a camera artist present at this interview to preserve the facial
expressions of these two men as they sat glaring at each other. Finally
a gleam of intelligence penetrated the armor-plated skull of Vinegar,
and he said:
“Boss, it ’pears like you an’ me don’t sop gravy outen de same dish.
When you talks, nothin’ don’t specify; an’ when I talks my argumint
don’t show wharin. Us is bofe jes’ wuckin’ our jaws widout chawin’ no
cud. Whut I axes you is dis: Does you sells pictures or does you takes
pictures?”
“I takes pictures,” Shirley grinned.
“Dar now!” Vinegar grinned back. “Now us is bofe lickin’ offen de same
spoon. You keep yo’ mouf sot till I axes you anodder ’terrogation: Is
dese here movin’ pictures jes’ de same as livin’ pictures?”
“Yes--no--I suppose so,” Rouke answered, wondering how he could explain
to the negro without getting him all balled up again.
“Ef dat’s so, den I understand whut you signifies,” Vinegar boomed.
“A feller come to my chu’ch las’ year an’ he had somepin like dat. He
had a Noer’s Ark, an’ de Chillum of Israel, an’ a Daniel in de lions’
pen--an’ dat wus all pretty pious an’ proper. But atter dat, he had
whut he called a _Tablow Vevong_ of livin’ pictures, an’ I didn’t favor
’em much. He put some black little tight underclothes on me an’ made me
stand in a wash tub an’ called me ‘September Mawn.’”
“Aw, hell!” Shirley Rouke remarked. “That ain’t it at all.”
“Sorry, boss,” Vinegar said in troubled tones. “I figgered dat us wus
jes’ ’bout to ketch on to each yuther.”
“Don’t you colored persons ever put on any plays?” Rouke inquired.
“Does you mean do us pull off any shows?” Vinegar asked.
“Yes.”
“Suttinly, boss. Us gin a show las’ week.”
“That’s good,” Rouke declared. “Now a moving picture is simply a show,
a play, all the parts taken an’ acted by colored persons, and while
they are playing we will take pictures of them. See?”
“I sees!”
“The actors won’t have a thing to do with the pictures. They only play
the parts which I teach them. Und’stand?”
“Ain’t you gwine gib us no koodak shotsnaps of ourse’ves?” Vinegar
demanded in a disappointed tone.
“Oh, sure!” Rouke assented in an acidulous voice. “Any dang little
thing to please. Do you think you could round me up a bunch of colored
people who would like to act in a show?”
“Git ’em?” Vinegar bellowed. “Boss, my job is gwine be to keep ’em
away! When de news gits aroun’ dat eve’y nigger gits a free picture of
hisse’f an’ a chance to speak a piece on de flatform--Mister Man, I
tells you honest--us better keep dis a secret! You’ll wear yo’ koodak
plum’ out takin’ nigger pictures!”
“All right!” Rouke agreed. “Keep it quiet. Don’t tell anybody except
those you want in the play. See? Now let’s discuss terms.”
“Cuss--which?”
“Talk money!” Rouke barked.
Vinegar’s face fell.
“I thought de pictures wus free!” he protested.
“Oh, I don’t mean that!” Rouke grated through his teeth. “Listen! I
want to know how much you will charge me to get the actors for the play
and help me stage it. Get that?”
“I ketch on!” Vinegar beamed. “You wants to make a trade. Well, suh,
when Marse Tom wants me to git him some plantation hands, he pays me
one dollar apiece per each nigger an’ one dollar per day extry fer
knowin’ whar dey is at an’ how to argufy ’em loose from de yuther
planters.”
“I’ll pay you two dollars for every negro I employ in the play and five
dollars a week for wages. When I see the actors, I’ll arrange rates
with them. Is that all right?”
“Yes, suh, dat shore sounds like free charity,” Vinegar agreed.
“What about a contract?” Rouke asked.
“A which?”
“A contract--a writing--write up the agreement!” Rouke explained.
“You means a obscribe!” Vinegar said. “Naw, suh, ’tain’t wuth writin’
up. Niggers don’t favor obscribes. Us gits in lawsuits wid de cotehouse
when us scratches on paper. Ef you pays us eve’y day, us niggers will
wuck. Ef de pay stops, restin’ time is done come.”
“Very good!” Rouke said, as he rose from his chair. “Go out now and get
all the niggers who have ever acted in a show. Tell them to meet me
here tomorrow morning at nine o’clock. I’ll see you then. So long!”
He turned and walked back toward the village of Tickfall.
Vinegar watched him until he disappeared from view; then he said:
“Dat’s a nice white man, but more’n half de time his mouf don’t
understan’ his mind. Eve’y time I esplained to him whut he wus tryin’
to say, he specify dat wusn’t it!”
Rouke returned to his hotel, opened the door to his room, and found the
chair by his typewriter pre-empted by Peter Pellet.
“What’s the grouch, Pete?” Rouke demanded. “You got a pout on your mug
like a camel. I bet you can’t walk without stepping on your lip.”
“Oh, sugar, Shirley,” Peter mourned. “I just came in to tell you what
a hellarious town this Tickfall is. During the day the men just sit
in front of the stores and chew tobacco and kid the niggers. If a
dog-fight happens the town gets so excited the doctors are called out
to quiet their nerves. At night the whole bunch goes home and goes to
bed. If it ain’t so, you may hang my body on a sour apple tree. I asked
one of ’em what they did on Sunday and he said they went to church!
What do you know about that? Two days of dissipation have dragged me
down, Shirley--I’m a faint and feeble frazzle! Fan me with a brick!”
“Aw, can that!” Rouke growled. “Have you been out finding those
locations I told you about?”
“You bet!” Peter answered, and now his tone changed to admiration.
“These swamps are the real thing, Shirley. I saw a jungle so thick
that a raccoon could not crawl through it without scraping all the
hair off of his tail. I saw a lake that’s got no bottom, one side of
it hot water and the other cold. I saw mosquitoes as big as a daddy
longlegs--felt ’em, too; when they bite they feel like a red-hot poker
and when you slap ’em you are a murderer with a raw and bleeding corpse
upon your hands!”
“I saw a swamp rattlesnake five feet long, big around as my leg, full
of fight as Jess Willard or Jesse James, and hungry enough to manifest
a carnivorous desire for my acquaintance, but I moved the free lunch
about forty feet away before he got a bite. I found a place where you
could stick a pole down in the swamp mud, pull it out all dripping with
water, and light it like a torch--the mud is so full of gas. I----”
“Get out of here!” Rouke said. “Order that reel from New Orleans to
come up to-night and fix it up with the movie man so we can show it
to-morrow morning!”
Left alone with his typewriter, Rouke slipped a sheet of paper in the
machine and wrote:
THE JEWEL OF THE JUNGLE
“Gee,” he grinned, as he began his scenario, “that’s an utterly
wretched title, I don’t think!”
III
THE MOVING PICTURE WRITES
When Rouke entered the Shoofly church next morning, he found the
pulpit chair occupied by the Reverend Vinegar Atts, while forty of his
parishioners sat in mute and reverent attitude in the pews.
Rouke stood for a moment in the dusty, smelly, dilapidated building,
gazed at the rude benches scrawled with names and dates and letters,
and at the windows whose broken panes had been mended by different
colored glass, and his artistic soul got a cold chill. The place looked
like a morgue and the occupants reminded him of stiffs.
“Bring your congregation out in front, Atts!” he called. “I want to see
’em in the sunlight!”
Standing in the churchyard, Rouke got his first look at some of our
old acquaintances: Skeeter Butts, small, wiry, dressy, his face
saddle-colored, his hair close-cropped with the part in the middle made
by a razor, his shirt-collar so high that he resembled a sorrel mule
looking over a whitewashed fence; Figger Bush, with his kinky wool,
his ratlike eyes, and his shoe-brush mustache; Hitch Diamond, massive,
solid, built like a rock quarry; and a dozen more men and a score of
women filed out behind them and stood about the steps of the church.
Skeeter Butts suddenly left his place, passed around to the other end
of the group, and stood close beside a certain girl.
Rouke, watching him, found in that moment the bright particular gem for
the Jewel of the Jungle.
Lalla Cordona was well worth looking at.
She stood among the others as distinct as a polished diamond lying in
a slag-heap, slim and straight as a javelin, graceful as a stalk of
waving corn, the features of her coal-black face as clear-cut as a
cameo, her flexible, expressive lips curling smilingly over absolutely
flawless teeth--she was as exquisite as a statue carved in ebony by the
hands of Beauty and Grace.
But over all and through all there poured the flame, the personal
magnetism of the girl, that unanalyzable something which makes the
perfect moving picture type--the fire, the soul, which glows in the
eyes, quivers in the cheek, distends the nostrils, curls the lip, or
when the lip is still, reposes there, making the lip palpitant with its
presence.
As for Skeeter Butts, love had made him a fool. No beggar ever groveled
before a princess at the distribution of alms, no dog ever fawned
before his mistress, as Skeeter acted in the presence of this ebon
divinity.
“Skeeter’s done kotch it at las’,” Hitch Diamond grinned, as he watched
the infatuated barkeeper. “He acts as proud as a monkey wid a tin tail,
an’ as shy as a houn’ pup whut’s tumbled in a bucket of tar!”
“She’s sot up shiny and purty jes’ like a autermobile, ain’t she?”
Figger Bush remarked in admiring tones.
“Huh,” Hitch Diamond grinned, “eve’y woman is sot up jes’ like a
autermobile. A autermobile costs money to git it, an’ it costs money
to keep it, an’ when it takes a notion to stop nothin’ cain’t make it
go, an’ when somepin gits de matter wid it, not even Gawd knows whut de
trouble am. Ain’t dat jes’ like a woman?”
This edifying dissertation was terminated by the stentorian voice of
Vinegar Atts:
“Eve’ybody listen to me: dis here white gen’leman is named Mr. Rouke.
He specify dat he gits up shows an’ takes koodaks fer a livin’. He
wants us niggers to he’p him. Eve’ybody gits a free picture. Eve’ybody
is ’lowed to speak a piece on de platform. Eve’ybody gits a few loose
change fer deir time an’ wuck. I now resigns in Mr. Rouke’s favor!”
Vinegar sat down on the church steps and fanned himself with his hat.
“I want to teach you folks to play a drama entitled _The Jewel of the
Jungle_,” Rouke announced in crisp tones.
“Whut is a draymer?” Figger Bush wanted to know.
“It’s a tragedy,” Rouke informed him. “Not a funny play, but a show
full of love and fighting, and brave men and women.”
“Don’t us be allowed to bust no jokes in dis here draymer?” Vinegar
Atts wanted to know.
“No!” Rouke told him. “You won’t have to say a word. You don’t talk.
You act!”
“Huh!” Skeeter Butts proclaimed. “You cain’t git up no lock-jaw play
wid niggers. Ef a nigger cain’t whistle and sing and pat his foots,
he’d druther be dead!”
“You don’t understand,” Rouke said sharply. “This is a motion picture
play. Didn’t any of you folks ever see a movie show?”
“Naw, suh!” came a chorus of voices.
“All right!” Rouke answered. “Follow me and I’ll take you down to the
theater and show you one!”
The negroes fell in line, and Rouke led them through the mazes of
Dirty-Six, up the main streets of Tickfall and into the little theater.
Peter Pellet was perched aloft, having made all arrangements with the
owner of the house for this exhibition.
The negroes seated themselves close to the front, a circle of light
flashed upon the screen, a slight whirring sound came from the
projection room and a title fluttered before them:
THE DANCE OF DEATH
Then for twenty minutes the negroes were transported to a tropic island
in the South Pacific Ocean.
They beheld a bamboo village, the little naked children playing in
front of the huts, the dogs lying in the sun or slinking among the
cooking-pots, the men and women wearing the rude, barbaric garments of
the tribe, their legs and shoulders bare.
They witnessed the preparation for a great feast, the camp filling up
with wild, cruel savages, both men and women.
Then the village princess danced before them, a frenzied whirl of
bare arms and bare limbs, while a band of musicians beat upon rude
instruments whose melody they could not hear.
They beheld a white man appear upon this scene, peep at the dancing
princess, through the interstices of the jungle, fall in love with her
infatuating grace and beauty, and later seek her out in her bamboo hut.
Betrayed by her white lover, the Black Swan sought revenge.
The white man was captured, bound to a stake, and in the midst of a
horrible revelry of torture a posse of white men arrived, rescued the
victim of savage hate, slaughtered most of the inhabitants of the
village, burned the bamboo huts and departed.
But the Black Swan had escaped the slaughter, and the negroes watched
her with breathless interest as she trailed the rescue party until they
came to a narrow defile in the mountains. She climbed the mountain side
and stood, at last, silhouetted against the sky, as graceful as the
bird whose name she bore, looking down upon the posse in the valley
below. She called to her faithless lover, hurled a javelin through his
body, then turned and fled, leaping like a deer from rock to rock.
With tense bodies and aching eyes, the negroes watched the flight of
the girl and the pursuit of the posse until the girl was cornered,
stopping at last on a high, sharp crag, overlooking the sea.
Then as the rifle bullets of the pursuing mob splashed against the rock
at her feet she poised like a bird prepared for flight, leaped far out
from the precipice, curved like an arrow in its course, and plunged
head foremost into the rolling flood of the ocean beneath.
The picture vanished and the negroes found themselves looking with
popping eyeballs at a bare, white screen!
“Dar now!” Hitch Diamond bellowed in a mighty voice. “Whut do Gawd
A’mighty think about dat?”
“Lawdymussy!” Figger Bush squawked. “Dat little gal dived so fur
she’ll stick head down in de mud in de bottom of dat puddle like a
cypress stump!”
“Dat white man shore got his’n,” Vinegar remarked. “’Tain’t no way fer
a white man to do--hangin’ aroun’ nigger cabins like dat!”
The electric light flashed up, and Mr. Rouke, stepped to the front.
“Now, folks,” he began, “you understand what a moving picture play is.
There is no talking. The people act. I have a fine act for all of you
to take part in, and I want you to meet me at the Shoofly church this
afternoon at one o’clock. That’s all now!”
The negroes filed out in silence and scattered to different parts of
the town.
Rouke and Pellet went to the hotel for lunch, and at the time appointed
walked out to the church.
There was not a negro on the place. They waited for three hours and not
one appeared, not even Vinegar Atts.
They began a search for Atts, and found him whitewashing a fence for
Colonel Tom Gaitskill.
“What’s the matter, Atts? Why didn’t you niggers show up?”
Vinegar wiped the splashes of whitewash off of his black face and
answered:
“Dey said dey didn’t want to come, boss.”
“Who said?”
“All of ’em, excusin’ dat little gal named Lalla Cordona, whut says
she visitin’ here from N’Awleens. She wus game fer it, but nobody else
wouldn’t mess wid it no more!”
“Why not?” Rouke snapped.
“Dey say dey wusn’t gwine play no play whar de white folks peeped at
’em through de bushes----”
“Aw, that’s not in the play--” Rouke began.
“Yes, suh ’tis! Dat’s wut de movin’ picture wrote down on de wall at
dat little theater----”
“Yes, I know, but you don’t understand--where are all those people?”
“Dey’s all gone out to Lake Basteneau fishin’, boss. I’se gwine out as
soon as I git dis fence whitewashed. A new coon done come to town and
tole me he was de beau of dat Lalla Cordona. He’s done fotch her a red
ruben necklace an’ a ruben ring, an’ I guess dat’s so. He hired me to
drive him out dar.”
“I’ll go out there and bring them back,” Rouke said.
“’Twon’t do no good, boss. Dey won’t ack. All dem mens and womens say
dey ain’t gwine do it. Dey got conscience scruples.”
“What’s the trouble?”
Vinegar scratched his head and answered, choosing his words with care:
“Well, suh, dey is all agreed dat dey ain’t gwine hab deir pictures
took sashayin’ aroun’ in de woods widout no pants on!”
Rouke sat down on the end of a log and fanned himself with his hat.
Then he said:
But why record what Shirley Rouke said?
Nothing but the _Diabolos Gazette_ printed on asbestos paper on O-hell
street in Purgatory Bottom would dare to publish the language of anger
and disgust and exasperation to which Rouke gave vocal utterance.
Vinegar Atts, appalled to the core of his ecclesiastical soul by this
thunderous fulmination of anathema, picked up his whitewash bucket and
slunk away.
Turning a distant corner, he stopped and peeped behind him.
“Lawdymussy!” he sighed. “Dat yuther man is done j’ined in now! Dem
white mens is shore tellin’ Gawd all about us niggers!”
Ten minutes later, Rouke, having relieved his mind, looked up and
grinned at Pellet.
“Peter,” he said in a quiet voice, “would you mind leading me to the
private office of Colonel Tom Gaitskill in the Tickfall bank? Since
I’ve been associating with the negro inhabitants of this village, I
don’t believe I have sense enough to find that office.”
IV
STUNT STUFF!
Five personages arrived at the fishing camp on Lake Basteneau early the
next morning.
First came Rev. Vinegar Atts and Miss Cordona’s New Orleans lover, the
latter wearing clothes of the newest model and a slick smile of the
most recent duplicity--a tall, slim, smooth-faced negro of the typical
Ethiopian features and the air of a race-track tout.
Next came Miss Lalla Cordona in a hired buggy, as dressy as a cheap
Christmas doll, radiant with smiles and quivering with vivacity and
vital magnetism.
Then an automobile puffed along the swamp road and stopped in front of
the camp and Shirley Rouke and Peter Pellet dismounted and unloaded
their moving picture cameras.
“Dar now!” Vinegar Atts boomed. “Whenever a white man shows up at a
nigger chu’ch, de niggers lose deir religion right away. Nobody bawls
‘Amen,’ nobody whoops ‘Hallelujah,’ an’ nobody gits happy. An’ when
white mens shows up at a nigger fishin’ picnic--boof! de fun is done
all over. Excusin’ dat, dem white men ain’t real pious--dey cuss!”
Skeeter Butts beat the New Orleans lover in a foot race to Miss
Cordona’s buggy, helped her out, and engaged her in a rapid-fire
conversation while he hitched her horse to a tree.
“Dem jewelry you got on yo’ pusson is shore squinchin’ to de eyes,
Laller,” he proclaimed in admiring tones.
“Yes, suh,” Lalla remarked with self-satisfaction, as she preened
herself before him revealing every excruciating gaud and gewgaw she
could buy from the ten-cent store. “De man whut sold it to me told me
dat ev’y piece was _rolled_ gold--he specify dat wus de purest kind of
gold whut is!”
“Dat’s right!” Skeeter agreed. “You’s gwine be de only dazzle on dis
fish camp--nobody cain’t shine while you is aroun’.”
When Skeeter beat him to the buggy, the city beau had simply lifted his
hat to Lalla and walked away. At that moment the automobile arrived,
and the stranger found consolation in watching the white men and their
cameras.
Impelled by curiosity, the other negroes had gathered around, and the
new coon saw a good opportunity to show off.
“Boss,” he inquired of Mr. Rouke, “is you-alls movin’ picture mens?”
“Yes.”
“Is you gwine take pictures of dis here lake?”
“Yes,” Rouke replied, as he busied himself setting up his machine.
The darky took off his hat, rubbed his head, hesitated a moment, then
said in a pleading voice:
“Please, suh, boss, would you wish to take a picture of me doin’ some
kind of stunts? I used to wuck in de movies an’ I likes it.”
“Who? You?” Rouke snapped, gazing at the negro with incredulous eyes.
“What did you do in the studio?”
“I wucked fer a feller whut took de pictures. He lemme tote his extry
films, and lemme hold his hat, an’ sometimes he gimme a board wid a
number on it, an’ lemme stan’ in front of de picture-box while he
turned de crank an’ tuck my tintype.”
Shirley Rouke saw that this speech had made an impression upon the
negroes gathered around. He hesitated a moment, then said:
“What’s your name?”
“Dey calls me Sour Sudds.”
“All right, Sudds. You seem to have had considerable experience as a
movie actor. Now if you can get some of these other people to get in it
with you, I think I will take a picture of you all.”
“Come on, niggers!” Sudds bellowed in delighted tones. “Eve’ybody is
gwine hab his tintype took! Hustle! Dese here white mens ain’t got no
time fer foolishness!”
Under the leadership of Sour Sudds, the picnic party was eager to get
into the picture.
“Is you gwine show us how to do, boss?” Sudds inquired.
“Certainly,” Rouke answered.
While Peter Pellet was adjusting his camera and placing his side lines,
Rouke went into the fishing camp and brought out a small table and two
chairs, which he placed in front of the camera.
“That won’t do, Pete!” he called, pointing to some lines which Pete
had drawn in the sand. “You better get your cord and stretch it for
your side lines like you do in the studio. These coons won’t pay any
attention to a mark on the ground!”
Rouke hastened to the automobile and brought out a tray, two glasses,
and a bottle of cheap wine, while Pellet readjusted his lines.
Then Vinegar Atts put in.
“Mister Rouke, I’s gwine be de umpire of dis here show because you an’
me done made a trade to dem effecks.”
“That’s right,” Rouke agreed, as his eyes ran over the crowd
of negroes. “Get that black, dressy wench sitting beside that
saddle-colored man!”
“Dat’s Laller an’ Skeeter!” Atts informed him.
“Get that black with the kinky hair and the shoebrush mustache!”
“Dat’s Figger Bush!”
The three actors were conducted to the front of the camera and Rouke
gave his directions:
“Lalla, you and Sour Sudds sit down in the chairs beside that little
table. Sour, you make love to the girl with all your might. Hold her
hand, make goo-goo eyes, act like you loved her more than any other
woman in the world----”
“Lemme do dat!” Skeeter Butts broke in.
Had there been a proneness to apoplexy in the Rouke family, Shirley
would now be dead. As it was, Skeeter Butts never knew how near his
interruption had brought him to a sudden and violent death. It is safe
to say that nothing like that had ever happened before in the moving
picture world.
“Buck up, Rouke!” Pellet spoke sharply. “Don’t scatter the beans!”
Rouke swallowed four times, then spoke in a voice as gentle as the
tones of a butcher conducting some Mary’s little lamb into the
slaughterhouse after the said lamb had butted him down:
“No, Skeeter. I’ll tell you what to do in a minute. I might also
tell you where to go and some other things, but duty restrains my
inclination.”
Then he turned to Figger Bush:
“Now, Figger, listen: when I give the word, you come over here and get
this tray with the glasses and the wine bottle and bring it in and set
it on the table between Lalla and Sudds. Then retire. Get me?”
“Yes, suh. I fotch it in an’ git out!”
“Sudds, you register love, infatuation--aw, I said that before! Lalla,
you register maiden modesty, timidity, growing love. Now, Skeeter
Butts, when I give the word you enter, walk up to the table where Sudds
and Lalla are sitting, register jealousy, anger, desire for revenge;
then catch Sour Sudds by the shoulder, lift him out of the chair, and
take the seat yourself. Sudds, you walk off. Lalla, you look after him
and register love.”
The actors moved to their places and Rouke gave the command:
“Now--ready--rehearse!”
The rehearsal was perfect. Rouke and Pellet were delighted.
“Now we are ready to take the picture!” Rouke exclaimed. “All of you
act just like you did before!”
Then he gave the command which in the moving picture world starts the
camera crank to turning:
“Ready--Action--Go!”
Thereupon, Reverend Vinegar Atts walked out and sat down on the table
between Lalla and Sudds.
“Hol’ on, dar!” he bellowed, shaking his finger at the camera. “Don’t I
git my picture took, too? You an’ me made a trade----”
“Cut!” Rouke snapped, which is the technical word of command to the
camera artist to stop the picture.
“Get away from there, you fat fool! What you cut across the front for
and spoil the picture? Get out!”
Rouke’s tone and gestures were so threatening that Vinegar jumped ten
feet, tripped over a side line and fell on his head.
“Aw, the devil!” Pellet snarled savagely. “Now I got to set up that
line again!”