Unfortunately the car at that moment failed to make a sharp turn, left the road, leaped a ditch, and brought up in a plowed field. It seemed a bad omen to begin with, and Tish, I think, so considered it.
“My nephew developed jaundice after an air ride, Mr. Stein,” she said as the driver backed the car onto the road, and we pulled Aggie from beneath the three of us. “An attack of jaundice on my part would hold up the picture indefinitely.”
But Mr. Stein was ready for that, as we later found him ready for every emergency.
“We’ve a doctor on the lot, Miss Carberry,” he said. “Specializes in jaundice. Don’t you worry at all.”
Looking back, both Aggie and I realize the significance of the remark he made on leaving us after having settled us at the hotel.
“We’ve made one or two changes in the story, Miss Carberry,” he said. “Nothing you will object to.” He smiled genially. “Have to give the scenario department something to do to earn their salaries!”
Had Tish not been preoccupied this would not have gone unchallenged. But she was staring up just then at the blue California sky, where an aviator was looping the loop, and so forth, and she made no comment.
When we recall our California experience, Aggie and I date our first disappointment from the following day, Tish’s first at the studio.
Though Tish cannot be termed a handsome woman, she has a certain majesty of mien, which has its own charm. Her new transformation, too, had softened certain of her facial angles, and we had felt that she would have real distinction on the screen. But it was to be otherwise, alas!
Aggie and I had been put out, and sat on the dressing-room steps, perspiring freely, while numerous people came and went from Tish’s room. We had heard of the great change effected by the make-up, and our hopes were high. We had not expected her to compete with the various beauties of the silver sheet, but we had expected to find her natural charms emphasized.