CHAPTER XIV
PUNCH VERSES PRESTIGE
It seems to be a popular belief among those who are unfamiliar with thebusiness of making motion pictures that all dangerous or difficultfeats are merely tricks of the camera, and that the actors themselvestake no risks whatever. The truth is that they take a good many morerisks than the camera ever records; and that directors who worship whatthey call "punch" in their scenes are frequently as tender of thephysical safety of their actors as was Napoleon or any other greatwarrior who measured results rather than wounds.
Robert Grant Burns had discovered that he had at least two persons inhis company who were perfectly willing to do anything he asked them todo. He had set tasks before Jean Douglas that many a man would haverefused without losing his self-respect, and Jean had performed thosetasks with enthusiasm. She had let herself down over a nasty bit ofthe rim-rock whose broken line extended half around the coulee bluff,with only her rope between herself and broken bones, and with her blondwig properly tousled and her face turned always towards the rock wall,lest the camera should reveal the fact that she was not Muriel Gay.She had climbed that same rock-rim, with the aid of that same rope, andwith her face hidden as usual from the camera. She had been bound andgagged and flung across Gil Huntley's saddle and carried away at asharp gallop, and she had afterwards freed herself from her bonds inthe semi-darkness of a hut that half concealed her features, and hadstolen the knife from Gil Huntley's belt while he slept, and crept awayto where the horses were picketed. In the revealing light of a veryfine moon-effect, which was a triumph of Pete's skill, she slashed arope that held a high-strung "mustang" (so called in the scenario), andhad leaped upon his bare back and gone hurtling out of that scene andinto another, where she was riding furiously over dangerously roughground, the whole outlaw band in pursuit and silhouetted against theskyline and the moon (which was another photographic triumph of PeteLowry).
Gil Huntley had also done many things that were risky. Jean had shotat him with real bullets so many times that her nervousness on thisparticular day was rather unaccountable to him. Jean had lassoed himand dragged him behind Pard through brush. She had pulled him from aquicksand bed,--made of cement that showed a strong tendency to "set"about his form before she could rescue him,--and she had fought withhim on the edge of a cliff and had thrown him over; and his director,anxious for the "punch" that was his fetish, had insisted on a panoramaof the fall, so that there was no chance for Gil to save himself thebruises he got. Gil Huntley's part it was always to die a violentdeath, or to be captured spectacularly, because he was the villainwhose horrible example must bear a moral to youthful brains.
Since Jean had become one of the company, he nearly always died at herhands or was captured by her. This left Muriel Gay unruffled andunhurt, so that she could weep and accept the love of Lee Milligan inthe artistic ending of which Robert Grant Burns was so fond.
Jean had never before considered it necessary to warn Gil and implorehim not to be nervous, and Gil took her solicitude as an encouragingsign and was visibly cheered thereby. He knew little of guns and finemarksmanship, and he did not know that it is extremely difficult toshoot a revolver accurately and instantaneously; whereas Jean knew verywell that Gil Huntley might be thrown off ledges every day in the weekwithout taking the risk he would take that day.
The scene was to close a full reel of desperate attempts upon the partof Gil Huntley to win Muriel; such desperate attempts, indeed, thatMuriel Gay spent most of the time sitting at ease in the shade, talkingwith Lee Milligan, who was two thirds in love with her and had half hislove returned, while Jean played her part for her. Sometimes Murielwould be called upon to assume the exact pose which Jean had assumed ina previous scene, for "close-up" that would reveal to audiencesMuriel's well-known prettiness and help to carry along the deception.Each morning the two stood side by side and were carefully inspected byRobert Grant Burns, to make sure that hair and costumes were exactlyalike in the smallest detail. This also helped to carry on thedeception--to those who were not aware of Muriel's limitations. Theirfaces were not at all alike; and that is why Jean's face must never beseen in a picture.
This shooting scene was a fitting climax to a long and desperate chaseover a difficult trail; so difficult that Pard stumbled andfell,--supposedly with a broken leg,--and Jean must run on and onafoot, and climb over rocks and spring across dangerous crevices. Shewas not supposed to know where her flight was taking her. Sometimesthe camera caught her silhouetted against the sky (Burns was partial toskyline silhouettes), and sometimes it showed her quite close,--inwhich case it would be Muriel instead of Jean,--clinging desperately tothe face of a ledge (ledges were also favorite scenes), and seekingwith hands or feet for a hold upon the rough face of the rock. Duringthe last two or three scenes Gil Huntley had been shown gaining uponher.
So they came to the location where the shooting scene was to be madethat morning. Burns, with the camera and Pete and Muriel and hermother and Lee Milligan, drove to the place in the machine. Jean andGil Huntley found them comfortably disposed in the shade, out of rangeof the camera which Pete was setting up somewhat closer than usual,under the direction of Burns.
"There won't be any rehearsal of this," Burns stated at last, steppingback. "When it's done, if you don't bungle the scene, it'll be done.You stand here, Jean, and kind of lean against the rock as if you'reall in from that chase. You hear Gil coming, and you start forward andlisten, and look,--how far can she turn, Pete; without showing too muchof her face?"
Pete squinted into the finder and gave the information.
"Well, Gil, you come from behind that bush. She'll be looking towardyou then without turning too much. You grin, and come up with thateager, I-got-you-now look. Don't hurry too much; we'll give this sceneplenty of time. This is the feature scene. Jean, you're at the end ofyour rope. You couldn't run another step if you wanted to, and you'recornered anyway, so you can't get away; get me? You're scared. Did youever get scared in your life?"
"Yes," said Jean simply, remembering last night when she had pulled theblanket over her head.
"Well, you think of that time you were scared. And you make yourselfthink that you're going to shoot the thing that scared you. You don'tput in half the punch when you shoot blanks; I've noticed that allalong. So that's why you shoot a bullet. See? And you come as closeto Gil as you can and not hit him. Gil, when you're shot, you go downall in a heap; you know what I mean. And Jean, when he falls, youstart and lean forward, looking at him,--remember and keep your faceaway from the camera!--and then you start toward him kind of horrified.The scene stops right there, just as you start towards him. Then Gaytakes it up and does the remorse and horror stuff because she's killeda man. That will be a close-up.
"All right, now; take your places. Sure your gun is loose so you canpull it quick? That's the feature of this scene, remember. You wantto get it across BIG! And make it real,--the scare, and all that. Hey,you women get behind the camera! Bullets glance, sometimes, and playthe very mischief." He looked all around to make sure that everythingwas as it should be, faced Jean again, and raised his hand.
"All ready? Start your action! Camera!"
Jean had never before been given so much dramatic work to do, and Burnswatched her anxiously, wishing that he dared cut the scene in two andgive Muriel that tense interval when Gil Huntley came creeping into thescene from behind the bush. But after the first few seconds hisstrained expression relaxed; anxiety gave place to something likesurprise.
Jean stood leaning heavily against the rock, panting from the flight ofthe day before,--for so must emotion be carried over into the next daywhen photo-players work at their profession. Her face was dropped uponher arms flung up against the rock in an attitude of completeexhaustion and despair. Burns involuntarily nodded his headapprovingly; the girl had the idea, all right, even if she never hadbeen trained to act a part.
"Come into the scene, Gil!" he commanded, when Jean mad
e a move asthough she was tempted to drop down upon the ground and sobhysterically. "Jean, register that you hear him coming."
Jean's head came up and she listened, every muscle stiffening withfear. She turned her face toward Gil, who stopped and looked at hermost villainously. Gil, you must know, had come from "legitimate" andwas a clever actor. Jean recoiled a little before the leering face ofhim; pressed her shoulder hard against the ledge that had trapped her,and watched him in an agony of fear. One felt that she did, though onecould not see her face. Gil spoke a few words and came on with acertain tigerish assurance of his power, but Jean did not move amuscle. She had backed as far away from him as she could get. She wasnot the kind to weep and plead with him. She just waited; and one feltthat she was keyed up to the supreme moment of her life.
Gil came closer and closer, and there was a look in his eyes thatalmost frightened Jean, accustomed as she had become to his acting apart; there was an intensity of purpose which she instinctively feltwas real. She did not know what it was he had in mind, but whatever itwas, she knew what it meant. He was almost within reach, so close thatone saw Jean shrink a little from his nearness. He stopped andgathered himself for a quick, forward lunge--
The two women screamed, though they had been expecting that swiftdrawing of Jean's gun and the shot that seemed to sound the instant herhand dropped. Gil stiffened, and his hand flew up to his temple. Hiseyes became two staring questions that bored into the soul of Jean.His hand dropped to his side, and his head sagged forward. He lurched,tried to steady himself and then went down limply.
Jean dropped her gun and darted toward him, her face like chalk, as sheturned it for one horrified instant toward Burns. She went down on herknees and lifted Gil's head, looking at the red blotch on his templeand the trickle that ran down his cheek. She laid his head down with agentleness wholly unconscious, and looked again at Burns. "I've killedhim," she said in a small, dry, flat voice. She put out her handsgropingly and fell forward across Gil's inert body. It was the firsttime in her life that Jean had ever fainted.
"Stop the camera!" Burns croaked tardily, and Pete stopped turning.Pete had that little, twisted grin on his face, and he was perfectlycalm and self-possessed.
"You sure got the punch that time, Burns," he remarked unfeelingly,while he held his palm over the lens and gave the crank another turn ortwo to divide that scene from the next.
"She's fainted! She's hit him!" cried Burns, and waddled over to wherethe two of them lay. The two women drew farther away, clinging to eachother with excited exclamations.
And then Gil Huntley lifted himself carefully so as not to push Jeanupon the ground, and when he was sitting up, he took her in his armswith some remorse and a good deal of tenderness.
"How was that for a punch?" he inquired of his director. "I didn'ttell her I was going to furnish the blood-sponge; I thought it mightrattle her. I never thought she'd take it so hard--"
Robert Grant Burns stopped and looked at him in heavy silence. "GoodLord!" he snapped out at last. "I dunno whether to fire you off thejob--or raise your salary! You got the punch, all right. And thechances are you've ruined her nerve for shooting, into the bargain."He stood looking down perturbedly at Gil, who was smoothing Jean's hairback from her forehead after the manner of men who feel tenderly towardthe woman who cries or faints in their presence. "I'm after the punchevery time," Burns went on ruefully, "but there's no use being a hogabout it. Where's that water-bag, Lee? Go get it out of the machine.Say! Can't you women do something besides stand there and howl?Nobody's hurt, or going to be."
While Muriel and Gil Huntley did what they could to bring Jean back toconsciousness and composure, Robert Grant Burns paced up and down anddebated within himself a subject which might have been called "punchversus prestige." Should he let that scene stand, or should he order a"re-take" because Jean had, after all, done the dramatic part, the"remorse stuff"? Of course, when Pete sent the film in, the trimmerscould cut the scene; they probably would cut the scene just where Gilwent down in a decidedly realistic heap. But it hurt the professionalsoul of Robert Grant Burns to retake a scene so compellingly dramatic,because it had been so absolutely real.
Jean was sitting up with her back against the ledge looking rather paleand feeling exceedingly foolish, while Gil Huntley explained to herabout the "blood-sponge" and how he had held it concealed in his handuntil the right moment, and had used it in the interest of realism andnot to frighten her, as she might have reason to suspect. Gil Huntleywas showing a marked tendency to repeat himself. He had three timesassured her earnestly that he did not mean to scare her so, when thevoice of the chief reminded him that this was merely an episode in theday's work. He jumped up and gave his attention to Burns.
"Gil, take that same position you had when you fell. Put a little moreblood on your face; you wiped most of it off. That right leg issprawled out too far. Draw it up a little. Throw out your left arm alittle more. Whoa-- Enough is plenty. Now, Gay, you take Jean's gunand hold it down by your side, where her hand dropped right after shefired. You stand right about here, where her tracks are. Get INTO hertracks! We're picking up the scene right where Gil fell. She lookedstraight into the camera and spoiled the rest, or I'd let it go in.Some acting, if you ask me, seeing it wasn't acting at all." He sentone of his slant-eyed glances toward Jean, who bit her lips and lookedaway.
"Lean forward a little, and hold that gun like you knew what it wasmade for, anyway!" He regarded Muriel glumly. "Say! that ain't astick of candy you're trying to hide in your skirt," he pointed out,with an exasperated, rising inflection at the end of the sentence."John Jimpson! If I could take you two girls to pieces and make oneout of the two of you, I'd have an actress that could play Westernleads, maybe!
"Oh, well--thunder! All you can do is put over the action so they'llforget the gun. Say, you drop it the second the camera starts. Youpick up the action where Jean dropped the gun and started for Gil. Seeif you can put it over the way she did. She really thought she'dkilled him, remember. You saw the real, honest-to-John, horror-dopethat time. Now see how close you can copy it.
"All ready? START your ACTION!" he barked. "Camera!"
Brutally absorbed in his work he might be; callous to the tragedy inJean's eyes at what might have happened; unfeeling in his greedyseizure of her horror as good "stuff" for Muriel Gay to mimic. Yet theman's energy was dynamic; his callousness was born of his passion forthe making of good pictures. He swept even Jean out of the emotionalwhirlpool and into the calm, steady current of the work they had to do.
He instructed Pete to count as spoiled those fifteen feet of film whichrecorded Jean's swift horror. But Pete Lowry did not always followslavishly his instructions. He sent the film in as it was, withoutcomment. Then he and Gil Huntley counted on their fingers the numberof days that would probably elapse before they might hope to hear theresult, and exchanged knowing glances now and then when Robert GrantBurns seemed especially careful that Jean's face should not be seen bythe recording eye of the camera. And they waited; and after awhilethey began to show a marked interest in the mail from the west.