SOMETHING OF A MYSTERY
"Look out there!"
"Where you going?"
"Hold him back, somebody! Look out, you'll spoil that scene! Don't cross
in front of the camera!"
Half a dozen frantic voices were calling to the sailor who, with dogged
persistence, kept on, shaking his grizzled and gray head, and muttering
over and over again:
"It won't do for Jack Jepson! No sir! It won't do. I had one experience
with trouble and I don't want any more. No sir!"
Evidently utterly unused to a moving picture studio, the old man kept on
his way. He was headed directly toward a camera that was "filming" an
elaborate ball room scene.
If any figure came between the scene and the camera with the pictures it
was imprinting on the sensitive celluloid film (at the rate of sixteen
per second) part of the elaborate work would have to be done over
again. And as one of the characters in the little play was a celebrated
dancer, whose time was paid for at an almost unbelieveable sum per hour,
it would mean a heavy expense.
"Stop him!" cried Mr. Pertell. "Come back here!"
"Halt! Vamoose! Turn about!" Paul Ardite called to the worked-up
traveler of the deep blue sea.
This had no effect.
"Avast there! Belay!" cried Russ Dalwood, who was not at that moment
engaged at the crank of some camera. He used the same sea terms the old
man himself had uttered, but this salt-water "lingo," or translation of
the command to halt, had no effect either.
Then came an interruption at a most opportune time. Just ahead of the
sailor a scene from a Wild West drama was being enacted. A group of
cowboys were engaged in a quarrel in the bunk house, which had been set
up in the studio. The outdoor scenes of the little play were to be made
later, for it is the custom in this business to make all the scenes,
taking place in one locality, at the same time, regardless of their
sequence in the finished play. Later the film is cut up into strips,
pasted together with the proper headings, or captions, and the finished
play results.
And just as the old sailor, who called himself Jack Jepson, was about to
step in front of the ball room scene camera, to the frantic horror of
the operator, one of the cowboys, following out his lines, drew his
revolver, and fired a blank cartridge at the "villain."
In the studio the noise was like that of a small cannon.
"Mutiny!" yelled Jack Jepson, jumping in the air a foot or more.
"Mutiny!"
But he stopped, and just in time. Two steps more would have brought him
in front of the clicking camera.
"Mutiny!" he fairly roared. "What is this! Who's firin' a shot across my
bows? All hands on deck t' repel boarders! Avast there!" and he stood
looking around in bewilderment, while the smoke from the revolver
floated upward.
"Come here!" called Mr. Pertell running forward, and grasping the arm of
the sailor before he could get away to step in front of any of the other
moving picture machines. "You don't understand, Mr. Jepson. I merely
want you to----"
"Yes, I reckon I heard you say what you wanted me to do. Now look here!
I don't know much about you, but you come over t' our Sailors' Snug
Harbor, an' you took some pictures. That was all right, I'm not captain
there an' I haven't anything t' say. You said you wanted an old
able-bodied man for certain work, an' I volunteered. I didn't know where
the voyage was, but I signed on, an' come here; didn't I?"
"You did," said Mr. Pertell. "But let me explain."
"No, you listen to me, first!" exclaimed the old salt, shaking a
thickened and roughened finger at the manager. "I come here, willin' to
do anything from slushin' th' mast, or holystonin' th' decks t' furlin'
sail in a blow. But what do I get; eh? I ask you what do I get? Why an
order to steal shippin' papers, that's what I get! An' that's a serious
crime. I'm not goin' t' be mixed up with it. No sir! Not for Jack
Jepson!" and he tried to break away.
"Wait a minute!" Mr. Pertell begged. "You don't understand. It's only
the business of stealing the papers, you know."
"Well, it's mighty poor business for any man t' be in; that's my
opinion. I was raised honest, an', man and boy, I've lived honest for
fifty years, with one exception, an' that wasn't my fault, and now----"
Again he made an effort to leave, which effort, if not blocked, would
have once more taken him in front of some clicking camera.
"Oh, can't you understand!" cried the manager with a hopeless gesture.
"Perhaps I could explain to him," suggested Ruth in a low voice. "I have
plenty of time, Mr. Pertell, and though I don't know this gentleman----"
"Oh, I forgot. He's going to act with you and your sister, Miss DeVere,"
said the manager. "Come over and be introduced. You too, Mr. DeVere.
He's to have a part in our great sea drama, that is, if I can ever get
it started. I began explaining to Jepson, here, about taking the papers
which have to do with the case, but he can't----"
"You can't make me believe stealin's right, no matter how you go at it!"
interrupted the old salt, doggedly shaking his head.
"Perhaps _I_ can," put in Ruth with a smile, as the manager mentioned
their names to the newest and, seemingly, the most refractory member of
the company.
"Well, Miss," said the sailor, "you look honest. I would believe what
you'd tell me, for I know you couldn't do no wrong. Perhaps I was a bit
hasty, but you see this is all new to me--this play-actin', an' shootin'
at folks unexpected like. I wouldn't have tried it, only the captain at
the Sailors' Snug Harbor, over on Staten Island, where I'm berthed,
asked me as a favor to come here. But I don't like it!"
"I didn't at first," said Alice, joining with her sister, in an attempt
to placate the old salt. "But I became used to it."
"Ha! You're pretty young to be in this business," said Jack Jepson, who
evidently said what he thought.
"Oh, I'm older than I look," replied Alice with a smile. "I just love
the sea. I wish you would tell me about some of your voyages, for I'm
sure you must have been on many."
"That I have, Miss, but this is th' queerest cruise I ever started on,"
and he looked around at the many scenes being enacted.
Meanwhile Ruth had slipped to Mr. Pertell's side.
"Give me a brief outline of the play," she suggested. "I think I can
make it plain to him. He is all fussed up because it's something new.
You haven't time to go into details."
"That's right--I haven't," agreed the harassed manager. "Well, this is
enough for you to know just now. There's a plot to sink a ship, and it
is necessary that certain papers appear to be stolen.
"I picked Jepson up, as he says, at a sailors' home, over on Staten
Island. He's a typical salt, but he balks at even a semblance of
wrong-doing."
"I think I can make him understand," Ruth said as she took the
typewritten pages of the scenario, or plot, of the drama from the
manager.
"I wish you would," Mr. Pertell said. "I've a thousand and one things to
do."
Ruth started toward the old sailor. To her surprise her sister Alice was
now in earnest conversation with him. Jack Jepson seemed to have warmed
to Alice at once. And Ruth heard him saying, as she approached:
"Well, Miss, you see it was this way. There was a mutiny, an' I was
accused, but I wasn't guilty. There was a mystery about it when the
captain disappeared, an' that mystery hasn't been solved yet, though I'd
give a good bit if it were. It's hangin' over me like a nightmare, Miss.
Now I'll tell you all about it, if I don't tire you."
"I should love to listen!" exclaimed Alice, with dancing eyes and
flushed cheeks.