Jack and Susan in 1913

by Michael McDowell

  The film then rolled on, showing shots of small towns and mountains and forests and deserts, taken from the windows of the train.

  Junius Fane was not interested in this stock material. “Is Beaumont in here yet?” he called out, rising from his chair into the light from the projector.

  “I’m here,” said Jack.

  “Splendid stuff,” said Fane.

  “Oh, yes,” murmured others in the room, “perfectly splendid.” Susan murmured other words.

  “Have you ever acted before?” Fane asked. The projector whirred on. A snowcapped mountain peaked against Fane’s neck.

  “No,” replied Jack, “never.”

  “Well, it doesn’t matter,” said Fane easily. “Because you are a natural actor. I just wish that I had known this in New York. A true, natural hero—perfect to play opposite Miss Conquest here. Ida, didn’t you think that you and Mr. Beaumont looked splendid together? Didn’t he show you off to advantage?”

  “Sure as sugar,” replied Ida.

  “I’m going to hire you right now,” said Fane, “on the spot. Somebody fetch our standard contract. Doesn’t matter what it says, as long as there’s a place for him and me to sign. We’ll worry about the details later, but I want him on the Cosmic payroll before some other studio gets to him.”

  Jack stood speechless. Cactus whirred across Junius Fane’s chest.

  “Hosmer, stop the projector and run it back so that we can watch Beaumont’s scene again. Susan, you pay particular attention, because I want you to concoct a script around this footage. Introduce Jack’s character as the hero. He’s in love with Ida, but too shy to tell her so. He follows her out west. He makes an advance. He is rebuffed in the dining car. Bandits attack the train. Ida’s life is threatened. Her virtue is in danger. Jack saves her life and her virtue—”

  “And her diamonds—” Ida prompted.

  “And then let him save her life again. No, wait, change that. She should save his life. That’s it. She has to make a choice between her virtue and her diamonds or Jack’s life.”

  “I know which I’d choose,” Susan muttered darkly. “In a minute.”

  “She chooses to save Jack’s life, of course,” said Fane. “And that proves she loves him. Let’s have a scene at the beach, too. Maybe she chooses between her diamonds and saving Jack from being eaten by sharks. I’m sure you can come up with the details. And keep the titles down, Susan. With Jack and Ida up on the screen, we’re not going to need words to tell the audience what is happening between them.”

  “Does Mr. Beaumont die at the end?” Susan asked.

  “Certainly not. This is a moving picture. We will leave unhappy endings to the stage, Miss Bright. And to bad novels, which is where they belong.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  SOMEONE FOUND A blank contract, and Junius Fane pushed Jack into the nearest office to have him sign. “Have you a pen?” Fane asked.

  “No,” replied Jack.

  “Susan, please get Mr. Beaumont something to sign his name with.”

  Susan wouldn’t do it. “Junius,” she protested, “I am sure you know the story of how this man tricked me.”

  Jack, who had been reading the contract, glanced up and smiled a little smile of apology at Susan Bright.

  “Oh, of course. Everyone in the company knows,” returned Fane easily, insensitive to whatever additional pain this might afford Susan. He rummaged in a box of supplies and came up with a fountain pen for Jack.

  “Well, then, do you really want to hire a man who is an inveterate liar? A man who makes up wild tales about anything? And everything?”

  Jack blushed, but he did not look up from the contract.

  “All actors are liars, Susan,” replied Junius Fane easily. “And the better the liar, the better the actor. Jack—may I call you Jack?” Jack nodded with a polite smile of acquiescence, then returned to the contract. Mr. Fane went on: “Jack showed a natural talent before the camera, and I am convinced that he will—with his disregard for danger and his own physical well-being—be a distinct asset to our little acting company. I was at a bit of a loss what to do when Mr. Fitcher decided to remain in New York with his parents. I had no one of the proper height to play against Ida. Ida looks best against someone who is quite tall, and as you see, Mr. Beaumont is exactly the right height. Besides, I’m not hiring Mr. Beaumont simply because of his splendid performance before the camera and his height. I’m also hiring him because of his mechanical abilities. It’s not as easy to get things done in California, I’m told, as it is in New York. I’ll feel safer having Mr. Beaumont around if things go wrong with the cameras or any other mechanical equipment.”

  “But he’s a stockbroker! He’s not a professional mechanic, and he never was! He lied about that too!”

  “That’s as it may be, Susan, but then all I can say is that Mr. Beaumont is the best damned amateur mechanic I’ve ever come across.” Then turning to Jack, he said, “It’s time to sign the contract.”

  “I’ve inked in a few changes,” said Jack, handing the contract to Fane, who took it and looked it over.

  “I should argue about these alterations,” the director said, “but I know that you are a man of independent means, and I suppose that if I do not agree to your stipulations, you will simply walk out the door. I don’t want to lose you, so I will sign. Mr. Beaumont, you’re an extortioner.”

  With a nod to Jack, Fane signed the contract and blotted the signatures, then folded the document and put it into his pocket. Then, just before leaving, he said, “Susan, look for a place for Jack to live, would you?”

  When he was gone, Jack smiled at Susan. Susan stared back at him with enraged astonishment and blurted, “Tripod is exploring the hillside, but I wish he were here to tell you what I think of you. I refuse to have anything to do with you.”

  “You don’t have to,” Jack said smugly. “You’re a writer. I’m an actor. You can sit inside this dark office all day and write, and I’ll be outside under the splendid sun, smelling the splendid air, standing in front of the camera being taller than Ida.”

  “I won’t work with this company while you’re in it,” Susan went on.

  “I’m given to understand there are other moving-picture companies in Hollywood. Perhaps, after a while, you could find employment in one of them.”

  “That’s what you should do,” said Susan. “I had this job first. You don’t need the money anyway. The only reason you’re doing this is in order to annoy me.”

  “In the first place,” said Jack, “I do need the work, if I’m to sleep with a roof over my head, fill my stomach with food, and pay back the five hundred dollars you demanded of me, though it was, of course, mine to begin with. In the second place, you should remember that it was I who obtained this work for you. And, in the third place, I know my presence is an annoyance to you, so I will endeavor to stay out of your way. I wish you all joy in your married life. Hosmer will make a wonderful husband and father. Your children are sure to win prizes for beauty and intelligence.”

  Junius Fane had been apprised of the difficulty of obtaining lodging for “movies” in Hollywood, for the town had not yet become reconciled to having a sinful industry take root within its boundaries. So, employing a sympathetic agent, Fane had rented a row of new, cheaply constructed two-bedroom furnished bungalows on the southern edge of Hollywood in which to house his little company. The tiny yards in back of these houses were fenced, and beyond the fences were massive flat fields with stately pumping oil wells and trolleys moving back and forth on their way to and from town. Bleaker dwellings could not be imagined; they were all of the same design and bore only rudimentary, machine-made ornamentation. The yards were dirt, and the sun shone blisteringly on the tile roofs. Nothing grew, nothing attracted the eye.

  But there were no signs against Jews, actors, and dogs. The rent was, as Mr. Fane had predicted, less than they would have paid in New York. Fane himself took the last bungalow at the eastern end of the muddy street
, and Susan shared the one next door with Ida Conquest. The third bungalow from the end had been taken by Hosmer Collamore and into this tiny house Jack was also billeted.

  Hosmer welcomed Jack with a surprisingly cordial little speech: “I hope we’re going to be friends again. I’ve got nothing against you—never had, never did, and never will—and if you’re a man you’ll say the same to me, Jack Beaumont.”

  Jack’s first instinct was to pummel Hosmer Collamore into the middle of next week, but then it occurred to him that Hosmer and Susan were not married yet, and that perhaps he would be wise to bide his time in this matter. So, blushing at his duplicity, Jack shook Hosmer’s hand, and said, “When’s the wedding?”

  “We’re going to get settled first,” said Hosmer, and then added with a wink, “but it doesn’t matter so much to me anyway, for just look out that window there. There’s no fence between the houses, and the nights are dark out here—if you get my meaning.”

  Jack got Hosmer’s meaning, all right, and it made him want to hammer Hosmer straight through the calendar, not pausing even for holidays. But he judiciously did and said nothing.

  Jack took the bedroom at the back of the house. For him, the job of unpacking was quickly accomplished; having abandoned his luggage at the hotel in Los Angeles, he had only to empty his pockets. The room’s furnishings consisted of a bed, a dresser, a mirror on the wall above the dresser, and an ugly carpet on the floor. A window with a rickety sash looked out on to the oil fields, and another window with an equally rickety sash looked out at Susan and Ida’s bungalow. Jack moved his bed—too short for him by at least six inches—so that he would be able to spy on the house next door.

  He lay down to see what he could see from the bed’s new position. It would be easier to see into Susan’s windows at night when the lights were on. Tripod was in the yard, accustoming himself to the new difficulties of running about in dirt. This was proving to be much more difficult than moving on sidewalks; wooden legs sink in dirt.

  Jack’s luck was improving, he thought, if Tripod had been slowed down. As if sensing Jack’s thought, the dog trotted across the yard, and growled beneath the window, where Jack sprawled on the mattress.

  Jack lay back and thought about Susan. It was wounding that she had gone to bed with Hosmer Collamore. Perhaps she would have gone to bed with Jack if he had asked. Jack hadn’t asked because he hadn’t wanted to seem forward—and he hadn’t wanted her to do something that might have been against her principles or inclination. Now he wished he had at least broached the subject.

  Jack knew that other men, in his position, would have lost all respect for the woman, upon learning that she had gone to bed with another man—or even if she had gone to bed with themselves, for that matter. Most men wanted to marry virgins. Just as an experiment, Jack tried to lessen his regard for Susan. It didn’t work. He still felt the same about her, even knowing that she had invited Hosmer to her room in the hotel. He knew that he would love her even if every night Hosmer walked across the yard, scraped his shoes on the doormat, and knocked discreetly at her back door, and she let him in. Jack wasn’t sure why this didn’t matter to him, but it didn’t. All he wanted was Susan.

  He wanted her here with him on this naked mattress. He wanted her head and her thick black hair pressing against his chest. He wanted to see her legs, and make sure that her injury was healed. He wanted to kiss her legs and apologize once more for having caused her so much pain and suffering. He tried to imagine her body and what it looked like beneath her clothes; he found he had no difficulty in doing so. He recalled the shape and the taste of her mouth. He—

  He got up and pulled down the shades, and then he thought about Susan a while longer.

  A few hours later, after Jack had brushed off his suit and washed out his shirt and underwear, Susan Bright herself—in the flesh, and not just in Jack’s febrile imagination—knocked at the door.

  “Hosmer’s not here,” said Jack.

  “I came to see you,” said Susan.

  “Please wipe your feet before you come inside. I wish there were some grass growing around here.”

  “Me too. I brought you something to read.” She handed him a dozen typewritten pages.

  “What is this?”

  “It’s the script for the picture you’re to start shooting tomorrow. I just finished it. It’s called Plunder, and the holdup is, of course, the climax. But I thought you might like to see what else happens to you.”

  In the sparsely furnished living room there was a low uncomfortable settee and two low uncomfortable chairs. Susan sat on the settee and Jack sat across from her and read through the scenario.

  A few minutes later, he looked up. “This seems quite…thrilling,” he said uncertainly.

  “Mr. Fane is very pleased with it,” said Susan complacently.

  “In the first scene,” said Jack, flipping the manuscript to the front, “I’m run down in the street by a motorcyclist.”

  “Mr. Westermeade, minus two teeth,” said Susan. “I don’t think he’ll have much objection to that. Mr. Fane says that it can be filmed on Sunset Boulevard.”

  Jack turned a few pages of the script. “Here I’m nearly hit by a speedboat, and then I’m bound and gagged and thrown into a trunk, and the trunk is buried on the beach at low tide.”

  “Mr. Fane wanted a scene at the shore,” said Susan with a hypocritical smile.

  “Then here, at the end, after I’ve rescued Ida, the bandits capture me again, tie me up in cornstalks and leave me to be pecked to death by ostriches.”

  “Did you see the ostrich ranch the train from Los Angeles passed by?”

  “Yes I did,” said Jack, with annoyance. “I’m not so certain that I’m going to relish making this picture.”

  “Well, it does end happily with you married to Ida—if you consider that a happy ending. Of course, that part will be shot first, just in case something goes wrong in any of the thrilling scenes.”

  “I’m very much relieved to hear it. Did you enjoy yourself, thinking up this torture for me?”

  “Immensely,” said Susan. “And I have an idea for another script that I’m going to begin on tonight.”

  “Perhaps you should wait to see if I survive this one.”

  “In the next,” said Susan, “I’m going to have you thrown off a cliff. You know, Junius pays extra for falls—ten cents a foot. I want you to earn as much money as possible, so that you can begin to pay me back the money you owe me.”

  “You realize, of course, that I don’t actually owe you that money,” said Jack stiffly. Susan was being unpleasant. He liked it better when she was running from him, and he was chasing after her. He didn’t like it when she stopped, turned around, looked him in the eye, and began hurling darts. In the next day or so he was to stand in the middle of Sunset Boulevard and be run down by a motorcycle in order to appease Susan Bright’s bloodthirsty temper. “For that five hundred dollars you got a full interest in my patent.”

  “What?” said Susan, with surprise.

  Jack repeated himself. “I said, you got a full interest in my patent. You see, when Hosmer came to me with an offer to buy the rights to my invention for five hundred dollars, I knew that the offer was really coming from you.”

  “How? How did you know?”

  “Because Hosmer wasn’t the type to do me favors of any sort—and you were. I also knew that you had five hundred dollars in the bank. So I accepted the money and signed over the rights to Hosmer, knowing that he would, in turn, sign them over to you. And if I can ever find who stole the plans, I’ll patent the thing, and in a few years you will probably find yourself very, very rich.”

  Susan blinked hard. “Someone stole those plans?”

  “I’ve told you that several times, but you never believed me.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” she exclaimed. “Let me understand this—for those five hundred dollars I gave to Hosmer to give to you, you turned over the entire income from that invention to
Hosmer.”

  “Yes. And Hosmer turned it over to you.”

  Susan hesitated a moment, then went on, “And now someone has stolen the plans—have I got it right?”

  “Yes.”

  She thought for a moment, then said decisively, “Then we have to get them back.”

  “I don’t,” said Jack. “Because even if I got them back, and went through the trouble and expense of having them patented, and then went to the expense of marketing the device—you’d get all the money. Which was a fine idea as long as you and I were getting married, but I have no inclination to go to such lengths in order to improve the financial condition of Mr. and Mrs. Hosmer T. Collamore.”

  Susan was still for a moment. Then she said suddenly, “Do you have any brandy in the house?”

  “No,” replied Jack. “Hollywood is a dry town. And I don’t have any money to buy brandy with anyway.”

  Susan sat back and thought for a few minutes.

  She’s sharpening her darts, Jack thought.

  “You signed over all of the proceeds of that camera invention to Hosmer, on my behalf…” said Susan.

  “For the third or fourth time—yes.”

  “Hosmer signed over only half of them to me,” said Susan. “He kept the other half for himself.”

  Jack’s eyes went wide. “I’m not surprised to hear it. I also wouldn’t be surprised to discover that he had stolen the plans himself. After all, he knew they existed, he knew where they were, and he knew that they could bring in a great deal of money.”