Chamisso et. al. - "Peter Schlemihl etc."

Douglas Jerrold - "Mrs. Caudle's Curtain Lectures"

Jean de La Fontaine - "The Tales and Novels, v4: The Old Man's Calendar and Others"

Samuel Butler - "The Note Books of Samuel Butler"

New Philadelphia Book Publisher Highlights Local Talent
Book and Publishing News from Publishers Newswire(tm)

Looking for Child to be on Cover of a New Book, 'The Model Child'
PHILADELPHIA, Pa. -- The Philadelphia literary world will celebrate the launch of two new players today, April 10th: Kay Square Press, a new publishing company focused on Philadelphia-area artists, their stories, and their art; and Kay Square's first release, 'With the Rich and Mighty: Emlen Etting of Philadelphia' (ISBN: 978-0-9815129-0-7), a critical biography by Kenneth C. Kaleta.

FlatSigned Press Alleges Don Imus Remarks Damage Legacy of President Gerald R. Ford
NEW YORK, N.Y. -- Nathan Yungerberg, an accomplished model scout and professional child photographer is launching a nation-wide casting call to find the cover model for his highly anticipated book release, 'The Model Child: A Parents Guide to the Child Modeling Industry' (ISBN: 978-0-9817018-0-6).

Books: Merton of the Movies

H >> Harry Leon Wilson >> Merton of the Movies




"That's good, Flips. Come in and see me some time. Have a little
chat. Ma working?"

"Yeah--got a character bit with Charlotte King in Her Other
Husband." "Glad to hear it. How's Pa Montague?"

"Pa's in bed. They've signed him for Camillia 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 putterin' around
with his new still."

"Well, drop over sometime, Flips, I'm keeping you in mind."

"Thanks, Governor. Say--" Merton glanced up in time to see her wink
broadly at the man, and look 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 if you're busy just now--"

The director thawed 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 have 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 Montague--an Hawaiian princess. Go on, go on!"

"Oh, excuse me; I was thinking how I'd dress her 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 cue--"

Mr. Henshaw blinked rapidly at this. For a moment he was dazed. "A
billiard cue, did you say?" he demanded blankly.

"Yes. And every morning I have to go out and ram it down the
volcanoes to see are they 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 ukelele
factory in the islands, and he tries to get me in his power, but
he's foiled by my fiance, a young native by the name of Herman
Schwarz, who has invented a folding ukelele, 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 bath-tub, 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, they're in this
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 young
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 Montague 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 Beulah Baxter. Alone at her table, she gazed raptly
aloft, meditating perhaps some daring new feat. Merton Gill stared,
entranced, frozen. The Montague 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 rapt.

Beulah 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 near-by 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 fergittin' somepin'."

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 Montague 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 Beulah Baxter
would be lost. "Exit limping," 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 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 it 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-by 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 photoplay. 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, "Naught 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, would find her
ere 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 Beulah 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 criticised.

"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 Montague girl still in her
gipsy 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 Montague that stickeree of yours." Al
seemed glad to relinquish the weapon. Miss Montague 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 it at him 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 nor 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. This thing's going to be a knockout. I bet it'll gross
a million. Nearly done, too, except for some chase stuff up in the
hills. I'll do that next week. What 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. Laid 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
practise that himself sometime. 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
in large letters on the back of a folding chair: "Jeff Baird's
Buckeye Comedies." 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 Baird himself, the man whose regrettable sense of so-called
humour 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 Baird with
his uplifted tray at a precarious balance.

"All right, that's better," said Baird. "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! Atta boy!"

He knew without turning that the Montague girl was again at his
elbow. He wondered if she could be following him.

"Hello, Flips! 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 Glue, with the waiters on roller
skates in honour of rich Uncle Rollo Glue. The head waiter starts
the fight by doing a fall with his tray. Tom gets the tray in the
neck and soaks the nearest man banquet goes flooey. Then we go into
the chase stuff."

"Which is Uncle Rollo?"

"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." Montague 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 Rollo 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?" Baird
had listened respectfully and now patted the girl on a shoulder.

"Good work, Kid! That's a gag, all right. The little bean's sparking
on all six, ain't it? Drop around again. We need folks like you.
Now, listen, Rollo--you there, Rollo, come here and get this. Now,
listen--when the fight begins--"

Merton Gill turned decisively away. Such coarse foolery as this was
too remote from Beulah Baxter who, somewhere on that lot, was doing
something really, as her interview had put it, distinctive and worth
while.

He lingered only to hear the last of Baird's instructions to Rollo
and the absurd guests, finding some sinister fascination in the
man's talk. Baird then turned to the girl, who had also started off.

"Hang around, Flips. Why the rush?"

"Got to beat it over to Number Pour."

"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 working
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 goin' to do something
new, see? Got a big idea. Probably something for you in it. Drop in
t' the office and talk it over. Come in some time next week. 'F I
ain't there I'll be on the lot some place. Don't forget, now."

Merton Gill, some distance from the Buckeye 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 in the exciting street. But the afternoon was drawing
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 favour 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 Eezo 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
dazed 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 bis 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
Montague 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 any one 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 among screen patrons.

But there was one impression from the day's whirl that remained
clear and radiant: He had looked at the veritable face of his
heroine. He began his letter to Tessie Kearns. "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. Cecelia playing on
the piano. . . ."




CHAPTER VI

UNDER THE GLASS TOPS


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 persecuter of golden-
haired innocence, 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 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 forever be 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 the potent Eezo
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 recurrence.

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 indisposition did attack her. Just now there could be no doubt
that she was free from pain.