Impulsively she turned her back to the camera. Reached under her collar and brassiere and with exaggerated wiggles of hips and shoulders, worked the padding upward to its right place. She turned around and smiled at the camera. Both bosoms promptly slid down to her waist.
She mugged, gave the padding a ferocious sideways wrench; the scene was beyond saving anyway. She popped her eyes at Loy, stuck out her index finger as a pistol, cried, “Hands up.” Caught between surprise and mirth, he raised both hands. Fritzi grabbed them and began to waltz.
Not watching too carefully, she waltzed him into a chair. He bumped it, reeled away, fell against a cuckoo clock on the wall. The cuckoo sprang out, twittered, then flopped at the end of its wire, dead. Fritzi was breaking up, laughing and unable to stop.
Trying to help him stand, she lost her balance. Grabbing the shelf of a china cabinet to catch herself, she spilled and shattered plates, saucers, and cups. Playing along, Loy charged her but misjudged his position and went headfirst through an open window painted on the canvas flat. His legs stuck into the room, thrashing.
Caught up in the madness, Fritzi marched toward the camera. She wriggled her padding upward again, slapping her dress as though that might stick the gay deceivers in place. She looked down; the padding slowly sank to her navel. The effect was something like watching a pair of burrowing moles.
With a rueful smile and a shrug she gave up. She crossed her eyes, did a little curtsey, kicked up the hem of her skirt, and tripped out of the frame.
Kelly screamed. “Cut. Cut, Ferguson, or I’ll break your goddamn arm.”
Jock Ferguson let go of the crank. Everyone but Kelly was laughing. Mo Isenhour sat on the ground holding his sides. Eddie wiped his eyes with a red bandanna. Windy staggered around like a drunken man, not a difficult impersonation.
Charlie cocked his head and applauded. When Kelly glared, Charlie looked at him defiantly and cried, “Bravo, bravo.”
Fritzi rushed to Loy, who’d extricated himself from the torn flat. “I’m sorry, I’m really sorry,” she panted.
He managed to stop laughing. “You didn’t hurt me, don’t worry about it. You’re a sketch, you know that? I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“By God, I haven’t either,” Kelly said. “Will somebody tell me what’s going on? Hearn, why didn’t you cut?”
“Because she’s hilarious.”
“You think George Eastman’s running a charity? You think he’s giving the goddamn raw stock away?”
“Oh, see here,” Charlie said with a flourish of his cane. “I suppose you’re one of the studio muckety-mucks, but carrying on like that, you’re a sap.”
“What did you say?”
“Sap, spelled s-a-p. As in idiot. You’re all idiots if you don’t put Fritzi in a picture doing exactly what she just did, only without the cowboy claptrap.”
“We don’t need advice from a goddamn limey,” Kelly shouted.
“Al, wait a minute,” Eddie said. “Maybe Mr. Chaplin’s got something. Maybe this is what we’ve been looking for. A character.”
“Character, what character? I don’t see any character. I see hundreds of goddamn dollars of lumber and props shot to hell.”
“A character for Fritzi. A lovable imp who bangs up everything and everybody—breaks down doors, destroys houses, ruins fancy parties, never meaning to—and every time it makes the story come out right. I’m going to show this footage to B.B. and Hayman.”
“This is some kind of conspiracy. I won’t stand for it.”
“Sure you will, Al,” Eddie said with a cheery smile. “You want to make money. B.B. and Ham want to make money. We all want to make money.”
He walked up on the littered stage, slipped his arm around Fritzi. Plaster dust blanched her face. Her gay deceivers hung crookedly inside her dress; the lumps of padding at her waist gave her a total of four bosoms, all unsatisfactory.
And now Loy knows I wear padding. Oh, God.
Eddie squeezed her shoulder like an accordion. “Money, Al, you keep telling us that’s what it’s all about. Well, take a look. You want to strike it rich, I’m standing next to the mother lode.”
Every carpenter on the lot was dragooned to rebuild the set. It was repainted, refurnished, and ready by noon Friday. Fritzi crashed the Model T through the wall again and this time finished the scene as planned. Eddie made the last shot at half past four. He was thanking everyone when his wife arrived with the children and three hampers containing a picnic supper.
Fritzi helped Rita arrange the food on a trestle next to the stage. Rita said Eddie had worked most of the night writing a scenario for a new comedy inspired by yesterday’s mishaps. He called it Knockabout Nell. He intended to present it to B.B. and Hayman on Saturday, along with the unusable footage.
Eddie sidled up. “Fritzi, do I dare ask what slipped in your—that is, inside—”
Rita poked him. “No, you don’t dare. Be a gentleman and eat this sandwich. It’s liverwurst, your favorite.”
B.B. came stumping out from the main building. He approached Loy, who was chatting with Windy and the other extra.
“Hardin, my wife saw you work this week. She likes your looks. Very manly, she said.”
Loy smiled and dipped his head in polite acknowledgment. B.B. snatched his hand and wrung it. “Sophie knows talent. Why don’t we shoot a little test, hey?”
“Mighty kind of you, Mr. Pelzer. But I’ve got to say no, thanks.”
“You wouldn’t like a real part? Maybe a chance at a steady salary?”
“Don’t think I’m ungrateful. I like what I’m doing now.”
B.B.’s mouth dropped open. He ran over to Fritzi. “I offered him a part and he turned it down. Can you feature that? I never heard of anybody turning down an offer to star in pictures.”
Fritzi murmured that it was certainly strange, but before she could say more, Loy set his high-crowned hat on his head and started his goodbyes. “Excuse me,” she exclaimed, nearly knocking B.B. down as she dashed around him. “Loy, I still owe you for saving me from that snake. May I treat you to supper. Say tomorrow evening?”
He was surprised and amused by her brashness. “Why, sure, that’d be fun. Tell you what. If you can get free, come on out to the Universal ranch in the afternoon. Watch the big battle scene Griffith’s shooting. Then we’ll find some grub.”
Fritzi almost leaped into the air. “I’ll be there.”
“Don’t dress fancy.”
“Oh, no. No!”
“See you then. Look forward to it.”
As he might say he looked forward to a good night’s rest. Fritzi was disappointed again by his casual ways. She screwed up her determination. She’d make him fall for her, no matter what it took.
65. Crash Landing
The consequences of Harvard’s desertion were more inconvenient than serious, or so it seemed at first. The senior staff tongue-lashed Rene but could not really hold him responsible. The one who suffered was Major Ruiz, the army’s liaison to the flyers. He was ordered to ride along on each flight armed with a five-shot bolt-action Mauser rifle for use not only against the enemy but a pilot who might take it on himself to defect.
To accommodate a second passenger a new seat was installed on the Curtiss. The major fitted himself into it with all the composure of a frightened baby. In the wind fanning over his face as they flew, he sweated profusely. A strap had been rigged around the Mauser stock so it wouldn’t fall and be lost. Twice on one flight the major’s damp hand let the rifle slip. Only the strap saved it.
Carl shouted at Ruiz repeatedly, ordering him to sit still, shut up, stop badgering him with questions. The major took the reversal of authority without protest, he was that scared.
Some ten days after Harvard left, Carl climbed into the shoulder yoke that operated the ailerons on the Curtiss, and he and his passenger went up the line for the third time. Rain had fallen for forty-eight hours, flooding fields and waterways. A dark and cloudy afternoon had
given way to a livid sky, copper colored, with more thunderheads piling up in the north.
They flew over a railroad trestle spanning a stream overflowing with rushing water. Beyond it lay a scattering of casitas surrounded by the queer structures for storing maize that abounded in the region—columns of concrete or adobe brick held up egg-shaped bins covered over with thatch. Carl tossed down two oranges to a pair of boys feeding chickens. They waved, and as Carl waved back, Major Ruiz nearly yanked his arm off.
“For Christ’s sake, what—?” Carl began, shouting over the snarl of the pusher engine. He saw the fright on Ruiz’s face, then the cause of it, sweeping at them from the northeast quadrant of the sky. The Martin bomber.
It climbed abruptly, passing over twenty feet above them. Carl saw the full bomb rack, recognized the red-faced pilot despite goggles and a canvas helmet. Major Ruiz motioned frantically toward the south, wanting no quarrel with the renegade Englishman.
“For once I agree,” Carl said. He turned the rudder wheel and leaned to the right, his body in the shoulder yoke working the ailerons in tandem with the vertical rudder. The plane banked right to retreat.
In response the Martin executed its own turn and came back at them from the right, hurtling toward them on what appeared to be a collision course. Harvard was coming on so fast, Carl could see his teeth clenched in a spiteful smile. “Pull up, pull away,” Major Ruiz screamed as Harvard drew his Colt revolver and started shooting. One bullet tore the wing fabric.
Harvard zoomed above the Curtiss at the last moment. Flying one-handed, Carl pulled his revolver. Maybe the encounter was accidental. Maybe Harvard had lain in wait. It didn’t matter. They had a fight on their hands.
Against the stormy Mexican sky the two planes buzzed around one another like crazed moths. Harvard made a second pass at right angles to the Curtiss, this time flying below it so he could fire upward while Carl’s line of fire was blocked by the wings. Major Ruiz crossed himself again and again. Three shots blasted from below. One nicked the propeller, and Carl shuddered.
He dipped low, a hundred feet above the ground, then fifty, zooming toward the trestle where the water rushed and foamed. The Martin caught the Curtiss, flying level on the left, where Major Ruiz sat with a dark stain at the crotch of his breeches. Harvard gave Carl a chipper salute, the barrel of his Colt touching his canvas helmet. Then he extended his arm and fired. Carl pushed the control stick forward, dove, leveled out, chopping the tops off columnar cactus with his landing gear. The Martin climbed, flying above them and to the left. Harvard smiled his toothy smile and pointed down with an exaggerated gesture.
The bomb rack. The son of a bitch meant to drop a bomb on them. The Martin veered to the right, directly overhead. Carl operated the rudder wheel and yoke to bank left. Harvard was a good pilot, and he followed. Major Ruiz wailed, “He’s going to bomb us, he will kill us.” He grabbed the wheel at the top of the control stick, shoved it forward. The Curtiss abruptly dropped toward the ground.
Enraged, Carl shouted, “Let go. There isn’t a chance in a million that he can hit us.”
The major had his hands on Carl’s, digging in with his nails to pry Carl from the stick. Carl rammed him in the head with his elbow. Major Ruiz bleated; the Mauser dropped between his legs and tumbled over the wing’s forward edge, dangling by the strap, banging and tearing the fabric underneath.
Something sailed past the left wing. Carl watched the pipe bomb spinning earthward, then lost it behind them. After a loud detonation came a shock wave that rocked the plane as it sped toward the trestle. The engine began to run roughly. What now?
With a series of coughs and a spurt of smoke the pusher quit. Bad gas again? Whatever the cause, they were hurtling into a long glide; if they were unlucky it would drop them on the narrow trestle or hurl them against the wall of the cut, cracking them apart either way. He yanked the stick back, lifted the plane, praying they’d glide far enough to overshoot the trestle and land on solid ground.
He counted the seconds as the Curtiss lost altitude. Five. Six. Seven—
The trestle flashed beneath them. He banked slightly to the right, heading for a cart path between tilled fields. Ruiz was gibbering like a man deranged. Somehow he’d lost his glasses.
The Curtiss dropped to earth. Carl felt the landing gear crunch, bounce them high, then crack and collapse as they came down again. The plane nosed over, throwing its tail assembly in the air. The major somehow hung onto the wing. Carl’s shoulder harness broke; he was hurled forward, tossed high, and dropped in the field with a sudden sharp pain in his left leg. It streaked upward to his hip like wildfire.
Blinking, dazed, he listened to the buzz of the Martin as it circled leisurely away from them, climbing to a thousand feet, then turning back. He pushed at the ground with both hands, dragged his right knee up, gained his feet only to fall. He couldn’t stand on his left leg. Something was broken or torn.
Major Ruiz sat spraddle-legged in front of the crumpled plane, the Mauser in his lap, hair hanging in his eyes, tears streaking his olive cheeks. The Martin was returning, and they were perfect targets.
“Shoot at him,” Carl shouted. Ruiz fumbled the Mauser to his shoulder as the Martin flew over. A pipe bomb dropped from the undercarriage rack, tumbled slowly downward.
Harvard’s timing was faulty, though. The bomb landed fifty yards behind the Curtiss, shaking the earth with its boom and tossing up a cloud of dirt. As the Martin went over, Major Ruiz tried to fire but for some reason could not. He fumbled with the bolt like a bewildered child. Carl fisted his hands, began to crawl, using his right knee to push. His left was useless.
“Give me the rifle,” he yelled as he crawled. The Martin buzzed out of range, made another slow turn, and came back for a second attempt. Carl dug his arms into the rough ground, ripping the elbows out of his shirt, bloodying his skin, dirtying the red silk scarf. He jammed his right knee into the ground, pushed, jammed it in again, pushed. His left leg sent pain streaking through his body.
“I want the rifle,” he yelled. The major stared at him blankly. “Do you hear me? Help me up. Brace me against the plane, then give me the goddamn rifle.”
Grabbing the vertical wing behind him, Major Ruiz put his fist through the fabric, found a strut, and used it to pull himself to his feet. He stared at the approaching bomber, then at Carl.
“Damn you, you yellow bastard”—Carl was nearly incoherent with pain and rage—“help me!” Pop-eyed, Ruiz threw the rifle at him and ran.
Lying on his side, Carl stretched his hand out, caught the Mauser’s barrel, dragged the rifle to his chest. The Martin’s drone grew steadily louder. Carl shoved the rifle butt in the dirt, used it to raise himself to a sitting position by climbing the barrel hand over hand. Dizzy with pain, he got the rifle to his shoulder. The Martin approached from behind. If the bomb got him before he shot, well, that was that.
Shadows of wings flickered over the bare ground. The Martin appeared overhead. Carl fired upward seconds before the bomb detonated behind the Curtiss. A torrent of earth fell on Carl, blinding him.
He spat out dirt, rubbed it out of his eyes. The Martin was descending rapidly, veering into a steep right-hand bank. Harvard slumped like a rag doll, hanging onto his seat with both hands. Carl’s round had hit him, a lucky shot. Harvard had to be fighting to stay conscious because he clearly couldn’t control the plane. It nosed downward, straight to the ground. Carl watched with horror and fascination as the impact broke the engine loose. It flew forward like an iron guillotine. Harvard’s head was sliced from his shoulders and sent spinning into the sky like a bloody medicine ball.
The engine buried itself in the ground. The Martin telescoped with a crackling and snapping of struts. One or more of the bombs detonated in a flash of fire and noise. Seconds later there was nothing left except wreckage and smoke ascending toward the storm clouds. Carl flung the hot metal of the rifle out of his hand, rolled over in pain, and threw up.
A mestizo fou
nd him. The man had a reticent air but the shrewd eyes of someone who saw an advantage. Yes, he had a mule. He would trade it for the rifle and Carl’s Colt. Lying on the dirt floor of the man’s hut, with a fiery jolt of pulque partially dulling his pain, Carl shook his head. He held the rifle in the air while clutching the pistol to his chest.
“You have this. I keep this.”
After some argument the bargain was struck. The man found a rope and tied him on the mule’s back. Carl guessed he was twenty-five or thirty kilometers from the Federal position. He set out at first light with more of the milky pulque in him and his gun hand resting on his thigh. The mestizo pointed him in the direction of the railway line.
At half past noon, with the sun frying his skull and his tongue a piece of dry wood, he spied something coming toward him through the heat devils above the glittering rails. He halted the mule and waited. Out of the haze came a hand car pumped by sweating Federalistas. Carl grinned an insane grin of relief, released his knee hold on his mount, and fell sideways to the ground in a faint.
The army doctor who examined Carl’s leg said no bones were broken, though he’d surely torn or sprained something and should rest the leg until he could walk without severe pain. Carl followed orders by staying in a berth in the private car, where Rene brought news.
“The major was caught wandering around nude in a bean field. Why he removed his clothes no one knows. Since I had already relayed your account of his behavior, he was shown no leniency. He was shown the wall instead.”
Carl took no satisfaction from it. He sipped tepid water from an old canteen Bert filled for him.
“By the way, mon ami. There is still no pay from our employers. That’s two months and more we’ve gone begging. I’m out of patience. Besides, the rebels are winning. General Obregón’s Division of the Northwest has taken Guadalajara. Huerta stepped down day before yesterday, went into exile aboard a German naval cruiser. A man named Francisco Carvajal, former chief of the Supreme Court, is trying to hold the Constitutionalist government together. If we’re to fight for these people, there should be some profit in it, if not some honor, or hope of victory.”