"Hello, Countess! Say, listen, can you give the camera a little peek at me to-day, or at pa or ma? 'No, nothing to-day, dear.'" She had imitated the little woman's voice in her accustomed reply. "Well, Ididn't think there would be. I just thought I'd ask. You ain't mad, are you? I could have gone on in a harem tank scene over at the Bigart place, but they wanted me to dress the same as a fish, and a young girl's got to draw the line somewhere. Besides, I don't like that Hugo over there so much. He hates to part with anything like money, and he'll gyp you if he can. Say, I'll bet he couldn't play an honest game of solitaire. How'd you like my hair this way? Like it, eh? That's good. And me having the only freckles left in all Hollywood. Ain't I the little prairie flower, growing wilder every hour?
"Say, on the level, pa needs work. These days when he's idle he mostly sticks home and tries out new ways to make prime old Kentucky sour mash in eight hours. If he don't quit he is going to find himself seeing some moving pictures that no one else can. And he's all worried up about his hair going off on top, and trying new hair restorers. You know his latest? Well, he goes over to the Selig place one day and watches horse meat fed to the lions and says to himself that horses have plenty of hair, and it must be the fat under the skin that makes it grow, so he begs for a hunk of horse from just under the mane and he's rubbing that on. You can't tell what he'll bring home next. The old boy still believes you can raise hair from the dead. Do you want some new stills of me? I got a new one yesterday that shows my other expression. Well, so long, Countess."The creature turned to her parents.
"Let's be on our way, old dears. This place is dead, but the Countess says they'll soon be shooting some tenement-house stuff up at the Consolidated. Maybe there'll be something in it for someone.
We might as well have a look-in."
Merton felt relieved when the Montague family went out, the girl in the lead. He approved of the fine old father, but the daughter lacked dignity in speech and manner. You couldn't tell what she might say next.
The Montagues were often there, sometimes in full, sometimes represented by but one of their number. Once Mrs. Montague was told to be on Stage Six the next morning at 8:30 to attend a swell reception.
"Wear the gray georgette, dearie," said the casting director, "and your big pearls and the lorgnon.""Not forgetting the gold cigarette case and the chinchilla neck piece," said Mrs. Montague. "The spare parts will all be there, Countess, and thanks for the word."The elder Montague on the occasion of his calls often found time to regale those present with anecdotes of Lawrence Barrett.
"A fine artist in his day, sir; none finer ever appeared in a hall show."And always about his once superb frock coat clung the scent of forbidden beverages. On one such day he appeared with an untidy sprouting of beard, accompanied by the talkative daughter.
"Pa's landed a part," she explained through the little window. "It's one of those we-uns mountaineer plays with revenooers and feuds; one of those plays where the city chap don't treat our Nell right--you know. And they won't stand for the crepe hair, so pop has got to raise a brush and he's mad. But it ought to give him a month or so, and after that he may be able to peddle the brush again; you can never tell in this business, can you, Countess?""It's most annoying," the old gentleman explained to the bench occupants. "In the true art of the speaking stage an artificial beard was considered above reproach. Nowadays one must descend to mere physical means if one is to be thought worthy."
