“Coffee now, or with dessert? Gary, don’t you dare look question marks at me! I can’t have your mind distracted with food while I’m telling you the most wonderful thing in the world. Moreover, this dinner deserves a little appreciation.” Patricia’s lips trembled, but only because she was tired and excited and happy. Her happiness would have been quite apparent to a blind man.
I do not mean to hint that Patricia deliberately fed Gary to repletion with the things he liked best, before imparting her won-derful surprise. She had frequently cooked nice little dinners for him when there was nothing surprising to follow. But it is a fact that when she had stacked the dishes neatly away for a later washing, and returned the dining table to its ordinary library-table guise, Gary looked as if nothing on earth could disturb him. Mental, emotional and physical content permeated the atmosphere of his immediate neighborhood. Patricia sat down and laid her arms upon the table, and studied Gary, biting her lips to hide their quiver.
CHAPTER TWO
PATRICIA EXPLAINS
Womanlike, Patricia began in a somewhat roundabout fashion and in a tone not far from cajolery.
“Gary! You do know all about ranch life and raising cattle and hay and horses and so on, don’t you?”
Gary was lighting a cigarette. If he had learned the “picture value” of holding a pose, he was at least unconscious of his deliberation in waving out the match flame before he replied. His was a profile very effective in close-ups against the firelight. Holding a pose comes to be second nature to an actor who has to do those things for a living.
“Dad would rather feature the so-on stuff. Subtitle, father saying, ‘You ain’t much on raisin’ cattle but you’re shore an expert at raisin’ hell!’ Cut back to son on horse at gate, gazing wistfully toward house. Sighs. Turns away. Iris out, son riding away into dusk. Why?”
“Fathers are like that. Of course you know all about those things. You were raised on a ranch. Have you landed that contract with Mills yet, to play Western leads?”
“Not yet—Mills is waiting for his chief to come on from New York. He’s due here about the First. I was talking with Mills to-day, and he says he’s morally certain they’ll give me a company of my own and put on Western Features. You know what that would mean, Pat—a year’s contract for me. And we could get married——”
“Yes, never mind that, since you haven’t landed it.” Patricia drew in her breath. “Well, you know what I think of the movie game; we’ve thrashed that all out, times enough. I simply can’t see my husband making movie love to various and sundry females who sob and smile and smirk at him for so many dollars per. We’ll skip that. Also my conviction that the movies are lowering—cheapening to any full-sized man. Smirking and frowning before a camera, and making mushy love for kids on the front seats to stamp and whistle at—well, never mind; we won’t go into that at this time.