Planet, Bowie C . . . Tennessee Judge, married Elsie Wilson Denver; small copper lead interests. . . . Anaconda? unlucky oil speculator . . . member one-horse lawfirm Planet and Wilson, Springfield, Illinois.
“All right, Miss Rosenthal,” he said when there was a knock at the door. She went off into the other room with the filing card.
Morton opened the door to let in a roundfaced man with a black felt hat and a cigar.
“Hello, judge,” Ward said, getting to his feet and holding out his hand. “How’s everything? Won’t you sit down?” Judge Planet advanced slowly into the room. He had a curious rolling gait as if his feet hurt him. They shook hands, and Judge Planet found himself sitting facing the steelbright light that came through the big windows back of Moorehouse’s desk.
“Won’t you have a cup of tea, sir?” asked Morton, who advanced slowly with a tray glittering with silver teathings. The judge was so surprised that he let the long ash that he’d been carrying on his cigar to prove to himself he was sober drop off on his bulging vest. The judge’s face remained round and bland. It was the face of a mucker from which all the lines of muckerdom had been carefully massaged away. The judge found himself sipping a cup of lukewarm tea with milk in it.
“Clears the head, judge, clears the head,” said Ward, whose cup was cooling untasted before him.
Judge Planet puffed silently on his cigar.
“Well, sir,” he said, “I’m very glad to see you.”
At that moment Morton announced Mr. Barrow, a skinny man with popeyes and a big adamsapple above a stringy necktie. He had a nervous manner of speaking and smoked too many cigarettes. He had the look of being stained with nicotine all over, face, fingers, teeth yellow.
On Ward’s desk there was another little filing card that read:
Barrow, G. H., labor connections, reformer type. Once sec. Bro. locomotive engineers; unreliable.
As he got to his feet he turned the card over. After he’d shaken hands with Mr. Barrow, placed him facing the light and encumbered him with a cup of tea, he began to talk.
“Capital and labor,” he began in a slow careful voice as if dictating, “as you must have noticed, gentlemen, in the course of your varied and useful careers, capital and labor, those two great forces of our national life neither of which can exist without the other are growing further and further apart; any cursory glance at the newspapers will tell you that. Well, it has occurred to me that one reason for this unfortunate state of affairs has been the lack of any private agency that might fairly present the situation to the public. The lack of properly distributed information is the cause of most of the misunderstandings in this world . . . The great leaders of American capital, as you probably realize, Mr. Barrow, are firm believers in fairplay and democracy and are only too anxious to give the worker his share of the proceeds of industry if they can only see their way to do so in fairness to the public and the investor. After all, the public is the investor whom we all aim to serve.”
“Sometimes,” said Mr. Barrow, “but hardly . . .”
“Perhaps you gentlemen would have a whisky and soda.” Morton stood sleekhaired between them with a tray on which were decanters, tall glasses full of ice and some open splits of Apollinaris.
“I don’t mind if I do,” said Judge Planet.
Morton padded out, leaving them each with a clinking glass. Outside the sky was beginning to glow with evening a little. The air was winecolored in the room. The glasses made things chattier. The judge chewed on the end of a fresh cigar.
“Now, let’s see if I’m getting you right, Mr. Moorehouse. You feel that with your connections with advertising and big business you want to open up a new field in the shape of an agency to peaceably and in a friendly fashion settle labor disputes. Just how would you go about it?”
“I am sure that organized labor would coöperate in such a movement,” said G. H. Barrow, leaning forward on the edge of his chair. “If only they could be sure that . . . well, that . . .”
“That they weren’t getting the wool pulled over their eyes,” said the judge, laughing.
“Exactly.”
“Well, gentlemen, I’m going to put my cards right down on the table. The great motto upon which I have built up my business has always been coöperation.”
“I certainly agree with you there,” said the judge, laughing again and slapping his knee. “The difficult question is how to bring about that happy state.”
“Well, the first step is to establish contact . . . Right at this moment under our very eyes we see friendly contact being established.”
“I must admit,” said G. H. Barrow with an uneasy laugh, “I never expected to be drinking a highball with a member of the firm of Planet and Wilson.”
The judge slapped his fat thigh. “You mean on account of the Colorado trouble . . . ? You needn’t be afraid. I won’t eat you, Mr. Barrow . . . But, frankly, Mr. Moorehouse, this doesn’t seem to me to be just the time to launch your little project.”
“This war in Europe . . .” began G. H. Barrow.
“Is America’s great opportunity . . . You know the proverb about when thieves fall out . . . Just at present I admit we find ourselves in a moment of doubt and despair, but as soon as American business recovers from the first shock and begins to pull itself together . . . Why, gentlemen, I just came back from Europe; my wife and I sailed the day Great Britain declared war . . . I can tell you it was a narrow squeak . . . Of one thing I can assure you with comparative certainty, whoever wins, Europe will be economically ruined. This war is America’s great opportunity. The very fact of our neutrality . . .” “I don’t see who will be benefited outside of the munitionsmakers,” said G. H. Barrow.
Ward talked a long time, and then looked at his watch, that lay on the desk before him, and got to his feet. “Gentlemen, I’m afraid you’ll have to excuse me. I have just time to dress for dinner.” Morton was already standing beside the desk with their hats. It had gotten dark in the room. “Lights, please, Morton,” snapped Ward. As they went out Judge Planet said, “Well, it’s been a very pleasant chat, Mr. Moorehouse, but I’m afraid your schemes are a little idealistic.” “I’ve rarely heard a business man speak with such sympathy and understanding of the labor situation,” said G. H. Barrow. “I only voice the sentiments of my clients,” said Ward as he bowed them out.
Next day he spoke at a Rotary Club luncheon on “Labor Troubles: A Way Out.” He sat at a long table in the big hotel banquet hall full of smells of food and cigarettes, and scurrying waiters. He spread the food a little round his plate with a fork, answering when he was spoken to, joking a little with Judge Planet, who sat opposite him, trying to formulate sentences out of the haze of phrases in his mind. At last it was time for him to get to his feet. He stood at the end of the long table with a cigar in his hand, looking at the two rows of heavyjowled faces turned towards him.
“When I was a boy down along the Delaware . . .” He stopped. A tremendous clatter of dishes was coming from behind the swinging doors through which waiters were still scuttling with trays. The man who had gone to the door to make them keep quiet came stealthily back. You could hear his shoes creak across the parquet floor. Men leaned forward along the table. Ward started off again. He was going on now; he hardly knew what he was saying, but he had raised a laugh out of them. The tension relaxed. “American business has been slow to take advantage of the possibilities of modern publicity . . . education of the public and of employers and employees, all equally servants of the public . . . Coöperation . . . stockownership giving the employee an interest in the industry . . . avoiding the grave dangers of socialism and demagoguery and worse . . . It is in such a situation that the public relations counsel can step in in a quiet manly way and say, Look here, men, let’s talk this over eye to eye . . . But his main importance is in times of industrial peace . . . when two men are sore and just about to hit one another is no time to preach public service to them . . . The time for an educational campaign and
an oral crusade that will drive home to the rank and file of the mighty colossus of American uptodate industry is right now, today.”
There was a great deal of clapping. He sat down and sought out Judge Planet’s face with his blue-eyed smile. Judge Planet looked impressed.
Newsreel XVI
the Philadelphian had completed the thirteenth lap and was two miles away on the fourteenth. His speed it is thought must have been between a hundred and a hundred and ten miles an hour. His car wavered for a flash and then careered to the left. It struck a slight elevation and jumped. When the car alighted it was on four wheels atop of a high embankment. Its rush apparently was unimpeded. Wishart turned the car off the embankment and attempted to regain the road. The speed would not permit the slight turn necessary, however, and the car plowed through the frontyard of a farmer residing on the course. He escaped one tree but was brought up sideways against another. The legs being impeded by the steering gear they were torn from the trunk as he was thrown through
I want to go
To Mexico
Under the stars and stripes to fight the foe
SNAPS CAMERA; ENDS LIFE
gay little chairs and tables stand forlornly on the sidewalk for there are few people feeling rich enough to take even a small drink
PLUMBER HAS 100 LOVES
BRINGS MONKEYS HOME
missing rector located losses in U S crop report let baby go naked if you want it to be healthy if this mystery is ever solved you will find a woman at the bottom of the mystery said Patrolman E. B. Garfinkle events leading up to the present war run continuously back to the French Revolution
UNIVERSITY EXPELS GUM
they seemed to stagger like drunken men suddenly hit between the eyes after which they made a run for us shouting some outlandish cry we could not make out
And the ladies of the harem
Knew exactly how to wear ’em
In oriental Baghdad long ago.
The Camera Eye (23)
this friend of mother’s was a very lovely woman with lovely blond hair and she had two lovely daughters the blond one married an oil man who was bald as the palm of your hand and went to live in Sumatra the dark one married a man from Bogota and it was a long trip in a dugout canoe up the Magdalena River and the natives were Indians and slept in hammocks and had such horrible diseases and when the woman had a baby it was the husband who went to bed and used poisoned arrows and if you got a wound in that country it never healed but festered white and maturated and the dugout tipped over so easily into the warm steamy water full of ravenous fish that if you had a scratch on you or an unhealed wound it was the smell of blood attracted them sometimes they tore people to pieces
it was eight weeks up the Magdalena River in dugout canoes and then you got to Bogota
poor Jonas Fenimore came home from Bogota a very sick man and they said it was elephantiasis he was a good fellow and told stories about the steamy jungle and the thunderstorms and the crocodiles and the horrible diseases and the ravenous fish and he drank up all the whisky in the sideboard and when he went in swimming you could see that there were brown thick blotches on his legs like the scale on an apple and he liked to drink whisky and he talked about Colombia becoming one of the richest countries in the world and oil and rare woods for veneering and tropical butterflies
but the trip up the Magdalena River was too long and too hot and too dangerous and he died
they said it was whisky and elephantiasis
and the Magdalena River
Eleanor Stoddard
When they first arrived in New York, Eleanor, who’d never been East before, had to rely on Eveline for everything. Freddy met them at the train and took them to get rooms at the Brevoort. He said it was a little far from the theater but much more interesting than an uptown hotel, all the artists and radicals and really interesting people stayed there and it was very French. Going down in the taxi he chattered about the lovely magnificent play and his grand part, and what a fool the director Ben Freelby was, and how one of the backers had only put up half the money he’d promised; but that Josephine Gilchrist, the business manager, had the sum virtually lined up now and the Shuberts were interested and they would open out of town at Greenwich exactly a month from today. Eleanor looked out at Fifth Avenue and the chilly Spring wind blowing women’s skirts, a man chasing a derby hat, the green buses, taxicabs, the shine on shopwindows; after all, this wasn’t so very different from Chicago. But at lunch at the Brevoort it was very different, Freddy seemed to know so many people and introduced them to everybody as if he was very proud of them. They were all names she had heard or read of in the book column of The Daily News. Everybody seemed very friendly. Freddy talked French to the waiter and the hollandaise sauce was the most delicious she had ever eaten.
That afternoon on the way to rehearsal, Eleanor had her first glimpse of Times Square out of the taxicab window. In the dark theater they found the company sitting waiting for Mr. Freelby. It was very mysterious, with just a single big electric light bulb hanging over the stage and the set for some other play looking all flat and dusty.
A grayhaired man with a broad sad face and big circles under his eyes came in. That was the famous Benjamin Freelby; he had a tired fatherly manner and asked Eveline and Eleanor up to his apartment to dinner with Freddy that night so that they could talk at their ease about the settings and the costumes. Eleanor was relieved that he was so kind and tired and thought that after all she and Eveline were much better dressed than any of those New York actresses. Mr. Freelby made a great fuss about there being no lights; did they expect him to rehearse in the dark? The stagemanager with the manuscript in his hand ran round looking for the electrician and somebody was sent to call up the office. Mr. Freelby walked about the stage and fretted and fumed and said, “This is monstrous.” When the electrician arrived wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, and finally switched on the houselights and some spots, Mr. Freelby had to have a table and chair and a reading light on the table. Nobody seemed to be able to find a chair the right height for him. He kept fuming up and down, tugging at his coarse gray hair and saying, “This is monstrous.” At last he got settled and he said to Mr. Stein, the stagemanager, a lanky man who sat in another chair near him, “We’ll start with act one, Mr. Stein. Has everybody their parts?” Several actors got on the stage and stood around and the rest talked in low voices. Mr. Freelby “shushed” them and said, “Please, children, we’ve got to be quiet,” and the rehearsal was in progress.
From that time on everything was a terrible rush. Eleanor never seemed to get to bed. The scenepainter, Mr. Bridgeman, at whose studios the scenery was painted found objections to everything; it turned out that someone else, a pale young man with glasses who worked for Mr. Bridgeman, would have to design the scenery from their sketches and that they couldn’t have their names in the program at all except for the costumes on account of not belonging to the scene designers’ union. When they weren’t wrangling at the Bridgeman Studios they were dashing about the streets in taxicabs with samples of materials. They never seemed to get to bed before four or five in the morning. Everybody was so temperamental and Eleanor had quite a siege each week to get a check out of Miss Gilchrist.
When the costumes were ready, all in early Victorian style, and Eleanor and Freddy and Mr. Freelby went to see them at the costumers’ they really looked lovely but the costumers wouldn’t deliver them without a check and nobody could find Miss Gilchrist and everybody was running round in taxis and at last late that night Mr. Freelby said he’d give his personal check. The transfer company had its trucks at the door with the scenery but wouldn’t let the flats be carried into the theater until they had a check. Mr. Bridgeman was there, too, saying his check had come back marked no funds and he and Mr. Freelby had words in the boxoffice. At last Josephine Gilchrist appeared in a taxi with five hundred dollars in bills on account for Mr. Bridgeman and for the transfer company. Everybody smiled when they saw the crisp orangebac
ked bills. It was a great relief.
When they had made sure that the scenery was going into the theater, Eleanor and Eveline and Freddy Seargeant and Josephine Gilchrist and Mr. Freelby all went to Bustanoby’s to get a bite to eat and Mr. Freelby set them up to a couple of bottles of Pol Roger and Josephine Gilchrist said that she felt it in her bones that the play would be a hit and that didn’t often happen with her, and Freddy said the stagehands liked it and that was always a good sign and Mr. Freelby said Ike Gold, the Shuberts’ officeboy, had sat through the runthrough with the tears running down his cheeks, but nobody knew what theater they’d open in after a week in Greenwich and a week in Hartford and Mr. Freelby said he’d go and talk to J. J. about it personally first thing in the morning.
Friends from Chicago called up who wanted to get into the dress rehearsal. It made Eleanor feel quite important, especially when Sally Emerson called up. The dress rehearsal dragged terribly, half the scenery hadn’t come and the Wessex villagers didn’t have any costumes, but everybody said that it was a good sign to have a bad dress rehearsal.
Opening night Eleanor didn’t get any supper and had only a half an hour to dress in. She was icy all over with excitement. She hoped the new chartreuse tulle evening dress she’d charged at Tappé’s looked well but she didn’t have time to worry. She drank a cup of black coffee and it seemed as if the taxi never would get uptown. When she got to the theater the lobby was all lit up and full of silk hats and bare powdered backs and diamonds and eveningwraps and all the firstnighters looked at each other and waved to their friends and talked about who was there and kept trooping up the aisle half way through the first act. Eleanor and Eveline stood stiffly side by side in the back of the theater and nudged each other when a costume looked good and agreed that the actors were too dreadful and that Freddy Seargeant was the worst. At the party that Sally Emerson gave for them afterwards at the duplex apartment of her friends the Careys everybody said that the scenery and costumes were lovely and that they were sure the play would be a great success. Eleanor and Eveline were the center of everything and Eleanor was annoyed because Eveline drank a little too much and was noisy. Eleanor met a great many interesting people and decided that she’d stay on in New York whatever happened.