One genial morning a few days later the sun shone in across the desk of
Baird while he talked to Merton Gill of the new piece. It was a sun of
fairest promise. Mr. Gill’s late work was again lavishly commended,
and confidence was expressed that he would surpass himself in the drama
shortly to be produced.
Mr. Baird spoke in enthusiastic terms of this, declaring that if it did
not prove to be a knock-out--a clean-up picture--then he, Jeff Baird,
could safely be called a Chinaman. And during the time that would elapse
before shooting on the new piece could begin he specified a certain
study in which he wished his actor to engage.
“You’ve watched the Edgar Wayne pictures, haven’t you?”
“Yes, I’ve seen a number of them.”
“Like his work?--that honest
country-boy-loving-his--mother-and-little-sister stuff, wearing overalls
and tousled hair in the first part, and coming out in city clothes and
eight dollar neckties at the last, with his hair slicked back same as a
seal?”
“Oh, yes, I like it. He’s fine. He has a great appeal.”
“Good! That’s the kind of a part you’re going to get in this new piece.
Lots of managers in my place would say ‘No-he’s a capable young chap and
has plenty of talent, but he lacks the experience to play an Edgar Wayne
part.’ That’s what a lot of these Wisenheimers would say. But me--not
so. I believe you can get away with this part, and I’m going to give you
your chance.”
“I’m sure I don’t know how to thank you, Mr. Baird, and I’ll try to give
you the very best that is in me--”
“I’m sure of that, my boy; you needn’t tell me. But now--what I want you
to do while you got this lay-off between pieces, chase out and watch all
the Edgar Wayne pictures you can find. There was one up on the Boulevard
last week I’d like you to watch half-a-dozen times. It may be at another
house down this way, or it may be out in one of the suburbs. I’ll have
someone outside call up and find where it is to-day and they’ll let you
know. It’s called Happy Homestead or something snappy like that, and it
kind of suggests a layout for this new piece of mine, see what I mean?
It’ll suggest things to you.
“Edgar and his mother and little sister live on this farm and Edgar
mixes in with a swell dame down at the summer hotel, and a villain tries
to get his old mother’s farm and another villain takes his little sister
off up to the wicked city, and Edgar has more trouble than would patch
Hell a mile, see? But it all comes right in the end, and the city girl
falls for him when she sees him in his stepping-out clothes.
“It’s a pretty little thing, but to my way of thinking it lacks
strength; not enough punch to it. So we’re sort of building up on that
general idea, only we’ll put in the pep that this piece lacked. If I
don’t miss my guess, you’ll be able to show Wayne a few things about
serious acting--especially after you’ve studied his methods a little bit
in this piece.”
“Well, if you think I can do it,” began Merton, then broke off in answer
to a sudden thought. “Will my mother be the same actress that played it
before, the one that mopped all the time?”
“Yes, the same actress, but a different sort of mother. She--she’s more
enterprising; she’s a sort of chemist, in a way; puts up preserves and
jellies for the hotel. She never touches a mop in the whole piece and
dresses neat from start to finish.”
“And does the cross-eyed man play in it? Sometimes, in scenes with him,
I’d get the idea I wasn’t really doing my best.”
“Yes, yes, I know.” Baird waved a sympathetic hand. “Poor old Jack. He’s
trying hard to do something worth while, but he’s played in those cheap
comedy things so long it’s sort of hard for him to get out of it and
play serious stuff, if you know what I mean.”
“I know what you mean,” said Merton.
“And he’s been with me so long I kind of hate to discharge him. You see,
on account of those eyes of his, it would be hard for him to get a job
as a serious actor, so I did think I’d give him another part in
this piece if you didn’t object, just to sort of work him into the
worth-while things. He’s so eager for the chance. It was quite pathetic
how grateful he looked when I told him I’d try him once more in one of
the better and finer things. And a promise is a promise.”
“Still, Merton, you’re the man I must suit in this cast; if you say the
word I’ll tell Jack he must go, though I know what a blow it will be to
him--”
“Oh, no, Mr. Baird,” Merton interrupted fervently, “I wouldn’t think
of such a thing. Let the poor fellow have a chance to learn something
better than the buffoonery he’s been doing. I’ll do everything I can
to help him. I think it is very pathetic, his wanting to do the better
things; it’s fine of him. And maybe some day he could save up enough to
have a good surgeon fix his eyes right. It might be done, you know.”
“Now that’s nice of you, my boy. It’s kind and generous. Not every actor
of your talent would want Jack working in the same scene with him. And
perhaps, as you say, some day he can save up enough from his wages
to have his eyes fixed. I’ll mention it to him. And this reminds me,
speaking of the cast, there’s another member who might bother some of
these fussy actors. She’s the girl who will take the part of your city
sweetheart. As a matter of fact, she isn’t exactly the type I’d have
picked for the part, because she’s rather a large, hearty girl, if you
know what I mean. I could have found a lot who were better lookers; but
the poor thing has a bedridden father and mother and a little crippled
brother and a little sister that isn’t well, and she’s working hard to
send them all to school--I mean the children, not her parents; so I saw
the chance to do her a good turn, and I hope you’ll feel that you can
work harmoniously with her. I know I’m too darned human to be in this
business--” Baird looked aside to conceal his emotion.
“I’m sure, Mr. Baird, I’ll get along fine with the young lady, and I
think it’s fine of you to give these people jobs when you could get
better folks in their places.”
“Well, well, we’ll say no more about that,” replied Baird gruffly, as
one who had again hidden his too-impressionable heart. “Now ask in the
outer office where that Wayne film is to-day and catch it as often as
you feel you’re getting any of the Edgar Wayne stuff. We’ll call you up
when work begins.”
He saw the Edgar Wayne film, a touching story in which the timid,
diffident country boy triumphed over difficulties and won the love of
a pure New York society girl, meantime protecting his mother from the
insulting sneers of the idle rich and being made to suffer intensely by
the apparent moral wreck of his dear little sister whom a rich scoundrel
lured to the great city with false promises that he would make a fine
lady of her. Never before had he studied the acting method of Wayne
with a definite aim in view. Now he watched until he himself became the
awkward country boy. He was primed with the Wayne manner, the appealing
ingenuousness, the simple embarrassments; the manly regard for the old
mother, when word came that Baird was ready for him in the new piece.
This drama was strikingly like the Wayne piece he had watched, at least
in its beginning. Baird, in his striving for the better things, seemed
at first to have copied his model almost too faithfully. Not only was
Merton to be the awkward country boy in the little hillside farmhouse,
but his mother and sister were like the other mother and sister.
Still, he began to observe differences. The little sister--played by the
Montague girl--was a simple farm maiden as in the other piece, but the
mother was more energetic. She had silvery hair and wore a neat black
dress, with a white lace collar and a cameo brooch at her neck, and
she embraced her son tearfully at frequent intervals, as had the other
mother; but she carried on in her kitchen an active business in canning
fruits and putting up jellies, which, sold to the rich people at
the hotel, would swell the little fund that must be saved to pay the
mortgage. Also, in the present piece, the country boy was to become a
great inventor, and this was different. Merton felt that this was a good
touch; it gave him dignity.
He appeared ready for work on the morning designated. He was now able to
make up himself, and he dressed in the country-boy costume that had been
provided. It was perhaps not so attractive a costume as Edgar Wayne
had worn, consisting of loose-fitting overalls that came well above his
waist and were fastened by straps that went over the shoulders; but, as
Baird remarked, the contrast would be greater when he dressed in rich
city clothes at the last. His hair, too, was no longer the slicked-back
hair of Parmalee, but tousled in country disorder.
For much of the action of the new piece they would require an outside
location, but there were some interiors to be shot on the lot. He forgot
the ill-fitting overalls when shown his attic laboratory where, as an
ambitious young inventor, sustained by the unfaltering trust of mother
and sister, he would perfect certain mechanical devices that would bring
him fame, fortune, and the love of a pure New York society girl. It was
a humble little room containing a work-bench that held his tools and a
table littered with drawings over which he bent until late hours of the
night.
At this table, simple, unaffected, deeply earnest, he was shown as the
dreaming young inventor, perplexed at moments, then, with brightening
eyes, making some needful change in the drawings. He felt in these
scenes that he was revealing a world of personality. And he must
struggle to give a sincere interpretation in later scenes that would
require more action. He would show Baird that he had not watched Edgar
Wayne without profit.
Another interior was of the neat living room of the humble home. Here
were scenes of happy family life with the little sister and the fond
old mother. The Montague girl was a charming picture in her simple print
dress and sunbonnet beneath which hung her braid of golden hair. The
mother was a sweet old dear, dressed as Baird had promised. She early
confided to Merton that she was glad her part was not to be a mopping
part. In that case she would have had to wear knee-pads, whereas now she
was merely, she said, to be a tired business woman.
Still another interior was of her kitchen where she busily carried on
her fruit-canning activities. Pots boiled on the stove and glass jars
were filled with her product. One of the pots, Merton noticed, the
largest, had a tightly closed top from which a slender tube of copper
went across one corner of the little room to where it coiled in a bucket
filled with water, whence it discharged its contents into bottles.
This, it seemed, was his mother’s improved grape juice, a cooling drink
to tempt the jaded palates of the city folks up at the big hotel.
The laboratory of the young inventor was abundantly filmed while the
earnest country boy dreamed hopefully above his drawings or tinkered at
metal devices on the work-bench. The kitchen in which his mother toiled
was repeatedly shot, including close-ups of the old mother’s ingenious
contrivances--especially of the closed boiler with its coil of copper
tubing--by which she was helping to save the humble home.
And a scene in the neat living room with its old-fashioned furniture
made it all too clear that every effort would be required to save
the little home. The cruel money-lender, a lawyer with mean-looking
whiskers, confronted the three shrinking inmates to warn them that
he must have his money by a certain day or out they would go into the
streets. The old mother wept at this, and the earnest boy took her in
his arms. The little sister, terrified by the man’s rough words, also
flew to this shelter, and thus he defied the intruder, calm, fearless,
dignified. The money would be paid and the intruder would now please
remember that, until the day named, this little home was their very own.
The scoundrel left with a final menacing wave of his gnarled hand; left
the group facing ruin unless the invention could be perfected, unless
Mother could sell an extraordinary quantity of fruit or improved grape
juice to the city folks, or, indeed, unless the little sister could do
something wonderful.
She, it now seemed, was confident she also could help. She stood apart
from them and prettily promised to do something wonderful. She asked
them to remember that she was no longer a mere girl, but a woman with a
woman’s determination. They both patted the little thing encouragingly
on the back.
The interiors possible on the Holden lot having been finished, they
motored each day to a remote edge of the city where outside locations
had been found for the humble farmhouse and the grand hotel. The
farmhouse was excellently chosen, Merton thought, being the neat,
unpretentious abode of honest, hard-working people; but the hotel, some
distance off, was not so grand, he thought, as Baird’s new play seemed
to demand. It was plainly a hotel, a wooden structure with balconies;
but it seemed hardly to afford those attractions that would draw
wealthier element from New York. He forebore to warn Baird of this,
however, fearing to discourage a manager who was honestly striving for
the serious in photodrama.
His first exterior scene saw him, with the help of Mother and little
sister, loading the one poor motor car which the family possessed with
Mother’s products. These were then driven to the hotel. The Montague
girl drove the car, and scenes of it in motion were shot from a car that
preceded them.
They arrived before the hotel; Merton was directed to take from the car
an iron weight attached to a rope and running to a connection forward
on the hood. He was to throw the weight to the ground, plainly with the
notion that he would thus prevent the car from running away. The simple
device was, in fact, similar to that used, at Gashwiler’s strict orders,
on the delivery wagon back in Simsbury, for Gashwiler had believed that
Dexter would run away if untethered. But of course it was absurd, Merton
saw, to anchor a motor car in such a manner, and he was somewhat taken
aback when Baird directed this action.
“It’s all right,” Baird assured him. “You’re a simple country boy, and
don’t know any better, so do it plumb serious. You’ll be smart enough
before the show’s over. Go ahead, get out, grab the weight, throw it
down, and don’t look at it again, as if you did this every time. That’s
it. You’re not being funny; just a simple country boy like Wayne was
at first.” He performed the action, still with some slight misgiving.
Followed scenes of brother and sister offering Mother’s wares to the
city folks idling on the porch of the hotel. Each bearing a basket they
were caught submitting the jellies and jams. The brother was laughed at,
even sneered at, by the supercilious rich, the handsomely gowned women
and the dissipated looking men. No one appeared to wish his jellies.
The little sister had better luck. The women turned from her, but the
men gathered about her and quickly bought out the stock. She went to
the car for more and the men followed her. To Merton, who watched these
scenes, the dramatist’s intention was plain. These men did not really
care for jellies and jams, they were attracted solely by the wild-rose
beauty of the little country girl. And they were plainly the sort of men
whose attentions could mean no good to such as she.
Left on the porch, he was now directed to approach a distinguished
looking old gentleman, probably a banker and a power in Wall Street, who
read his morning papers. Timidly he stood before this person, thrusting
forward his basket. The old gentleman glanced up in annoyance and
brutally rebuffed the country boy with an angry flourish of the paper he
read.
“You’re hurt by this treatment,” called Baird, “and almost discouraged.
You look back over your shoulder to where sister is doing a good
business with her stuff, and you see the old mother back in her kitchen,
working her fingers to the bone--we’ll have a flash of that, see?--and
you try again. Take out that bottle in the corner of the basket, uncork
it, and try again. The old man looks up-he’s smelled something. You hold
the bottle toward him and you’re saying so-and-so, so-and-so, so-and-so,
‘Oh, Mister, if you knew how hard my poor old mother works to make this
stuff! Won’t you please take a little taste of her improved grape juice
and see if you don’t want to buy a few shillings’ worth’--so-and-so,
so-and-so, so-and-so--see what I mean? That’s it, look pleading. Think
how the little home depends on it.”
The old gentleman, first so rude, consented to taste the improved grape
juice. He put the bottle to his lips and tilted it. A camera was brought
up to record closely the look of pleased astonishment that enlivened his
face. He arose to his feet, tilted the bottle again, this time drinking
abundantly. He smacked his lips with relish, glanced furtively at the
group of women in the background, caught the country boy by a sleeve and
drew him farther along the porch.
“He’s telling you what fine stuff this grape juice is,” explained Baird;
“saying that your mother must be a wonderful old lady, and he’ll drop
over to meet her; and in the meantime he wants you to bring him all this
grape juice she has. He’ll take it; she can name her own price. He
hands you a ten dollar bill for the bottle he has and for another in the
basket--that’s it, give it to him. The rest of the bottles are jams
or something. You want him to take them, but he pushes them back. He’s
saying he wants the improved grape juice or nothing. He shows a big wad
of bills to show he can pay for it. You look glad now--the little home
may be saved after all.”
The scene was shot. Merton felt that he carried it acceptably. He
had shown the diffident pleading of the country boy that his mother’s
product should be at least tasted, his frank rejoicing when the old
gentleman approved of it. He was not so well satisfied with the work of
the Montague girl as his innocent little sister. In her sale of Mother’s
jellies to the city men, in her acceptance of their attentions, she
appeared to be just the least bit bold. It seemed almost as if she
wished to attract their notice. He hesitated to admit it, for he
profoundly esteemed the girl, but there were even moments when, in
technical language, she actually seemed to “vamp” these creatures who
thronged about her to profess for her jams and jellies an interest he
was sure they did not feel.
He wondered if Baird had made it plain to her that she was a very
innocent little country girl who should be unpleasantly affected by
these advances. The scene he watched shot where the little sister
climbed back into the motor car, leered at by the four New York
club-men, he thought especially distasteful. Surely the skirt of her
print dress was already short enough. She needed not to lift it under
this evil regard as she put her foot up to the step.
It was on the porch of the hotel, too, that he was to have his first
scene with the New York society girl whose hand he won. She proved to be
the daughter of the old gentleman who liked the improved grape juice.
As Baird had intimated, she was a large girl; not only tall and stoutly
built, but somewhat heavy of face. Baird’s heart must have been touched
indeed when he consented to employ her, but Merton remembered her
bedridden father and mother, the little crippled brother, the little
sister who was also in poor health, and resolved to make their scenes
together as easy for her as he could.
At their first encounter she appeared in a mannish coat and riding
breeches, though she looked every inch a woman in this attire.
“She sees you, and it’s a case of love at first sight on her part,”
explained Baird. “And you love her, too, only you’re a bashful country
boy and can’t show it the way she can. Try out a little first scene
now.”
Merton stood, his basket on his arm, as the girl approached him. “Look
down,” called Baird, and Merton lowered his gaze under the ardent regard
of the social butterfly. She tossed away her cigarette and came nearer.
Then she mischievously pinched his cheek as the New York men had pinched
his little sister’s. Having done this, she placed her hand beneath his
chin and raised his face to hers.
“Now look up at her,” called Baird. “But she frightens you. Remember
your country raising. You never saw a society girl before. That’s
it--look frightened while she’s admiring you in that bold way. Now turn
a little and look down again. Pinch his cheek once more, Lulu. Now,
Merton, look up and smile, but kind of scared--you’re still afraid of
her--and offer her a bottle of Ma’s preserves. Step back a little as you
do it, because you’re kind of afraid of what she might do next. That’s
fine. Good work, both of you.”
He was glad for the girl’s sake that Baird had approved the work of
both. He had been afraid she was overdoing the New York society manner
in the boldness of her advances to him, but of course Baird would know.
His conscience hurt him a little when the Montague girl added her praise
to Baird’s for his own work. “Kid, you certainly stepped neat and looked
nice in that love scene,” she warmly told him. He would have liked to
praise her own work, but could not bring himself to. Perhaps she would
grow more shrinking and modest as the drama progressed.
A part of the play now developed as he had foreseen it would, in that
the city men at the hotel pursued the little sister to her own door-step
with attentions that she should have found unwelcome. But even now she
behaved in a way he could not approve. She seemed determined to meet
the city men halfway. “I’m to be the sunlight arc of this hovel,” she
announced when the city men came, one at a time, to shower gifts upon
the little wild rose.
Later it became apparent that she must in the end pay dearly for her
too-ready acceptance of these favours. One after another the four city
men, whose very appearance would have been sufficient warning to most
girls, endeavoured to lure her up to the great city where they promised
to make a lady of her. It was a situation notoriously involving danger
to the simple country girl, yet not even her mother frowned upon it.
The mother, indeed, frankly urged the child to let all of these kind
gentlemen make a lady of her. The brother should have warned her in this
extremity; but the brother was not permitted any share in these scenes.
Only Merton Gill, in his proper person, seemed to feel the little girl
was all too cordially inviting trouble.
He became confused, ultimately, by reason of the scenes not being taken
consecutively. It appeared that the little sister actually left her
humble home at the insistence of one of the villains, yet she did not,
apparently, creep back months later broken in body and soul. As nearly
as he could gather, she was back the next day. And it almost seemed as
if later, at brief intervals, she allowed herself to start for the great
city with each of the other three scoundrels who were bent upon her
destruction. But always she appeared to return safely and to bring large
sums of money with which to delight the old mother.
It was puzzling to Merton. He decided at last--he did not like to ask
the Montague girl--that Baird had tried the same scene four times, and
would choose the best of these for his drama.
Brother and sister made further trips to the hotel with their offerings,
only the sister now took jams and jellies exclusively, which she sold
to the male guests, while the brother took only the improved grape juice
which the rich old New Yorker bought and generously paid for.
There were other scenes at the hotel between the country boy and the
heavy-faced New York society girl, in which the latter was an ardent
wooer. Once she was made to snatch a kiss from him as he stood by her,
his basket on his arm. He struggled in her embrace, then turned to flee.
She was shown looking after him, laughing, carelessly slapping one leg
with her riding crop.
“You’re still timid,” Baird told him. “You can hardly believe you have
won her love.”
In some following scenes at the little farmhouse it became impossible
for him longer to doubt this, for the girl frankly told her love as she
lingered with him at the gate.
“She’s one of these new women,” said Baird. “She’s living her own life.
You listen--it’s wonderful that this great love should have come to you.
Let us see the great joy dawning in your eyes.”
He endeavoured to show this. The New York girl became more ardent. She
put an arm about him, drew him to her. Slowly, almost in the manner of
Harold Parmalee, as it seemed to him, she bent down and imprinted a long
kiss upon his lips. He had been somewhat difficult to rehearse in this
scene, but Baird made it all plain. He was still the bashful country
boy, though now he would be awakened by love.
The girl drew him from the gate to her waiting automobile. Here she
overcame a last reluctance and induced him to enter. She followed and
drove rapidly off.
It was only now that Baird let him into the very heart of the drama.
“You see,” he told Merton, “you’ve watched these city folks; you’ve
wanted city life and fine clothes for yourself; so, in a moment of
weakness, you’ve gone up to town with this girl to have a look at the
place, and it sort of took hold of you. In fact, you hit up quite a pace
for awhile; but at last you go stale on it--” “The blight of Broadway,”
suggested Merton, wondering if there could be a cabaret scene.
“Exactly,” said Baird. “And you get to thinking of the poor old mother
and little sister back here at home, working away to pay off the
mortgage, and you decide to come back. You get back on a stormy night;
lots of snow and wind; you’re pretty weak. We’ll show you sort of
fainting as you reach the door. You have no overcoat nor hat, and your
city suit is practically ruined. You got a great chance for some good
acting here, especially after you get inside to face the folks. It’ll be
the strongest thing you’ve done, so far.”
It was indeed an opportunity for strong acting. He could see that.
He stayed late with Baird and his staff one night and a scene of the
prodigal’s return to the door of the little home was shot in a blinding
snow-storm. Baird warmly congratulated the mechanics who contrived the
storm, and was enthusiastic over the acting of the hero. Through the
wintry blast he staggered, half falling, to reach the door where he
collapsed. The light caught the agony on his pale face. He lay a moment,
half-fainting, then reached up a feeble hand to the knob of the door.
It was one of the annoyances incident to screen art that he could not go
in at that moment to finish his great scene. But this must be done back
on the lot, and the scene could not be secured until the next day.
Once more he became the pitiful victim of a great city, crawling back
to the home shelter on a wintry night. It was Christmas eve, he now
learned. He pushed open the door of the little home and staggered in to
face his old mother and the little sister. They sprang forward at his
entrance; the sister ran to support him to the homely old sofa. He was
weak, emaciated, his face an agony of repentance, as he mutely pled
forgiveness for his flight.
His old mother had risen, had seemed about to embrace him fondly when
he knelt at her feet, but then had drawn herself sternly up and pointed
commandingly to the door. The prodigal, anguished anew at this repulse,
fell weakly back upon the couch with a cry of despair. The little sister
placed a pillow under his head and ran to plead with the mother. A long
time she remained obdurate, but at last relented. Then she, too, came to
fall upon her knees before the wreck who had returned to her.
Not many rehearsals were required for this scene, difficult though
it was. Merton Gill had seized his opportunity. His study of agony
expressions in the film course was here rewarded. The scene closed with
the departure of the little sister. Resolutely, showing the light of
some fierce determination, she put on hat and wraps, spoke words of
promise to the stricken mother and son, and darted out into the night.
The snow whirled in as she opened the door.
“Good work,” said Baird to Merton. “If you don’t hear from that little
bit you can call me a Swede.”
Some later scenes were shot in the same little home, which seemed to
bring the drama to a close. While the returned prodigal lay on the
couch, nursed by the forgiving mother, the sister returned in company
with the New York society girl who seemed aghast at the wreck of him
she had once wooed. Slowly she approached the couch of the sufferer,
tenderly she reached down to enfold him. In some manner, which Merton
could not divine, the lovers had been reunited.
The New York girl was followed by her father--it would seem they had
both come from the hotel--and the father, after giving an order for
more of Mother’s grape juice, examined the son’s patents. Two of them
he exclaimed with delight over, and at once paid the boy a huge roll of
bills for a tenth interest in them.
Now came the grasping man who held the mortgage and who had counted upon
driving the family into the streets this stormy Christmas eve. He was
overwhelmed with confusion when his money was paid from an ample hoard,
and slunk, shame-faced, out into the night. It could be seen that
Christmas day would dawn bright and happy for the little group.
To Merton’s eye there was but one discord in this finale. He had known
that the cross-eyed man was playing the part of hotel clerk at the
neighbouring resort, but he had watched few scenes in which the poor
fellow acted; and he surely had not known that this man was the little
sister’s future husband. It was with real dismay that he averted his
gaze from the embrace that occurred between these two, as the clerk
entered the now happy home.
One other detail had puzzled him. This was the bundle to which he had
clung as he blindly plunged through the storm. He had still fiercely
clutched it after entering the little room, clasping it to his breast
even as he sank at his mother’s feet in physical exhaustion and mental
anguish, to implore her forgiveness. Later the bundle was placed beside
him as he lay, pale and wan, on the couch.
He supposed this bundle to contain one of his patents; a question to
Baird when the scene was over proved him to be correct. “Sure,” said
Baird, “that’s one of your patents.” Yet he still wished the little
sister had not been made to marry the cross-eyed hotel clerk.
And another detail lingered in his memory to bother him. The actress
playing his mother was wont to smoke cigarettes when not engaged in
acting. He had long known it. But he now seemed to recall, in that
touching last scene of reconciliation, that she had smoked one while
the camera actually turned. He hoped this was not so. It would mean
a mistake. And Baird would be justly annoyed by the old mother’s
carelessness.