The Moving Picture Girls Snowbound | Page 2

are you so anxious?"

"I want some money, sister mine, and daddy promised to bring my
moving picture salary up with him. I wanted to do a little shopping
before the stores close. But I'm afraid it's too late now," the girl added,
ruefully. "Daddy said he'd be here in plenty of time, and he never
disappointed me before."
"Oh, if that's all you're worrying about, I'll lend you some money."
"Will you, really? Then I'll get ready and go. There's that little French
shop just around the corner. They keep open after the others. Madame
Morey is so thrifty, and there was the sweetest shirt waist in the
window the other day. I hope it isn't gone! I'll get ready at once. You be
getting out the money, Ruth, dear. Is there anything I can get for you?
It's awfully kind of you. Shall I bring back anything for supper?"
"Gracious, what a rattlebox you're getting to be, Alice," spoke Ruth,
soberly, as she laid aside her sewing and went to the bureau for her
pocketbook.
"That's half of life!" laughed the younger girl. "Quick, Ruth, I want to
get out and get back, and be here when daddy comes. I want to hear all
about the new plans for taking moving picture plays. Is that the money?
Thanks! I'm off!" and the girl fairly rushed down the hall of the
apartment. Ruth heard her call a greeting to Mrs. Dalwood, who lived
across the corridor--a cheery greeting, in her fresh, joyous voice.
"Dear little sister!" murmured Ruth, as she sat with folded hands,
looking off into space and meditating. "She enjoys life!"
And certainly Alice DeVere did. Not that Ruth did not also; but it was
in a different way. Alice was of a more lively disposition, and her
father said she reminded him every day more and more of her dead
mother. Ruth had an element of romanticism in her character, which
perhaps accounted for her dreaminess at times. In the work of acting
and posing for moving pictures, which was what the two girls, and their
father, a veteran actor, were engaged in, Ruth always played the
romantic parts, while nothing so rejoiced Alice as to have a hoydenish
part to enact.

Alice hastened along the streets, now covered with a film of newly
fallen snow. It was sifting down from a leaden sky, and the clouds had
added to the darkness which was already coming that November
evening.
"Oh, it's good to be alive, such weather as this!" Alice exulted as she
hastened along, the crisp air and the exercise bringing to her cheeks a
deeper bloom. Her eyes shone, and there was so much of life and youth
and vitality in her that, as she hastened along through the falling snow,
which dusted itself on her furs, more than one passerby turned to look
at her in admiration. She was a "moving picture" in herself.
She lingered long in the quaint little French shop, there were so many
bargains in the way of lingerie. Alice looked at many longingly, and
turned some over more longingly, but she thought of her purse, and
knew it would not stand the strain to which she contemplated putting it.
"I'll just have to wait about the others, Madame," she said, with a sigh.
"I've really bought more now than I intended."
"I hope zat Mademoiselle will come often!" laughed the French
woman.
Back through the streets, now covered with snow, hastened Alice,
tripping lightly, and now and then, when she thought no one was
watching her, she took a little run and slide, as in the days of her
childhood. Not that she was much more than a child still, being only a
little over fifteen. Ruth was two years her senior, but Ruth considered
herself quite "grown up."
"I wonder if daddy has come back yet?" Alice mused, as she hastened
on to the apartment. "That looks like Russ Dalwood ahead of me," she
went on, referring to the son of the neighbor across the hall. Russ
"filmed," or made the moving pictures for the company by whom Mr.
DeVere and his daughters were engaged. "Yes, it is Russ!" the girl
exclaimed. "He has probably come right from the studio, and he'll
know about daddy. Russ! Russ!" she called, as she came nearer to the
young man.

He turned, and a welcoming smile lighted his face.
"Oh, hello, Alice!" he greeted, genially. "Where's Ruth?"
"Just for that I shan't tell you! Don't you want to walk with me?" she
asked, archly. "Why must you always ask for Ruth when I meet you
alone?"
"I didn't! I mean--I--er----"
"Oh, don't try to make it any worse!" she laughed at his discomfiture.
"Let it go at that! Did you just come from