‘¥audeville when it was really good.
You don’t have to be thirty-five,
though, to remember what happened to
it. One year it was there, and the next it
had melted as quickly as an ice cream
cone in a kid’s hot hand. And not many
of the troupers believed in that saving-
for-a-rainy-day stuff either.
“Gee, Katie,” Georgie used to say,
numb with the first shock, “it was only
last December that Hollywood dame,
by JOHN W.
Claudia Lagrande, that writes for “Stage
and Film,” said my art was a living ex-
pression of the—the great comic muse
of Aris—Aristoph—""
“Forget all that stuff, Georgie,” Katie
returned. “Lord knows, you’re funny,
but do you know why? No. Neither do I.
Nobody knows. You know what troupers
say: ‘When a comedian begins to take
himself serious, he’s no longer a come-
dian.’ ”?
Gradually they worked west, and one
night, after the last turn in one of the
plaster-and-gilt palaces, Katie was
dressed first and went to find Georgie.
She knocked at his unpainted pine
door, heard a murmur of voices, and then
Georgie calling, “Come in.”
“Nearly ready?’ Katie began, pushing
the door open. Then she stopped short,
There was Georgie in his soup-and-fish
and a Barrymore pose, and leaning
eagerly forward was—
“Meet Miss Claudia Lagrande, Miss
Cobbett,” Georgie said.
A willowy brunet undulated toward
her. ;
“My dear Miss—Cobbett, isn’t it?”
The brown eyes above Katie rolled. ‘It’s
—1I am only the instrument—the articu-
late voice of the great miming art. It’s a
labor of love. I mean that never since
Chaplin has there been a player like Mr.
Kearns, with the divine fire of the old
comedy. Even the vulgarities he has to
give the rabble”’—she swung a clanking
arm toward the darkened stage—‘‘are
softened by his subtle, wistful inter-
pretation.”
{IT WAS NOON the next day when
| Georgie met Katie, sleepy-eyed and a lit-
[ tle sheepish, Over their lunch Katie ques-
tioned him ironically. “What does the
AAO.
TOWN WEEKLY MAGAZINE Li
Hollywood dirt-disher hold out to the in-
heritor of Chaplin’s mantle?”
“Miss Lagrande,” Georgie corrected
stiffly, “says that we—I—ought to get
into the movies as soon as she can get a
good spot for me.”
“Not—we?” Katie questioned.
“Well, you know, Katie,” Georgie
softened, “she says it might be hard to
work it for the two of us, but later—"""
“I see,” said Katie slowly.
ALEXANDER
For the next three months she watched
him silently. Once or twice a week there
was a square gray envelope for Georgie
which he concealed awkwardly, but
Katie knew it was from Claudia.
In Denver, Georgie rushed from the
telepfione one day. “Claudia’s in town,
Katie,” he said. “She wants me to go to
the coast and meet Herman Goldfarb of
Diamond Pictures.”
“When?” Katie said. She was white.
“Tomorrow,” Georgie said. “I hate to
break up, Katie...”
“Okay,” Katie cut him off brightly.
“Let’s break the news over at the thea-
ter.”
IN THE MOVIES, build-up counts for a
lot, and give Claudia credit—she ‘built
Georgie up. “The greatest since Chap-
lin,” her column trumpeted, day after
BELLS
day. She saw to it that Georgie met the
right people, and in the evenings, though
he dressed wearily now, he was never
out of his white tie and tails.
Perhaps it was because of the old
vaudeville pull of Georgie’s name that
his first two pictures made money at the
box-office. The third, however, didn’t go.
Give Georgie credit for one thing. He
tried to keep in touch with Katie. At first
her letters were frequent and cheerful,
but brief. Then suddenly they stopped,
and Georgie’s last one was returned with
one of those scrawled “Not ats.”
I didn’t know any more than Georgie
did where Katie was. That winter got
pretty cold, the booking business was
shot, and instead of buying an overcoat,
I thought I'd keep warm in Hollywood.
I found lots of my friends were in the
movie-town, but they were friends in
need. So after a few days of dodging
touches I couldn’t give I stuck close to
my theatrical boarding house, where the
worst you had to do was listen, and look
at stage scrapbooks.
One night late I was cornered by old
Pat Dorio, the equilibrist. A half hour
later he ended his monologue on hard
luck. “Some of them were lucky,
though,” Pat ended. ‘“There’s that little
worm, Georgie Kearns.”
“Worm?” I said. “Why, Pat!” After
all,’T had helped to bring Georgie up.
“Well, he has all the gray markings,”
Pat said. “The way he let a nice girl go
downhill till she’s sweating to make a liv-
ing in the same town where he’s a big
shot!”
‘You mean Katie Cobbett’s here?”
“Yeah,” said Pat. He rattled through
a newspaper and found the small thea-
ter’s address. “It’s just squirrel-cage
vaudeville and movies,” he said.
“Georgie doesn’t know,” I yelled, and
snatched my hat.
It was close to midnight when I found
Katie. When she saw me she gave a
scream. “Pete!” she said. “Gee, it’s good
to see a face that’s not celluloid.” There
were tears in her eyes.
“No.” Katie said half an hour later,
making rings with her coffee cup. “I can’t
do it, Pete. I don’t want him to see me
like this.” She pointed to her shabby
sleeve.
I couldn’t change her, so we rose to
leave, and I stopped to pay the check.
Katie kept on, and when I got outside
she was gone! I did that block three
times, but no luck. I stopped in a drug-
store and called Georgie’s place.
“He go out,” an oriental voice kept
saying at the other end.
“Tell him Katie’s in town,” I said.
That was the best I could do.
THE NEXT AFTERNOON I went
around to Katie’s theater. The manager
shook his head. “She came ‘round this
morning to say she was quitting,” he
said.
TOWN QUIZ: STIMULATING MENTAL CONTEST FOR
CREDIT YOURSELF with one point for
each question answered correctly. 10 is
average, 12 good, 15 or more excellent.
The correct answers to these questions
appear on page 11.
1—In which of these sentences is
%cache” used correctly?
(a) A cache is a delicious nut.
(b) Cache is used to denote winnings
in a game.
(c) A cache is a place for concealing
or storing.
2—If you’re up on current events you
should be able to match the names of
these Cabinet officers with the depart-
ments they head:
Cordell Hull Treasury
Harold L. Ickes State
Frances Perkins Labor
Henry Morgenthau, Jr. Interior
3—Answer “true” or “false” to the
following statements:
(a) The Dewey Decimal System is a
method of computing interest.
(b) Lines of longitude measure dis-
tance east and west on the earth’s sur-
4—Which of these statesmen is asso-
ciated with Queen Victoria of England?
Bismarck Robert Walpole
Richelieu Disraeli
5—Nursery rhymes are now popular
in new songs, so you should be able to
tell o..
(a) Who had a great fall?
(b) Who called for fiddlers three?
(¢) Who ran after the farmer’s wife?
6—The mumble-jumble man receives
more invitations than he can accept be-
cause he’s so good at indoor games. He’s
an expert in...
MMNBKCAAOG HSRAECDA
MASRAGAN EECCKRSH
7—The capital of Canada is...
Montreal Toronto
Ottawa Quebec
8—The names Montague and Capulet
are immortalized in Shakespeare’s . , s
As You Like It Hamlet :
Twelfth Night Romeo and Juliet
. 9—Esperanto isa... :
country language
cheese | ship
10—Another word -for ‘“mendicant”
is...
physician
dressmaker
treatment
beggar
11—Each of these sentences containg
an error in spelling. Can you find it?
(a) The committee will eanvas the
town for votes.
(b) The tourists admired the beauti-
ful alter.
(¢c) The medicine had a startling af-
fect.
12—A person who steals the literary
or artistic work of another and gives it
out as his own isa...
parodist
pragmatist
protagonist
plagiarist
13—The Adriatic Sea lies between . . ¢
England and France
Sweden and Denmark
Jugoslavia and Italy
Russia and Japan
14—The expedition which set out te
find the Golden Fleece of Greek mythole
ogy was led by.oe:
~ Ulysses
Aeneas
Jason
Vl a of
Katie stopped short. There
was Georgie in a soup-and-
fish and a Barrymore pose.
That was a tough winter for Thespian
—so tough that the film Croesuses de
cided to give a benefit for out-of-luci
vaudeville performers. ;
It would make your eyes go all funny
to see them—many of them headliners
once—come shuffling on, then take
heart at the applause.
But before the first juggling act, a
guy in a dress suit came out. It was
Georgie! I wondered if he had found
Katie. Then I began to listen. His speech
was as stiff as his shirt. When he had
finished there was a polite patter of ap-
plause—for Georgie Kearns who had
wowed ’em from tank town to subway
Down front I spotted Claudia La
grande. I could see her making notes,
probably for tomorrow’s lecture to
Georgie. He looked timidly at her, bowed
till his chin hit his stiff collar, and sidled
off. Then the fun started.
The Trancho family of trapeze artists
had just bowed off. A gaunt man in a
comedy coat walked on and sank down
on a bench. In a moment a cute little
number came tripping out. I straight.
ened up. It was Katie! 2
Nobody’ll ever know what their act
was, for as she made her third trip past
the bench she looked worried, then tip-
toed up to it. Then she gave a strangled
cry and started shaking him. If it had
been straight acting it would have been
good, but it wasn’t. It was only an old
comedian involuntarily playing the
tragedy of the hungry.
If it had been a regular performance
the curtain would have come down with
a snap, but this was a benefit. Before you
could say Greta Garbo, though, stage
hands carried the old-timer off,
Continued On Page 12
ALL THE FAMILY
15—XKlieg is a name for a type of ooo
furnace light
match furniture
16—Which of the following are known
as ‘‘common carriers’?
mosquitoes persons in quarantine
baskets freight companies
17—Rockwell Kent is famous for , ¢ |
music
dancing
illustrations
acting
18—Devil’s Island is off the coast of cee
Africa
South America
19—1TIn which of these sentences is the
expression “casus belli” used correctly?
(a) Casus belli is a type of musical
eomposition,
(b) Grounds for one country to war
against another are called casus belli.
§c) Casus belli is a flower. :