Nan had come away from the apartment of her friend, "the Moving Picture Queen," as Walter called her, that afternoon, with the address of the studio and a letter to Madam's assistant, Mr. Gray. The next morning, she and Bess went to the studio to make inquiries about the runaway girls. They went alone because Grace had much to do before returning to school; and now their day of departure for Lakeview was close at hand.
"And oh! how I hate to go back to those horrid studies again," groaned Bess.
Nan laughed. "What a ridiculous girl you are, Bess Harley," she said.
"You were just crazy to go to Lakeview in the first place."
"Yes! wasn't I?" interposed Bess, gloomily. "But I didn't know I was crazy."
When once the chums came to the motion picture studio they had no thought for anything but their errand and the interesting things they saw on every side. At a high grilled gate a man let them into the courtyard after a glance at the outside of the letter Nan carried.
"You'll find Mr. Gray inside somewhere," said the gatekeeper. "You'll have to look for him."
Nan and Bess were timid, and they hesitated for some moments in the paved yard, uncertain which of the several doors to enter. They saw a number of girls and men enter through the gate as they had, and watched the men hurry to one door, and the women and girls to another.
"Lets follow those girls," suggested Bess, as a chattering trio went into the building. "We can't go far wrong, for the sheep and the goats seem to be separated," and she giggled.
"Meaning the men from the women?" said Nan. "I guess those doors lead to the dressing rooms."
She was right in this, for when the two friends stepped doubtfully into a long, high, white-plastered passage, which was quite empty, but out of which many doors opened, they heard a confusion of conversation and laughter from somewhere near.