The Moving Picture Girls at Rocky Ranch | Page 6

I was too quick for him!" declared the tester.
Harry Wilson had no more to say. His bravado deserted him and he was now in abject fear.
"What have you to say for yourself?" demanded Mr. Pertell, angrily.
The other did not answer.
"Now, you get out of here!" ordered the manager, "and never come back."
"I'll not go until I get what is coming to me," was the sullen retort.
"If you got what is coming to you it would be arrest!" declared Walsh.
"I want my money!" mumbled Wilson.
"Here is an order on the cashier for it," said Mr. Pertell. "Get it and--go!"
Hastily writing on a slip of paper, he tendered it to the actor, who took it without a word, and slunk off. The others watched him curiously. It was something they had never before witnessed--an attempt to gain possession of the secrets of the company--for a moving picture concern guards its films jealously, until they are "released," or ready for reproduction.
"Curious," remarked Mr. Pertell, "but I had a distrust of that chap from the first. Do any of you know him?"
"I acted mit him vunce in der Universal company, but he dit not stay long," said Mr. Switzer.
"Probably he was up to some underhand work," observed Walsh.
"I wonder what his object was?" went on the manager. "He evidently wasn't doing this for himself." Idly he turned over the scrap of paper on which the other had been making notes in the testing room. Then the manager uttered a cry of surprise.
"Ha! The International Picture Company! This is part of one of their letter heads. So Wilson was working for them! They very likely sent him here to get a position, and instructed him to steal some of our secrets and ideas, if he could. The scoundrel!"
"He didn't see much!" chuckled Walsh. "The film broke after a few feet had been run off, and I switched on the lights. He didn't see a great deal."
"No, his notes show that," said the manager. "But only for that accident he might have learned of our plans and given our rivals information sufficient to spoil our big play."
"Have you new plans?" asked Mr. DeVere, who was on very friendly terms with the manager.
"Yes, we are going to make a big three-reel play, called 'East and West,' and while some of the scenes will be laid in New York, the main ones will be filmed out beyond the Mississippi. One of the most important New York scenes has already been made. It was this one which was being tested when Wilson went in there. Had he seen it all he might have guessed at the rest of our plans and our rivals, the International people, would have been able to get ahead of us. They are always on the alert to take the ideas of other concerns. But I think I'll beat them this time."
"So we are to go West; eh?" queried Mr. DeVere.
"Yes, out on what prairies are left, in some rather wild sections, and I think we will make the best views we have yet had," responded Mr. Pertell. "Now, if you please, ladies and gentlemen, take your places, and go on with your acts. I am sorry this interruption distracted you."
CHAPTER III
A DARING FEAT
"Oh, Ruth, did you hear? We are to go out West!"
"Are you glad, Alice?"
"Indeed I am. Why, we can see Indians and cowboys, and ride bucking broncos and all that. Oh, it's perfectly delightful!" and Alice, who had been taking down her jacket, held it in her arms, as one might clasp a dancing partner, and swept about the now almost deserted studio in a hesitation waltz.
"Can't I come in on that?" cried Paul Ardite, as he began to whistle, keeping time with Alice's steps.
"No, indeed, I'm too tired," she answered, with a laugh. "Oh, but to think of going West! I've always wanted to!"
"Alice always says that, whenever a new location is decided on," observed Ruth, with a quiet smile.
The work of the day was over, and most of the players had gone home. Ruth and Alice were waiting for their father, who was in Mr. Pertell's office. They had intended going shopping, thinking Mr. DeVere would be detained, but he had said he would be with them directly.
And the two girls had brought up the subject of the new line of work, broached by Mr. Pertell in mentioning the matter of the spy.
"I hope nothing comes of that incident," said Mr. DeVere, as he came from the manager's office, while Ruth and Alice finished their preparations for the street.
"I hope not, either," returned the manager, slipping into his coat, for, like many busy men, he worked best in his shirt sleeves. "Yet I don't like it, and I am frank to confess that the International concern has more than once