"You're not really old, Daddy!" said Alice, slipping her arms about him, and nestling her cheek against his.

"There—there!" he returned, indulgently, "don't try to flatter your old father. You are just like your dear mother. Run along now, I must take up this new work. What a relief not to have to declaim my lines! I shall only move my lips, and who knows but, in time, my voice may come back?"

"I hope it will," answered Ruth, with a sigh. Somehow she could not quite bring herself to like her father in moving picture roles. Alice was entirely different.

"But, even if it does come back," said the younger girl, "you may like this new work so well, Dad, that you'll keep at it."

"Perhaps," he assented. "Here, Ruth, take care of this money—my first moving picture salary," and he handed her the bills.

As he went to his room with the typewritten sheets of his new part, Alice whispered to her sister:

"Hurray! Now we can have a real dinner. I'll go and buy out a delicatessen store."

The meal was a great success—not only from a gastronomic standpoint, but because of the jollity—real or assumed—of Mr. DeVere. He went over the lines of his new part, telling the girls how at certain places he was to "register," or denote, different emotions. "Register" is the word used in moving picture scenarios to indicate the showing of fear, hate, revenge or other emotion. All this must be done by facial expression or gestures, for of course no talking comes from the moving pictures—except in the latest kind, with a phonographic arrangement, and with that sort we are not dealing.

"Oh, I'm sure it will be fine!" cried Alice. "Can we go and see you act for the camera, Daddy?"

"Yes, I guess so," he replied. "Would you like it, Ruth?"

"I believe I should!" she exclaimed, with more interest than she had before shown. "It sounds interesting."

"Maybe we'll act ourselves, some day," added Alice.

"Oh, no!" protested her sister. "But let's sit down. The meal is spoiling. Oh!" she cried, with a hasty glance at the table. "Not a bit of salt. I forgot it. Alice, dear, just slip across the hall and borrow some from Mrs. Dalwood."

Humming, in the lightness of her heart, a little tune, Alice crossed to the apartment of their neighbor, not pausing after her first knock at the rear kitchen door.

She heard a rattling among the pots and pans, and naturally supposed Mrs. Dalwood was there.

"May we have some salt?" Alice called, as she entered the kitchen, but the next moment she drew back in surprise and fear, for a strange man, rising suddenly from under the sink, confronted her.

He, too, seemed startled.

"Oh—Oh!" gasped Alice. "Isn't Mrs. Dalwood here?"

"I—I believe not," stammered the man. "I—I'm the plumber—there's a leak——"

"Oh, excuse me," murmured Alice, but even in her embarrassment she could not help thinking that the man looked like anything but a plumber. She backed out of the kitchen, after picking up a salt cellar, and was more startled as she observed the man following her.



CHAPTER XI

RUSS IS WORRIED

Alice was racking her brain to recall where she had seen the man before. If he was a plumber, as he said he was, it might be that he had been in the apartment house on other occasions to repair breaks. But Alice was not certain.

"And yet I've seen him before, and lately, too," she thought. The girls was in the hall, now. The man, who seemed ill at ease, had followed and stood near.

"The leak wasn't a bad one; it is repaired now," he said.

"I—I didn't know Mrs. Dalwood was out," faltered Alice. And then, as the man turned to go down the stairs, like a flash it came to her who he was.

"The man Russ had the trouble with that day—Simp Wolley—who tried to get his patent!" Alice almost spoke the words aloud.

"The—the leak is fixed," the man went on.

"You—you—" stammered Alice. But the man did not stay to hear, but hurried downstairs.

Alice burst in on her sister and father.

"Oh!" she exclaimed. "That man—he—he was in the Dalwood kitchen!"

"What man?" asked Mr. DeVere, starting forward.

"The one who was after Russ's patent! Quick, can't you get him?"

Mr. DeVere ran into the hall, but the man had gone. The Dalwood kitchen door was still open, and a hasty look through the apartment showed none of the family could be at home.

"Could he have stolen the patent?" cried Alice, when the excitement had quieted down.

"We can't tell until Russ comes home," replied her father. "I'll leave our door ajar, and we can hear if anyone goes into the Dalwood rooms. As soon as some of them return we will tell them what has taken place."

Alice helped herself to the needed salt, and the meal began, with pauses now and then to learn if there was any movement in the flat across the hallway. Presently footsteps were heard, and proved to be those of Russ himself.

"Plumber!" he exclaimed. "So he was masquerading as that; eh?" the moving picture operator exclaimed when Alice told him what had occurred. "You're right, he was after my patent," and a worried look came over his face.

"Did he get it?" asked Ruth, anxiously.

"No, for it isn't here. The model is at a machine shop on the East Side, and several of the attachments are being made from it to be tested."

"Then it's all right," declared Alice, in a tone of relief.

"Yes—and no," returned Russ. "It's all right, for the time being, but I don't like what has happened. Simp Wolley must be getting desperate to come here in broad daylight and rummage the house under the pretense of being a plumber. It shows, too, that he must be watching this place, or he wouldn't have known when I went out."

"Hadn't you better notify the police?" suggested Mr. DeVere.

"I'll think about it," agreed Russ. "Of course he hasn't really done anything yet that they could arrest him for, unless coming into our apartment without being invited is illegal, and he could wriggle out of a charge of that sort. No, I'll keep my eyes open. In a little while, after I obtain my patent, and the attachment is on the market, he can't bother me. But I don't mind admitting that I'm worried."

"Then sit down and have something to eat with us," urged Alice, and Ruth, with a nod and a blush, seconded the request. "You'll be eating some of your own salt, anyhow," Alice suggested, in fun.

Russ lost a little of his apprehensive air as the meal progressed. Perhaps it was because Ruth sat opposite. Alice said as much to her sister afterward, when they were getting ready for bed.

"Don't be silly!" was Ruth's sole reply.

Mr. DeVere attended several rehearsals at the moving picture theater and, one morning, said:

"Girls, how would you like to come and see me in my new role? We have a dress rehearsal to-day, so to speak, and we'll "film" the play, as they call it, to-morrow."

"Oh, let's go, Ruth!" cried Alice, clapping her hands. "I know you'll enjoy it!"

"I'm sure I will," agreed Ruth. Her attitude toward the movies was also changing.

Together father and daughters went. It did Alice good to see how Mr. DeVere was welcomed by his fellow actors. He had already made himself friendly with most of them.

As Alice and Ruth came into the big studio, where a battery of cameras were clicking away, the two girls became aware of the looks cast at them by those not actually engaged in some scene. And, while most of the looks were friendly, those from two of the players were not.

Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon, standing together at one side of a section of a log cabin, whispered to each other.

"Ah, Mr. DeVere!" called Mr. Pertell. "Glad you're here; we were waiting for you."

"I hope I'm not late!" replied the actor, huskily, with a proper regard for not delaying a rehearsal.

"Oh, no. You're ahead of time if anything, and I'm glad of it. We'll have to set the smuggling play aside for a time. One of my men isn't here, and I can slip in your scenes now, and be that much ahead. So if you'll get ready we'll go on with 'A Turn of the Card.'"

"Yes, Mr. Pertell—certainly. Let me present you to my daughters. I believe you have met one."

"Yes—Miss Alice. I am glad to know the other one," and he bowed to Ruth. Then he hurried away. Mr. Pertell always seemed to be in a hurry.

Mr. DeVere went to his dressing room to don the costume of the character he was to represent—a wealthy banker—and Ruth and Alice gazed with interest at the various scenes going on about them.

While there were many persons connected with the Comet Film Company, there were certain principals who did most of the work. Among them, excepting Mr. DeVere, was Wellington Bunn, an old-time actor, who had long aspired to Hamlet, but who had given it up for the more certain income of the movies. Then there was Mrs. Margaret Maguire (on the bills as Cora Ashleigh) who did "old women" parts, and did them exceedingly well. She had two grandchildren, Tommy and Nellie, who were often cast for juvenile roles.

Carl Switzer was a joy to know. A German, with an accent that was "t'icker dan cheese," to use his own expression, he was a fund of happy philosophy under the most adverse circumstances. And on his round face was always a smile. He did the "comic relief," when it was needed, which was often.

Exactly opposite him in character was Pepper Sneed, the "grouch" of the company. Nothing ever went the way Pepper wanted it to go, from the depiction of a play to the meals he ate. No wonder he had dyspepsia. He was always apprehensive of something going to happen and when it did—well, they used to say that Pepper was the original "I told you so!"

Pearl Pennington and Laura Dixon have already been mentioned. Paul Ardite, who played opposite to Miss Dixon, was a good looking chap, with considerable ability. It was rumored that he and the ingenue—but there, I am not supposed to tell secrets.

Had it not been for "Pop" Snooks, I am sure the Comet Film Company would never have enjoyed the success it did. For Pop was the property man—the one of all work and little play. On him devolved the task of manufacturing at short notice anything from a castle to a police station.

And the best part of it was that Pop could do it. He was ingenuity itself, and they tell the story yet of how, when on the theatrical circuit, he made a queen's throne out of two cheese boxes and a board, and a little later in the same play, made from the same materials a very serviceable dog-cart.

As usual in the studio, several plays were going on at the same time—or, rather, parts of plays.

"Come on now!" called Mr. Pertell, sharply. "Get ready for that safe robbery scene. Pop, where's that safe?"

"It's being used as part of the wall in the dungeon in that 'Lord Scatterwait' scene," answered the property man.

"Well, hustle it over here, and get something else for the dungeon wall. I need that safe."

"That's the way it goes!" grumbled Pop as he scurried about. But that was all the fault he found, and presently the hole in the dungeon wall, caused by the removal of the safe with a painted canvas on it to represent stones, was filled by some boards taken from a fence used in a rural love drama.

"I say now, dot's not right!" spluttered Mr. Switzer, who as a country boy was making love to a country lass, (Miss Dixon). "Dot's not right, Pop. You dake our fence avay, und vat I goin' t' lean on ven I makes eyes at Miss Dixon? Ve got t' haf dot fence, yet!"

"I'll make you another in a minute!" cried Pop. "You don't go on for ten minutes."

"Mine gracious! Vot a business!" exclaimed the German, his round face showing as much woe as he ever allowed it to depict. "Dot vos a fine fence, mit der evening-glory vines trailing 'round mit it. Ach, yah!"

"Never mind," said Miss Dixon, "Pop will fix us up," and while she was waiting she strolled over to where Paul Ardite was talking to Alice. Russ Dalwood had come in and had greeted Ruth and Alice, and then, in response to an unseen gesture from Paul, had introduced him. Both girls liked the young fellow, who seemed quite interested in Alice.

"Are you going to play parts here?" asked Miss Dixon, with the freemasonry of the theater, speaking without being introduced.

"Oh, no!" replied Ruth, quickly. "We just came to see my father."

"Maybe they think they're too good for the movies," sneered Pearl Pennington, but only Russ heard her, and he glanced at her sharply.

"All ready for 'A Turn of the Card' now!" called Mr. Pertell, as Mr. DeVere came out of his dressing room. "Is your camera all ready, Russ?" for Russ had obtained a place with the film company, and had given up his position in the little moving picture theatre.

"All ready," was the answer. "I've got a thousand-foot reel in."

"Well, I don't want this particular scene to run more than eighty feet. Got to save most of the film for the bigger scenes. Now, watch yourselves, ladies and gentlemen. This is going to be one of our best yet, or I'm mistaken. Pop—where's Pop?"

"Here I am. What is it?"

"Get me a big armchair. I want Mr. DeVere to be sitting in that when the adventuress comes in. Miss Pennington, you're the adventuress, and I wish you'd look the part more."

"I'm doing the best I can."

"Well, fix your hair a little differently—a little more fluffy, you know—I don't know what you call it."

"Oh, that's easily remedied," she laughed. "I'm ready now," and with dexterous use of a side-comb she produced the desired result.

"Got that chair, Pop?" called the manager.

"Yep. Just as soon as I fix that fence for the rural scene."

"Yah! Py gracious, ve got t' haf our fence or dot love scene mit der evening-glory flowers vill be terrible!" insisted Mr. Switzer.

"All ready, now!" Mr. Pertell said, as the chair was placed in what was to represent a parlor. Mr. DeVere took his seat, and the action of the drama began. Ruth and Alice looked on with interest.



CHAPTER XII

THE PHOTO DRAMA

Mr. DeVere was an excellent actor. In his time he had played many parts, so the necessary action, or "business," as it is called, was not hard for him. He had learned readily what was expected of him, and though it seemed rather odd to make his gestures, his exits and entrances before nothing more than the eye of a camera, he soon had become accustomed to it after the days of rehearsal. And the great point was that he did not have to use his voice. Or, at the most, when some vital part of the little play called for speaking, he had only to whisper to give the "cue" to the others.

The plot was not a very complicated one, telling the story of a wealthy young fellow (played by Paul Ardite) the son of a wealthy banker, (Mr. DeVere) getting into bad company, and how he was saved by the influence of a good girl.

The "card" in question, was a visiting card, which seemed to compromise the young man, but the "turn" of it cleared him.

To save time, different scenes had already been set up in various parts of the big studio, and to these scenes—mere sections of rooms or offices—the actors moved.

With them moved Russ Dalwood, who was "filming" this particular play. He placed his little box-machine, on its tripod, before each scene, and used as many feet of film to get the succeeding pictures as Mr. Pertell thought was necessary.

I presume all my readers have seen moving pictures many times, and perhaps many of you know how they are made. But at the risk of repeating what is already known I will give just a little description of how the work is done.

In the first place there has to be a play to be "filmed," or taken. It may be a parlor drama an outdoor scene—anything from a burning building to a flood. With the play decided on, the actors and actresses for the different parts are selected and carefully rehearsed. This is necessary as the camera is instantaneous and one false move or gestures may spoil the film.

Next comes the selection of the location for the various scenes. Indoor ones are comparatively easy, for the scenic artist can build almost anything. But to get the proper outdoor setting is not so easy, and often moving picture companies go many miles to get just the proper scenery for a background.

So careful are some managers that they will send to California, or to the Holy Land, in order that their actors may have the proper historical surroundings. This costs many thousands of dollars, so it can be seen how important it is to get the film right at first.

There are two main parts to the moving picture business—the taking of the pictures and later the projection, or showing, of them on a white screen in some theatre.

For this two different machines are needed. The first is a camera, similar in the main principle to the same camera with which you may have taken snapshots. But there is a difference. Where you take one picture in a second, the moving picture camera takes sixteen. That is the uniform rate maintained, though there may be exceptions. And in your camera you take a picture on a short strip of celluloid film, or on a glass plate, but in the moving picture machine the pictures are taken on a narrow strip of celluloid film perhaps a thousand feet long.

The camera consists of a narrow box. On one side is a handle, and there is a lens that can be adjusted or focused. Inside is varied machinery, but I will not tire you with a description of it. Sufficient to say that there are two wheels, or reels. On one—the upper—is wound the unexposed film. One end of this film is fastened to the empty, or lower, reel. The film is passed back of lens, which is fitted with a shutter that opens and closes at the rate of sixteen times a second.

Turning a handle on the outside of the camera operates it. So that when the scene is ready to be photographed the actors, whether men or animals, begin to move. The handle turns, and the unexposed film is wound from one reel to the other, inside the camera, passing behind the lens, so that the picture falls on it in a flash, just as you take one snapshot. But, as I have said, the moving picture camera takes snapshot after snapshot—sixteen a second—until many thousands are taken, so that when the pictures are shown afterward they give the effect of continuous motion.

The film is moved forward by means of toothed sprocket wheels inside the camera, the shutter opening and closing automatically.

When the reel of film has all been exposed, it is taken to the dark room, and there developed, just as a small roll from your camera would be. This film is called the negative. From it any number of positives can be made, all depending on the popularity of the subject.

To make positives, the negative film is laid on another strip of sensitive celluloid of the same size. The two films are placed in a suitable machine, and then set in front of a bright light. The two films are then moved along so as to print each of the thousands of pictures previously taken.

The positive film is then developed, "fixed" to prevent it from fading, and it is then ready for the projecting machine. This latter is like the old-fashioned stereopticon, and by means of suitable lenses, and a brilliant light, the small pictures, hardly more than an inch square, are so magnified that they appear life-size on the screen.

That, in brief, is how moving pictures are made and shown, but it tells nothing of the hard work involved, on the part of operators, and actors and actresses. Often the performers risk their lives to make a "snappy" film, and many accidents have occurred where daring men and women took parts with wild beasts in the cast, or dared serious injury by long jumps.

Ruth and Alice watched their father enact his role. He did it well, and the girls were gratified to hear Mr. Pertell say from time to time:

"Good! That's the way to do it! Oh, that's great!"

The play was not a long one, but if it had taken three times the half-hour it consumed Ruth and Alice would not have been weary.

The last scene had been "filmed" by Russ, who was getting ready to take his camera to the dark room for development, when there came a crash from where Mr. Switzer was going through a love scene with Miss Dixon.

"Look out!" someone called.

There was a sound as of rending, splintering wood.

"Oh!" screamed Miss Dixon.

"Py gracious goodness!" ejaculated Mr. Switzer. "I am caught fast!"

"Oh, what has happened?" gasped Ruth, clinging to Alice.

"It sounded like an explosion!" the latter answered.

"Don't be alarmed," Russ assured them. "It's nothing. Only Switzer leaned too hard on that fence and it went down with him."

And that was what had happened. Amid the wreckage of the property fence, which had collapsed with the weight of the German actor, sat he and Miss Dixon, while the manager, with a gesture of despair exclaimed:

"That's another scene to be done over."

"I knew that would happen!" observed Pepper Sneed, gloomily.



CHAPTER XIII

MR. DEVERE'S SUCCESS

Amid laughter, now that it was seen that nothing serious had happened, the wreckage was cleared away, and the German actor, and his partner in the rural love scene, were assisted to their feet.

"Are you hurt?" asked Mr. Pertell, anxiously, when quiet had in a measure been restored.

"Only my feelings iss hurted!" replied Mr. Switzer, with an odd look on his round, fat face. "It iss not seemly und proper dot ven a feller is telling a nice girl vot he dinks of her, dot he should be upset head ofer heels alretty yet; ain't it?"

"It certainly is," agreed Miss Dixon, a little spasm of pain flitting across her face as she limped to one side.

"Oh, dear, I hope you're not hurt!" exclaimed Miss Pennington, hastening to her friend's side, and supporting her with an arm about her waist.

"It's only my ankle; it's a bit sprained, I think. A good thing I haven't a dancing part," said Miss Dixon.

"Will you be able to go on, when we make the film over again?" asked the manager anxiously. He did not make this inquiry because he was heartless, but the foremost thought with those who provide amusement for the public—whether they be managers or actors—is that "the show must go on." For that reason sickness, and even the death of loved ones, often does not stop the player from appearing on the stage. And, in a measure, this is no less so with those who help to make the moving pictures.

"Oh, I think I'll be able to go on after a bit," declared Miss Dixon, sinking into a chair that Pepper Sneed pushed forward for her.

"Go on! You'll never be able to go on inside of a week, little girl!" exclaimed the actor with the perpetual "grouch." He looked gloomily at those about him. "This is the worst business in the world," he went on. "Something is always happening. I know something will go wrong in that safe-blowing act I'm to do next. I——"

"Say, you go do that act, and then let us know if anything happens!" interrupted the manager. "They're waiting for you over there," and he motioned to an office setting, in which a safe robbery, one of the scenes of another play, was to take place.

"All right!" sighed Pepper Sneed, as he moved off to take his part. "But, mind what I'm telling you," he said to Miss Dixon. "You'll be laid up for a week."

"An' it all de fault of dot property man!" exclaimed Mr. Switzer. "He made dot fence like paper yet alretty! It vouldn't holt up a fly!"

"That was a good fence!" defended Pop Snooks. "The trouble was you leaned your ton weight on it."

"Ton veight! Huh! Vot you tink I am? A hipperperpotamusses? A ton veight—huh!" spluttered Mr. Switzer.

"Never mind now!" called the manager sharply, with a reassuring glance at Ruth and Alice, who were regarding this little flurry with anxious eyes. They glanced over toward their father. "Pop, make a new fence—a strong one—and we'll film that scene over again," went on Mr. Pertell. "To your places, the rest of you. Mr. DeVere, I think that will be all we will require of you to-day. But come into the office. I have a new play I'm thinking of filming, and I'd like your advice on some of the scenes. Miss Dixon, shall I send for a doctor?"

"Oh, no, indeed, I'll be all right!" was her hasty answer.

"If you're not, don't be afraid to say so," spoke Mr. Pertell. "I can understudy you——"

"Oh, no, indeed!" she exclaimed, energetically. If there is one thing more than another that an actor or actress fears, it is being supplanted in a role. Of course, all the important parts in a play are "understudied"; that is, some other actor or actress than the principal has learned the lines and "business" so, in case the latter is taken ill, the play can go on, after a fashion. But players are jealous of one another to a marked degree, and rather than permit their understudy to succeed him, many a performer has gone on when physically unfit. Perhaps it was this that induced Miss Dixon to conceal the pain she was really suffering.

Mr. Pertell glanced sharply at her, and then his gaze roved to Ruth and Alice, who were standing with their father. A musing look was on the face of the manager. Miss Dixon saw it, and arose.

"I am perfectly able to go on, Mr. Pertell," she said, quickly. "There is no need of getting anyone in my place."

She walked across the room, with a slight limp, and the spasm of pain that showed on her face was quickly replaced by a smile. But it was an obvious effort.

Miss Dixon staggered, and would have fallen had not Alice stepped forward quickly and caught her.

"You really ought to have a doctor," Alice said, anxiously. "A sprained ankle is sometimes quite serious."

"I don't need a doctor!" exclaimed the ingenue, sharply. "I shall be all right. It will take some little time to repair the fence, and by then——"

"You must let me attend to you," broke in a motherly voice, and Mrs. Maguire, who, as Cora Ashleigh, had finished her part in a little drama, came bustling over. "I'll put some hot compresses on your ankle, and that will take out the pain," went on the elderly actress. "Come along."

And Miss Dixon was glad enough to go. Mrs. Maguire was really a sort of "mother" to the others of the company, and many a physical ache and pain, as well as some mental ones, yielded to her ministering care.

"Now, then, Pop, how are you coming on with that fence?" asked the manager a little later.

"Oh, I'll get her done some time to-day if you don't give me too much else to do," was the answer. "But I've had to quit work on that trick auto you wanted—the one that turns into an airship."

"Pshaw! And I needed that, too. Well, go ahead. Do the best you can, and when you've finished I want a fake stone tower made for that fairy picture we're going to do next week."

"All right," agreed Pop. "I'll do it."

Nothing seemed too hard for him. He responded to the most exacting and diverse commands as easily as to the smallest. He was an invaluable property man.

"Oh, Mr. Ardite," continued the manager to the leading juvenile, "I'm going to change your part in that runaway drama. I'll want some exterior scenes. One on the Brooklyn Bridge and another at the Grand Central Terminal. Get ready to go up there. Miss Fillmore will be here soon. She's in that with you. I'll send Charlie Blake up to film it. Here's the "register" list—look it over," and he tossed a sheaf of typewritten sheets to the young actor.

"I wish we could go see that taken," whispered Alice.

"You can, if you like," responded the manager, overhearing her.

"I—I'll be delighted to take you along," said Paul, coloring as he glanced at Alice.

Miss Dixon, who had come back from her room, after having her ankle bathed, looked up quickly at these words. She glanced from Alice to Paul, and back again, and then said something in a low voice to Miss Pennington.

"May I go, Daddy?" asked Alice. "I'm so interested in these moving pictures."

"Oh, yes, I think so," he assented. "Perhaps Ruth——"

"No, I'll go home with you," Ruth answered. "I'm a bit tired to-day."

"I'd never tire of this!" exclaimed Alice, with enthusiasm.

"Come along then!" invited Paul. "Here's Miss Fillmore now," he added, as another member of the company entered.

There was a sudden cry of pain from the other side of the studio, and a moving picture camera ceased clicking.

"What's the matter now?" asked the manager, as he looked to where the safe robbery scene was being filmed.

"Oh, I caught my hand in the safe door!" exclaimed Pepper Sneed. "Nearly took my finger off! I just knew something would happen to me to-day!"

"Great Scott! Another scene spoiled!" groaned Mr. Pertell. "Well, do it over. Had you run out much film?" he asked the operator.

"No, only a few feet."

"Well, try again. And, Pepper, look out for your head this time, that you don't get that caught in the safe. You might lose it."

"Uh!" grunted the human grouch.

Russ Dalwood came out of the developing room.

"That's going to be a great film!" he declared. It's one of the best I've ever seen. The pictures will show up fine."

"Glad to hear it," remarked the manager. "That's some good news in this day of trouble."

"Did I do all right?" asked Mr. DeVere, hoarsely. "I would like to see myself—as others see me—and that's possible now, in the movies."

"Your pictures are fine," answered Ross.

"And I want to congratulate you," went on Mr. Pertell. "You are doing splendid work, and we are glad to have you with us. It is not everyone who can come from the legitimate stage and go into the movies with success; but you have."

"I am glad to hear it," declared the actor. "There was great necessity, or I should not have done it; but I am not sorry now. It is a great relief not to have to speak my lines."

"And you mustn't do much talking now, Daddy," cautioned Ruth. "You want your throat to get well, you know."

"Yes, I know, dear," replied her father, patting her on the shoulder.

"Good-bye!" called Alice, who with Paul, Miss Fillmore, and the camera operator, were going out for the exterior scenes. "I'll be home soon."

"I'll take care of her," promised Paul, and, as he and Alice went out, side by side, Ruth caught a sharp glance from Miss Dixon, who was narrowly watching the two.

"Well, everything seems to be going on all right now," observed Mr. Pertell. "Here's Pop with the fence. Now, Mr. Switzer, and Miss Dixon——well, what is it?" he broke off with, as he saw Wellington Bunn approaching with an irritated air.

"I must refuse, sir, positively refuse, to go on with the part you have assigned to me!" exclaimed the former Shakespearean player, striking what he thought was a dignified attitude. "I cannot do it, Mr. Pertell, and I wonder that you expect it of me."

"What part is it you object to?" asked the manager. "Let's see, you're in 'A Man's Home;' aren't you?"

"Yes, and in one scene I am supposed to come home from the office, and get down on the floor to play with blocks with the children. I do not mind that so much, but I have to play horse, and ride the children around on my back, and then, to cap the climax, I have to turn a somersault."

"Well?" asked the manager, as the actor paused.

"Well, I positively refuse to do that somersault! The idea of me—Wellington Bunn—who has played in Shakespearean dramas, groveling on the floor and turning somersaults! The somersaults positively must be cut out."

"But they can't very well, Mr. Pertell!" broke in one of the other actors in the same drama. "Because when Mr. Bunn goes over that way he is supposed accidentally to upset the table, and the supper things fly all over, and the children laugh and think it's a great joke. The whole scene will be spoiled if Mr. Bunn doesn't turn his somersault."

"Then he'll turn it!" announced the manager, grimly.

"What! But I protest, sir! I protest!" cried the tragedian. "I will not do it! The idea of me—Wellington Bunn——"

"Somersault—or look for another engagement," was the terse rejoinder, and with a gesture of despair Mr. Bunn turned aside murmuring;

"Oh, that I should come to this! Oh, the pity of it! The pity! I'll never do it!"

But a little later, for the sake of his salary, he turned the somersault.



CHAPTER XIV

AN EMERGENCY

"Did you enjoy yourself, Alice?" asked Ruth, a little later that afternoon, when her sister had returned from her trip to the Brooklyn Bridge, and the Grand Central Terminal, with Paul.

"Indeed I did!" replied the younger girl. "It was really exciting. And Paul is so nice!"

"Do you call him Paul?"

"Certainly—why not."

"And does he call you Alice?"

"Yes. He asked me if he couldn't, and I don't see any harm. He's just like a brother would be."

"Oh," remarked Ruth, with a little smile. "Tell me about it."

"Oh, there isn't much to tell. We went up in a car until we got to where the scenes were to be filmed. Then Paul and Miss Fillmore did what they had to do, and the pictures were taken.

"There was quite a crowd looking, on, too, and some of them got in the pictures," Alice went on.

"Purposely, do you mean—to spoil them?" asked Ruth.

"Oh, no, they belonged in. You see this was supposed to be a natural scene of Paul and Miss Fillmore meeting on the bridge. They walk along a little way, and part of the plot develops there. So there had to be other persons walking along to make it look natural. How odd it must be if those same persons happen to see the film play later, and recognize themselves in the pictures."

"Rather, I should say," agreed Ruth. "What next?"

"Oh, then we went up to the Grand Central, and there Paul had to pretend to get on a train, and Miss Fillmore bade him a tearful good-bye. She's quite an emotional actress, too.

"It was quite exciting. Paul had some work getting the station master to let us out on the train platform without tickets. But when he explained about the moving pictures, it was all right.

"It was as real as anything—just as if it wasn't for the films at all. Paul got on the platform, and a porter took someone else's grip to make it look as though he were going on a journey.

"That porter enjoyed it more than anyone else. He grinned so much that Paul had to tell him to stop, or the top of his head might come off. And laugh! I wish you could have heard him laugh at that. It took us a little longer to get those films, for there was such a crowd. But it was all right. I've had a lovely time!" cried Alice, her brown eyes brilliant with excitement, and her cheeks flushed.

"And what happened next?" asked Ruth, after a pause.

"Oh, Miss Fillmore had an engagement, so Paul and I went and had lunch together. He's an awfully nice boy!"

"Alice!"

"I don't care; he is! And he's in papa's company, so I don't see any harm—especially as it was in daylight, and it was only in one of those dairy lunches, you know. Paul wanted to take me to a better place, but I know he doesn't earn much yet, and I wasn't going to have him waste his money."

"Thoughtful of you," murmured Ruth.

"Wasn't it. Where's daddy?"

"Oh, he went back to the studio. There was some mistake in one of his acts and he wanted to have it corrected so he could study over it to-night."

"Oh, hasn't it been a day!" exclaimed Alice, as she laid aside her hat. "Do you know, I think outdoor pictures are better, and more interesting. I'd like to be in some myself."

"It is interesting," agreed Ruth. "And really it doesn't seem like acting when you don't have any audience except a camera. But I suppose that makes it all the more difficult. Russ was in a little while ago."

"What did he want?" asked Alice with a quick glance at her sister.

"Oh, he just called to say that all the films in which dad appears came out fine. He mentioned that his patent was coming on all right, and he expects soon to have it out on royalty."

"That's nice. I do hope those horrid men won't get it away from him. What have we to eat? I'm nearly starved."

"Why, I thought you had lunch."

"I did, but we—we took a walk afterward, and my appetite came back."

Ruth looked curiously at Alice, sighed and then went out to the kitchen.

As the days went on Mr. DeVere grew to like his new occupation more and more. At first he had talked and mused over the coming time when he could go back to the regular theatre. But his voice showed no tendency to lose its whispering hoarseness, and he was, perforce, compelled to do his acting for the camera. Then came a gradual change of feeling, and he grew really to like his new occupation. Besides, it paid almost as well as a legitimate role, and was more certain.

The girls and their father enjoyed a private view of the film in which Mr. DeVere was depicted. It was an absorbing play, and while it seemed a bit uncanny, at first, to look at yourself moving about, Mr. DeVere grew accustomed to it.

"And it is surprising what faults one can see in onesself," he remarked, after the film had been thrown on the screen for him. "I can pick out a number of places where I can improve in my gestures. And I see places where the action can be more easily and plainly explained to the audience."

"I am glad you do," spoke Mr. Pertell. "It is a good thing to try to improve the movies. They have, in my opinion, a great lesson to teach to the masses, as well as to provide amusement for them. And all we can do, individually, to help, adds to it.

"I am thinking of greatly broadening my fields, I am not satisfied to film merely parlor dramas and a few city scenes. I want a larger scenic background, and I'm working to that end."

"I hope I shall be able to fit into some of them," observed Mr. DeVere. "I, too, begin to think I would like to get out in the open."

"I intend to have you with me," declared the manager. "I am looking around for a locality to serve as a background for certain rural plays. But I have not found it yet."

Ruth and Alice paid many visits to the film studio, and watched the making of many plays. Their father had parts in a number of them, and for others new actors were engaged temporarily.

Russ was becoming an expert operator, and meanwhile was working on his patent. It was nearly perfected.

They were exacting days that followed. Many dramas had to be filmed, and all the actors and actresses were kept busy. Ruth and Alice spent many afternoons in the studio, growing more and more interested all the while. There was much fun, as well as much hard work, for Mr. Switzer, with his odd expressions and mishaps, was a source of considerable amusement.

Then, too, the "human grouch," Pepper Sneed, seemed always to find some new objection to raise, or some dire calamity to predict. And as for Mr. Bunn, he made many protests at roles he considered incongruous with his dignity.

Once he wanted the story of a play so changed that he might give an impersonation of Hamlet in a setting that included a Western mining cabin, and when he was refused by the manager he grew quite indignant.

"You might as well try to introduce Macbeth in the clown act," declared Mr. Pertell.

Several times Ruth and Alice had expressed a desire to try a little part in one of the dramas, but their father would not listen. At last, however, their chance came.

Mr. DeVere had just completed his role in a difficult part, and Russ, with his camera, had been shifted over to film another play, a few of the scenes of which were laid in the studio, the others being set out of doors.

"Well, aren't those two young ladies here yet?" asked Mr. Pertell, coming out of his office, as he noted a delay.

"Not yet," answered Mrs. Maguire, who was to have a part in the act. "They said they'd be early, too."

"That's always the way when you want someone in a hurry," stormed the manager. "Here we are holding things up just because Miss Parker and Miss Dengon aren't here. It wouldn't taken them five minutes to do their parts, either."

"Well, I can't wait much longer," said the principal actor, who was to take a part with the young ladies who were missing. "I've got to get that train, you know, Pertell."

"Yes, I know!" was the answer, as the manager snapped shut his watch. "I can't see what's keeping them. This gets on my nerves!"

"What is it?" asked Mr. DeVere, coming from his dressing room. "Anything I can do to help you?"

"No, but two extra young girls I hired for certain parts are missing, and this thing ought to go on. Harrison has an important engagement, and can't wait either. I didn't count on this emergency, though usually I allow for delays. If I only had two girls now—Say!" he cried, as he looked over at Ruth and Alice. "They might do it—they might fill in! How about it, Mr. DeVere; would you let them substitute in this drama? It's a simple thing, and with two minutes' coaching they can do it. That will let Harrison get his train, and I can go on with the next scenes. Will you girls try?" he asked, appealing to them.



CHAPTER XV

JEALOUSIES

Alice hesitated, but only a moment, and, while Ruth was looking at her father, the younger girl exclaimed:

"Oh, do let us try! I don't know that we could do it, Mr. Pertell, but let us try! Won't you, Daddy?"

Mr. DeVere looked troubled. For some time past he had been watching the growing liking of his daughters for the moving pictures, and he was in two minds about the matter. He had seen that this new manner of presenting plays had a great future, not only for the public but for the acting profession. And now, when a chance came for his daughters to get into it, he hardly knew what to say. He had made up his mind that they should never go on the dramatic stage. But this——.

"Something has to be done," urged the manager. "I can't hold things back much longer."

"Wouldn't you like to try it, Ruth?" asked Alice, catching her sister's hands. "I think it will be just fine!"

"Why, I—I think I would like it—if they think I can do it," agreed Ruth.

"Oh, you can do it all right," Mr. Pertell assured her. "It is very simple. A little coaching is all you need. What do you say, Mr. DeVere? May the girls go in?"

"Why, I—er—I hardly know what to say. It is so different from anything they have ever done. And I never expected——"

"Oh, they can do it!" interrupted the manager. "They've been around here long enough to know how we do things. Come, it may be a good opening for them."

"All right, I don't mind," said the actor. "I shall be very glad to let them help you out, Mr. Pertell."

"Oh, I don't ask it as a favor. I'm willing to pay for their time. I was to give Miss Parker and Miss Dengon five dollars each for a few minutes of their time to-day, but they have disappointed me. I now offer it to your daughters."

"Oh, fine!" cried Alice, clapping her hands. "Then I can get that new hat I've been wanting so much. Come on, Ruth. What do we have to do, Mr. Pertell?"

The manager quickly explained what was wanted. The two girls had simple parts, with Mr. Harrison as the chief character. Alice and Ruth soon grasped what was required of them, and, after a little coaching and rehearsing, they were ready.

"Now stand over here," directed Mr. Pertell, who took personal charge this time, "and don't pay any attention to the camera. Don't look at it, in fact. Keep your eyes on Mr. Harrison, or on some part of scenery. Just forget everything but what you have to do."

"Shall we speak the lines aloud?" asked Ruth.

"If you like. Perhaps it will be better, for the first time, to do so," suggested Mr. Pertell. "It may help you to get the 'business' down better. A little more light here!" he called to the electrician, for in one of the scenes artificial illumination was used. "Are you all ready, Russ?" he asked the young operator.

"All ready; yes, sir!"

"Then—go!"

The little section, from what was to be a two-reel play of the movies, was under way. Though a bit nervous Ruth and Alice did very well, and soon they were in the swing of it.

When it came time for Alice to act the part of a hoydenish character, she was exceedingly natural in it, and her laugh at the simulated discomfiture of Mr. Harrison was so spontaneous that even some of the others joined in.

Ruth, too, who had a more demure part, acquitted herself well. The camera clicked on, Russ turning the handle steadily. He nodded reassuringly at Ruth when she had a moment's respite.

Then came a slight change of scene, and a change of costume on the part of the girls, Mrs. Maguire finding just what was needed in the wardrobe of the studio.

Then, just as the final strip of film had been exposed, and the emergency work of Ruth and Alice had ended, in came the two tardy actresses.

"You're too late!" exclaimed Mr. Pertell. "We couldn't wait for you."

"What!" exclaimed Miss Parker. "Do you mean to tell us you went and filmed our parts with somebody else in the cast?"

"That's what we did," replied the manager, coolly. "Maybe you'll learn after this that four o'clock means four o'clock, and not half past."

"Well, what do you know about that?" gasped Miss Dengon, sinking into a plush chair, and dabbing at her nose with a chamois skin, which gave off puffs of powder like a miniature gun.

"An' us tryin' as hard as ever we could to get here!" went on Miss Parker, vigorously chewing gum. "The nerve of some people is suttinly amazin'! Come on, Ruby, I never did care much for movies anyhow, an' how some folks can stay in 'em is suttinly a mystery to me!"

Then, with heads held high, and with meaning glances at Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon, who were busy in another drama, the two young ladies went out, looking superciliously at Ruth and Alice.

"Business is business—in the movies the same as anywhere else," chuckled Mr. Pertell, as he gave Ruth and Alice each a crisp five-dollar bill. "I am very much obliged to you, in the bargain," he went on.

"So am I!" added Mr. Harrison. "I can get my train now, and it's a satisfaction to know that the scenes are completed."

"Oh, it was fun!" laughed Alice.

"I liked it, too," confessed Ruth.

"And I want to tell you that you both did most excellently," said the manager. "You have a very good grasp of what is wanted, and you put in the 'business' very naturally. I congratulate you and your father," and he nodded to Mr. DeVere.

"I have given them a little instruction in the fundamentals," confessed the actor, "and of course they have been about the theatre, more or less, since they were small children."

"I suppose that accounts for it," observed Mr. Pertell. "Well, I want to say that I am very much pleased with you, and, if you think you would like to try it again, I can make parts for you in a drama that I am going to film next week."

"Oh, Ruth! Let's do it!" begged Alice.

Ruth looked at her father inquiringly.

"What sort of parts are they?" he asked.

"Oh, very much the same as they undertook to-day, only longer and more elaborate. There will be several changes of scene and costume. Do you think you'd like it?"

"Like it? I'd love it!" cried Alice, gaily, "Do say we may, Daddy dear!" and she put her arms around his neck.

"I'll see," was all he would promise. "I must look over the parts, and then—well, little coaching wouldn't do you any harm, I guess," he added with a smile.

"It would make them all the better," declared the manager.

"Oh, Ruth! I believe he's going to let us go in!" whispered Alice in delight. "Won't you like it?"

"Yes, dear! It's more exciting than I imagined. And I think you did splendidly!"

"Not half as well as you, Ruth. You are a born actress!"

"And you're a born ingenue!"

"Oh, aren't we silly to compliment each other this way!" laughed Alice. "But, really, Ruth, I just love it; don't you?"

"Yes, dear. Oh, I wonder what sort of parts we'll get. I'd like something romantic."

"And I want something funny—with laughs in it," declared Alice. "Oh, say, Ruth," and her voice went to a whisper, "do you really think I'm an ingenue—like Miss Dixon?"

"I think you're—better!" responded Ruth, kissing her sister, and stroking her soft hair.

The work in the film studio was over for the day and the actors and actresses were getting ready to go home. From the time Ruth and Alice had taken the emergency parts Russ had observed Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon casting sharp looks at them.

"Jealous!" mused Russ. And his diagnosis was confirmed a little later, when, as the two former vaudeville performers passed Ruth and Alice, Miss Pennington, with a sharp glance at the latter, murmured loudly enough to be heard:

"Humph! It takes more than one performance in a little part to make a movie actress! Some folks think they are mighty smart, coming in over the heads of others!"

"That's what I say, too!" added Miss Dixon. "It was a shame the way they took the parts away from Ruby and Maude!"



CHAPTER XVI

THE MOVING PICTURE GIRLS

For a moment Ruth and Alice looked at each other with eyes that showed the pain they felt. Ruth turned pale at hearing the unkind words, but Alice blushed a rosy red, and started to say something.

"Don't," advised Mrs. Maguire, coming up beside them, and evidently guessing her intention. "It would only make matters worse to reply to them, my dear."

"But—but——" began Alice.

"Hush!" begged Ruth. "Oh, how could they say it—as if we wanted to displace those girls."

"I'm just going to tell them what I think!" exclaimed Alice, and there was a hint of real anger in her voice. But she had no chance, for Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon, as though satisfied with what they had done, swept out to the elevator.

"Don't mind them, my dears," said motherly Mrs. Maguire. "It's only professional jealousy, anyhow; and you'll see plenty of that if you stay in this business long enough."

"Then I'm not going to stay!" cried Alice. "I'm not used to having such things said of me."

Mrs. Maguire laughed genially. She was standing with Ruth and Alice, who were waiting for their father to join them. Most of the other performers had now gone.

"Oh, you'll get so you won't mind that a bit!" went on Mrs. Maguire. "Sure, I used to eat my heart over it in my younger days, but now I only laugh. It's part of the business. It's a tribute to your acting, my dear, and you ought to take it as such. Don't mind it."

"Oh, but it was so—so uncalled—for!" murmured Ruth. "I think I must—"

"Hush! Here comes daddy!" interrupted Alice. "Don't let him know about it."

"That's wise," commented Mrs. Maguire. "Though probably he's seen enough of it in his time. But perhaps he wouldn't like to know that it bothered you. Best say nothing to him, my dears. It will wear away soon enough."

"No, we won't say anything," agreed Alice, slipping her arm through her sister's. "Papa has enough trouble as it is."

A little later, as the girls were walking along with Mr. DeVere, he asked them:

"Well, how did you like your parts in the movies?"

"Fine. It was so interesting, Dad!" exclaimed Ruth.

"I'd like to do some more!" echoed Alice, with a meaning look at her sister.

"Well, I must see what sort of parts Mr. Pertell will cast you for," said Mr. DeVere. "But I am glad you like the work. It may be a great deal better for all of us to be in this than if I was alone in a regular theater. We can always be together now, and certainly my voice doesn't seem to be improving very fast."

This was only too true. Several visits to the physician, and a heroic course of treatment, had resulted in only a slight improvement. The pain in the vocal chords had been lessened, but the huskiness remained, so that it would have been practically impossible for Mr. DeVere to speak his lines in a regular theater. So the moving pictures were suited to him.

The DeVere family was now in much better circumstances than when we first made their acquaintance. They had been gradually paying the back bills, the landlord had been appeased, so that there was no danger of dispossession, and there was much happiness in the little flat.

"We could even afford a better one, if you girls would like to move," said Mr. DeVere one day.

"Oh, no, let's stay," suggested Ruth. "We can save a little money by remaining here, and paying less rent."

"Besides, we have such nice neighbors!" observed Alice, with a glance at the Dalwood apartments across the hall, at the same time giving Ruth a sly nudge.

"Stop it!" commanded Ruth. "What do you mean, Alice?"

"Just what I said—we have such nice neighbors across the way," and she gave a little pinch to her sister's blushing cheek.

"Yes, the Dalwoods are very good friends," remarked Mr. DeVere, all unconscious of this little by-play between his daughters. "And Russ is certainly a fine young man."

"Indeed he is; isn't he, Ruth?" asked Alice tantalizingly.

"Oh, yes, I suppose so," was the blushing answer. "But how should I know—any more than you do about Paul Ardite?" and she glanced shrewdly at Alice.

"A hit, I suppose you would call that. A Roland for my Oliver, my dear!" laughed Alice, frankly. "I don't mind."

She looked toward her father, but he was so absorbed in looking over a new part he was to take, that he paid little attention to the chatter of the girls.

A few days after the first appearance of Ruth and Alice before the moving picture camera, in the small roles they had taken to bridge over an emergency, Mr. Pertell brought them their parts in a new drama. Meanwhile it had been ascertained that the films where the girls filled in had been a success. Ruth and Alice felt a little diffident about going to the studio again, especially after the scene with the jealous actresses.

But Miss Dixon and Miss Pennington appeared to have gotten over their pique, and they acted as though they had never said anything to wound or annoy Ruth and Alice. The latter, however, could not forget it, and were rather cool toward their fellow-players.

"Here are your new parts," said Mr. Pertell. "Look them over with your father as soon as you can. He is to be in the play with you."

"Oh, isn't this exciting!" cried Alice, as she took the typewritten manuscript. "Real parts at last, Ruth!"

"Yes. We will be real actresses if we keep on. I wonder what I am cast for?"

"My! We're becoming quite adept in theatrical talk. Ahem!" laughed Alice with pretended sarcasm.

Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon, who were already rehearsing for another play, looked over at the two enthusiastic sisters, and shrugged their shoulders.

"Wait until they have been in it as long as we have, my dear, then they won't be so jolly," remarked Miss Pennington.

"Oh, I don't know as you can include me," was Miss Dixon's rather tart comment. "I haven't been at it so many years."

"Oh, haven't you?" asked Miss Pennington, with a raising of her penciled eyebrows. "Excuse me, my dear!"

"Don't mention it!"

"Get on to that, would you!" exclaimed Pop Snooks to Mr. Sneed. "The two old-timers are scrappin'."

"I knew they would," was the grouchy rejoinder. "They'll have a real quarrel, and both quit, and that'll mean some new members in the company. And just as we are about through rehearsing that piece, and about to film it, too. That means I'll have to do it all over again. I knew something would happen!"

"Oh, cheer up! The worst is yet to come!" laughed Paul Ardite. "Here's Switzer looking as red as a lobster. What is it now, Carl?" he asked.

"Ach! Vot isn't der matter?" cried the moon-faced one. "I haf a part vot incessitates me to be bound und gagged by a band of robbers, und stood in a corner vhile dey loot der blace."

"Well, that's a nice, romantic part," observed Paul.

"Yah, but how would you like to haf a rag stuffed in your mout so vot you couldn't breath yet for five minutes? How vould you like dot; hey? Dell me dot!"

"Oh, well, tell 'em to leave you a breathing hole," laughed Paul.

"Where is Mr. Pertell? Where is he? I demand to see him at once!" broke in the voice of Wellington Bunn. "I must see him instantly!"

"He was here a moment ago, giving the Misses DeVere their parts," replied Paul. "Why, is the place on fire?"

"No, but I refuse to take the part he has assigned to me. I utterly and positively refuse to so demean myself."

"What part have you?" asked the young fellow, looking over at Alice and nodding.

"Why, he has cast me—I, who have played all the principal Shakespearean characters—he has cast me—Wellington Bunn—as a waiter in a hotel scene! Where is Mr. Pertell? I refuse to take that character!"

"Oh, what's the trouble now?" asked the manager, coming from his office. The Shakespearean actor explained.

"Now see here!" exclaimed Mr. Pertell, with more anger than he usually displayed. "You'll take that part, Mr. Bunn, or leave the company! It is an important part, and has to do with the development of the plot. Why, as that waiter you intercept the taking of ten thousand dollars, and prevent the heroine from being abducted. Afterward you become rich, and blossom out as a theatrical manager."

"And do I produce Shakespeare?" asked the old actor, eagerly.

"There's nothing to stop you—in the play," returned Mr. Pertell, rather drily.

"Oh, then it's all right," said Mr. Bunn, with a sigh of relief. "I'll take the part."

Rehearsals were going on in various parts of the studio, and some plays were being filmed. Russ Dalwood was busy at one of the cameras.

"Have you got a part you like, Ruth?" asked Alice, when she had finished looking over her lines.

"Indeed I have, I'm supposed to be Lady Montgomery, and there are two counts in love with me. At least, one is a count and the other pretends to be one. It's quite romantic. What is yours?"

"Mine's jolly. I'm a school girl, always up to some trick or other, and—yes, see here—why in one of my tricks I disclose that the pretended count who's in love with you is only an organ grinder! Oh, that will be fun," and she laughed gleefully.

"Do you like your parts?" asked the manager, coming up.

"Indeed we do!" chorused Ruth and Alice.

"Then talk to your father about them," he advised. "See what he says, and if he is willing you may begin rehearsals with him, and the others of the cast."

Mr. DeVere was fully satisfied with the parts assigned to his daughters, and agreed to allow them to enter formally into the work of the moving pictures at a very fair salary for beginners. The others of the company were called together, including Paul Ardite, and the best method of getting the finest results out of the drama was discussed.

In the days that followed, Ruth and Alice, as well as the others, did hard work. It is not as easy to go through a moving picture play as it appears merely from seeing the film on the white curtain. Some scenes have to be rehearsed over and over again, and often, after being filmed, some defect results and the work has to be all done once more.

Mr. DeVere rehearsed his daughters at home in the intervals of their appearance at the studio, and this redounded to their benefit. They were thus able to do effective work, and Mr. Pertell complimented them on it.

The play was soon ready for filming, and Russ was chosen to work the camera. Some of the scenes were out of doors, in a big flower garden, and for this the company was taken to Brooklyn, where a private owner was induced to allow his place to be used for a few minutes. Ruth and Alice enjoyed their part in the flower garden very much.

Finally the last rehearsal was had, and the day was set for making the films of the first real, big play in which the two girls had ever taken part. As they were leaving the studio together, on the afternoon of the day before the first "performance," they saw a group of children standing down near the main entrance.

"There go some of the moving picture girls now," one boy exclaimed.

"Don't I wish I was them!" sighed a tall, lanky girl next him. "Ain't they nice, Jimmie?"

"They sure is!" was the enthusiastic rejoinder.

"We're achieving fame, Ruth," laughed Alice.

"Such as it is—yes," replied her sister. "'Moving picture girls'; eh? Well, I suppose we are."



CHAPTER XVII

A PROMISE

"Now then, are we all ready?" asked Mr. Pertell. He looked about the studio, at the groups of actors and actresses, at the camera men—particularly at Russ. "Everybody here?" he went on.

"All here," replied Pop Snooks, checking off a list he held.

"How about your props?"

"Nothing missing, not even the firecracker Miss Alice sets off under the chair of the false count," replied the property man.

"Good! I don't want any failure at the last minute. Now, Russ, how is the camera working?"

"Fine, sir."

"Good fresh film?"

"Fresh to-day, Mr. Pertell—just like new-laid eggs."

"All right. You may have a chance to snap some newly laid eggs if my future plans work out all right. Well, I guess we'll begin. Take your places for the first scene."

"Oh, I'm so nervous!" confided Ruth to Alice.

"Silly! You needn't be!" was the response. "You're just perfect in your part. I only wish I was as sure of myself."

"Why, you're great, Alice!" said her sister. "Only you do such funny things—it makes me laugh, and I'm afraid I'll smile in the wrong place—when I'm being made love to, for instance."

"Well, it's a funny part, and I have to act funny," insisted the younger girl. "But I wish it was all over, and on the films. It's been a little harder than I thought it would be."

"Indeed it has. But papa was so good to rehearse us. Now we must be a credit to him."

"Oh, of course. Come on, the others are ready."

It was not without a feeling of nervousness that Ruth and Alice prepared to take their places in the actual depiction of the new play. The rehearsals had not been so trying; but now, when the photographs were to be made, there was a strain on all.

For in making moving pictures mistakes are worse than on the real stage. There, when one is speaking, one can correct a false line, or turn it so that the audience does not notice the "break."

But in the movies a false move, a wrong gesture, is at once indelibly registered on the film, to reappear greatly magnified. And though sometimes the incorrect part of the film can be cut out, mistakes are generally costly.

"Are you all ready?" asked Mr. Pertell again, as he stood with watch in hand beside Russ at the camera, while the actors and actresses took their places in the first scene.

"All ready," answered Mr. Harrison, who was one of the principal characters.

"Then—go!" cried the manager, and Russ was about to turn the operating handle.

"Vait! Vait a minute. Holt on!" cried the voice of Mr. Switzer. "Don't shoot yet alretty!" and he held up a restraining hand.

"Oh, what's the matter now?" demanded Mr. Pertell, with a gesture of annoyance.

"Vun of mine shoes—he iss unloose, und der lacing is dingle-dangling. It might trip me!" explained the good-natured German actor, in all seriousness.

"Well, fix it, and hurry up!" cried the manager, unable to repress a smile.

"Yah! I tie her goot und strong," he said, and soon this was done.

"Now then—all ready?" asked Mr. Pertell once more.

This time there was no delay, and the clicking of the camera was heard as Russ turned the handle. Mr. DeVere and his two daughters were not in this first scene, so it gave the girls a chance to lose some of their nervousness—or "stage fright." As for Mr. DeVere, he was too much of a veteran actor to mind this. Besides, he had played many parts before the camera now.

Mr. Pertell stood with watch in hand, timing the performance. For the play must be gotten on a certain length of film, and if one scene ran over its allotted time it might spoil the next one by curtailing the action.

"Hurry a little with that," ordered the manager sharply, at a certain point. "Don't 'screen' the letter too long, and skip part of that leave-taking. That eats up far too much celluloid."

Accordingly some parts, not essential to the play, were "cut" to shorten the time. Russ went on turning the crank, getting hundreds of the tiny pictures that afterward would be magnified, and thrown on the screen in dozens of moving picture playhouses, for the Comet Company supplied a large "circuit."

"Now then, Mr. DeVere, it's time for you to come on," the manager said. "And then your daughters."

"Oh, I know I'm going to be nervous!" murmured Ruth.

"No you won't," spoke Russ, encouragingly. She stood near him, and flashed him a grateful look. "I'll be watching you," he said, "and if I see anything wrong I'll stop in an instant, so we won't spoil any film."

"That's good of you," she replied. "Come on, Alice."

"All right! Oh, I just know it's going to be splendid!" her sister exclaimed. There was the flush of excitement on her cheeks, and though she would not admit, Alice, too, was nervous. So much, she felt, depended on this first real play—so much for herself and her sister. It was thrilling to feel that they might be able to make a comfortable living through the medium of the movies.

"All ready now, Russ, for this scene," called the manager, indicating the one where Ruth and Alice were to appear. "Watch your register closely."

"Yes, sir."

The play went on. Ruth took her part first, and the little drama was enacted. Her father, who was in the scene with her, smiled encouragement, and Russ nodded gaily as he continued to turn the clicking camera.

"Now, Miss Alice!" called the manager. "Here's where you come in. Come smiling!"

It was hardly necessary to tell Alice this, for she generally had a smile on her face. Nor was it lacking this time.

She began her part, but in an instant the manager called:

"Wait. Hold on a minute!"

The clicking of the camera ceased instantly.

"Oh, have I done something wrong?" thought Alice, her heart beating violently.

"Cut out what's been done so far," ordered the manager to Russ. "It will have to be done over."

"Yes, sir," answered the operator, as he noted from the automatic register at the side of the camera how many feet of film had been run on the new scene. Then, when it came to be developed, it could be eliminated. The figures also showed how much of the thousand-foot reel was left for succeeding scenes.

Everyone was a little nervous, fearing he or she had made the trouble, but all were reassured a moment later, when the manager said:

"I think it will be a little more effective if Miss Alice makes her entrance from the other side. It brings her out better. Try it that way once, and then, if it goes, film it, Russ."

The benefit of the change was at once apparent, and after a moment of rehearsal it was decided on. Again the camera began its clicking and everyone breathed freely once more, Alice most of all, for failure would have meant so much to her.

"Very good—very good," spoke the manager encouragingly, as the play developed.

Alice and Ruth had rather difficult parts, and in one scene they held the stage alone, "plotting" to disclose the false count. It was in this scene that Alice had some effective work along comedy lines.

It seemed to go off very well—at least, as far as the girls could tell. Alice, as a rather hoydenish school girl, home for the summer, played havoc with the admirers of the romantic Ruth, who seemed to fill the role to perfection.

"You're doing well, little girl," whispered Paul to Alice, when she stepped out of the scene for a moment, while another part of the play went on.

"Do you really mean it?" she asked him.

"I certainly do. Say, you've got the other two guessing, all right."

"What other two?"

"Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon."

"Oh, I'm so sorry."

"Sorry for what?"

"I mean, I don't want them to dislike me," returned Alice.

"Oh, don't worry about that, little girl. They don't like anyone who can do better than themselves. But they're the only ones. The rest of us like you!"

"Really?"

"Well I should say!" and there was more energy in the words than was actually necessary. Alice blushed, but looked pleased.

"Very good!" observed the manager, after an effective scene in which Alice and Ruth took part. "You are doing excellent work. If this play is a hit I'll star you two in something more elaborate next week."

"Will you, really?" asked Ruth, as she came out of the scene.

"I really will," answered Mr. Pertell. "That's a promise!"



CHAPTER XVIII

A HIT

"Ruth, I do hope it's a success; don't you?" asked Alice.

"Of course I do. It means a whole lot."

"You mean to Mr. Pertell?"

"And to us, dear."

"What do you mean? Tell me."

The two girls were resting after the performance of the play "A False Count." The last scene had been filmed, and the long strips of celluloid, with the hidden pictures, sent to the dark room for development. Not until then could it be told whether the affair had been a success from a mechanical standpoint. And then, later, would come the test before the great public.

"Did you hear what Mr. Pertell said to me?" asked Ruth.

"Well, he said so much, directing us, and all that—I'm sure I don't recall anything special. What was it?"

"Why, he told me that if this play was a success—I mean if we showed up well in it—he'd give us parts in a big drama he's getting ready. Won't that be splendid?"

"Of course it will. But I liked this one very much. I wish I could see the real pictures."

"You can!" exclaimed a voice back of the girls, and, turning they saw Russ. "I'll take you to see them when the positives are made," he said.

"Oh, but I mean in a regular moving picture theater," went on Alice. "I'd like to see how the public takes us."

"I'll do that, too," agreed Russ. "As soon as the pictures are released we'll find some place where they are being shown, and you can watch yourself doing your act."

"That will be fine!" cried Ruth.

"What does 'released' mean?" asked Alice.

"Well, you know the moving picture business is something like the Associated Press," explained Russ. "The Associated Press is an organization for getting news. Often news has to be gotten in advance—say a thing like the President's message, or a speech by a big man.

"The Associated Press gets a copy in advance, and sends duplicates of it out to the newspapers that take its service. And on each duplicate copy is stamped a notice that it is to be released for publication on a certain day—or at even a certain hour. That is, it can't be used by the newspapers until that time.

"It's somewhat like that with moving pictures. The reels of new plays are sent out to the different theaters, and to fix it so a theater quite a distance from New York won't be at a disadvantage with one right here, which would get the film sooner, there is a certain date set for the release of the film. That means that though one theater gets it first it can't use it until the date set, when all the playhouses are supposed to have it."

"Oh, that's the way they do it?" observed Alice.

"Yes," went on Russ. "Of course the best stuff is what is called 'first run,'" he went on to explain. "That is, it is a reel of film of a new play, never before shown in a certain city. The best moving picture theaters take the first run, and pay good prices for it. Then, later on, second-rate theaters may get it at a lower price."

"And is our play a 'first run'?" asked Ruth.

"It will be for a time," answered Russ. "I think you girls did fine!" he went on. "Acting comes natural to you, I guess."

"Well, we've seen enough of it around the house, with daddy getting ready for some of his plays," admitted Alice. "Oh, I wish I could do it all over again!" she cried, gliding over to her sister and whirling her off in a little waltz to the tune of a piano that was playing so that the performers in another play, representing a ball room scene, might keep proper time.

"Did you like your part, Ruth?" asked Russ, after Alice had allowed her sister to quiet down.

"Yes. I always like a romantic character."

"I like fun!" confessed Alice. "The more the better!"

"Oh, will you ever grow up?" asked Ruth.

"I hope not—ever!" laughed Alice, gaily.

Off in another part of the studio Miss Pennington and her chum, Miss Dixon, were going through their parts. They looked over at Ruth, Alice and Russ, and their glances were far from friendly.

"I don't see what Mr. Pertell can see in those girls," remarked Miss Pennington, during a lull, when they did not have to be before the camera.

"Neither do I," agreed her friend. "They can't act, and the airs they put on!"

"Shocking!" commented Miss Pennington.

"Come, young ladies!" broke in the voice of the manager. "It is time for you to go on again. And please put a little more vim into your work. I want that play to be a snappy one."

"Humph!" sneered Miss Dixon.

"If he wants more snap he ought to pay more money," whispered her friend. "All he cares about now are those DeVere girls."

"Attention!" called the manager. "Get some good business into this, now. Mr. Switzer, when you come in, after that scene where you apply for work, and can't get it, you must throw yourself into your chair despondently. Do it as though you had lost all hope. You know what I mean."

"Vot you mean? Dot I should sit in it so?" and the German actor plumped himself into the chair in question by approaching it so that he could sit on it in astride, in reverse position, folding his arms over the rounded back.

"No—no, not that way—not as if you were riding a horse!" cried the manager. "Throw yourself into it with abandon, as the stage directions call for."

"Let me show him," broke in the melancholy voice of Wellington Bunn.

Striding into the scene, which had been interrupted to enable this bit of rehearsal to be gone through with, the old Shakespearean actor approached the chair and cast himself into it as though he had lost his last friend, and had no hope left on earth.

"That's the way—that's the idea—copy that!" cried Mr. Pertell, enthusiastically.

But he spoke too soon.

Mr. Bunn had cast himself into the chair with such "abandon" that the chair abandoned him. It fell apart, it disintegrated, it parted company with its legs—all at once—so that chair and actor came to the ground in a heap.

"Oh, my! I am injured! A physician, I beseech you!" moaned Mr. Bunn, while others of the cast rushed to help him to his feet. He was soon pulled from the ruins of the chair.

"Ach! So. I unterstandt now!" exclaimed Mr. Switzer. "I haf your meaning now, of vat 'abandon' is, Mr. Pertell. I am to break der chair ven I sits on it, yes? Dot is 'abandon' a chair. Vot a queer lanquitch der English is, alretty. Vell, brings me annuder chair und I vill abandon it!"

Mr. Pertell threw his hands upwards in a despairing gesture.

"No—no!" he cried. "I didn't mean that way."

"Than vot you means?" asked the German, puzzled.

Meanwhile Wellington Bunn was painfully walking over to a more substantial chair.

"That was all a trick!" he cried. "You did that on purpose, Mr. Snooks. You provided a broken chair!"

"I did not!" protested the property man. "It was the way you threw yourself into it. What did you think it was made of—iron?"

"I knew something would happen!" observed Mr. Sneed, gloomily. "I felt it in my bones."

"Und I guess me dot he veels it in his bones, now," chuckled Mr. Switzer. "I am glat dot I, myself, did not abandon dot chair alretty yet."

The play went on after a little delay, and for some time after that the Shakespearean actor was very chary of offering to show other actors how to put "abandon" into their parts.

So far as could be told by an inspection of the negatives of the first important play in which Ruth and Alice had appeared, it was a success. Of course how it would "take" with the public was yet to be learned.

Meanwhile other plays were being considered, and Mr. Pertell repeated his promise, that if "A False Count" was successful he would give Ruth and Alice real "star" parts. They were eager for this, and, now that their father had seen how well they did, he was enthusiastic over them, and very glad to let them go on in the moving picture business.

"Who knows," he said, "but what it may mend the broken fortunes of the DeVere family?"

One evening Russ came over to the apartment of the girls.

"Come on out!" he called, gaily.

"Where?" asked Ruth.

"To the moving pictures. I've got a surprise for you. They are going to try my new invention for the first time."

"May we go, Daddy?" asked Alice, anxiously.

"Yes, I guess so," he answered, absentmindedly, hardly looking up from the manuscript of a new play he was studying.

So Russ took the girls.

"Oh, let's see what is going on!" begged Ruth, as they came to a halt outside a nearby moving picture theater.

"No, don't bother now!" urged Russ, gently urging them away from the lithographs and pictures in front of the place. "We're a bit late, and we want to get good seats."

He got them inside before they had more than a fleeting glimpse of the advertisements of the films that were to be shown, and soon they were comfortably settled.

"I wonder what we'll see?" mused Ruth, looking about the darkened theater. The performance was just about to start.

"I wish we could see our play," spoke Alice. "When do you think we can, Russ?"

"Oh, soon now," he answered, and the girls thought they heard him laugh. They wondered why.

The first film was shown—a western scene, and the girls were not much interested in it, except that Ruth remarked:

"The pictures seem much clearer than usual."

"That's on account of my invention," said Russ, proudly. "I'm glad you noticed it." Then the girls were more interested. A little later, when the title of the next play was shown, Ruth and Alice could not repress exclamations of pleased surprise. For it was "A False Count!"

"Why, Russ Dalwood!" whispered Alice. "Did you know this was here?"

"Sure!" he chuckled.

"Oh, that's why you hurried us in without giving us a chance to see what the bill was," reproached Ruth.

"Yes, I wanted to surprise you."

"Well, you did it all right," remarked Alice.

And then the girls gave themselves up to watching the moving pictures of themselves on the screen.

It was rather an uncanny experience at first, but they soon became used to it, and gave themselves up to the enjoyment of the little play, made doubly delightful from the fact that they had helped to make it.

"I'd hardly know myself," whispered Alice.

"Nor I," added her sister.

From the darkness behind them came a voice saying:

"I saw this play this afternoon, Mollie. It's fine. I like the tall actress best," and she referred to Ruth, whose presentment was then on the screen. "She's so romantic, I think."

"Listen to that!" Alice said to her sister. "Don't your ears burn?"

"Indeed they do. Oh! isn't it queer to see yourself, and hear yourself criticised?"

"Wasn't that fine?" demanded the unseen critic behind the sisters, as Ruth did an effective bit of acting. "Oh, I know I'm just going to love her. I hope she is in lots of films."

"So do I," added her companion. "But I like the small one best—the one that was in the scene before this."

"Oh, you mean the jolly one?"

"Yes."

"That's you, Alice," whispered Ruth. "Now it's your turn for your ears to burn."

"I thought you'd like this," commented Russ. "This film is a hit, all right."

And so it seemed, for the audience applauded when the little photo play was over, and that is a pretty good test.

"I think they were perfectly splendid," said another voice off to the left.

"Who, those two girls in that play?" some one asked.

"Yes. They're new ones, too. I haven't seen them in any of the Comet's other plays."

"Yes, I guess they must be new," and this was a girl's voice back in the darkness of the theater. "Oh, I'd like to meet them! I wish I could act for the movies!"

"She doesn't know how near she is to meeting us!" whispered Alice to her sister, as the next film was flashed on the white screen. "Did you ever have an experience like this before?"

"I never did!"



CHAPTER XIX

A BIT OF OUTDOORS

"Wasn't it fine!"

"Splendid! I never expected to see myself like that."

"Neither did I. Russ, how did you come to think of it?"

"Oh, it just came to me," he answered, chuckling.

The two "moving picture girls," as they laughingly called themselves, with Russ, were on their way home from the little theater where they had just witnessed the depiction of themselves on the screen. They had listened with amusement, not unmixed with pride, at the whispered comments on the play in which they had taken part.

"Do you think—I mean—would you call that a successful film, Russ?" asked Alice.

"I certainly would," he replied. "Didn't I take it myself?"

"That's so!" exclaimed Ruth. "But I wish Mr. Pertell could know how well it went. Not on our account," she added quickly, "but on account of his own business, and because dear daddy is in it. And the others, too—they'd be glad to know the audience liked it, I think."

"Don't worry," returned Russ. "Mr. Pertell will know it soon enough. He keeps track of all his films, and he knows which are successful or not. He'll hear of this one the first thing in the morning. The owners of the theaters where our films are used report as to which go the best. And their own re-orders also show that. So you'll be discovered, all right."

"Oh, it wasn't so much that!" declared Alice, quickly. "But it is new and strange to us, and I suppose we're too enthusiastic about it."

"Not a bit too enthusiastic!" Russ assured her. "That's what I like to see, and I guess the manager does, too. It would be a good thing if some of the others were a little more enthusiastic. They'd do better acting. Say!" he broke in, "what do you say to an ice cream soda? It's warm this evening," and he paused before a brilliantly lighted drug store.

"Shall we, Ruth?" asked Alice, with a queer little look at her sister.

"Oh, I don't know," began Ruth, hesitatingly.

"Which means—yes!" Alice cried, gaily. "Come on!"

Mr. DeVere looked up inquiringly from his bundle of manuscript as the girls and Russ entered the little apartment later.

"Oh, Daddy! It was just fine!" cried Alice, going over to him, and covering his eyes with her hands.

"We saw ourselves—and you, too, as others see us!" added Ruth.

"I—er—I don't understand," their father whispered.

"The moving pictures," explained Alice. "It was that play, 'A False Count,' you know. Oh, it made a great hit, I can tell you!"

"Ah, I'm glad to hear it," he said. "Sit down, Russ."

"No, I can't stay," answered the visitor from across the hall. "I've brought your daughters safely home, and now I have to get back. I've got a little work to do yet."

"Not at the studio; have you—so late?" asked Ruth.

"Oh, it isn't late," he laughed. "But I want to do a little work on my invention. I've sort of struck a snag, and it's bothering me. I want it as nearly perfect as I can get it, and I've thought of an improvement I can put on it. So I'll say good-night."

"Thank you, ever so much, for taking us!" said Alice, warmly.

"Yes, indeed, it was fine!" added Ruth, her eyes sparkling. "To think of seeing ourselves! It was a great surprise."

"Oh, you'll get used to it after a while," returned Russ. And then he went to his own room to labor ambitiously over his patent.

"No more work to-night, Dad!" announced Ruth, firmly, as she saw her father preparing to resume the study of the manuscript containing his part in a new moving picture drama. "Your eyes must be tired, and you must save them. It won't do to have them spoiled, as well as your voice."

"No, I suppose not," he answered, somewhat wearily. "This work is rather trying. I believe I would like to get out in the open for a change. Though I always said I never would do open-air parts in the movies."

"I'd like to get out, too," said Alice. "I enjoyed what little we did in the Brooklyn garden very much."

"I heard something at the studio about a prospect of the whole company being given a chance to do some outdoor dramas," observed Ruth, musingly. "I wonder what was meant?"

"Mr. Pertell will probably tell us when he has his plans perfected," Alice returned. "You know, though, that he promised if this 'A False Count' play should be a success he'd give us a chance in a more pretentious drama. I'm counting on that."

"And so am I," said Ruth. "Come, now, Daddy. No more work to-night."

As Russ had predicted, Mr. Pertell was not long in learning of the success of the play in which Ruth and Alice had main parts. In a day or so there came an increased demand for the films of the drama, and the manager was well pleased.

"And now I'm going to keep the promise I made you," he said to Ruth and Alice. "I've been holding back on a big drama, waiting until I saw how that one turned out. I didn't have any doubts, though, after I saw you two act. Now I'm going to star you in that. And afterward, well, we'll see what will happen. I've got a lot of ideas I want to try," he added.

"Mr. DeVere," the manager went on, "I believe you told me at one time that you did not care to do any acting that took you out in the open; am I right?"

"I did say that," admitted the actor, in his husky voice; "but I think I have changed my mind since then. I believe I would like to get out of doors more."

"Then I have the very thing for you and your daughters, too," the manager said. "That is, if they have no objection to going out of doors?" and he looked questioningly at them.

"We'd love it!" cried Alice.

"Then I'll make my plans," went on Mr. Pertell, after a confirmatory nod from Mr. DeVere. "I think you'll like your parts. One of the acts takes place on a yacht. I've hired one for a little trip down the bay, and you can play at being millionaires for a day."

"How lovely!" cried Ruth, and clapped her hands gleefully.

"It is fine on the water these days!" exclaimed Alice.

"I'll have your parts ready soon," went on the manager. "I must start some of the other dramas going now," and he glanced about the studio. Off in one corner, talking together, were Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon, and, as the two actresses conversed they cast envious glances, from time to time, at Alice and Ruth. They were plainly jealous of the rapid rise of our two friends, but the moving picture girls bore in mind what motherly Mrs. Maguire had told them, and did not worry.

Mr. Pertell and his assistants gave out the parts in another play, and the rehearsals began. Almost at the start there was trouble.

"I'm not going to play that part!" objected Wellington Bunn, stalking with a tragic air toward the manager.

"Why, what's the matter with your part?"

"Why, you have been promising that you would put on one of Shakespeare's plays, and give me a chance in Hamlet, and here you go and cast me for one of a gang of counterfeiters. I have to wear a black mask. The public will not know that it is Wellington Bunn playing."

"Well, maybe it's a good thing they won't," murmured the manager, but what he said, aloud, was:

"You will have to take that part, Mr. Bunn, or look for another engagement."

"Then I'll leave!" the old actor declared gloomily.

But a little later he was observed to be putting on his mask, and taking his place in the "den of the counterfeiters," as the screen announced the place to be. It was one of the masterpieces of scenery evolved by Pop Snooks. And a little later he transformed the same scene, with a little manipulation, into the cave of a thirteenth century monk. Such was Pop Snooks.

"Ha! Ha! I haf a funny part!" laughed Carl Switzer, a little later.

"What is it?" asked Russ, who was getting a camera in readiness for action.

"Ha! It iss dot I go in a restaurant, und order a meal. Der vaiter he brings me some cheese und I am so thoughtfulness dot I put red pepper and horse radish on it. Den, ven I eat it I jumps ofer der table alretty yet. Dot is a fine part!" and he laughed gleefully, for Mr. Switzer was a simple soul.

A little later Alice and Ruth were given their new parts to study. It was announced that rehearsals would take place in a day or two, and many of the scenes were to be out of doors, some of them taking place on a yacht. Meanwhile Mr. DeVere went through with his role in a film drama, Ruth and Alice not being called on.

Finally announcement was made that the work of preparation for filming the big drama would be undertaken. This was the most ambitious play yet planned by Mr. Pertell, and he was anxious to make it a success.

That the price of success is high was amply proven in the next week. Everyone worked hard at the rehearsals, and none harder than Ruth and Alice. They were determined that their parts should be a credit to the performance. Later they learned that Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon had pleaded for the roles assigned to them.

But Mr. Pertell was true to his promise, and kept Alice and Ruth in their assigned places. The drama was an elaborate one, involving the making of special scenery, and Pop Snooks had to call in several assistants. But he liked that.

Then, too, the location of the outdoor scenes had to be chosen with care, to fit properly into the story.

But at last the rehearsals were complete, including those for the outdoor scenes. Of course the latter were rehearsed in the studio first, so that when the time came to film such as the scenes on the yacht, the pictures could be made without any preliminary trial on the vessel itself. To this end Pop had set up in the studio enough of the deck and fittings of a yacht to enable the performers to familiarize themselves with them.

"And now for the real thing!" exclaimed Russ, as a goodly part of the company, including Mr. DeVere and his daughters, started for the Battery one morning. They were to board the yacht there, and one of the scenes would show the girls going up the gang-plank.

It was a beautiful day in early summer, when even New York, with its rattle of elevated trains, rumble of the surface cars and hurry and scurry of automobiles, was attractive.

Quite a throng of curious people gathered when the film theatrical company prepared to board the vessel which had been chartered for the occasion. The embarking place was near the round building, now used as an Aquarium, but which, in former years, was Castle Garden, the immigrant landing station.

"All ready now—start aboard," ordered Mr. Pertell. "And, Russ, get your camera a little more this way. I want to show off the yacht as well as possible."

The moving picture operator shifted his three-legged machine to one side, and was about to start moving the film, as Ruth, Alice and the others, presumably of a gay yachting party, started up the gang-plank.

Several feet of film had been exposed, when there was a series of shouts and cries back of the crowd that had gathered to see the pictures made in the open air. Then came a warning:

"A runaway! A runaway horse! Look out!"

The crowd parted, and Ruth, looking up, saw a big horse, attached to a dray, dashing along one of the walks of Battery Park, having evidently come from one of the steamship piers nearby.

"Grab him, somebody!" yelled Mr. Pertell. "He'll spoil the picture!" That seemed to be his main thought.

On came the maddened animal, while the crowd scattered still more. Russ continued to make pictures, for the beast was not yet in focus.

"Go on! Keep moving!" directed Mr. Pertell to Ruth, Alice and the others. "Maybe you can get aboard before he gets here. Watch yourself, Russ!"

But the horse was charging directly for the gang-plank, and with frightened eyes Ruth, Alice and some of the others prepared to rush back to the pier.

"Go on! I'll get that horse!" cried a voice back of Mr. Pertell, and a man, apparently a farmer, sprang at the head of the plunging steed.



CHAPTER XX

FARMER SANDY APGAR

For a moment there was considerable confusion and excitement. Men in pursuit of the frantic animal had rushed after him, calling warnings to those in the zone of danger. Two policemen ran up to intercept the steed.

As for the moving picture actresses they hardly knew what to do. If the plunging animal crashed into the gang-plank he might injure a number of the performers, and break the rather frail structure, letting them slip into the water.

"That picture will be spoiled!" groaned Mr. Pertell.

"No, it won't!" cried Russ. "Go on! I'm getting you all right. The horse isn't in range yet and that young fellow has him now. Go on!"

Ruth and Alice gathered courage and the others followed, going through with the little gang-plank "business" called for in the play.

And indeed the quick-witted, rustic youth had the frantic horse in a firm grip. He seemed to know just how to handle frightened animals, and by the time the two policemen had reached him, the beast, though still restive, had quieted down.

"Good work, young fellow!" called one of the officers. "Whose horse is it?"

"I don't know, constable," was the answer, given with a country twang that caused several spectators to smile. "I jest seen him comin' and I see he was headed for them people what's goin' to Europe, I expect. I didn't want their voyage spoiled, so I jest jumped at his head."

"Well, you know how to do it, all right," said the second "constable," as the young farmer had called the policemen.

"I ought to know how to handle horses," was the answer, as the youth relinquished the reins to the officer. "I've been among 'em all my life. I was brought up on a farm."

He looked it, but there was something in his simple, manly face, and in the look of his honest blue eyes, that made one like him.

"Good work, all right!" repeated the first officer. "I'll take your name, young fellow, for my report," and he drew out a notebook. "I'll also want to find out to whom the horse belongs, but I s'pose the truckman's license number will be a clue."

"He's mine," broke in a voice, as a drayman pushed his way through the crowd. "Some boys got to fooling around him, and he started off. No damage done, I hope."

"No," replied the policeman, "but you want to tie your animal after this. He might have hurt someone—probably would have if it hadn't been for this chap. What's your name?" he asked the young farmer.

"Sandy Apgar."

"And where do you live?"

"On Oak Farm."

"Never heard of the place," went on the officer, with a smile.

"Oh, that's the name of our farm. It's jest outside the town of Beatonville, about forty miles back in Jersey."

"Oh, Jersey!" laughed the officer. "No wonder! Well, there's your horse, truckman. And now I want your name."

"Can I go, or do I have to appear in court?" asked Sandy Apgar. "I hope I don't, 'caused I'm in a hurry to git back to the farm. I've got a passel of work to do there, with the weather coming on the way it is.

"No, I guess you won't have to go to court," laughed the policeman. "We're much obliged to you."

"And so am I," added the truckman. "I haven't got any money to give you, because business is poor——"

"Oh, that's all right," said Sandy with a generous wave of his hand. "I don't stop runaway horses for a livin'. I farm it."

"If you ever want any carting done," went on the drayman, "you send for me, young feller, and it won't cost you a cent."

"Guess you wouldn't want to do any cartin' as far as Beatonville," laughed Sandy. "Folks out there don't ever move—they jest die and are buried in the same place. And I guess this is my last trip to New York in a long while. I'm jest as much obliged though," and patting the nose of the now quieted horse, he moved off through the thinning crowd. But he was not to escape unnoticed.

Mr. Pertell had learned, by a hasty talk with Russ, that the horse had been stopped just in time to avoid spoiling any of the film. Russ had continued to make the pictures and the first act of the new drama was a success. The other scenes would take place on board the chartered yacht.

So when the manager saw Sandy Apgar, who by his quick work had saved a film from being spoiled, making his way out of the throng, the theatrical man called to him:

"One moment, please. I want to thank you."

"Gosh! I'm getting thanked all around to-day!" laughed the young fellow.

"Well, I want to make it a little more substantial, then," went on the manager. "You saved me a few dollars."

"Oh, pshaw, that's nothing!" returned Sandy. "I guess your trip to Europe could have gone on."

"Europe?" questioned Mr. Pertell.

"Yes; ain't you folks going to Europe?"

"No, this is only a make-believe trip," laughed the manager. "It's for moving pictures. See, there's the chap who was taking the films, and they'd been spoiled if that horse got on the gang-plank. So you see what you did for us."

"Moving pictures; eh?" mused Sandy. "I thought they had to be took in the dark. Leastways, all I ever saw was in the dark."

"Oh, that's just to show them," the manager explained. "But we ought to be under way now. Can you come aboard for a little trip? We'll soon be back, and I want to thank you properly. I haven't time now. Come, take a little trip with us."

"Well, I s'pose I can," responded Sandy, slowly. "But I ought to be gettin' back to Oak Farm."

However, he went aboard the yacht, looking curiously about him, and more curiously at Russ, who began making more pictures as the yacht steamed off down the bay.

There were to be a number of scenes on board, but they would not be filmed until the yacht was farther out. Meanwhile, however, the progress of the ship down the bay was to be depicted on the screen, so Russ took pictures from either rail, no members of the company being required in these. Mr. Pertell thus had a chance to talk to Sandy.

The young fellow was very willing to tell about himself.

"Yes, I live on a farm," he said. "It's a right nice place, too, in summer, though lonesome in winter. I've lived there all my twenty-two years—never knew any other place."

"Do you live there all alone?" asked Ruth, for the young farmer had been introduced to the members of the company.

"No, my father and mother are there with me. Father is Mr. Felix Apgar—maybe you've heard of him?" the young man asked the manager, innocently.

"No, I don't think so," and Mr. Pertell had hard work to repress a smile.

"Well, he used to ship a lot of asparagus to New York, but maybe that was before your day," went on Sandy. "Pop is too feeble to work now, so I'm running the farm for him. And it—it's sorter hard," he added, rather pathetically. "Especially when you ain't got any too much money. I come to New York to raise some," he went on, "but folks don't seem to want to part with any—especially on a second mortgage."

"Is that what you came for?" asked Mr. Pertell.

"Yep. I come to raise some money—we need it bad, out our way, but I couldn't do it."

"Suppose you tell me," suggested Mr. Pertell. "I may be able to help you."

"Say, Mister, I reckon you've got enough troubles of your own, without bothering with mine," said Sandy. "Besides, maybe Pop wouldn't like me to tell. No, I'll jest make another try somewhere else. But we sure do need cash!"