Cowboy For Hire

by Duncan, Alice

  “My dearest Amy,” the letter read, “I must admit to feeling great consternation about the conditions that appear to obtain on the Peerless moving picture set.”

  “Hmmm,” mused Amy, trying to decide whether or not to be angry about that first sentence and deciding not to be. “He sounds awfully pompous, though.” She wondered why she’d never noticed Vernon’s tendency toward pomposity before.

  “I must again express my disapproval,” Vernon continued in the same stuffy prose, in his same stuffy hand, “of this folly of yours.”

  “Well, I like that! Folly, indeed!” Amy was doing a job of work and earning money, and she resented Vernon’s attitude like anything. She chose to forget that she herself had possessed grave doubts about the venture in the beginning. Vernon had no right to approve or disapprove of anything she did. They weren’t married, after all. Or even officially engaged. There had been an agreement, of sorts, between them for some time, but that was all it was: a sort-of agreement.

  “I don’t like to know,” Vernon’s letter went on, “that my future wife is doing something of which I disapprove so strongly. You know, my dear Amy, that the acting profession has been practiced among the lowest classes for generations. Even in the great Bard’s day, actors were considered far from upstanding citizens.”

  “Fiddlesticks,” muttered Amy. “I don’t need this.” So saying, she thrust the letter aside, intending to ignore it until her attitude improved. It had been a trying day, and she wasn’t up to fighting Horace Huxtable, Mr. Archuleta, a horse, and Vernon Catesby. What she realized she really wanted to do was to hold a quiet, civilized conversation with Charlie Fox.

  Or Karen Crenshaw, of course.

  But, really, there was something so comforting about Mr. Fox. He was such a sensible fellow. So calm. He wasn’t stuffy and disapproving of everything that didn’t fit neatly into his boxed-in life. He didn’t write bothersome letters expressing his doubts about Amy’s common sense and intelligence. He could even ride a horse.

  Amy would bet anything she owned that Vernon could ride a horse no better than she could. And, actually, after today’s lesson, she’d bet she could ride better than he.

  So there.

  On that childish note, the supper gong sounded, and Amy had to rush to wash her face and hands and get to the chow tent before the soup got cold. She sat with Karen, Martin and Charlie, forgot all about Vernon Catesby, and enjoyed herself. Hugely.

  Nine

  “It must be a hundred and fifteen out there,” Amy told Karen, who was holding out a limp shirtwaist for her to put on. Amy was every bit as limp as the shirtwaist. What was more, she was dripping with sweat—she refused to think of it as perspiration as a lady should, because she was too hot and miserable and crabby. “And the air’s as thick as cream.”

  They were in a hastily set-up tent way out on the desert near the dilapidated cabin being used as the sawmill.

  “More like a hundred and twenty,” Karen said. “And I suspect that thickness is a prelude to rain. It looks like we’re in for a summer storm.”

  “Wonderful. Maybe I won’t have to wash the sweat off. Maybe the rain will do it for me.”

  Karen laughed. “Nothing ever works out that well.” She, too, was dripping and uncomfortable. “I’m sorry you’ll have to wear that awful makeup. It’ll make you even more uncomfortable, or I miss my guess.”

  “Makeup?” Amy stared at Karen, slightly befuddled by her words although she knew she shouldn’t be. It was the heat making her fuddle-headed.

  With a nod, Karen said, “Oh, yes. This is the first scene to be shot, and you and everybody else will have to be made up. The cameras are unkind to unmade-up faces. The stuff is thick and sort of greasy.”

  “Oh.” What an unhappy reflection. Amy’s moral attitudes toward makeup weren’t strong enough to poke their uncomfortable heads through the heat of the day and out into the open, but the notion of slapping greasepaint over her sweaty brow held no appeal whatsoever. Nor did the knowledge that, if Vernon ever saw this picture, or a photograph of Amy in theatrical makeup, he’d assuredly pitch a fit.

  Her attitude toward Vernon had improved slightly overnight. It was still true that he was relatively fussy, but when Amy considered the options in her life, Vernon looked pretty good. He was absolutely reliable and solid. Rather boulder like, in truth. And that was exactly what Amy needed. Never again, if she could help it, would her life be insecure. Never. Ever. She wouldn’t even entertain the possibility.

  She stuck her arms in the sleeves of her costume, and Karen buttoned her up the back. Amy’s body was sleek with sweat, and she hoped perspiration stains wouldn’t show on celluloid. How icky to have the whole world view her sweaty armpits in a nickelodeon or theatre.

  “With luck, the process won’t take long. The rehearsal went surprisingly well.”

  “Yes, it did.” Amy had been as surprised as Karen. Horace Huxtable had been as docile as a lamb all morning long. Amy hoped it meant a mended attitude on his part, although she acknowledged that it was too soon to count any chickens. If she knew Huxtable, he’d wait until the chicks were ready to hatch and then smash them flat.

  “Hope it keeps up.”

  “Oh, so do I!”

  She groaned when Karen pulled the sash at her waist tight and tied a bow in the back. “This is very uncomfortable.”

  “I’m sure it is,” Karen said sympathetically. “But I’ll have water for you if you need it, and a towel to blot your face, and you can change again as soon as the shot’s in the can.”

  What strange terminology these people used. Amy smiled at her new friend, and they walked out to the adopted sawmill together. In truth, it was a large, ramshackle cabin that had probably been used as a prospector’s home in the last century, although nobody knew for sure. Martin had scouted it out—Amy didn’t know how he kept all aspects of his job straight—and decided to use it, and here they were.

  The building sat alone on the bare landscape, brown and dilapidated, and listing to port. The wind and earthquakes, Martin had confided to Charlie and Amy, Tilted most structures in California that weren’t tended regularly. Amy, who was familiar with earthquakes, had nodded. Charlie had swallowed and muttered something she didn’t catch, but she got the impression that Charlie’d as soon not hang around California long enough to experience an earthquake for himself. She was vaguely disappointed, although she couldn’t have said why.

  There wasn’t a speck of green on the ground anywhere. Amy wished these motion picture people possessed the sense God gave a gnat and had decided to film their famous feature picture in the springtime rather than in midsummer. Midsummer on the desert was extremely uncomfortable. Spring, on the other hand, could be rather pleasant, fraught as it was with sufficient rain, grass, and wildflowers. But had they? Heavens, no. They had to follow the sun. Like a sunflower. Or a buzzard.

  She tried to console herself with the thought of all the money she was making, but sweat kept dripping down her arms and legs and trickling down her back and between her breasts and annoying her.

  “Fiddle,” she grumbled.

  “Beg pardon?” Karen turned from wiping her forehead with a handkerchief and lifted her eyebrows.

  “Nothing,” mumbled Amy. “Just talking to myself.”

  “Better watch out,” cautioned Karen. “If Huxtable catches you talking to yourself, he’ll never let you live it down.”

  She was right. Amy shut her mouth and intended to keep it shut until she had to say a line. Or pretend to say a line. Making a motion picture could be awfully silly sometimes.

  “Ready to be tied to the log, Miss Wilkes?”

  Charlie’s friendly, humorous voice did something to banish Amy’s hot, black thoughts. When she turned, she beheld him walking toward her, lean and lanky, clean and handsome, and cool as a cucumber. How did he do that?

  “You don’t look nearly as hot as you ought to, given the weather, Mr. Fox,” she said, only partly teasing.

  He
grinned. “Don’t tell anybody, but I just dumped a bucket of water on my head.”

  She and Karen laughed. “What a splendid idea,” Amy said. “I wish I could do that.”

  “No such luck,” Karen said. “In fact, we’d better get you made up.”

  Amy sighed and capitulated. Charlie walked with them over to the makeup table, where several tall, short-backed stools stood with people behind them under some shady umbrellas that didn’t do anything to reduce the heat but would probably prevent sunburn. Amy presumed the people were the Peerless Studio’s makeup artists.

  Horace Huxtable sat on one stool, and was in the process of having his handsome face plastered with dead-white grease-paint by a young woman who didn’t appear to be enjoying the job. Forgetting for a moment that she knew better than to say or do anything that might stir Huxtable to sarcasm, Amy stared at him, aghast.

  He eyed her malevolently. “What’s the matter, my dear Miss Wilkes? You’ll look every bit as charming as I when you’re made up.”

  Amy swallowed, wishing she’d guarded her reaction to the hideous white makeup more closely. But it was truly awful. Ghostly. Eerie. She hated it. “I beg your pardon,” she said in a smothered voice.

  “Don’t beg, sweetheart. It’s demeaning.”

  Karen tapped Amy on the arm and shook her head, as if to warn her not to answer the fiendish Huxtable. Amy didn’t need the warning; she already knew that Huxtable could twist anything anybody said into something vile. So she smiled at Charlie, tried to stifle her distaste for the icky makeup, and went to the tall stool that was farthest away from Huxtable. She knew he followed her with his eyes, and wished he’d just go away.

  Fat chance.

  Fortunately, Charlie walked with her and helped her climb onto the stool. He, of course, was tall enough so that he had no trouble sitting on the high stool. Amy’s legs dangled several inches from the ground, making her feel unsophisticated and more like a child playing dress-up than an actress in a major motion picture.

  The makeup artist assigned to Amy tucked a towel into the neck of her shirtwaist—which made her even hotter than she already was - and brushed her hair back from her face. Amy almost protested before she recalled that she knew nothing—nothing—about the process and she’d do well to keep her mouth shut.

  She was glad she’d caught herself before she could rile Horace Huxtable. He was still watching her, his gaze sharp, hoping to catch her doing something he could malign, impugn, or otherwise belittle.

  She had a mad impulse to stick her tongue out at him. And then introduce him to Vernon Catesby.

  Which was silly. “Mph.”

  “Sorry,” the makeup artist said, handing Amy a handkerchief. “Here, you can wipe it with this.”

  “Ew. Thank you.” Pfew, makeup tasted vile. She wiped her lips and shuddered, wondering if one could be poisoned by theatrical makeup. Probably not. One never read about actors and actresses dying of imbibing makeup.

  Although she couldn’t imagine how the greasepaint could stick to her sweaty skin, the artist seemed to be having no problem in making her up. As the woman worked, Amy observed the set. The cabin itself was nondescript, but one wall had been removed so that the cameras could manoeuvre more easily. Indoors, the place had been transformed.

  Members of the movie crew had made up a huge cardboard saw-like structure that was operated by a crank. A bucket of sawdust had been placed beneath the saw, where another crew member would be positioned. He would toss up handfuls of sawdust when the saw was cranked, in order to simulate the process of cutting logs. Amy was supposed to be tied to a log by Charlie Fox’s character, and rescued by Horace Huxtable’s before she could be sawn in half by the cardboard saw. It seemed to Amy that the chances of her being tickled to death by the serrated cardboard were more likely.

  The whole setup seemed comical to her earlier in the day. Now it all seemed like work. Hot work. And she had no desire to be rescued by Horace Huxtable. In fact, she wanted nothing whatever to do with Huxtable for the rest of her life.

  But she’d agreed to do this picture, and she’d keep her word. She felt as if she had a blanket plastered to her face by the time the artist was finished with her. She was hot, cranky, and felt smothered. A glance at Charlie Fox garnered her a grin, which perked her up a little bit, but not much. It was too hot to be perky. He, too, looked ghastly in the makeup, although not nearly as ghastly as she did.

  She did, however, feel as though she was among friends when she walked back to the pseudo-sawmill, what with Charlie on one side and Karen on the other. Even Horace Huxtable and the heat couldn’t defeat her if she had such nice people on her side.

  That thought carried her through Horace Huxtable’s first snide comments when she walked onto the set. Martin’s friendly smile and considerate manner helped her through Huxtable’s next several vicious verbal thrusts, and by that time Martin was ready to start the scene.

  “I know you’ve not acted in front of the camera before, Amy, but just think of it as an extension of me, if you want to. Then you won’t be worried about it.”

  Oh, really? Little did he know. She smiled. “Certainly. Thank you.”

  Huxtable huffed.

  Charlie said, “Shall I tie her up now, Martin?”

  “My, my, the cowboy is eager to tie the girl up, isn’t he?” muttered Huxtable, buffing his nails on his plaid shirtfront. “One never knows what odd fancies other folks enjoy, does one?”

  Amy ignored him. So did Charlie. Martin thought about Charlie’s question. “Let’s rehearse the scene once first. Up to the tying-up part.”

  They rehearsed the scene. As they did so, Amy remembering Karen’s comment about the prospect of rain, thought she heard the rumble of distant thunder. So unfamiliar was she with thunder, however—Pasadena was too proper to allow any but the very rarest of thunderstorms to invade its precincts—that she wasn’t sure. Since she was lying on lumpy log, staring into Charlie’s eyes, and doing her best to look terrified, she didn’t comment on the possibility of a storm in the distance.

  “Good, Amy, good. You should probably scream now,” Martin coached. “Remember, this man is aiming to kill you.”

  Scream? Good Lord, if she screamed in reality, she’d deafen the poor man. It was annoying, too, that the heat was so intense. If it weren’t for the insufferable stuffiness and sweltering heat inside this awful building, she’d likely enjoy being tied up by Charlie Fox As it was, her skin was so slick the rope kept slipping. She sighed heavily, wondering again if Vernon was right and her morals were in jeopardy of being compromised.

  With an effort, she opened her mouth and pretended to scream. She also struggled, as Martin had requested. Both she and Charlie were so drippy that, if he’d been trying to restrain her in earnest, she’d have slithered from his grasp in an instant, but they tried to make it look good for the picture’s sake.

  “Good!” Martin called. “That’s good! Let’s take our places and shoot the scene now. Do it just that way! Let’s get it in one take.”

  “Grph.” Amy knew it was unladylike to grunt, but she couldn’t help it. The stupid log was grotesquely uncomfortable to lie upon.

  “Here, Miss Wilkes, let me help you up.”

  She took Charlie’s hand and appreciated his tugging her to her feet. “Thank you.”

  Horace Huxtable was standing a few feet off, glaring at her as she straightened her skirt. Although she felt like making a face at him, she didn’t, and was proud of her restraint.

  “Here, Amy, blot your face with this.”

  She turned to find Karen holding out a fresh towel. She’d rather have a drink of water. Nevertheless, she blotted the sweat from her face, being careful not to smear her paint. “Thanks, Karen.”

  “Sure. We have to take care of our stars.”

  Amy wasn’t sure, but she thought Karen was making a joke. She didn’t have energy enough to laugh, but drank greedily when another crew member handed her a glass of water. It wasn’t cold, but i
t was wet. Since Amy felt sort of like a squeezed sponge at the moment, it was pleasant to fill up her empty spots.

  “Places!”

  Martin’s cry drew the cast back to the sawmill. Amy found her mark chalked on the floor where she was to begin the scene, struggling with Charlie. Again she wished it weren’t so blasted hot. It got hotter—and much noisier—when a crew member touched a match to the gas jets, lights flared up on the set and the cameramen began cranking.

  The camera seemed an ominous instrument. Amy tried to ignore it, but it was as noisy as the very devil, and it kept spitting out sprockets as it churned. She envisioned some kind of rodent inside the box, running wildly on a wheel that kept the thing going. As the sprockets hit the floor, they sounded like discarded rifle casings, and she hoped the rodent wouldn’t get hurt. She knew she was being fanciful and chalked it up to the heat.

  “I’ve heard people say they might make talking pictures someday,” Charlie shouted as he pretended to rough her up. “It doesn’t seem likely to me.”

  “Impossible,” Amy shouted back. “You’d never be able to hear the actors talking over the noise of the camera.”

  “Maybe they’ll invent quieter cameras eventually.”

  “I hope so, if only to protect the ears of the—Ack!”

  “Whoops. Sorry.”

  “Don’t apologize, Charlie!” Martin cried from the sidelines. “Somebody might read your lips.”

  “Right,” said Charlie, remarkably unabashed. How nice that he didn’t get upset when he made a mistake. Amy wished she were more like that.

  Amy would like to read his lips. By hand.

  Good heavens, if she got any more shocking notions in her head, she’d have to retire from picture making and enter a nunnery. And she wasn’t even Catholic.

  “Make it look good!” hollered Martin. “Struggle, Amy!”

  Amy thought she had been struggling. However, she increased her energy output until she thought for sure she’d faint from heat prostration. “Anyway, I’ve heard some of the case members talking about how they think adding talk to the movies will destroy their artistic merit.” She shrieked, hoping she looked scared for the camera. She felt thoroughly rotten, if that counted.