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The Pat Hobby Stories

Page 9

by F. Scott Fitzgerald


  Pat recognized Ward Wainwright.

  'Go in and look at it!' Wainwright roared. 'Look at it. Here's

  some ticket stubs! I think the prop boy directed it! Go and

  look!' To the doorman he said: 'It's all right! He wrote it. I

  wouldn't have my name on an inch of it.'

  Trembling with frustration, Wainwright threw up his hands and

  strode off into the curious crowd.

  Eleanor was terrified. But the same spirit that had inspired 'I'd

  do anything to get in the movies', kept her standing there--though

  she felt invisible fingers reaching forth to drag her back to

  Boise. She had been intending to run--hard and fast. The hard-

  boiled doorman and the tall stranger had crystallized her feelings

  that Pat was 'rather simple'. She would never let those red-rimmed

  eyes come close to her--at least for any more than a doorstep kiss.

  She was saving herself for somebody--and it wasn't Pat. Yet she

  felt that the lingering crowd was a tribute to her--such as she had

  never exacted before. Several times she threw a glance at the

  crowd--a glance that now changed from wavering fear into a sort of

  queenliness.

  She felt exactly like a star.

  Pat, too, was all confidence. This was HIS preview; all had been

  delivered into his hands: his name would stand alone on the screen

  when the picture was released. There had to be somebody's name,

  didn't there?--and Wainwright had withdrawn.

  SCREENPLAY BY PAT HOBBY.

  He seized Eleanor's elbow in a firm grasp and steered her

  triumphantly towards the door:

  'Cheer up, baby. That's the way it is. You see?'

  NO HARM TRYING

  Esquire (November 1940)

  Pat hobby's apartment lay athwart a delicatessen shop on Wilshire

  Boulevard. And there lay Pat himself, surrounded by his books--the

  Motion Picture Almanac of 1928 and Barton's Track Guide, 1939--by

  his pictures, authentically signed photographs of Mabel Normand and

  Barbara LaMarr (who, being deceased, had no value in the pawn-

  shops)--and by his dogs in their cracked leather oxfords, perched

  on the arm of a slanting settee.

  Pat was at "the end of his resources"--though this term is too

  ominous to describe a fairly usual condition in his life. He was

  an old-timer in pictures; he had once known sumptuous living, but

  for the past ten years jobs had been hard to hold--harder to hold

  than glasses.

  "Think of it," he often mourned. "Only a writer--at forty-nine."

  All this afternoon he had turned the pages of The Times and The

  Examiner for an idea. Though he did not intend to compose a motion

  picture from this idea, he needed it to get him inside a studio.

  If you had nothing to submit it was increasingly difficult to pass

  the gate. But though these two newspapers, together with Life,

  were the sources most commonly combed for "originals," they yielded

  him nothing this afternoon. There were wars, a fire in Topanga

  Canyon, press releases from the studios, municipal corruptions, and

  always the redeeming deeds of "The Trojuns," but Pat found nothing

  that competed in human interest with the betting page.

  --If I could get out to Santa Anita, he thought--I could maybe get

  an idea about the nags.

  This cheering idea was interrupted by his landlord, from the

  delicatessen store below.

  "I told you I wouldn't deliver any more messages," said Nick, "and

  STILL I won't. But Mr. Carl Le Vigne is telephoning in person from

  the studio and wants you should go over right away."

  The prospect of a job did something to Pat. It anesthetized the

  crumbled, struggling remnants of his manhood, and inoculated him

  instead with a bland, easygoing confidence. The set speeches and

  attitudes of success returned to him. His manner as he winked at a

  studio policeman, stopped to chat with Louie, the bookie, and

  presented himself to Mr. Le Vigne's secretary, indicated that he

  had been engaged with momentous tasks in other parts of the globe.

  By saluting Le Vigne with a facetious "Hel-LO Captain!" he behaved

  almost as an equal, a trusted lieutenant who had never really been

  away.

  "Pat, your wife's in the hospital," Le Vigne said. "It'll probably

  be in the papers this afternoon."

  Pat started.

  "My wife?" he said. "What wife?"

  "Estelle. She tried to cut her wrists."

  "Estelle!" Pat exclaimed. "You mean ESTELLE? Say, I was only

  married to her three weeks!"

  "She was the best girl you ever had," said Le Vigne grimly.

  "I haven't even heard of her for ten years."

  "You're hearing about her now. They called all the studios trying

  to locate you."

  "I had nothing to do with it."

  "I know--she's only been here a week. She had a run of hard luck

  wherever it was she lived--New Orleans? Husband died, child died,

  no money . . ."

  Pat breathed easier. They weren't trying to hang anything on him.

  "Anyhow she'll live," Le Vigne reassured him superfluously, "--and

  she was the best script girl on the lot once. We'd like to take

  care of her. We thought the way was give you a job. Not exactly a

  job, because I know you're not up to it." He glanced into Pat's

  red-rimmed eyes. "More of a sinecure."

  Pat became uneasy. He didn't recognize the word, but "sin"

  disturbed him and "cure" brought a whole flood of unpleasant

  memories.

  "You're on the payroll at two-fifty a week for three weeks," said

  Le Vigne, "--but one-fifty of that goes to the hospital for your

  wife's bill."

  "But we're divorced!" Pat protested. "No Mexican stuff either.

  I've been married since, and so has--"

  "Take it or leave it. You can have an office here, and if anything

  you can do comes up we'll let you know."

  "I never worked for a hundred a week."

  "We're not asking you to work. If you want you can stay home."

  Pat reversed his field.

  "Oh, I'll work," he said quickly. "You dig me up a good story and

  I'll show you whether I can work or not."

  Le Vigne wrote something on a slip of paper.

  "All right. They'll find you an office."

  Outside Pat looked at the memorandum.

  "Mrs. John Devlin," it read, "Good Samaritan Hospital."

  The very words irritated him.

  "Good Samaritan!" he exclaimed. "Good gyp joint! One hundred and

  fifty bucks a week!"

  Pat had been given many a charity job but this was the first one

  that made him feel ashamed. He did not mind not EARN-ing his

  salary, but not getting it was another matter. And he wondered if

  other people on the lot who were obviously doing nothing, were

  being fairly paid for it. There were, for example, a number of

  beautiful young ladies who walked aloof as stars, and whom Pat took

  for stock girls, until Eric, the callboy, told him they were

  imports from Vienna and Budapest, not yet cast for pictures. Did

  half their pay checks go to keep husbands they had only had for

  three weeks!

  The loveliest of these was Lizzette Sta
rheim, a violet-eyed little

  blonde with an ill-concealed air of disillusion. Pat saw her alone

  at tea almost every afternoon in the commissary--and made her

  acquaintance one day by simply sliding into a chair opposite.

  "Hello, Lizzette," he said. "I'm Pat Hobby, the writer."

  "Oh, hel-LO!"

  She flashed such a dazzling smile that for a moment he thought she

  must have heard of him.

  "When they going to cast you?" he demanded.

  "I don't know." Her accent was faint and poignant.

  "Don't let them give you the run-around. Not with a face like

  yours." Her beauty roused a rusty eloquence. "Sometimes they just

  keep you under contract till your teeth fall out, because you look

  too much like their big star."

  "Oh no," she said distressfully.

  "Oh yes!" he assured her. "I'm telling YOU. Why don't you go to

  another company and get borrowed? Have you thought of that idea?"

  "I think it's wonderful."

  He intended to go further into the subject but Miss Starheim looked

  at her watch and got up.

  "I must go now, Mr.--"

  "Hobby. Pat Hobby."

  Pat joined Dutch Waggoner, the director, who was shooting dice with

  a waitress at another table.

  "Between pictures, Dutch?"

  "Between pictures hell!" said Dutch. "I haven't done a picture for

  six months and my contract's got six months to run. I'm trying to

  break it. Who was the little blonde?"

  Afterwards, back in his office, Pat discussed these encounters with

  Eric the callboy.

  "All signed up and no place to go," said Eric. "Look at this Jeff

  Manfred, now--an associate producer! Sits in his office and sends

  notes to the big shots--and I carry back word they're in Palm

  Springs. It breaks my heart. Yesterday he put his head on his

  desk and boo-hoo'd."

  "What's the answer?" asked Pat.

  "Changa management," suggested Eric, darkly. "Shake-up coming."

  "Who's going to the top?" Pat asked, with scarcely concealed

  excitement.

  "Nobody knows," said Eric. "But wouldn't I like to land uphill!

  Boy! I want a writer's job. I got three ideas so new they're wet

  behind the ears."

  "It's no life at all," Pat assured him with conviction. "I'd trade

  with you right now."

  In the hall next day he intercepted Jeff Manfred who walked with

  the unconvincing hurry of one without a destination.

  "What's the rush, Jeff?" Pat demanded, falling into step.

  "Reading some scripts," Jeff panted without conviction.

  Pat drew him unwillingly into his office.

  "Jeff, have you heard about the shake-up?"

  "Listen now, Pat--" Jeff looked nervously at the walls. "What

  shake-up?" he demanded.

  "I heard that this Harmon Shaver is going to be the new boss,"

  ventured Pat, "Wall Street control."

  "Harmon Shaver!" Jeff scoffed. "He doesn't know anything about

  pictures--he's just a money man. He wanders around like a lost

  soul." Jeff sat back and considered. "Still--if you're RIGHT,

  he'd be a man you could get to." He turned mournful eyes on Pat.

  "I haven't been able to see Le Vigne or Barnes or Bill Behrer for a

  month. Can't get an assignment, can't get an actor, can't get a

  story." He broke off. "I've thought of drumming up something on

  my own. Got any ideas?"

  "Have I?" said Pat. "I got three ideas so new they're wet behind

  the ears."

  "Who for?"

  "Lizzette Starheim," said Pat, "with Dutch Waggoner directing--

  see?"

  "I'm with you all a hundred per cent," said Harmon Shaver. "This

  is the most encouraging experience I've had in pictures." He had a

  bright bond-salesman's chuckle. "By God, it reminds me of a circus

  we got up when I was a boy."

  They had come to his office inconspicuously like conspirators--Jeff

  Manfred, Waggoner, Miss Starheim and Pat Hobby.

  "You like the idea, Miss Starheim?" Shaver continued.

  "I think it's wonderful."

  "And you, Mr. Waggoner?"

  "I've heard only the general line," said Waggoner with director's

  caution, "but it seems to have the old emotional socko." He winked

  at Pat. "I didn't know this old tramp had it in him."

  Pat glowed with pride. Jeff Manfred, though he was elated, was

  less sanguine.

  "It's important nobody talks," he said nervously. "The Big Boys

  would find some way of killing it. In a week, when we've got the

  script done we'll go to them."

  "I agree," said Shaver. "They have run the studio so long that--

  well, I don't trust my own secretaries--I sent them to the races

  this afternoon."

  Back in Pat's office Eric, the callboy, was waiting. He did not

  know that he was the hinge upon which swung a great affair.

  "You like the stuff, eh?" he asked eagerly.

  "Pretty good," said Pat with calculated indifference.

  "You said you'd pay more for the next batch."

  "Have a heart!" Pat was aggrieved. "How many callboys get seventy-

  five a week?"

  "How many callboys can write?"

  Pat considered. Out of the two hundred a week Jeff Manfred was

  advancing from his own pocket, he had naturally awarded himself a

  commission of sixty per cent.

  "I'll make it a hundred," he said. "Now check yourself off the lot

  and meet me in front of Benny's bar."

  At the hospital, Estelle Hobby Devlin sat up in bed, overwhelmed by

  the unexpected visit.

  "I'm glad you came, Pat," she said, "you've been very kind. Did

  you get my note?"

  "Forget it," Pat said gruffly. He had never liked this wife. She

  had loved him too much--until she found suddenly that he was a poor

  lover. In her presence he felt inferior.

  "I got a guy outside," he said.

  "What for?"

  "I thought maybe you had nothing to do and you might want to pay me

  back for all this jack--"

  He waved his hand around the bare hospital room.

  "You were a swell script girl once. Do you think if I got a

  typewriter you could put some good stuff into continuity?"

  "Why--yes. I suppose I could."

  "It's a secret. We can't trust anybody at the studio."

  "All right," she said.

  "I'll send this kid in with the stuff. I got a conference."

  "All right--and--oh Pat--come and see me again."

  "Sure, I'll come."

  But he knew he wouldn't. He didn't like sickrooms--he lived in one

  himself. From now on he was done with poverty and failure. He

  admired strength--he was taking Lizzette Starheim to a wrestling

  match that night.

  In his private musings Harmon Shaver referred to the showdown as

  "the surprise party." He was going to confront Le Vigne with a

  fait accompli and he gathered his coterie before phoning Le Vigne

  to come over to his office.

  "What for?" demanded Le Vigne. "Couldn't you tell me now--I'm busy

  as hell."

  This arrogance irritated Shaver--who was here to watch over the

  interests of Eastern stockholders.

  "I don't ask much," he said sharply, "I let y
ou fellows laugh at me

  behind my back and freeze me out of things. But now I've got

  something and I'd like you to come over."

  "All right--all right."

  Le Vigne's eyebrows lifted as he saw the members of the new

  production unit but he said nothing--sprawled into an arm chair

  with his eyes on the floor and his fingers over his mouth.

  Mr. Shaver came around the desk and poured forth words that had

  been fermenting in him for months. Simmered to its essentials, his

  protest was: "You would not let me play, but I'm going to play

  anyhow." Then he nodded to Jeff Manfred--who opened the script and

  read aloud. This took an hour, and still Le Vigne sat motionless

  and silent.

  "There you are," said Shaver triumphantly. "Unless you've got any

  objection I think we ought to assign a budget to this proposition

  and get going. I'll answer to my people."

  Le Vigne spoke at last.

  "You like it, Miss Starheim?"

  "I think it's wonderful."

  "What language you going to play it in?"

  To everyone's surprise Miss Starheim got to her feet.

  "I must go now," she said with her faint poignant accent.

  "Sit down and answer me," said Le Vigne. "What language are you

  playing it in?"

  Miss Starheim looked tearful.

  "Wenn I gute teachers h�tte konnte ich dann thees r�le gut

  spielen," she faltered.

  "But you like the script."

  She hesitated.

  "I think it's wonderful."

  Le Vigne turned to the others.

  "Miss Starheim has been here eight months," he said. "She's had

  three teachers. Unless things have changed in the past two weeks

  she can say just three sentences. She can say, 'How do you do';

  she can say, 'I think it's wonderful'; and she can say, 'I must go

  now.' Miss Starheim has turned out to be a pinhead--I'm not

  insulting her because she doesn't know what it means. Anyhow--

  there's your Star."

  He turned to Dutch Waggoner, but Dutch was already on his feet.

  "Now Carl--" he said defensively.

  "You force me to it," said Le Vigne. "I've trusted drunks up to a

  point, but I'll be goddam if I'll trust a hophead."

  He turned to Harmon Shaver.

  "Dutch has been good for exactly one week apiece on his last four

  pictures. He's all right now but as soon as the heat goes on he

  reaches for the little white powders. Now Dutch! Don't say

  anything you'll regret. We're carrying you in HOPES--but you won't

  get on a stage till we've had a doctor's certificate for a year."

  Again he turned to Harmon.

  "There's your director. Your supervisor, Jeff Manfred, is here for

  one reason only--because he's Behrer's wife's cousin. There's

  nothing against him but he belongs to silent days as much as--as

  much as--" His eyes fell upon a quavering broken man, "--as much

  as Pat Hobby."

  "What do you mean?" demanded Jeff.

  "You trusted Hobby, didn't you? That tells the whole story." He

  turned back to Shaver. "Jeff's a weeper and a wisher and a

  dreamer. Mr. Shaver, you have bought a lot of condemned building

  material."

  "Well, I've bought a good story," said Shaver defiantly.

  "Yes. That's right. We'll make that story."

  "Isn't that something?" demanded Shaver. "With all this secrecy

  how was I to know about Mr. Waggoner and Miss Starheim? But I do

  know a good story."

  "Yes," said Le Vigne absently. He got up. "Yes--it's a good

  story. . . . Come along to my office, Pat."

  He was already at the door. Pat cast an agonized look at Mr.

  Shaver as if for support. Then, weakly, he followed.

 

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