him, but she was gone. He hoped the headache had not driven her home. If she were to suffer again he hoped it would be some morning. He would have the easel wafers in one pocket and a menthol pencil in the other, and she would again extend to him the freedom of that wonderful city. In his room that night he tried to smooth out the jumble in his day's mind. Those people seemed to say so many things they considered funny, but that were not really funny to any one else. And moving picture-plays were always waiting for something with the bored actors lounging about in idle apathy. Still in his ears sounded the drone of the sawmill and the deep purr of the lights when they were put on. That was a funny thing. When they wanted the lights on they said, Kick it! And when they wanted the lights off they said Save it! And why did a boy come out after every scene and hold up a placard with numbers on it before the camera? That placard had never shown in any picture he had seen. And that queer monogue girl always turning up when you thought you had got rid of her. Still she had thrown that knife pretty well. You had to give her credit for that. But she couldn't be much of an actress even if she had spoken of acting with Miss Baxter of climbing down cables with her and falling off cliffs. Probably she was boasting because he had never seen anyone but Miss Baxter do these things in her pictures. Probably she had some very minor part. Anyway, it was certain she couldn't be much of an actress because she had almost promised to act in those terrible Buckeye comedies. And of course no one with any real ambition or capacity could consider such a thing. Descending to rough horse play for the amusement of the coarser element amongst screen patrons. But there was one impression from the day's world that remained clear and radiant. He had looked at the veritable face of his heroine. He began his letter to Tessie Kerns. At last I have seen Miss Baxter face to face. There was no doubt about its being her. You would have known her at once. And how beautiful she is. She was looking up and seemed inspired. Probably thinking about her part. She reminded me of that beautiful picture of St. Cecilia playing on the piano. End of Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Part 1 of Merton of the Movies This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Merton of the Movies by Harry Leon Wilson Chapter 6 Under the Glass-Tops Part 1 He approached the office of the Holden Studios the following morning with a new air of assurance. Formerly the mere approach had been an adventure. The look through the gate, the quick glimpse of the privileged ones who entered, the mingling later with the hopeful and the near-hopeless ones who waited. But now his feeling was that he had somehow become a part of that higher life beyond the gate. He might linger outside at odd moments, but rightfully he belonged inside. His novitiate had passed. He was one of those who threw knives or battled at the sawmill with the persecutor of golden-haired innocents or lured beautiful women from their homes. He might be taken, he thought, for an actor resting between pictures. At the gate he suffered a momentary regret at an error of tactics committed the evening before. Instead of leaving the lot by the office he should have left by the gate. He should have strolled to this exit in a leisurely manner and stopped just inside the barrier for a chat with the watchman, a chat beginning with the gift of a cigar which should have impressed his appearance upon that person. He should have remarked casually that he had had a hard day on stage number four and must now be off to a good night's rest because of the equally hard day to-morrow. Thus he could now have approached the gate with confidence and passed freely in, with a few more pleasant words to the watchman who would have no difficulty in recalling him. But it was in vain to wish this. For all the watchman knew this young man had never been beyond the walls of the forbidden city, nor would he know any reason why the besieger should not be forever kept outside. He would fix that next time. He approached the window of the casting office with mingled emotions. He did not hope to find his friend again stricken with headache, but if it chanced that she did suffer he hoped to be the first to learn of it. Was he not fortified with a potent easel wafers and a new menthol pencil, even with an additional remedy of tablets that the druggist had strongly recommended? It was, therefore, not with any actual crude disappointment that he learned of his friend's perfect well-being. She smiled pleasantly at him, the telephone receiver at one ear. "'Nothing to-day, dear,' she said, and put down the instrument. Yes, the headache was gone, vanquished by his remedies. She was fine, thank you. No, the headaches didn't come often. It might be weeks before she had another attack. No, of course, she couldn't be certain of this, and indeed she would be sure to let him know at the very first sign of their reoccurrence. He looked over his patient with real anxiety, a solicitude from the bottom of which he was somehow unable to expel the last trace of a lingering hope that would have dismayed the little woman. Not hope exactly, but something almost like it which he would only translate to himself as an earnest desire that he might be at hand when the dread in disposition did attack her. Just now there could be no doubt that she was free from pain. He thanked her profusely for her courtesy of the day before. He had seen wonderful things. He had learned a lot. And he wanted to ask her something, assuring himself that he was alone in the waiting room. It was this. Did she happen to know, was Miss Bula Baxter married? The little woman sighed in a tired manner. Baxter married, let me see. She tapped her teeth with the end of a pencil frowning into her vast knowledge of the people beyond the gate. Now let me think. But this appeared to be without result. Oh, I really don't know. I forget. I suppose so. Why not? She often is. He would have asked more questions. But the telephone rang and she listened a long time, contributing a yes, yes, of understanding at brief intervals. This talk ended, she briskly demanded a number and began to talk in her turn. Merton Gill saw that for the time he had passed from her life. She was calling an agency. She wanted people for a diplomatic reception in Washington. She must have a Bulgarian general, a Serbian diplomat, two French colonels and a Belgian captain, all in uniform and all good types. She didn't want just anybody but types that would stand out. Holden's studio's on stage number two, before noon if possible. All right then. Another bell rang almost before she had hung up. Hello, Grace. Nothing to-day, dear. They're out on location, down toward Venice, getting some desert stuff. Yes, I'll let you know. Merton Gill had now to make way at the window for a youngish, very-looking woman who had once been prettier, who led an elaborately dressed little girl of five. She lifted the child to the window. Say good morning to the beautiful lady-toots. Good morning, Countess. I'm sure you've got something for toots in me today because it's our birthday, both born on the same day. What do you think of that? Any little thing will help us out a lot. How about it? He went outside before the end of this colloquy, but presently saw the woman and her child emerge and walk on disconsolately toward the next studio. Thus began another period of waiting from which much of the glamour had gone. It was not so easy now to be excited by those glimpses of the street beyond the gate. A certain haze had vanished, leaving all too apparent the circumstance that others were working beyond the gate, while Merton Gill loitered outside, his talent, his training, ignored. His early air of careless confidence had changed to one not at all careless or confident. He was looking rather desperate and rather unbelieving, and it daily grew easier to count his savings. He made no mistakes now. His hoard no longer enjoyed the addition of fifteen dollars a week. Only subtractions were made. There came a morning when but one bill remained. It was a ten-dollar bill bearing at its center a steel-engraved portrait of Andrew Jackson. He studied it in consternation, though still permitting himself to notice that Jackson would have made a good motion-picture type, the long, narrow, severe face, the stiff, uncompromising mane of gray hair. Probably they would have cast him for a feuding mountaineer, friendly with his rifle, or perhaps as an inventor whose device was stolen on his death-bed by his wicked Wall Street partner, thus leaving his motherless daughter at the mercy of society's wolves. But this was not the part that Jackson played in the gripping drama of Merton Gill. His face merely stared from the last money brought from Simsbury, Illinois, and the stare was not reassuring. It seemed to say that there was no other money in all the world. Decidedly things must take a turn. Merton Gill had a quite definite feeling that he had already struggled and sacrificed enough to give the public something better and finer. It was time the public realized this. Still he waited, not even again reaching the heart of things, for his friend beyond the window had suffered no relapse. He came to resent a certain inconsequence in the woman. She might have had those headaches oftener. He had been led to suppose that she would, and now she continued to be weary but entirely well. More waiting and the ten-dollar bill went for a five and some silver. He was illogically not sorry to be rid of Andrew Jackson, who had looked so tragically skeptical. The five-dollar bill was much more cheerful. It bore the portrait of Benjamin Harrison, a smooth, cheerful face adorned with whiskers that radiated success. They were little short of smug with success. He would almost rather have had Benjamin Harrison on five dollars than the grim-faced Jackson on ten. Still facts were facts. You couldn't wait as long on five dollars as you could on ten. Then on the afternoon of a day that promised to end as other days had ended, a wave of animation swept through the waiting-room and the casting-office. Swell cabaret stuff was the phrase that brought the applicants to a lively swarm about the little window. Evening clothes, glad-wraps, cigarette-cases, vanity-boxes, the victor-people doing the blight of Broadway with Muriel Mercer, stage number four at 8.30 tomorrow morning. There seemed no limit to the people desired. Merton Gill joined the throng about the window. Engagements were rapidly made, both through the window and over the telephone that was now ringing those people who had so long been told that there was nothing to-day. He did not push ahead of the women as some of the other men did. He even stood out of line for the Montague girl who had suddenly appeared and who from the rear had been exclaiming, Women and children first! Thanks, old dear, she acknowledged the courtesy and beamed through the window. Hello, Countess! The woman nodded briefly. All right, flips, I was just going to telephone you. Henshaw wants you for some baby vamp stuff in the cabaret scene and in the gambling-hall. Better wear that salmon-pink chiffon and the yellow curls. 8.30, stage four. Goodbye! Thanks, Countess! Me for the jumping-tin types at the hour aimed. I'm glad enough to be doing even third business. How about ma? Sure, tell her the grand-dom stuff, chaperone or something, the grey georgette and all her pearls and the cigarette case. I'll tell her she'll be glad there's something doing once more on the perpendicular stage. Goodbye! She stepped aside with a—your next, brother! Merton Gill acknowledged this with a haughty inclination of the head. He must not encourage this hoidon. He glanced expectantly through the little window. His friend held a telephone receiver at her ear. She smiled wearily. All right, son, you got evening clothes, haven't you? Of course, I remember now. Stage four at 8.30. Goodbye! I want to thank you for this opportunity, he began, but was pushed aside by an athletic young woman who spoke from under a broad hat. Hello, dearie, how about me and Ella? Hello, Maisie, all right. Stage four at 8.30 in your swellest evening stuff. At the door the monagu girl called to an approaching group who seemed to have heard by wireless or occult means the report of new activity in the casting office. Hurry, you troopers, you can eat to-morrow night, maybe. They hurried. She turned to Merton Gill. Seems like old times she observed. Was it? he replied coldly. Would this chit never understand that he disapproved of her trifling ways? He went on rejoicing that he had not been compelled to part, even temporarily, with a first-class full dress suit hither to warn only in the privacy of Lowell Hardy's studio. It would have been awkward, he thought, if the demand for it had been much longer delayed. He would surely have let that go before sacrificing his Buck Benson outfit. He had traversed the Eucalyptus Avenue in this ecstasy and was on a busier thoroughfare. Before a motion-picture theatre he paused to study the billing of Muriel Mercer in Hearts of Flame. The beauteous girl in an alarming gown was at the mercy of a fiend in evening dress whose hellish purpose was all too plainly read in his fevered eyes. The girl writhed in his grasp. Doubtless he was demanding her hand in marriage. It was a tense bit. And tomorrow he would act with this petted idol of the screen, and under the direction of that Mr. Henshaw who seemed to take screen art with proper seriousness. He wondered if by any chance Mr. Henshaw would call upon him to do a quadruple transition—hate, fear, love, despair. He practiced a few transitions as he went on to press his evening clothes in the Patterson kitchen and to dream that night that he rode his good old pal Pinto into the gilded cabaret to carry off Muriel Mercer, Broadway's pampered society-pet to the clean life out there in the open spaces where men are men. At eight the following morning he was made up in a large dressing-room by a grumbling extra who said that it was a dog's life plastering grease-paint over the maps of dubs. He was presently on stage four in the prescribed evening regalia for gentlemen. He found the cabaret set, a gilded haunt of pleasure with small tables set about an oblong of dancing floor. Back of these on three sides were raised platforms with other tables, and above these discrete boxes half masked by drapery for the seclusion of more retiring merry-makers. The scene was deserted as yet, but presently he was joined by another early-comer, a beautiful young woman of Spanish type with a thin face and eager dark eyes. Her gown was glistening black set low about her polished shoulders, and she carried a red rose. So exotic did she appear he was surprised when she addressed him in the purest English. Say, listen here, old-timer, let's pick a good table right on the edge before the mob scene starts. Let me see. She glanced up and down the rows of tables. The Camerals be back there so we can set a little closer, but not too closer we'll be moved over. How about this here? Let's try it. She sat, motioning him to the other chair. Even so early in his picture career did he detect that in facing this girl his back would be to the camera. He hitched his chair about. That's right, said the girl. I wasn't mean to hog it. Say, we was just in time, wasn't we? Ladies and gentlemen in evening dress were already entering. They looked inquiringly about and chose tables. Those next to the dancing space were quickly filled. Many of the ladies permitted costly wraps of fur or brocade to spill across the backs of their chairs. Many of the gentlemen lighted cigarettes from gleaming metal cases. There was a lively interchange of talk. We better light up, too, said the dark girl. Merton Gill had neglected cigarettes and confessed this with some embarrassment. The girl presented an open case of gold attached to a chain pendant from her girdle. They both smoked. On their table were small plates, two wine-glasses half filled with a pale liquid, and small coffee cups. Spirals of smoke ascended over a finished repast. Of course, if the part called for cigarettes you must smoke whether you had quit or not. The places back of the prized first row were now filling up with the later comers. One of these, a masterful-looking man of middle age, he would surely be a wealthy club man accustomed to command tables, regarded the filled row around the dancing space with frank irritation and paused significantly at Merton's side. He seemed about to voice a demand but the young actor glanced slowly up at him, achieving a superb transition, surprise, annoyance, and, as the invader turned quickly away, pitying contempt. "'Ada boy,' said his companion, who was, with the aid of a tiny gold-backed mirror suspended with a cigarette case, heightening the crimson of her full lips. Two cameras were now in view, and men were sighting through them. Merton saw henshaw, plump but worried looking, scan the scene from the rear. He gave hurried direction to an assistant who came down the line of tables with a running glance at their occupants. He made changes. A couple here and a couple there would be moved from the first row and other couples would come to take their places. Under the eyes of this assistant the Spanish girl had become coquettish, with veiled glances, with flashing smiles from the red lips, and a small, gloved hand upon Merton Gill's sleeve. She allured him. The assistant paused before them. The Spanish girl continued to allure. Merton Gill stared moodily at the half-empty wine-glass, then exhaled smoke as he glanced up at his companion in profound ennui. If it was the blight of Broadway, probably they would want him to look bored. You two stay where you are, said the assistant, and passed on. Good work, said the girl. I knew you was a type the minute I made you. Red-coated musicians entered an orchestra loft far down the set. The voice of Henshaw came through a megaphone. Everybody that's near the floor foxtrot. In a moment the space was thronged with dancers. Another voice called, Kick it!—and a glare of light came on. You and me both, said the Spanish girl, rising. Merton Gill remained seated. Can't, he said, sprained ankle. How was he to tell her that there had been no chance to learn this dance back in Simsbury, Illinois, where such things were frowned upon by pulpit and press? The girl resumed her seat, at first with annoyance, then brightened. All right at that, she said. I bet we get more footage this way. She again became coquettish, luring with her wiles one who remained sunken on we. A whistle blew, a voice called, Save it!—and the lights jarred off. Henshaw came trippingly down the line. You people didn't dance. What's the matter? Merton Gill glanced up, doing a double transition, from dignified surprise to smiling chagrin. Sprained ankle, he said, and fell into the bored look that had served him with the assistant. He exhaled smoke and raised his tired eyes to the still luring Spanish girl. Weariness of the world and women was in his look. Henshaw scanned him closely. All right, stay there. Keep just that way. It's what I want. He continued down the line which had become hushed. Now, people, I want some flashes along here between dances. See what I mean? You're talking, but you're bored with it all. The hollowness of this nightlife is getting you. Not all of you. Most of you girls can keep on smiling. But the blight of Broadway shows on many. You're beginning to wonder if this is all life has to offer. See what I mean? He continued down the line. From the table back of Merton Gill came a voice in speech to the retreating back of Henshaw. All right, old top, but it'll take a good lens to catch any blight on this bunch. Most of them haven't worked a lick in six weeks in their tickled pink. He knew without turning that this was the monogue girl trying to be funny at the expense of Henshaw, who was safely beyond hearing. He thought she would be a disturbing element in the scene, but in this he was wrong, for he bent upon the wine-glass a look more than ever fraught with jaded world weariness. The babble of Broadway was resumed as Henshaw went back to the cameras. Presently a camera was pushed forward. Merton Gill hardly dared look up, but he knew it was halted at no great distance from him. Now, here's rather a good little bit, Henshaw was saying. You there, the girl in black, go on, tease him the way you were, and he's to give you that same look. Got that cigarette going? All ready. Lights. Camera. Merton was achieving his first close-up. Under the hum of the lights he was thinking that he had been a fool not to learn to dance, no matter how the reverend Otto Carmichael denounced it as a survival from the barbaric Congo. He was also thinking that the Monigu girl ought to be kept away from people who were trying to do really creative things, and he was bitterly regretting that he had no silver cigarette case. The gloom of his young face was honest gloom. He was aware that his companion leaned ferviously toward him with gay chatter and gestures. Very slowly he inhaled from a cigarette that was already distasteful, adding no little to the desired effect, and very slowly he exhaled as he raised to hers the bored eyes of a soul quite disillusioned. Here, indeed, was the blight of Broadway. All right, first rate, called Henshaw. Now get this bunch down here. The camera was pushed on. Gee, that was luck, said the girl. Of course it'll be cut to a flash, but I bet we stand out at that. She was excited now, no longer needing to act. From the table back of Merton came the voice of the Monigu girl. Yes, one must suffer for one's art. Here I got to be a baby vamp when I'd rather be a simple little Madeline, beloved by all in the village. He restrained an impulse to look around at her. She was not serious and should not be encouraged. Further down the set Henshaw was beseeching a table of six revelers to give him a little hollow gaiety. You're simply forcing yourselves to have a good time, he was saying. Remember that. Your hearts aren't in it. You know this nightlife is a mockery. Still, you're playing the game. Now, two of you raise your glasses to drink. You at the end, stand up and hold your glass aloft. The girl next to you there. Stand up by him and raise your face to his. Turn sideways more. That's it. Put your hand up to his shoulder. You're slightly lit, you know, and you're inviting him to kiss you over his glass. You others, you're drinking gay enough, but see if you can get over that it's only half-hearted. You at the other end there, you're staring at your wine-glass, then you look slowly up at your partner but without any life. You're feeling the blight, see? A chap down the line here just did it perfectly. All right now. Lights. Camera. You blonde girl, stand up, face raised to him, hand up to his shoulder. You others, drinking, laughing. You at the end, look up slowly at the girl. Look away. Out there. Bored. Weary of it all. Cut! All right, not so bad. Now this next bunch, Paul. Merton Gill was beginning to load cigarettes. He wondered if Mr. Henshaw would mind if he didn't smoke so much, except, of course, in the close-ups. His throat was dry and rough, his voice husky. His companion had evidently played more smoking parts and seemed not to mind it. Henshaw was now opposite them across the dancing floor, warning his people to be gay but not too gay. The glamour of this nightlife must be a little dulled. Now, Paul, get about three medium shots along here. There's a good table. Get that bunch. And not quite so solemn people, don't overdo it. You think you're having a good time, even if it does turn to ashes in your mouth. Now, ready? Lights? Camera. I like Western stuff better, confided Merton to his companion. She considered this, though retaining her arch-manner. Well, I don't know. I done a Carmen seat apart in a dance hall scene last month over to the Biggert, and right in the midst of the fight I get a glass of something all over my gown that practically ruined it. I guess I'd rather do this refined cabaret stuff, at least he ain't so liable to ruin a gown. Still and all, after you've been warm in the extra bench for a month one can't be choosy. Say, there's the principles coming on the set. He looked around. There, indeed, was the beautiful Muriel Mercer radiant in an evening frock of silver. At the moment she was putting a few last touches to her perfect face from a makeup box held by a maid. Standing with her was another young woman, not nearly so beautiful, and three men. Henshaw was instructing these. Presently he called through his megaphone. You people are excited by the entrance of the famous Vera Evanderpool and her friends. You stop drinking, break off your talk, stare at her, see what I mean? She makes a sensation. Music. Lights. Camera. Down the set, escorted by a differential head waiter came Muriel Mercer on the arm of a middle-aged man who was elaborately garnished but whose thin-dyed mustaches, partially bald head and heavy eyes, proclaimed him to Merton Gill as one who meant the girl no good. They were followed by the girl who was not so beautiful and the other two men. These were young chaps of pleasing exterior who made the progress laughingly. The five were seated at a table next to the dancing space at the far end. They chatted gaily as the older man ordered importantly from the head waiter. Muriel Mercer tapped one of the younger men with her plumbed fan and they danced. Three other selected couples danced at the same time, though taking care not to come between the star and the grinding camera. The older man leered at the star and nervously lighted a gold-tipped cigarette which he immediately discarded after one savage bite at it. It could be seen that Vera Vanderpool was the gayest of all that gay throng. Upon her as yet had come no blight of Broadway, though she shrank perceptibly when the partially bald one laid his hand on her slender wrist as she resumed her seat. Food and wine were brought. Vera Vanderpool drank with a pretty flourish of her glass. Now the two cameras were moved forward for close-ups. The older man was caught leering at Vera. It would surely be seen that he was not one to trust. Vera was caught with the mad light of pleasure in her beautiful eyes. Henshaw was now speaking in low tones to the group and presently Vera Vanderpool did a transition. The mad light of pleasure died from her eyes and the smile froze on her beautiful mouth. A look almost of terror came into her eyes, followed by a pathetic lift of the upper lip. She stared intently above the camera. She was beholding something evil far from that palace of revels. Now they'll cut back to the Tenement House stuff they shot last week, explained the Spanish girl. Tenement House, queried Merton. But I thought the story would be that she falls in love with a man from the great windswept spaces out west, and goes out there to live a clean, open life with him. That's the way I thought it would be, out there where she could forget the blight of Broadway. No, Merton never does Western stuff. I got a little girlfriend working with her, and she told me about this story. Murser gets into this Tenement House down on the east side, and she's a careless society butterfly. But all at once she sees what a lot of sorrow there is in this world when she sees these people in the Tenement House, starving to death and sick kids and everything. And this little friend of mine does an Italian girl with the baby in this old man here. He's a rich swell and prominent in Wall Street and belongs to all the clubs. But he's the father of this girl's child, only Murser don't know that yet. But she gets aroused in her better nature by the sight of all this trouble, and she almost falls in love with another gentleman who devotes all his time to relieving the poor in these Tenements. It was him who took her there, but still she likes a good time as well as anybody, and she's sticking round Broadway and around this old guy who's pretty good company in spite of his faults. But just now she got a shock at remembering the horrible sights she's seen, and she can't get it out of her mind. And pretty soon she'll see this other gentleman that she nearly fell in love with, the one who hangs around these Tenements doing good. He'll be over at one of them tables, and she'll leave her party and go over to his table and say, Take me from this heartless Broadway to your Tenements where I can relieve their suffering. So she goes out and gets in a taxi with him, leaving the old guy with not a thing to do but pay the check. Of course he's mad, and he follows her down to the Tenements where she's relieving the poor, just in a plain black dress, and she finds out he's the real father of this little friend of mine's child, and tells him to go back to Broadway while she has chosen the better part and must live her life with these real people. But he sends her a note that's supposed to be from a poor woman dying of something to come and bring her some medicine, and she goes off alone to this dive in another street, and it's the old guy himself who has sent the note, and he has her there in this cellar in his power. But the other gentleman has found the note and has followed her, and breaks in the door and puts up a swell fight with the old guy, and some tufts he has hired, and gets her off safe and sound, and so they're married and live the real life far away from the blight of Broadway. It's a swell story all right, but Mercer can't act. This little friend of mine can act all around her. She'd be a star if only she was better looking. You bet Mercer don't allow any lookers on the same set with her. Do you make that one at the table with her now? Just got looks enough to show Mercer off. Mercer's swell-looking I'll give her that, but for acting. May all they need and a piece for her is just some stuff to go in between her close-ups. Don't make much difference what it is. Oh, look! There comes the dancers. It's Lusone and Mario. End of Chapter 6 Part 1. Chapter 6 Part 2 of Merton of the Movies. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Merton of the Movies by Harry Leon Wilson. Chapter 6 Under the Glass-Tops. Part 2. Merton Gill looked. These would be hired dancers to entertain the pleasure-mad throng, a young girl with vine-leaves in her hair, and a dark young man of barbaric appearance. The girl was clad in a mere wisp of a girdle and shining breast-plates while the man was arrayed chiefly in a coating of dark stain. They swirled over the dance floor to the broken rhythm of the orchestra, now clinging, now apart, working to a climax which the man poised with his partner perched upon one shoulder. Through the megaphone came instructions to applaud the couple and Broadway applauded, all but Merton Gill, who stared moodily into his coffee-cup, or lifted bored eyes to the scene of revelry. He was not bored, but his various emotions combined to produce this effect very plausibly. He was dismayed at this sudden revelation of art in the dance so near him. Imajean Pulver had once done an art dance back in Simsbury at the cantata of Esther in the vestry of the Methodist Church and had not been a little criticized for her daring, but Imajean had been abundantly clad and her gestures much more restrained. He was trying now to picture how Gashwiler would take a thing like this, or Mrs. Gashwiler for that matter. One glimpse of those practically unclad bodies skipping and bounding there would probably throw them into a panic. They couldn't have sat it through. And here he was right up in front of them and not turning a hair. This reflection permitted something of the contemptuous to show in the random glances with which he swept the dancers. He could not look at them steadily, not when they were close as they often were. Also he loathed the cigarette he was smoking. The tolerance scorn for the Gashwilers and his feeling for the cigarette brought him again into favorable notice. He heard Henshaw but did not look up. Get another flash here, Paul. He's rather a good little bit. Henshaw now stood beside him. Hold that, he said. No, wait! He spoke to Merton's companion. You change seats a minute with Miss Monogue as if you'd got tired of him. See what I mean? Miss Monogue, Miss Monogue! The Spanish girl arose, seeming not wholly pleased at this bit of directing. The Monogue girl came to the table. She was a blithesome sprite in a salmon-pink dancing frock. Her blonde curls fell low over one eye, which she now cocked inquiringly at the director. You're trying to liven him up, explained Henshaw. That's all. Baby vamp him. He'll do the rest. He's quite a good little bit. The Monogue girl flopped into the chair, leaned roguishly toward Merton Gill, placed a small hand upon the sleeve of his coat, and peered archly at him through beaded lashes, one eye almost hidden by its thatch of curls. Merton Gill, sunk low into his chair, cynically tapped the ash from his tenth cigarette into the coffee-cup and raised bored eyes to hers. That's it. Shoot it, Paul. Just a flash. The camera was being wheeled toward them. The Monogue girl, with her hand still on his arm, continued her wheeling, though now she spoke. Why look who's here? Kid, I didn't even know you in your stepping-out clothes. Say, listen, why do you always upstage me? I never done a thing to you, did I? Go on now, give me the fishy eye again. How did you ace yourself into this first row anyway? Did you have to fight for it? Say, your friend'll be mad at me putting her out of here, won't she? Well, blame it on the gelatin-master. I never suggested it. Say, you got Henshaw going. He likes that blighted look of yours. He made no reply to this chatter. He must keep in the picture. He merely favoured her with a glance of fatigued indifference. The camera was focused. All right, you people, do like I said now. Lights, camera? Merton Gill drew upon his cigarette with the utmost disrelish, raised the cold eyes of a disillusioned man to the face of the leering Monogue girl, turned aside from her with every sign of apathy, and wearily exhaled the smoke. There seemed to be but this one pleasure left to him. Cut! said Henshaw, and somewhere lights jarred off. Just stick there a bit, Miss Monogue. We'll have a couple more shots when the dancing begins. Merton resented this change. He preferred the other girl. She lured him but not in so pronounced, so flagrant a manner. The blight of Broadway became more apparent than ever upon his face. The girl's hand still fluttered upon his sleeve as the music came and dancers shuffled by them. Say, you're the acting kid all right. She was tapping the floor with the heel of a satin slipper. He wished above all things that she wouldn't call him kid. He meditated, putting a little of Broadway's blight upon her by saying in a dignified way that his real name was Clifford Armitage. Still, this might not blight her. You couldn't tell about the girl. You certainly are the actinous kid on this set. I'll tell the lot that. Of course, these close-ups won't mean much. Just about one second, or half that maybe. Or some hick in the cutting room may kill him dead. Come on, give me the fish eye again. That's it. Say, I'm glad I didn't have to smoke cigarettes in this scene. They wouldn't do for my type, standin' where the brook and river meet up. I hate a cigarette worse than anything. But you, I bet you'd give up food first. I hate him, too, he muttered grudgingly, glad to be able to say this, even though only to one whose attentions he meant to discourage. If I have to smoke one more, it'll finish me. Now, ain't that the limit? Too bad, kid. I didn't even have any of my own. That Spanish girl gave me these. The Montague girl glanced over his shoulder at the young woman whose place she had usurped. Spanish, eh? If she's Spanish, I'm a swede right out of Switzerland. Anyway, I never could like to smoke. I started to learn one summer when I was eight. Pa and Ma and I was out with a tent-tom show, me doin' little Eva, and between acts I had to put on pants and come out and do a smoking song, all about a kid learning to smoke his first cigar, and not doin' well with it. See? But they had to cut it out. Gosh, would us artists suffer at times? Pa had me try it a couple years later when I was doin' Louise the blind girl in the two orphans, playin' thirty cents top. It was a good song, all right, with lots of funny gags. I'd have been the laughing hit of the bill if I could have learned not to swallow. We had to cut it out again after the second night. Talk about entering into your part. Me, I was too good. If the distant camera glanced this way, it caught merely the persistent efforts of a beautiful debutante who had not yet felt the blight of Broadway to melt the cynicism of one who suffered it more and more acutely each moment. Her hand fluttered on his sleeve and her left eye continuously beguiled him from under the overhanging curl. As often as he thought it desirable he put the board glance upon her, though mostly he stared in dejection at the coffee-cup or the empty wine-glass. He was sorry that she had had that trouble with the cigar, but one who was little Eva or poor persecuted Louise the blind girl had to do a song and dance between the acts must surely come from a low plain of art. He was relieved when, at megaphone directions, an elderly fop came to whirl her off in the dance. Her last speech was, That poor Henshaw, the gelatin-master'll have megaphone lit by to-night. He was left alone at his table. He wondered if they might want a close-up of him this way, uncompagnioned, jaded, tired of it all, as if he would be saying, There's always the river. But nothing of this sort happened. There was more dancing, more close-ups of Muriel Mercer being stricken with her vision of tenement misery under the foul glare of a middle-aged roux-ay inflamed with wine. And there was a shot of Muriel perceiving at last the blight of Broadway and going to a table at which sat a pale, noble-looking young man with a high forehead who presently let her out into the night to the real life of the worthy poor. Later the deserted admirer became again a roux-ay inflamed with wine and submitted to a close-up that would depict his baffled rage. He clenched his hands in this and seemed to convey with a snarling lift of his lip that the girl would be yet his. Merton Gill had ceased to smoke. He had sounded on Broadway even the shallow pleasure of cigarettes. He was thoroughly blighted. At last a megaphone denouncement from the assistant director dismissing the extras, keeping the star, the lead, and a few small part-people to clean up medium shots, dramatics, and other work requiring no crowd. All you extra people here to-morrow morning, eight-thirty, same clothes and makeup. There was a quick breaking up of the revelry. The Broadway pleasure-seekers threw off the blight and stormed the assistant director for slips of paper which he was now issuing. Merton Gill received one, labeled Talent Check. There was fine print upon it which he took no pains to read beyond gathering its general effect that the Victor Fillmart Company had full right to use any photographs of him that its agents might that day have obtained. What engrossed him to the exclusion of this legal formality was the item that he would now be paid seven dollars and fifty cents for his day's work, and once he had been forced to toil half a week for this sum. Emerging from the stage into the sunlight he encountered the Montague girl who hailed him as he would have turned to avoid her. Say, Trooper, I thought I'd tell you in case you didn't know. We don't take our slips to that dame in the outside cafeteria any more. She always pinches off a quarter or maybe four bits. I got it fixed now so the cash is always on tap in the office. I just thought I'd tell you. Thanks, he said, still with the jaded air of the disillusioned. He had only the vaguest notion of her meaning, but her intention had been kindly. Thank you very much. Oh, don't mention it. I just thought I'd tell you. She glanced after him shrewdly. Nearing the office he observed a long line of Broadway revelers waiting to cash their slips. Its head was lost inside the building and it trailed far outside. No longer was any blight to be perceived. The slips were ready in hand. Instead of joining the line, Merton decided upon luncheon. It was two o'clock, and though waiters with trays had been abundant in the gilded cabaret, the best screen art had not seemed to demand a serving of actual food. Further he would eat in the cafeteria an evening dress, his makeup still on, like a real actor. The other time he had felt conspicuous because nothing had identified him with the ordinary clientele of the place. The room was not crowded now. Only a table here and there held late comers, and the choice of foods when he reached the serving counter at the back was limited. He permitted himself to complain of this in a practiced manner, but made a selection and bore his tray to the center of the room. He had chosen a table and was about to sit when he detected Henshaw further down the room and promptly took the one next to him. It was probable that Henshaw would recall him and praise the work he had done, but the director merely rolled unseen eyes over him as he seated himself and continued his speech to the man Merton had seen before with him, the grizzled dark man with the stubby gray mustache whom he called Governor. Merton wondered if he could be the Governor of California, but decided not. Perhaps an ex-Governor. She's working out well, he was saying. I consider it one of the best continuities Belmore has done. Not a line of smud in it, but to make up for that we'll have over thirty changes of costume. Merton Gill coughed violently, then stared moodily at his plate of baked beans. He hoped that this at least would recall him to Henshaw, who might fix an eye on him to say, and by the way, here is a young actor that was of great help to me this morning. But neither man even glanced up. Seemingly this young actor could choke to death without exciting their notice. He stared less moodily at the baked beans. Henshaw would notice him some time and you couldn't do everything at once. The men had finished their luncheon and were smoking. The animated Henshaw continued his talk. And about that other thing we were discussing, Governor, I want to go into that with you. I tell you, if we can do Robinson Crusoe and do it right, a regular five thousand foot program feature the thing ought to gross a million. A good, clean, censor-proof picture. Great kid show, run forever. Shipwreck stuff, loading the raft, island stuff, hut stuff, goats, finding the footprint, cannibals, the man Friday. Can't you see it? The governor seemed to see it. Fine, that's so. He stared above the director's head for the space of two inhalations from his cigarette, imbuing Merton Gill with gratitude that he need not smoke again that day. But say, look here, how about your love interest? Henshaw waved this aside with his own cigarette and began to make marks on the back of an envelope. Easy enough, Belmore can fix that up. We talked over one or two ways. How about having Friday's sister brought over with him to this island? The cannibals are going to eat her, too. Then the cannibals run to their canoes when they hear the gun just the same as in the book. And Crusoe rescues the two. And when he cuts the girl's bonds he finds she can't be Friday's real sister because she's white. See what I mean? Well, we work it out later that she's the daughter of an English earl that was wrecked near the cannibal island, and they rescued her, and Friday's mother brought her up as her own child. She saved the papers that came ashore, and she has the earl's coat of arms tattooed on her shoulder blade. And finally, after Crusoe has fallen in love with her, she's remembered a good deal of her past. Along comes the old earl, her father, and a ship, and rescues them all. How about that? Henshaw, brightly expectant, awaited the verdict of his chief. Well, I don't know, the other considered. Where's your conflict after the girl is saved from the savages? And Crusoe in the book wears a long beard. How about that? He won't look like anything. Sort of hairy, and that's all. Henshaw from the envelope on which he drew squares and oblongs appeared to gain fresh inspiration. He looked up with new light in his eyes. I got it. I got the whole thing. Modernize it. This chap is a rich young New Yorker cruising on his yacht, and he's wrecked on this island and gets a lot of stuff ashore, and his valet is saved too. Say, there's some good comedy. See what I mean? Valet is one of these stiff English lads never been wrecked on an island before and complains all the time about the lack of conveniences. I can see a lot of good gags for him, having to milk the goats and getting scared of the other animals, and no place to press his master's clothes. Things like that, you know. Well, the young fella explores the island and finds another party that's been wrecked on the other side, and it's the girl and the man that got her father into his power, and got all of his estate and is going to make beggars of them if the girl won't marry him. And she comes on the young fellow under some palms, and they fall in love and fix it up to double cross the villain. Belmore can work it out from there. How about that? And say, we can use a lot of trims from that South Sea piece we did last year, all that yacht and island stuff. See what I mean? The other considered profoundly. Yes, you got a story there, but it won't be Robinson Crusoe, don't you see? Again, Henshaw glanced up from his envelope with the light of inspiration. Well, how about this? Call it Robinson Crusoe, Jr. There you are. We get the value of the name and do the story the way we want it, the young fellow being shaved every day by the valet, and he can invite the other party over to dine with him and receive them an evening dress and everything. Can't you see it? If that story wouldn't grow spig, then I don't know a story. And all easy stuff. We can use the trims for the long shots, and use that inlet toward the other end of Catalina for the hut and the beach. Surefire stuff, Governor. And Robinson Crusoe, Jr. is a cinch title. Well, give Belmore as much dope as you've got and see what he can work out. They arose and stood by the counter to pay their checks. If you want to see the rushes of that stuff we shot this morning, be over to the projection room at five, said Henshaw as they went out. Neither had observed the rising young screen actor Clifford Armitage, though he had coughed violently again as they left. He had coughed most plausibly moreover because of the cigarettes. At the cashier's window no longer obstructed, he received his money, another $5.00 bill adorned with the cheerfully prosperous face of Benjamin Harrison, and half that amount in silver coin. Then, although loath to do this, he went to the dressing room and removed his makeup. That grease paint had given him a world of confidence. At the casting office he stopped to tell his friend of the day's camera triumph, how the director had seemed to single him out from a hundred or so revelers to portray facially the deadly effect of Broadway's nightlife. Good work, she applauded. Before long you'll be having jobs oftener, and don't forget you're called again to-morrow morning for the gambling-house scene. She was a funny woman, always afraid he would forget something he could not possibly forget. Once more in the Patterson kitchen he pressed his suit and dreamt of new eminences in his chosen art. The following morning he was again the first to reach the long dressing room, the first to be made up by the grumbling extra, the first to reach the big stage. The cabaret of yesterday had overnight been transformed into a palatial gambling-hall. Along the sides of the room and at its center were tables equipped for strained games of chance which only his picture knowledge enabled him to recognize. He might tarry at these tables, he thought, but he must remember to look bored in the near presence of Henshaw. The Spanish girl of yesterday appeared and he greeted her warmly. I got some cigarettes this time, he said, so let me pay you back all those I smoked of yours yesterday. Together they filled the golden case that hung from her girdle. It's swell all right, said the girl, gazing about the vast room now filling with richly clad gamblers. But I thought it was all over except the tenement house scenes where Vera Vanderpool has gone to relieve the poor, he said. The girl explained, this scene comes before the one we did yesterday. It's where the rich old boy first sees Vera playing roulette and she loses a lot of money as going to leave her string of pearls, but he says it's a mere trifle and let him pay her gambling losses, so in a weak moment she does, and that's how he starts to get her into his power. You'll see how it works out. Say, they spent some money on this set all right. It was indeed a rich set, as the girl had said. It seemed to Merton Gill that it would be called on the screen one of those plague spots that eat like a cancer at the heart of New York. He lighted a cigarette and leaned nonchalantly against a pillar to smile a tired little smile at the pleasure-mad victims of this life who were now grouping around the roulette and pharaoh-tables. He must try for his jaded look. Some swell shack, the speaker was back of him, but he knew her for the Montague girl and was instantly enabled to increase the blighted look for which he had been trying. One natty little hovel I'll tell the world, the girl continued. Say, this puts it all over the Grand Central Station, don't it? Must be right smack at the corner of Broadway and Fifth Avenue. Well, start the little ball rolling so I can make a killing. He turned his head slightly and saw her dance off to one of the roulette-tables, accompanied by the middle-aged Fop who had been her companion yesterday. Henshaw and his assistant now appeared and began grouping the players at various tables. Merton Gill remained leaning wearily against his massive pillar, trying to appear blasé under the chatter of the Spanish girl. The groups were arranged to the liking of Henshaw, the only after many trials. The roulette ball was twirled and the lively rattle of chips could be heard. Scanning his scene, he noted Merton and his companion. Oh, there you are, you two. Sister, you go and stand back of that crowd around the pharaoh-table. Keep craning to look over their shoulders and give us your side view. I want to use this man alone. Here. He led Merton to a round table on which were a deck of cards and some neatly stacked chips. Sit here facing the camera. Keep one hand on the cards, sort of toying with him. See what I mean? He scattered the piled chips loosely about the table and called to a black waiter. Here, George, put one of those wine glasses on his left. The wine glass was placed. Now, kind of slump down in your chair, like you saw the hollowness of it all. See what I mean? Merton Gill thought he saw. He exhaled smoke, toyed contemptuously with the cards at his right hand and, with a gesture of repulsion, pushed the wine glass further away. He saw the hollowness of it all. The spirit of wine sang in his glass, but to deaf ears. Chance could no longer entice him. It might again have been suspected that cigarettes were ceasing to allure. Good work, keep it up, said Henshaw, and went back to his cameras. The lights jarred on. Desperate gaming was filmed. More life at the roulette tables, Megaphone Henshaw. Crowd closer around that left-hand Faro table. You're playing for big stakes. The gaming became more feverish. The mad light of pleasure was in every eye, yet one felt that the blight of Broadway was real. The camera was wheeled forward, and Merton Gill joyously quit smoking while Henshaw secured flashes of various groups, chiefly of losers, who were seeing the hollowness of it all. He did not, however, disdain a bit of comedy. Miss Monogue. Yes, Mr. Henshaw. The Monogue girl paused in the act of sprinkling chips over a roulette layout. Your escort has lost all his chips, and you've lost all he's bought for you. The girl and her escort passed to other players the chips before them and waited. Your escort takes out his wallet, shows it to you empty, and shrugs his shoulders. You shrug, too, but turn your back on him, facing the camera, and take some bills out of your stocking. See what I mean? Give her some bills, some one. Never mind, Mr. Henshaw, I already got some there. The pant mime was done. The girl turned, stooped, withdrew flattened bills from one of the salmon-pink stockings, and flourished them at her escort, who achieved a transition from gloom to joy. Merton Gill, observing this shameless procedure, plumbed the nether depths of his disgust for Broadway's nightlife. The camera was now wheeled toward him, and he wearily lighted another cigarette. Get a flash of this chap, Henshaw was saying. The subject leaned forward in his chair, gazing with cynical eyes at the fevered throng. Wine, women's song, all had pawled. Gambling had no charm. He looked with disrelish at the cigarette he had but just lighted. All right, Paul, that's good. Now get that bunch over at the crap-table. Merton Gill lost no time in relinquishing his cigarette. He dropped it into the wine-glass which became a symbol of Broadway's dead sea fruit. Thereafter he smoked only when he was in the picture. He felt that he was becoming screen-wise, and Henshaw had remembered him. The cast of the Blight of Broadway might not be jooled with his name, but his work would stand out. He had given the best that was in him. He watched the entrance of Muriel Mercer, maddest of all the mad throng, accompanied by the two young men and the girl who was not so beautiful. He watched her lose steadily, and he saw her string of pearls saved by the elderly scoundrel who had long watched the beautiful girl as only the wolf of Wall Street could watch one so fair. He saw her leave upon his arm, perhaps for further unwholesome adventure along Broadway. The lights were out, the revel redone. Merton Gill beyond a doubt preferred western stuff, some heart-gripping tale of the open spaces, or perhaps of the frozen north, where he could be the hard-riding, straight-shooting, two-fisted wonder-man, and not have to smoke so many cigarettes, only one now and then which he would roll himself and toss away after a few puffs. Still he had shown above the mob of extra people, he thought. Henshaw had noticed him. He was coming on. The monigu girl hailed him as he left the set. Hello, old trooper. I caught you acting again today, right out before the white folks. Well, so far so good. But, say, I'm glad all that roulette and stuff was for the up-and-down stage and not on the level. I'd certainly have lost everything but my makeup. So long, kid. She danced off to join a group of other women who were leaving. He felt a kindly pity for the child. There could be little future in this difficult art for one who took it so lightly, who talked so frankly to strangers without being introduced. At luncheon in the cafeteria he waited a long time in the hope of encountering Henshaw, who would perhaps command his further services in the cause of creative screen art. He meant to be animated at this meeting to show the director that he could be something more than an actor who had probed the shams of Broadway. But he lingered in vain. He thought Henshaw would perhaps be doing without food in order to work on the scenario for Robinson Crusoe, Jr. He again stopped to thank his friend, the casting director, for securing him his first chance. She accepted his thanks smilingly and asked him to drop around often. Mind you don't forget our number, she said. He was on the point of making her understand once for all that he would not forget the number, that he would never forget Gashwiler's address, that he had been coming to this studio too often to forget its location. But someone engaged her at the window, so he was obliged to go on without enlightening the woman. She seemed to be curiously dense. End of Chapter 6, Part 2