The room was not crowded now. Only a table here and there held late comers, and the choice of foods when he reached the serving counter at the back was limited. He permitted himself to complain of this in a practised manner, but made a selection and bore his tray to the centre of the room. He had chosen a table and was about to sit, when he detected Henshaw farther down the room, and promptly took the one next him. It was probable that Henshaw would recall him and praise the work he had done. But the director merely rolled unseeing eyes over him as he seated himself, and continued his speech to the man Merton had before seen him with, the grizzled dark man with the stubby gray mustache whom he called Governor. Merton wondered if he could be the governor of California, but decided not. Perhaps an ex-governor.
"She's working out well," he was saying. "I consider it one of the best continuities Belmore has done. Not a line of smut in it, but to make up for that we'll have over thirty changes of costume."Merton Gill coughed violently, then stared moodily at his plate of baked beans. He hoped that this, at least, would recall him to Henshaw who might fix an eye on him to say: "And, by the way, here is a young actor that was of great help to me this morning." But neither man even glanced up. Seemingly this young actor could choke to death without exciting their notice. He stared less moodily at the baked beans. Henshaw would notice him sometime, and you couldn't do everything at once.
The men had finished their luncheon and were smoking. The animated Henshaw continued his talk. "And about that other thing we were discussing, Governor, I want to go into that with you. I tell you if we can do Robinson Crusoe, and do it right, a regular five-thousand-foot program feature, the thing ought to gross a million. A good, clean, censor-proof picture--great kid show, run forever. Shipwreck stuff, loading the raft, island stuff, hut stuff, goats, finding the footprint, cannibals, the man Friday--can't you see it?"The Governor seemed to see it. "Fine--that's so!" He stared above the director's head for the space of two inhalations from his cigarette, imbuing Merton Gill with gratitude that he need not smoke again that day. "But say, look here, how about your love interest?"Henshaw waved this aside with his own cigarette and began to make marks on the back of an envelope. "Easy enough--Belmore can fix that up. We talked over one or two ways. How about having Friday's sister brought over with him to this island? The cannibals are going to eat her, too. Then the cannibals run to their canoes when they hear the gun, just the same as in the book. And Crusoe rescues the two. And when he cuts the girl's bonds he finds she can't be Friday's real sister, because she's white--see what I mean? Well, we work it out later that she's the daughter of an English Earl that was wrecked near the cannibal island, and they rescued her, and Friday's mother brought her up as her own child. She's saved the papers that came ashore, and she has the Earl's coat-of-arms tattooed on her shoulder blade, and finally, after Crusoe has fallen in love with her, and she's remembered a good deal of her past, along comes the old Earl, her father, in a ship and rescues them all. How about that?"Henshaw, brightly expectant, awaited the verdict of his chief.
" Well--I don't know." The other considered. "Where's your conflict, after the girl is saved from the savages? And Crusoe in the book wears a long beard. How about that? He won't look like anything--sort of hairy, and that's all."
Henshaw from the envelope on which he drew squares and oblongs appeared to gain fresh inspiration. He looked up with new light in his eyes. "I got it--got the whole thing. Modernize it. This chap is a rich young New Yorker, cruising on his yacht, and he's wrecked on this island and gets a lot of stuff ashore and his valet is saved, too--say there's some good comedy, see what I mean?--valet is one of these stiff English lads, never been wrecked on an island before and complains all the time about the lack of conveniences. I can see a lot of good gags for him, having to milk the goats, and getting scared of the other animals, and no place to press his master's clothes--things like that, you know. Well, the young fellow explores the island and finds another party that's been wrecked on the other side, and it's the girl and the man that got her father into his power and got all of his estate and is going to make beggars of them if the girl won't marry him, and she comes on the young fellow under some palms and they fall in love and fix it up to double-cross the villain--Belmore can work it out from there. How about that? And say, we can use a lot of trims from that South Sea piece we did last year, all that yacht and island stuff--see what I mean?"The other considered profoundly. "Yes, you got a story there, but it won't be Robinson Crusoe, don't you see?"Again Henshaw glanced up from his envelope with the light of inspiration. "Well, how about this? Call it Robinson Crusoe, Junior!
There you are. We get the value of the name and do the story the way we want it, the young fellow being shaved every day by the valet, and he can invite the other party over to dine with him and receive them in evening dress and everything. Can't you see it? If that story wouldn't gross big then I don't know a story. And all easy stuff. We can use the trims for the long shots, and use that inlet, toward the other end of Catalina for the hut and the beach; sure-fire stuff, Governor--and Robinson Crusoe, Junior is a cinch title.""Well, give Belmore as much dope as you've got, and see what he can work out."They arose and stood by the counter to pay their checks.
"If you want to see the rushes of that stuff we shot this morning be over to the projection room at five," said Henshaw as they went out.
Neither had observed the rising young screen actor, Clifford Armytage, though he had coughed violently again as they left. He had coughed most plausibly, moreover, because of the cigarettes.
