The Gulliver Fortune

by Peter Corris

  Susannah waited patiently through all the arrangements that preceded their leaving the ship. It was late in the afternoon before they stepped ashore at Woolloomooloo. Susannah still had in her possession a shilling of the half crown Jack had given her at Colombo. When the family were settled in a cab, with the large trunks, which were as imposing as Mary had said, piled up behind them, Susannah handed the coin gravely to Digby Welcome.

  "Well, well," Laura said. "Now, there's a wonderful thing. We'll have to tell the cabbie to take us to a better hotel."

  "Don't tease the girl, Laura," Digby Welcome said. "You keep the shilling for a treat, Susy. We're all old troupers here. We'll make do, won't we, darling?"

  "Less of the 'old'," Laura said. The driver whipped up the horse and the cab jolted over the rough paving outside the dockyard. Digby stretched his legs, wondering how much strength and agility he'd lost during the voyage. "I can't wait to get into a bed after that bloody bunk. Excuse the French, ladies."

  Mary giggled and Susannah smiled carefully. For some years she would watch other people before smiling or laughing herself. She didn't want to do the wrong thing, particularly in the eyes of Laura. She guessed rightly that it was Digby who had been most responsive to Mary's plea that they take Susannah with them. Mary gripped her hand and whispered, "We're like sisters." The day was warm and Mary's fingers were sweaty but Susannah returned the pressure. She alone among the Gulliver children had seen her baby brother, a tiny red-faced thing sleeping quietly under the protective eye of the nurse. She wondered briefly at the time whether the Welcomes would take the baby too but she sensed that they would not. And she knew that she had to look out for herself, as Jack had done.

  The Welcomes and Susannah spent the night at the Metropole Hotel opposite the Botanic Gardens. In the morning Digby telephoned for an appointment with Harry Rickards, manager of the Tivoli Theatre. Laura and the girls spent the next few hours in the hot, dusty city trying to see the sights, frequently having to retire under shade to recover from the heat. Mary Welcome suffered greatly and spent much of the afternoon lying on her bed, but Laura and Susannah adapted quickly. By evening, when a cooler breeze got up, they had persuaded Mary to join them for dinner at a fish restaurant salubriously situated in Elizabeth Bay. Laura left the name of the place at the hotel for her husband, who had not returned by six o'clock, although his appointment had been for ten in the morning.

  "It's very bad of Digby," Laura said. She sipped iced water and looked out across the harbour to the few lights showing dimly on the opposite side. She was in the habit of talking to children as if they were adults. Children in the theatre were precocious. "He should have returned by now."

  "It's not a very big city," Susannah said, "nothing like London. I don't suppose he'll get lost."

  "Where was he supposed to see Mr Richards?" Mary asked. She felt better and was beginning to think about food.

  "Rickards," Laura corrected. "At the Tivoli, I imagine."

  "It sounds grand," Susannah said. "Oh, look, here he comes."

  Digby Welcome was stalking towards their table; he moved rapidly but unsteadily and bumped into a waiter. He did not apologise. A wide smile was set on his face.

  "Oh dear," Laura said. "Digby's been drinking."

  Digby planted a kiss on his wife's cheek and smiled at the girls as he sat down. He waved to a waiter and ordered champagne.

  "Can I have some, Papa?" Mary asked.

  "Yes."

  "Digby! She's far too young. Now, what's this all about? Did you get some kind of splendid contract out of Mr Rickards? Been celebrating, have you, dear?"

  The questions seemed to deflate Digby a little. He waited until he had champagne in his glass before he answered. "Not exactly, my sweet. D'you know what that wretch Rickards had the nerve to offer us?"

  Laura sipped some champagne and shook her head. The girls listened closely.

  Digby hiccupped. "Bottom of the bill in a country town tour. A pound a week."

  "You told him we were the Whirling Welcomes? You showed him the notices?"

  "Scarcely looked at 'em. Fellow's not a gentleman." He rubbed his hands briskly. "Devilish hot day, wasn't it? I nearly roasted in the shipping office."

  "You seemed to have cooled off in the bar," Laura said evenly. "What shipping office? Digby, we have to work. A country tour's better than starving, just."

  Digby smiled and said nothing. A waiter took their orders for fish, the names of which none of them had ever heard before. Digby worked on his second glass of champagne. He poured an inch for Mary and Susannah, who sipped carefully. Mary giggled at the taste. "Ooh, it's sour."

  "Dry, dear," Laura said. "Digby!"

  Digby's smile had faded, but he was determined not to let his spirits slump. He reached into his pocket and pulled out an envelope. "We're going to America. We sail the day after tomorrow!"

  Susannah's eyes widened at the news. Life among the Welcomes was certainly exciting. She was a little troubled; she'd had vague thoughts of seeing Carl and the others at some time in the future, imagining that they would all be in Sydney. Mary Welcome's geography was poor; her schooling had been much interrupted by her parents' touring and she was by no means sure where America was in relation to Australia. She judged it better to remain silent. Her mother did the same.

  The food arrived and Digby and the girls ate heartily. Digby finished his second glass of champagne and defiantly poured a third. Laura ate and drank little. When the meal was finished she ordered coffee and told the girls to go across to the piers and look at the boats. She spoke sharply, as Susannah noted she almost always did, and added a sting. "And don't fall in, because you can't swim."

  "Don't look at me like that, Laura," Digby said after the girls had strolled away. "We didn't come here to starve in the outback." He wiped his mouth and tried for an air of dignity. He was still a little dusty and his hair was unruly. The sun had put some colour in his face and Laura could see something of the old, optimistic Digby in him. She remembered the hangdog air he'd adopted in London. This was better. He was a brave man after all, but her faith in him had been badly dented and the close acquaintance she had with several other men during their stage career had left her wondering why she had married him. "I have two questions, Digby. If you can answer them satisfactorily I won't offer any objection to your plans, although God knows I don't want to get back onto a bloody ship."

  Digby sipped his coffee. "Shoot, old girl."

  "What are we going to do in America?"

  "We're going to act in the films. They've got a place called Hollywood in California where they're going to turn out films by the hundreds. They're desperate for English men and women with stage experience."

  Laura drank some coffee as she absorbed this news. She'd never heard of Hollywood and had seen very few films. She had a vague idea that American films were made in New York; still, it was possible that Digby's information was correct. The fact that Digby had no use for films, saying that they were a fad and that the vaudeville stage would still be alive when films were forgotten, was now, it seemed, conveniently forgotten.

  "Where did you get this idea?"

  "From this chap Williamson. He runs the other big theatrical show here, competitor to Rickards. He's an American—James Cassius Williamson. Would you believe it? Said we were perfect for films."

  Laura looked at her husband. Despite her disaffection, she had to admire him; he'd dashed about this strange city with the temperature in the nineties, trying his best. She loved him and regretted her dalliance with Mr La Vita aboard the Southern Maid. She reached for his hand. "And where did you get the money for the tickets, Digby?"

  "Ah hah, that's not fair. That's three questions. You said only two."

  "Digby?"

  "I borrowed some from Williamson. Very decent chap, for an American. He gave me some names to look up, too, he . . ."

  "And the rest?"

  "I sold the costumes, and the sashes and prizes and the trunks and my
father's watch and your jewellery. I sold everything we had."

  25

  The Welcomes arrived in San Francisco aboard the Pacific Pearl in April. It had been a rough passage in a vessel better constructed for cargo than people. Digby and Mary had been seasick continually, but Laura and Susannah were unaffected. With her husband still pale and weak, Laura had to take charge. She bought tickets on the Southern Pacific line for Los Angeles and food to eat on the journey. Susannah sat with the others at the busy rail terminus, waiting impatiently for the train. She was tired of travelling and wanted to stop somewhere, anywhere.

  "At least we're travelling light," Digby said, "don't need one of those niggers."

  Susannah looked at the black men handling the passengers' bags. They wore blue jackets and red caps and had very white teeth. People rushed around the station checking notice boards and shouting for porters. A big man with a white, wide-brimmed hat strode past her. His long-tailed coat blew open and she saw the pistol thrust into his broad belt. Susannah had seen only two films, both Westerns, in London. "It's like a film already,' she said.

  The Welcomes arrived in Hollywood, a dusty little town separated from Los Angeles by eight miles of rough road, after a day and a night on the train. J.C. Williamson, in fact, had given Digby Welcome only one contact—that of William N. Selig, who had moved his film studio from Chicago to Hollywood the year before. As soon as they got down from the branch line train Digby wanted to contact Selig, but Laura was firm.

  "We're hot and dusty. You need a shave and a change of clothes. We have to find a hotel and then you can telephone this Selig. I have to tell you, Digby, he sounds like a Jew and you know what they're like. Also, this Hollywood doesn't make a very favourable impression on me."

  Susannah looked around at the unpaved streets with their one- and two-storeyed wooden houses; the hills seemed very close and the air smelled of grass and trees. The sky was an intense blue and the people moving leisurely about on the streets cast dark, clear shadows. "It's a lovely day," she said.

  Digby enquired at the station. He was told the name of a hotel that would take 'movies' and was two blocks east. They walked, glad of the exercise after the hot, cramped train.

  "I'm sick of summer," Mary said. "We've had summer for months and months, ever since Colombo." She glanced at Susannah to see whether mention of the place upset her, but Susannah was staring off into the distance.

  "I want it to be cold," Mary whined. "I want to see some rain."

  "It doesn't look as if it ever rains," Susannah said. "Everything's so dry."

  Digby pondered on what a 'movie' might be but he had reached no decision when they found the hotel, a wooden-framed clapboard structure that looked as if it had been built yesterday. The weekly tariff for two rooms almost exhausted the Welcomes' funds. They were on the second floor with a view to the east across houses and stores, clustered where streets crossed, and vacant lots and dusty roads. Susannah looked out of her window at the long range of blue hills; big, dark birds swirled up above them, hovered in the sky and swooped. "I like it here," she said.

  Mary sneezed. "I don't. This dust is going to make me sneeze. I just know it."

  Susannah continued to enjoy things. She liked the hot, spicy food, cooked by a fat Mexican woman and served in the hotel's long, cool dining room. The food made Mary ill. After dinner Digby went off to the bar to drink beer and 'sniff out the lie of the land' as he put it to Laura. When he came to bed late he smelled of beer and was cheerful.

  "We're in on the ground floor, girl," he said. "The thing's just getting going, and this Selig is the top man."

  "Are there others?" Laura was cautious about top men.

  "From what I can gather there's a few about to start and plenty more interested. Making Westerns mainly, but before long they'll be making all sorts of movies."

  "Movies? Isn't that what the man at the station called us?"

  "That's right. It seems that people in town who don't like the films call the people who work in them 'movies'."

  "Why don't they like them?"

  Digby rolled into a comfortable position. "Haven't an earthly. I met a few tonight. Seemed like splendid chaps to me."

  Laura remained restless while Digby slept. He's always meeting splendid chaps and making a splendid chap of himself, she thought. But perhaps this time he's right. She had seen a few tall, dark men on the streets who'd be worth a second look if she got the chance. Prices in the town seemed high, and she'd seen a few big cars roaring through the Hollywood streets which indicated that there must be money about. In her heart Laura knew she was tired of 'whirling', and she suspected that Digby's wind and legs wouldn't be up to it much longer. She slid down in the bed and turned away from her husband. Her mind strayed to thoughts of the soft, dark moustache of Mr La Vita. A fine gentleman who had taken a great shine to Susannah's brother; what was his name? Edward. And Susannah was a charming child, and good company for Mary. As Laura was drifting optimistically off to sleep Mary sneezed loudly in the next room.

  Digby Welcome, spruced up and exuding confidence, made a good impression on William N. Selig. The producer was a little vague about who J.C. Williamson might be but he let it pass. As it happened, he was casting for his production of Daniel Boone and he had a perfect part for Digby.

  "What is it?" Laura asked when Digby showed her the card indicating that he was an employee of the Selig Polyscope Company.

  "Dancing," Digby said. "An Indian war dance around a campfire."

  Laura laughed. "Oh, Digby, can you do it?"

  Digby took out one of the cigars Selig had given him and lit it. "There never was a dance Digby Welcome couldn't do. I'll give them the best bloody Indian war dance they've ever seen."

  Digby's performance in Daniel Boone was a success and he was in constant demand thereafter. He learned to ride a horse and, more importantly, to fall off one. His sense of timing and the conformation of his body made him a natural stuntman. Selig worked his crew hard: a stuntman, limping after a fall, was pressed into service as a crippled waiter; a twisted ankle did not prevent a jump from a building into a net; a man with an arm in a sling was a point of interest in a crowd scene. Digby acquired a Model T Ford and sometimes drove it using walking sticks to manipulate the controls because of his injuries.

  The Welcomes installed themselves in a frame house in one of the cheaper of the new residential sections springing up around Hollywood. 'Movies' were still unpopular in the older more sedate neighbourhoods, which was a matter of regret to Laura. She had a few small roles in films such as The Merry Wives of Windsor and she was considered for a part in Kathryn, Selig's long-running serial, but she disliked filming. The constant noise, the waiting around and the short, jerky bursts of work did not suit her temperament.

  Laura devoted herself to maintaining a home for Digby to recuperate in, and to Mary and Susannah. Her sole recreation was a series of highly discreet affairs with actors, producers and directors who were interested in squiring an English lady who did not want them to divorce their wives, could dance like a dream and did not get crying drunk in public.

  Until 1913 Westerns were still being shot in New Jersey, but when Cecil B. de Mille chose Hollywood rather than Arizona to film The Squaw Man, the steady movement west became a rush. Hollywood grew fast as the New York-based industry shifted its operations west to benefit from the cheap land and the sunshine.

  After a seriously mistimed fall from a buckboard, which put him in hospital for several weeks, Digby Welcome abandoned stunting for production. He worked for Selig on the Kathryn serial and for Cecil B. de Mille on The Virginian.

  "The pay ain't much but no bones get broken," Digby told Laura and the girls. He had become very Americanised and Laura found him increasingly tiresome. Mary and Susannah attended school in Hollywood and developed into beauties of a contrasting kind. Mary shielded her skin from the Californian sun, brushed her fair silky hair a hundred times a night and cultivated an imperious, unapproachable manne
r. Susannah's dark hair tumbled around her face; she seldom wore a hat and her skin was tanned to a golden brown the year round.

  "Your face'll be like an alligator bag when you're forty," Mary told her.

  "Then I'll move to Florida and live in a swamp," Susannah said. She'd acquired a knack of deflecting Mary's more hurtful remarks.

  Mary wielded her hairbrush. "I'm going to live in London." London was a topic of conversation in the Welcome household at that time.

  Early in 1917 the United States entered the European war and Digby Welcome volunteered. He had wanted to fight since 1914 but his new devotion to all things American had made him uneasy about fighting for England in a 'foreign' war. Isolationism was a strong sentiment in Hollywood, where it was felt that wars were bad for business. The entry of the United States resolved his dilemma. Although almost forty, he was accepted and was among the first contingent to leave from the film capital. Laura and the girls farewelled him at the station. It suited each of them to be there.

  Mary had taken time off from her job at a fashion jewellery store on Sunset Boulevard. Her 'real' life, however, revolved around the lessons she was taking at Professor Louis's acting academy in Hollywood. The Professor had told her to involve herself in 'real-life' situations and play the part. Today she would play the tearful daughter waving her gallant father goodbye.

  Susannah was a cadet reporter on the Hollywood Evening Star. She had taken the job while waiting to hear from the several state colleges to which she had applied for scholarships. She had been accepted by Washington State, two universities in Chicago and two in the east, but in the meantime she had come to like journalism and was undecided about her future. She had formed in recent weeks a strong wish, unrevealed to anyone, to go to Paris. She went to the station along with one of the Star's senior reporters to cover the heroes' departure. Digby Welcome had been away in training camp for several weeks; she wanted urgently to tell him to send her a postcard from Paris.

  Laura travelled to the station in a Pierce Arrow driven by Samson Harkness, a New York stage director who had recently arrived in Hollywood to work for the Famous Players—Lasky Corporation. Harkness was a sleek, confident man pleased to have acquired a handsome mistress so quickly. Laura stepped down from the big, shiny car and placed her gloved hand against Harkness's smooth-shaven cheek.