Chapter III

Clancy woke with a shiver. Consciousness was not, with her, an achievement arrived at after yawning effort. She woke, always, clear-eyed and clear-brained. It was with no effort that she remembered every incident of yesterday, of last night. She trembled as, with her shabby bathrobe round her, she pattered, in her slippered feet, the few steps down the hall to the bathroom.

The cold water did little to allay her nervous trembling. Zenda, last night, had referred to having lost a hundred thousand dollars. That was too much money to be lost cheerfully. Cheerfully? She'd seen the beginning of a brawl, and from what Fay Marston had said to her, it had progressed brutally. And the mere departure of Ike Weber with his unsuspected wife would not tend to hush the matter up.

Back in her room, dressing, Clancy wondered why Weber's marriage had been kept quiet. Fay had said, last evening, that "Weber's little friend" could not go to the party. Clancy had been asked to fill in. Why had Fay Marston not merely kept her marriage secret but searched for girls to entertain her own husband? For Fay, even though she was apparently quite callously and frankly dishonest, was not immoral, Clancy judged, in the ordinary sense with which that adjective is applied to women.

The whole thing was strange, incomprehensible. Clancy was too new to Broadway to know many things. She did not guess that a girl only casually acquainted, apparently, with Ike Weber could help in a card game as his own publicly accepted wife could not. Miss Fay Marston could glimpse a card and nothing would be thought of it. Mrs. Ike Weber could not get away with the same thing. But Clancy had all of these matters yet to learn.

Down in the dining-room, presided over by Madame Napoli and her buxom daughter, two shabby waiters stood idle. They looked surprised at Clancy's entrance. _Madame_ ushered Clancy to a table.

"It's easy seen you ain't been in the business long, Miss Ladue," chuckled _madame_. "Gettin' down to breakfast is beginners' stuff, all right. At that, it would help a lot of 'em if they did it. You stick to it, Miss Ladue. The griddle-cakes is fine this morning."

Clancy had a rural appetite. The suggestion of buckwheat cakes appealed to her. She ordered them, and had them flanked with little sausages, and she prepared for their reception with some sliced oranges, and she also drank a cup of coffee.

Her nervousness had vanished by the time she finished. What had she to be concerned about? After all, she might as well look at last night's happenings in a common-sense way. She could prove that she arrived in New York only yesterday, that her acquaintance with Fay Marston--or Weber--had begun only last night. How could she be blamed? Still--and she twitched her shoulders--it was nasty and unpleasant, and she hoped that she wouldn't be dragged into it.

The waiter brought her check to her. Clancy drew a fifty-dollar bill from her pocketbook. The waiter scurried off with it, and _madame_, in a moment, came to the table with Clancy's change.

"Carryin' much money?" she asked.

"Quite a lot--for me," said Clancy.

"Better bank it," suggested _madame_.

Clancy looked blank. She hadn't thought of that. She'd never had a bank-account in her life. But seven hundred dollars or so was a lot of money. She took the name and address of a bank in the neighborhood, and thanked _madame_ for her offer of herself as a reference.

It was barely nine o'clock when she entered Times Square. The crowd differed greatly from the throng that she had observed last night. Times Square was a work-place now. Fascinated, Clancy watched the workers diving into subway entrances, emerging from them, only to plunge, like busy ants, into the office-buildings, hotels, and shops that bordered the square. The shops fascinated her, too. She was too new to the city, too unlearned in fashion's whimsicalities to know that the hats and gowns and men's clothing shown in these windows were the last thing in the bizarre.

It was quite exciting being ushered into a private office in the Thespian National Bank. But when it came to writing down the name: "Florine Ladue," she hesitated for a moment. It seemed immoral, wrong. But the hesitation was momentary. Firmly she wrote the _nom de théâtre_. It was the name that she intended to make famous, to see emblazoned in electric lights. It was the name of a person who had nothing in common with one Clancy Deane, of Zenith, Maine.

She deposited six hundred and fifty dollars, received a bank-book and a leather-bound folding check-book, and strolled out upon Broadway with a feeling of importance that had not been hers when she had had cash in her pocketbook. The fact that she possessed the right to order the great Thespian Bank to pay her bills seemed to confer upon her a financial standing. She wished that she could pay a bill right now.

She entered a drug store a block from the bank and looked in the telephone-book. Mademoiselle DeLisle had neglected to write upon the card of introduction Morris Beiner's address. For a moment, Clancy felt a sick sensation in the pit of her stomach. A doubt that, up to now, had never entered her head assailed her. Suppose that Mr. Beiner had gone into some other business in some other city! Suppose he'd died!

She sighed with relief when she found his name. There it was: "Beiner, Morris, Theatrical Agt., Heberworth B'ld'g. Bryant, 99087."

The condescending young gentleman at the soda-fountain affably told her that the Heberworth Building was just round the corner, on Forty-fifth Street. To it, Clancy made her way.

The elevator took her to the fifth floor, where, the street bulletin had informed her, Morris Beiner's office was located. There was his name, on the door of room 506. For a moment, Clancy stood still, staring at the name. It was a name, Fanchon DeLisle had assured her, with a certainty that had dispelled all doubt, owned by a man who would unlock for Clancy the doors to fame and fortune.

Yet Clancy trembled. It had been all very well, tied to a typewriting machine in Zenith, to visualize fame and fortune in far-off New York. It took no great imagination. But to be in New York, about to take the first step--that was different.

She half turned back toward the elevator. Then across her mind flashed a picture, a composite picture, of aunt Hetty, of Mr. Frank Miller, of a score of other Zenith people who had known her since infancy. And the composite face was grinning, and its brazen voice was saying, "I told you so."

She shook her head. She'd never go back to Zenith. That was the one outstanding sure thing in a world of uncertainties. She tossed her head now. What a silly little thing she was! Why, hadn't even Fay Marston last night told her that her skin alone would make her a film success? And didn't she herself _know_ that she had talent to back up her good looks? This was a fine time to be nervous! She crossed the hall and knocked upon the door.

A harsh voice bade her enter. She opened the door and stepped inside. It was a small office to which she had come. It contained a roll-top desk, of an old-fashioned type, two chairs, a shabby leather couch, half hidden beneath somewhat dusty theatrical magazines, and two filing-cases, one at either end of the couch. The couch itself was placed against the further wall, before a rather wide window that opened upon a fire-escape.

A man was seated in a swivel chair before the roll-top desk. He was tilted back, and his feet were resting comfortably upon an open drawer. He was almost entirely bald, and his scalp was red and shiny. His nose was stubby and his lips, thick, gross-looking, were clamped over a moist cigar. He was in his shirt-sleeves, and Clancy noticed that the noisily striped shirt he wore, although there was an ornate monogram upon the left sleeve, was of a flimsy and cheap grade of silk.

"Welcome to our city, chicken!" was his greeting. "Sit down and take a load off your feet."

His huge chest, padded with fat, shook with merriment at his own witticism.

"Is this Mr. Beiner?" asked Clancy. From her face and voice she kept disgust.

"Not to you, dearie," said the man. "I'm 'Morris' to my friends, and that's what you and I are goin' to be, eh?"

She colored, hating herself for that too easy flow of blood to cheek and throat.

"Why--why--that's very kind of you," she stammered.

Beiner waved his cigar grandiloquently.

"Bein' kind to pretty fillies is the best thing I do. What can I do for you?"

"Mademoiselle"--Clancy painfully articulated each syllable of the French word according to the best pronunciation taught in the Zenith High School--"Fanchon DeLisle gave me a card to you."

Beiner nodded.

"Oh, yes. How is Fanchon? How'd you happen to meet her?"

"In my home town in Maine," answered Clancy. "She was ill with the 'flu,' and we got right well acquainted. She told me that you'd get me into the movies."

Beiner eyed her appraisingly.

"Well, I've done stranger things than that," he chuckled. "What's your name, dearie?"

Clancy had read quite a bit of New York, of Broadway. Also, she had had an experience in the free-and-easy familiarity of Broadway's folk last night. Although she colored again at the "dearie," she did not resent it in speech.

"Florine Ladue," she replied.

Beiner laughed.

"What's that? Spanish for Maggie Smith? It's all right, kid. Don't get mad. I'm a great joker, I am. Florine Ladue you say it is, and Florine Ladue it'll be. Well, Florine, what makes you want to go into the movies?"

Clancy looked bewildered.

"Why--why does any one want to do anything?"

"God knows!" said Beiner. "Especially if the 'any one' is a young, pretty girl. But still, people do want to do something, and I'm one guy that helps some of 'em do it. Ever been in the movies at all?" Clancy shook her head. "Done any acting?"

"I played in 'The Rivals' at the high-school graduation," she confessed.

"Well, we'll keep that a dark secret," said Beiner. "You're an amachoor, eh? And Fanchon DeLisle gave you a card to me."

"Here it is," said Clancy. She produced the card from her pocketbook and handed it to the agent. Her fingers shook.

Beiner took the card, glanced at it carelessly, and dropped it upon his desk.

"From the country, eh? Ingénue, eh?" He pronounced it "anjenoo." He tapped his stubby, broken-nailed fingers upon the edge of his desk. "Well, I shouldn't wonder if I could place you," he said. "I know a couple companies that are hot after a real anjenoo. That's nice skin you have. Turn round."

Clancy stifled an impulse to laugh hysterically. Tears were very close. To be appraised by this gross man---- Nevertheless, she turned slowly round, feeling the man's coarse eyes roving up and down the lines of her figure.

"You got the looks, and you got the shape," said Beiner. "You ain't too big, and you ain't too small. 'Course, I can't tell how you'll photograph. Only a test will show. Still----" He picked up the desk telephone and asked for a number.

"Hildebloom there? This is Beiner talking. Say, Frank, you wanted an anjenoo, didn't you? I got a girl here in the office now that might do.... Yes; she's a peach. Fresh stuff, too. Just in from the country, with the bloom all on.... Bring her around? At six? You made a date, feller."

He hung up the receiver and turned to the furiously blushing Clancy.

"You're lucky, kid. Frank Hildebloom, studio manager for Rosebush Pictures, asked me to keep my eyes open for some new girls. He's a queer bug, Frank. He don't want professionals. He wants amateurs. Claims most of the professionals have learned so many tricks that it's impossible to unlearn them. I'll take you over to him. Come back here at five."

Somehow or other, Clancy found herself outside the office, found herself in the elevator, in the street down-stairs. She'd expected much; she had come to New York with every confidence of achieving a great success. But doubts linger unbidden in the hearts of the most hopeful, the most ambitious, the most confident. To have those recreant doubts scattered on the very first day! Of course she'd photograph well. Hadn't she always taken good pictures? Of course, moving pictures were different; still---- She wished that there were some one whom she knew intimately--to whom she could go and pour out the excitement that was welling within her. What an angel Fanchon DeLisle had been! Poor Fanchon--a soubrette in a cheap burlesque company! But she, Clancy Deane--she was forgetting. She, Florine Ladue, would "do something" for Fanchon DeLisle, who had set her feet upon the path to fortune.

She didn't know what she'd do, but she'd do something. She beheld a vision, in which Fanchon DeLisle embraced her with tears, thanked her. She endowed a school for film-acting in Zenith, Maine.

She walked through Forty-second Street to Fifth Avenue. She boarded a passing 'bus and rode up-town. She did not know the names of the hotels she passed, the great mansions, but--famous actresses were received everywhere, had social position equal to the best. In a year or so, she would ride up the avenue in her own limousine. At Grant's Tomb, she left the 'bus. She walked along Riverside Drive, marveling at the Palisades.

Hunger attacked her, and she lunched at Claremont, thrilling with excitement, and careless of prices upon the menu. She was going into the movies! What did a couple of dollars more or less matter to her?

Still moving in a glowing haze, out of which her name in brilliant electric lights thrust itself, she returned in mid-afternoon to the Napoli. Carefully she bathed herself. As meticulously as though she were going to her wedding, she dressed herself in fresh linen, in her best pair of silk stockings. She buttoned herself into her prettiest waist, brushed the last speck of lint from her blue suit, adjusted her hat to the most fascinatingly coquettish angle, and set forth for the Heberworth Building.

At its doorway, she stepped aside just in time to avoid being knocked down by a man leaving the building in great haste. The man turned to apologize. He wore a bandage across one eye, and his hat was pulled down over his face. Nevertheless, that mop of dark hair rendered him recognizable anywhere. It was Zenda!

For a moment, she feared recognition. But the movie director was thinking of other things than pretty girls. Her hat shielded her face, too. With a muttered, "Beg pardon," Zenda moved on.

He had not seen her--this time. But another time? For years to come, she was to be in a business where, necessarily, she must come into contact with a person so eminent in that business as Zenda. Then, once again, common sense reasserted itself. She had done nothing wrong. She could prove her lack of knowledge of the character of Fay Marston and her husband. Her pretty face was defiant as she entered the Heberworth Building.