Noblesse Oblige
Book Three
The Bells of Hell Go Ting-a-ling-a-ling

By: Pete Bruno & Henry Hilliard
(© 2014 by the authors)

The author retains all rights. No reproductions are allowed without the author's consent. Comments are appreciated at...

Chapter 11
Manifest Destiny 

Smoke could be seen rising in a great angry fist from somewhere on the other side of the Mississippi, just beyond where the railway yards sprawled untidily along the east bank.  The fire bells of the city rang out incessantly and now flames could be seen licking the heavens as a warehouse, probably full of cotton bales, caught.  For hours a stream of National Guardsmen and pump engines had poured east over the bridge where they tangled with the flood of Negroes who were trying to flee in the other direction.  Now the police were preventing any more from crossing to the Missouri side.

“A Mr Keil is here to see you, your lordship,” announced Carlo.  Martin and Stephen stepped back from the window of the Majestic Hotel where they had lodged upon their arrival south from Minnesota.

“Mr Mayor,” said Martin, advancing and addressing him in the manner that Americans used.  “Perhaps you can tell us what is going on.  Has there been some sort of accident?”

Introductions were effected and then Keil said: “I only wish it were just some accident. There is a big race riot going on over in East St Louis.  City Hall has lost control and it seems that now, I regret to say; the police and guards have joined in.  I fear hundreds have been killed—there have been reports of lynching and a scalping.”

Stephen said: “We are not used to mixed-race cities Mr Mayor, but I thought it was the Indians who used to take scalps, not Negroes.”

“I’m afraid it is said to be a white perpetrator, Captain.  The poor Negro is having a hard time of it.  He has been flooding north to take jobs, you see, and there has been union trouble and then there was an incident with white women at a union meeting, I believe.  Just now two detectives have been shot in their auto.  I’ve had to cancel your meeting for tonight.  It is for the best, I hope you understand.  I don’t want it to spread to Missouri.”  He walked to the window and pulled the curtain aside and stood where Martin and Stephen had just been. “They’ve cut the fire hoses— that’s why it continues to burn.  I’m very sorry, gentlemen, but you can see how it is.”

“Let’s leave tonight, Derby, I don’t like it here.” Stephen nodded and Carlo was sent down to the station through the riot.

“Are you excited about your motor, Derbs?” asked Martin trying to change the subject.  It had been a point of amusement that Stephen was a somewhat less than enthusiastic— even reticent—automobilist compared to Martin.  Now, in the land of King Henry, Stephen had succumbed.  While in St Cloud he had met a little round man with a blithe expression who was a friend of Senator Buckweet.  Mr Pandolfo had come to that city to set up his own manufacturing plant.  He had already built several dozen houses and his rudimentary factory was being greatly enlarged so he could go into full production, just as soon as he obtained financing.  Martin was interested in buying shares, but without Mr Sachs he dared not promise Mr Pandolfo anything.  Stephen, however, having been for a drive, was impressed with Mr Pandolfo’s ‘Queen of the Road’.  There was a compartment for holding ice to cool beer for picnics and the seats cleverly folded down flat to make a comfortable bed.  These two features, more than its mechanical virtuosity ‘sold’ Stephen and a deposit was paid.  Mr Pandolfo would ‘ship’ a ‘Pan 250’ to England, with the steering wheel on the proper side, just as soon as hostilities ended.  It was not an expensive machine, unlike Martin’s Rolls Royce, but Stephen had taken to it.

Carlo returned. “Your lordship, I was unable to get tickets.  There is much confusion and the rails are torn up on the East St Louis side so trains are not getting through.  They suggested we try tomorrow.”

The hotel room was stifling so Martin and Stephen preferred to take their chances in the street while Carlo set about unpacking their trunk.  The Majestic had a tennis court at the rear by the motor garages that catered for automobile guests.  “If we had your Pan and Mr Joy’s concrete highway we could drive across the United States, Derby,” said Martin.  “We could sleep under the stars on the folding seats and you could…”

“Do you want a game?” called a middle-aged man from the courts.  He had been practicing serving and a coloured boy was foxing the balls for him.

“We have no tennis clothes, sir,” called Stephen.  The man walked over, sweating.  “I’ll have the boy go up and get some of mine if you like,” said the man, wiping his brow with a towel.  

“You’re the two British soldiers who were going to speak tonight—I was told it was called-off.”  The boys replied that they were. “Gould, Jay Gould,” said the man thrusting out his hand and smiling for the first time.  I don’t know if they’ll fit of course, you’re a big fellow,” he said, looking a Stephen.  Stephen apologised for his inconvenient size and Mr Gould laughed, not really understanding what was funny.  Knickerbocker trousers and shirts were produced along with some expensive towels.  The boys changed in the pavilion, Gould noticing they wore nothing under their army trousers.  “Don’t you limeys wear shorts?”

“No,” said Martin, “they’re rationed because the BVD ship was torpedoed.”  Gould laughed again, uncertainly.

On the court Gould thrashed Martin and then Stephen.  It was humiliating.  “You’re a very good player, Mr Gould,” said Stephen.

“It’s not really my game.  I play ‘real tennis’ or ‘royal tennis’ as you call it.  Do you know what that is?”  They did.  “I played in your country in 1908—at the Olympic Games.  You don’t remember me do you?”

“I was too young to go to the games,” said Martin.

“No, I mean in New York.  We met at Mrs Vanderbilt’s— don’t worry about it.  There was a big crowd.” Stephen and Martin apologised profusely but Gould wasn’t offended.  They changed and went to the bar and they discussed the riots and their inability to leave St Louis.”

“Why don’t you come along with me?  I’m leaving this afternoon for San Francisco.”

“But how?  You’re not flying?” asked Martin in alarm, having heard that President Roosevelt had flown in an aeroplane from St Louis.

“No, I’ll go by train.”

“But the trains…”

“I have my own private train.  I own the damn railroad, that’s all!” said Gould with glee.

Martin and Stephen looked at each other and nodded enthusiastically.  “The King is the only person I know with his own train,” said Martin.

“Huh,” he replied, “they’re a dime a dozen in the States.  My grandfather had his own streetcar too.”

Martin hastened and said that they had to get their valet to pack. “Will there be room for Private Sifridi, he’s our batman and secretary?” Gould assented with just an imperious wave of his hand.  Martin then said: “We have to send some telegrams first to finalise arrangements in San Francisco.”

“Do them on the train; my secretary can send your wires.”

There was nothing to do but shake him excitedly by the hand and they left him grinning insouciantly at the bar while they rushed back to their room to tell Carlo to pack again. 

***** 

Mr Gould’s train was the most luxurious of conveyances and he clearly wasn’t a man who did things by halves.  He proudly showed them around: the rear carriage contained Mr Gould’s bedroom, all blue velvet and rare woods. “Here, there’s something I want you to see.” Beside the elaborately draped bed stood an inlayed cabinet; from a drawer he took a velvet box and handed it to Martin.  Inside was a medal with a design of St George and the Dragon on one side.  Martin turned it over; on the obverse were depicted two female figures placing a laurel wreath on a muscular nude athlete.  “Your Queen Alexandra presented it to me nine years ago herself,” said Gould, simply, as he replaced the medal in its box and shut the drawer.

Forward of the bedroom was a bathroom and a compartment for the secretary.  The corridor connected to the next carriage, which was a dining car and kitchen. “That’s palisander wood from Madagascar and the glass is Lalique from Paris, France,” he informed them.  The forward car contained berths for the cook, steward and valet.  In a separate compartment were four berths that the boys could share with Carlo if they didn’t prefer he bunk with the servants, which they didn’t.  It was all quite overwhelming.

Carlo busied himself unpacking, yet again, and ferried telegrams to the secretary while the boys settled down to pass the time reading: Martin leafing through McClure’s and Stephen intent on Lincoln Steffens’ Shame of the Cities and reading choice bits about St Louis and Minneapolis aloud out to Martin.

It was getting hot in their compartment and they turned on the electric fan and sat in their shirtsleeves.  The secretary knocked and asked if they would like to join Mr Gould in the dining car.  Gould was just signing some papers and he looked up.  He motioned for them to sit down.  He was in his shirtsleeves himself and he poured them some whiskey without asking. “Boys, I just had an idea.  You have no speaking engagements until you reach California, is that right?”

Martin said that this was so, their schedule being too tight.  “Well how would you feel about speaking to some of the plain folks out here?”  He motioned out of the window at the farmlands of Missouri.

“That would be alright with us, Mr Gould, if we had the time,” said Stephen, taking a sip.

“Well, we will make good time in this train, even if we have to pull over to let an express through—we don’t have a heavy load of freight, see.  You boys could speak from the train, like the president does.”

“But how would people know we were coming?” asked Martin.

“Easy, I’ll just wire ahead and there’ll be crowds in the yards, just you wait; you’re a genuine Marquess and the big fellow is already a poster boy, isn’t he?”

Stephen confessed that he was the soldier in the sketch.

“Now, how about a hand of cards; penny a point?” 

***** 

So it came about that Mr Gould’s luxurious train was shunted to a siding in the pleasant wooded town of Columbus where a crowd had gathered, many from the town’s colleges including quite a few ‘co-eds’ as they referred to female students.  Martin and Stephen stood on the balcony at the rear of Mr Gould’s bedroom and accepted the cheers from the crowd. They said the usual things about hoping that the war would end all the sooner with America in it.  They responded to some good-humoured banter and Stephen was asked to autograph posters.

“Are you a real lord?” called one Missourian.

“Yes, sir.”

“Well, show me!” The crowd laughed.

Martin did not know how to prove it, but Stephen knelt down in obeisance and the crowd roared some more.

In half an hour they were off again in the direction of Kansas City ‘across the wide Missouri’.  It was getting dark when they arrived.  The train halted in a rather dismal place where arc lights had been erected.  There was quite a crowd, men and women sitting in empty boxcars with their sliding doors thrown open and some had climbed on the roofs to get a better view.  “Ladies and gentlemen in the boxes…” began Martin with a bow in their direction and the crowd was won over as they repeated their performance.  Reporters came up to the train for comment.  The crowd dispersed and the lights were extinguished.

Gould said, “Come with me boys, I want to show you something.”  They took a taxi through the city, which was built in a basin surrounded by bluffs.  They saw little evidence of the city’s farm machinery factories but they did come across wide boulevards and darkened parks. Then they found themselves on a busy street—12^th Street—whose east side was dignified by a remarkable line of public houses, saloon bars and shops selling alcohol.  “Better stock up, boys, its dry from here to California.” Indeed it was true.  While the Missouri side of the street was ‘wet’ in Kansas they had ‘prohibition’ as they called it.

“This can’t end well,” said Stephen grimly as he bought some bottled beer and received large silver coins instead of banknotes in his change.

Back on the train there was a fine dinner and then more cards.  Gould talked about himself and his family’s houses in New Jersey, all of which sounded splendid.  Mrs Gould was there now with his two little daughters while he attended to railroad business.  The ‘Feather Pass’ route was a new one to San Francisco.  “My grandfather would have been pleased,” he said “he always wanted to get his own route into California.  He spoke of his brother who played polo.  His mother had been an actress and his wife’s cousin was a Hawaiian princess. “So I think a princess beats a Marquess, Lord Branksome—even a dusky one,” said Gould with a chuckle. “You can see we are an unconventional family.  We’re rich and we don’t care much what people think.”

He asked no questions about Martin’s family and did not seem particularly curious.  When Martin told him of the hostile reception they had received in some places he said, “My grandfather would have had them shot; he could do that sort of thing forty years ago.  But I don’t approve of what they were doing to those Negroes back in St Louis.  They only want to work.  You’ll find it’s the labour unions and Wobblies at the bottom of it all for sure.”

That night Martin tried to sleep in the close atmosphere of their compartment.  The berths were soft and the linen sheets were luxurious, but he tossed and turned.  He could hear Stephen snoring opposite. “Are you alright, your lordship?” called down Carlo.

“It’s too hot Carlo and I’ve had too much of Mr Gould’s whiskey.”

“Is there anything I can do for you?”

“Thank you Carlo, but I’ll wait for Mr Stephen.” 

***** 

Martin and Stephen sat for hours as the dreary monotony of the prairie slipped by their window.  It was an ocean of grass with few trees and just the occasional cluster of depressing, peeling wooden shanties that denoted the further reaches of civilization.

“There’s a vast emptiness in the heart of America,” said Steven ponderously after a long silence. Martin knew he meant more than the geography.

“You’re being too hard Derby; this place is terrifyingly empty, I admit, but look at the energy of the country—what they have done in New York and Chicago in just a few years.  Europe is old and has an unfair advantage.

“But why are they doing it, Mala?  That’s the question no one asks.  What is the goal of American life?  Is it to live more quickly and die more speedily?  To sell more things to each other?  To get an angle, corner a market, make a deal, secure an advantage, to sell a gadget? Is domestic convenience the greatest goal of civilization?  Like chewing gum; what’s it all for?”

“They have made a better life for a lot of people, Derby, no matter how you measure it.  I know they can seem shallow and vulgar—Mr Armour’s house, Mrs Vanderbilt’s palace, Mr Gould’s train—but is it any more vulgar than the red drawing room at Croome? Age can dull the raw and mute the gilding and then we English call it ‘charm’.”

“But everyone you talk to is selling you something; an idea or themselves—trying to convince you.  It’s very tiring.  Is there anything here that’s genuine, Mala?  I mean deep down good.”

Martin thought for a moment.  “Harvard Yard…”

“But that’s old, Mala.”

“Well, Mr May’s house— I can see it there and in Central Park, what about Bunny and Dwight, aren’t they genuine deep down?”

Stephen had to agree.  After a pause he said: “I think it’s all this business about ‘selling’ the idea that they are all Americans; that’s what all the flags, marching bands and loyalty oaths is really about; they are suddenly having to invent a nation from scratch.

“Every German knows what it means to be German and so does every Frenchman.  Scotchmen know they don’t want to be English.  The English are different because they have never even had to even ask the question: ‘What does it mean to be English?’—because we just know, rather smugly.  But the Americans have to keep asking and answering to reassure themselves because they are frightened that there’s nothing there and the snap flag and the hullabaloo of a parade fills the silence.  I can’t help but think of those Negroes back in St Louis.  That was worse than Milwaukee.”

“I agree with you Derby.  It’s disturbing to say the least.  I think I’m a bit homesick.”

“Now it’s you who is depressed, Mala.  I’m sorry.  I will think of Mr May’s American house and how lovely Bunny and Dwight are—although we don’t know them terribly well, do we? But I like what I know.”

There was a knock and Carlo entered. “Mr Gould wants to know if you’d like a hand of gin rummy before dinner, your lordship. 

***** 

The mountains grew closer and closer and by the next morning they were in Denver.  The crowd booed when they saw it was Gould’s private train but cheered when Martin and Stephen emerged into the clear, cool air on the platform behind the drum.  They were welcomed by the Mayor, Mr Speer, who assured them that the city was already on a war footing and was not to be taken for a corrupt, frontier, mining town any longer.  The boys were almost ‘sold’.

After Denver the dreariness of the plains was replaced by the grandeur of the mountains, the likes of which the boys had never seen, especially when they turned west after a stop in Pueblo.  Here the railway clung impossibly to the side of the tumbling, icy Arkansas River in a deep and narrow canyon.  Gould had the train stop for ten minutes so the boys might alight and walk along the side of the bank of the rushing torrent.  They enjoyed brook trout brought on-board at Salida.  Many hours later, after descending through deserted pine forests into a dry, stony desert they arrived at Grand Junction and the following day they had reached Salt Lake City in the Great Basin.  Here, even in this seemingly remote place, the War had penetrated and the boys heard that the Utah National Guard had already departed for training in California and that Fort Douglas had, disturbingly, in addition to the usual training facilities, a prison full of Germans and opponents of the draft.

Again they found themselves crossing a great purple vastness with mountains ahead and behind.  At night, after everyone had gone to bed, Martin woke Stephen. “Derby, wake up.” Stephen stopped snoring and roused, and looked at Martin, pushing his hair back from his eyes. “It’s a beautiful night; let’s go out onto the platform.” Carlo woke up.  They put on pairs of Stephen’s silk pyjama bottoms. “Carlo, keep watch for us,” instructed Martin.  They tiptoed down the corridor and pushed open the heavy door.  The landscape was rushing away behind them, but on the platform they were in the lee of the wind.  They could see the moonlight reflected on the snowy Rockies in the far distance.  Stunted spruce and pine trees whipped past, but they were crossing largely open plains.  Above them the stars were brighter than they had ever seen them in the clear, thin air.  Stephen stood behind Martin and put his arms around his naked torso as they looked upward.  As wondrous as the everlasting stars were, Martin began to wriggle against Stephen and Stephen’s cock responded.  “Fuck me Stephen, right here.” Right on cue, Carlo stepped from the shadows and produced the tube of Ee-zo (‘No more tears at bedtime’) and removed the expensive silk trousers lest they be swept away by the rushing wind.  Stephen entered Martin from behind, tenderly kissing his right ear lobe and the back of his neck.  Marin leaned on the iron railing and stretched his arms out to the night.  “Feel it, Derbs.” Stephen, holding Martin safely through the agency of his muscular member, also spread his arms to the glorious mountain air with its tang of resin.

“I feel like a god, Mala, it’s extraordinary.”

“Let’s go back, Derbs.  I want you to do me properly in your berth.  Is the coast clear, Carlo?”

Crossing the Nevada desert seemed to take forever.  Jay Gould kept them entertained with tales of his father and grandfather’s titanic business battles and his grandmother’s appetite for jewels, including the story of a fabulous string of pearls worth half million dollars.  He told stories of Harry Lehr who had married his mother’s friend Elizabeth Drexel but was famous for his extravagant practical jokes, such as attending a dinner in Newport disguised a Russian Grand Duke and organizing a party where a monkey sat in Mrs Astor’s place.

At last they threaded the spectacular Feather Pass and descended through the chain of mountains into the New World of California where the climate was warm and wet and where deserts, where they remained, were seen to blossom under irrigation.  They stopped at Sacramento but they came to believe, through the journalists who besieged them, that the Governor, Mr Johnson, would not meet them because he was a staunch ‘isolationist.’  They went on to Oakland where they were again met by the press.

It was time to say good-bye to Mr Gould.  They tried to express their gratitude for the four days they had spent as his guest.  He dismissed it with a wave of his hand, but gave them a smile at the same time.  Martin pressed him to come and stay at Croome when he was next in England.  “When tennis resumes after this damn war, Lord Branksome, I promise I’ll ‘look you up’.”

With Carlo wheeling the trunk, they walked down to the ferry and set out across the staggeringly beautiful harbour, lightly ghosted in fog, for the City of San Francisco, which rose on the slopes before them.  A taxi took them to the Fairmont located on one of the city’s famous hills.  A deputation was there to meet them.  This resulted in them being driven, the next day, in an open motorcar at the head of a military parade through streets lined with cheering crowds.  It was enough to turn anyone’s head.  The parade headed through Union Square then to the City Hall where it was clear that California, if not its governor, was ready to fight—especially as the Army and Navy would be requiring lots of Californian oil and the products from the lines of blast furnaces across the bay in Richmond.

One of the main journals, The Examiner, was very keen on war, but it became curiously clear that the editor was more anxious to fight the Japanese and Mexicans than the Germans.  “But they are our allies, Derbs, this is silly stuff,” said Martin reading it.  “And here is a moving picture serial all about a Japanese invasion of the United States.  Who is this Mr Hearst?”

It was on the same night that there was a rather reckless party in the Fairmont ballroom where a quantity of champagne was consumed.  Who paid for it remained a mystery.  Martin and Stephen, tired out from travel and from their overwhelming reception, became rather drunk.  Martin found himself talking to Mr Charles Bryant who was a moving picture star from Hollywood, although he was born in England.  He was elegant and extraordinarily good-looking and his perfect white teeth contrasted with his tanned skin. “Is Hollywood anywhere near San Francisco, Mr Bryant.  I mean I’ve heard of it but I don’t know where it is exactly.”

Please, it’s Charles, Lord Branksome.  Why, it’s a part of Los Angeles, which is a day south of here. You’ll love it; I’ll guarantee it.”

“Oh we go there the day after tomorrow.  I’ve heard it has the most perfect climate—like the South of France and you can swim all year.”

“Much better.  That’s why we make movies there.  Have you ever seen a picture being made?”

Martin hadn’t and listened, intrigued and excited and he had no idea they could be so profitable. He was finding Charles very attractive to listen to.  Mr Bryant kept filling his glass and resting is hand on Martin’s knee to emphasise the sincerity of his narrative.  Apparently Mr Bryant and his wife, Ala, were interested in making pictures of their own—Ala Nazimova writing them herself in Russian or adapting them from the more racy pages of the Old Testament.

Stephen meanwhile, was taken up by Mr Wallace Reid and Mr Gordon Edwards who were also from the southern city. “I’ve been making a war picture, Captain.  It concerns a British soldier in this war, rather like yourself I should think, but he is also a soldier in the time of Joan of Arc—get it?” Stephen did and found Wallace Reid very handsome and winning, and talk of Miss Theda Bara, the ‘star’ of many of Mr Edward’s pictures, quite alluring.

“Have you ever done any film work Captain Knight-Poole?” asked Mr Edwards.  “He’d test well on screen, wouldn’t he Wally?” Reid, feeling Stephen’s muscles and noting the fullness of his trousers, agreed and said that he should come to Hollywood at once as they were now both working on a new film about Cleopatra with Miss Bara. “We are still needing some gladiators and soldiers, aren’t we Gordon?  I think we could find you a part,” said Mr Reid.

Stephen downed his champagne and his glass was refilled.  “Would it take long?  I mean we have a schedule to keep.  Could I meet Miss Bara? I loved her in ‘A Fool There Was’.”  They thought that a test could be arranged at short notice and were sure Miss Bara would insist on meeting gladiators and soldiers from any era.

Stephen found Martin. “Mala, what say we go to Los Angeles tonight instead of the day after tomorrow.  The gentlemen over there want me to try out for the films.”

“Do they Derbs?  That would be very fine.  Mr Bryant wants me to look at a film he’s trying to make.  He’s going to Hollywood tonight.  That’s in Los Angeles, did you know that?” Stephen didn’t answer but said, with eyes shining, that they should tell Carlo right away.

Thus they found themselves on the night train to Los Angeles, still rather drunk, and in the morning, a little worse for wear, they emerged into the warm, white sunshine of the beautiful young city built where the desert meets the sea.  Wallace Reid departed and a pair of taxis conveyed Martin, Stephen, Carlo, Mr Taylor and Mr Bryant to the Rosslyn Hotel on Main Street.  “This is beautiful, said Martin as they swept down boulevards flanked by bright green lawns planted with rows of palms and dodged between big red streetcars.  “Look at the palm trees and all the autos, but it’s not crowded like other cities.”

“I’ll collect you at lunchtime, Martin, said Mr Bryant.  I want you to look at the script and I’ll take you to the studio afterwards to meet some film people.”

“That would be marvellous, Charles.”

Stephen raised his eyebrows at the use of Christian names but before he could say anything Mr Edwards said. “I will take you for a test over at Fox, Stephen.”

“This is very exciting,” said Martin as they rushed to get ready, Carlo hopping from one to another.  Stephen was ready first and disappeared with Mr Edwards.  Along came Mr Bryant and Martin was taken to parts unknown. Carlo sighed. He attempted to straighten the hotel room and checked their diary.  A talk was scheduled in two days’ time and following that they were to speak at the naval base.

At six o’clock the telephone in the room rang.  Carlo answered it.  “Yes, your lordship… Not to wait… I’m sure it must be exciting.”  At ten past six it rang again.  “Not to wait up, Mr Stephen?  I’ll tell him… Yes, the distances are very great.”

It was half past three when Carlo heard the key in the lock.  It was Martin. “Oh Carlo, I’m sorry to wake you.  I was delayed.  I’ll just sleep on the couch here so I don’t wake Mr Stephen.  He must be tired out.  So am I.  Good night.”

At five past four the door again woke Carlo. “’sonly me, Carlo.  Shuss!  Can I sleep in your room? I don’t wanna to wake his lordship.  He woulda had a long day and I’m a bit squiffy.”

“It’s this way, sir; that is the cupboard.”

The next day they had breakfast rather late. “What are you doing today, Mala?”

“Oh Derbs, I was going to see Mr Bryant at his favourite director’s house in the hills.  He wants to discuss the sort of sets his film will require—his picture is about Nebuchadnezzar- and they will naturally be costly.  It’s all rather technical but he says I have a good insight already.  That’s swell of him, don’t you think?”

“Yes, swell,” said Stephen with some asperity. “Why are you wearing tennis togs? ”

“Oh he has a court.  We might discuss business while we play.  Everyone does it here —or on the golf links.  Did you want to do something?”

“No, Mala.  I’m going back to the studio with Wally; they want to do another test and Miss Bara wants to see me in some costumes.”

“I see you have your swimming costume with you.  Is that one for the film?”

“No, but everyone has a pool here and film business is often conducted informally.  It’s rather charming, isn’t it?”

“Utterly,” said Martin with some venom.

This time Carlo saw them at seven and they had dinner together in the hotel suite.

“You’re looking a bit sunburnt, Derby,” said Martin as he sipped on some scotch whiskey where ice clinked in the glass. “Miss Bara should see that her guests cover up by her pool. It’s terribly hot out here isn’t it?”

”Stop complaining, Mala, it’s not hot.  The weather here is better than England’s,” he said crossly as he poured some whiskey for himself.  “I don’t know why you like it cold; that’s not normal.”

“I wasn’t complaining, Stephen, I just meant…” The telephone rang.  They both looked at it. Carlo picked it up. “Yes, yes….yes.  No…very well.”  He hung up the receiver.

“Well who was it Carlo?” asked Martin, impatiently.

“It was a friend of mine your lordship.  I hope you don’t mind.”  The boys turned back to their table.

“Mala, I’ve been invited by Mr Edwards to a supper party at his house.  I hope you don’t mind if I go out.”

Not at all, Derbs.  Enjoy yourself.  I have an engagement myself.

“Who with?”

“Some film producers at the Bryson Hotel.  Don’t wait up.  These things take forever.”

Carlo didn’t get home until 2:00 and neither of his masters was home, but when he awoke he found them stumping about the suite looking for clean clothes and keys and other things. “Carlo where’s my shirt?” said Martin.

“Carlo have you seen my watch?” said Stephen. “Oh here it is.”

They were quarrelsome all morning but put on a united front for the talk to the Angelinos at Clune’s Auditorium overlooking Pershing Square, where the mayor led a recruiting drive and there were several bands and a shrill choir.  They posed for the newspaper photographers but when they had gone they went their separate ways.

They returned briefly in the evening but quarrelled and went out again.  Martin came home late and Stephen did not come home at all.  Carlo found him by the hotel’s swimming bath in the middle of the morning. “Oh hello Carlo,” said Stephen looking miserable.

“Good morning sir.”

“I think I’ll just sit here for a bit.  The weather is marvellous in Los Angeles, isn’t it?” Carlo said nothing and went back up to their suite.

“Carlo! Carlo!” called Martin. “Oh there you are.  I say Carlo could you make me some tea. I’m sick of coffee and I think tea might settle my stomach.  I feel a little upset,” he said quietly.

Martin emerged from the bedroom just as Stephen came in the door.  They looked at each other and then at Carlo who was busy packing the trunk.

“What are you doing, Carlo?” asked Martin.

“Yes, Carlo, we have another two days here and we have to speak again,” said Stephen.

“We’re leaving, sir. This town has made you both lose your senses.  Tell them that you’ve lost your voices and cancel you engagement.

“Your lordship, I’m sorry to tell you that Mr Bryant is just after you because he thinks you have money to finance a moving picture he can’t find anyone to produce.  He has hawked it all over California.”

“Yes I began to realise that last night.  I’m sorry Carlo and I’m sorry Derby.  I made a fool of myself,”

Before Stephen could reply Carlo said: “Mr Stephen, your screen test ‘stank’— that’s a technical term used in Hollywood and Miss Theda Bara possibly omitted to tell you that they could not use the film they shot of you in the gladiator’s costume— that is they could not show it in the picture palaces, sir, not without the police and the Lord Chamberlain having something to say —although I believe Miss Bara has asked if she might keep the film for her private amusement.  They have already cast a Mr Novarro in your stead.”

“Oh,” said Stephen. “I suppose I did get carried away.  I’m sorry Carlo and I am so sorry, Mala.  Did you know she is not a real Arab? It’s just her name spelled backwards.  She wasn’t born ‘in the shadow of the ‘sphinx’ either; she’s a Jewish girl from Ohio”

“And she’s 32, sir,” added Carlo.

“No!”

“Yes, sir.  It’s a world of make believe as my friend makes clear.  Come on, help me pack or I’ll leave you both to stew in this fucking cesspit.”

Carlo dispatched a ‘wire’ cancelling their final appearance at the naval base and then brought the trunk down to where a taxi took them to the Southern Pacific Depot.  The boys said nothing on the trip, but Carlo was pleased that they sat with their hands touching.

They were standing by the tracks because they were quite early for their train.  Carlo had brought them some orange juice when a voice said: “Hello Poole, hello Stephen, good morning Carlo.”

The three wheeled around.  Before them, in civilian clothes, stood The Plunger.

To be continued…

Thanks for reading.  If you have any comments or questions, Henry and I would love to hear from you. 

Posted: 03/21/14