Эптон Синклер - Oil!

Suddenly Vee Tracy clapped her hands. “Oh, listen! I have one on Koski! Him and some others! Has anybody heard The Movie’s Prayer?”

There was a silence. No one had.

“This is something for all of us to teach our children to recite every night and morning. It is serious, and you mustn’t joke.”

“Let us pray,” said the voice of Bessie Barrie.

“Fold your hands, like good little children,” ordered Vee, “and bow your heads.” And then with slow and solemn intonation she began:

“Our Movie, which art Heaven, Hollywood by Thy Name. Let Koski come. His Will be done, in studio as in bed.”

There was a gasp, and then a roar of laughter swept the table; no explanations were needed, they all knew their emperor, master of the destiny of hundreds of screen actresses. “Go on!” shouted voices; and the girl continued to intone an invocation, which echoed in outline and rhythm the Lord’s prayer, and brought in the names of other rulers of their shadow world, always with an obscene implication. It was a kind of Black Mass, and performed the magic feat of lifting the conversation out of the ditch of Prohibition. They talked for a while about the sexual habits of their rulers; who was living with whom, and what scandals were threatened, and what shootings and attempted poisonings had resulted. There were thrilling crime mysteries, which would provide a topic of conversation for hours in any Hollywood gathering; you might hear half a dozen different solutions, each one positive, and no two alike.

They adjourned to the larger cathedral, where the lights were dim, and there appeared, very appropriately in place of the altar, a large white screen. At the far end of the room, was a projecting machine, and the guests distributed themselves in lounging chairs, prepared to pay for their entertainment by watching the first two reels of Annabelle’s new picture, and giving their professional judgments on the “cutting.” “Pangs of Passion” you may recall as a soul-shaking story about a society bud whose handsome young husband is led astray by a divorcee, and who, in order to make him jealous, begins a flirtation with a bootlegger, and is carried off in a rum-running vessel, and made the victim of the customary pulling and hauling and tearing of feminine costumes. “My God,” said Vee Tracy, in an aside to Bunny, “Annabelle has been playing these society flappers since before they were born, and in all that time she’s never had a story above the intelligence of a twelve year old child! You’ll think it’s a joke, but I know it for a fact that Perry Duchane gets a bunch of school children together and tells them the scenario, and if there’s anything they don’t like, he cuts it out.”

And then to Annabelle she said, “It’s up to standard, my dear; it will sell all right.” And to Bunny, “That’s one good thing about Annabelle, you can say that and she’s satisfied—she doesn’t ask you if it’s a work of art. But others do, and I’ve made mortal enemies because I won’t lie to them. I say, ‘Leave art out of it, dearie; we all know our stuff is trash.’”

There was technical discussion, and Bunny had an opportunity to learn about the tricks of “cutting.” Also he learned what had been the gross business on a number of Annabelle Ames’ pictures, and the inside figures on other successes. Tommy Paley had recently indulged in the luxury of making an artistic and beautiful picture, which the papers had called a “classic”; he and a group of friends had come out something over a hundred thousand in the hole, and he had charged it up to education, and said, “Let the Germans do the art stuff after this!”

All this time there had been a silent spectral figure flitting about the cathedral, clad in white duck coat and trousers and padded purple slippers; the Chinese boy, bearing a tray with little glasses full of pink and yellow and purple and green liquid. He would move from guest to guest, offering his tray, and they would put down empty glasses and take up full ones, and during the entire course of the evening the spectre never made one sound, nor did anyone make a sound to it. Some three hundred years ago an English poet, long since forgotten by the movie world, had asked the question why a man should put an enemy into his mouth to steal away his brains; but here at the Monastery, the anxiety appeared to be that some one might forget to put the enemy into his mouth—hence this Chinese spectre to save the need of recollecting.

There were a few who did not drink; Annabelle was one, and Vee Tracy another. The spectre had apparently been instructed not to go near Vernon Roscoe, and if Vernon tried to approach the spectre, there would be a sharp warning, “Now, Verne!” But others drank, and tongues were loosened, and hearts poured out as the evening passed. Even Fred Orpan came to life, and revealed a tongue! It was Vernon Roscoe’s habit to “josh” everybody, and now he got paid back, as the one-time rancher from Texas sat up in his chair and opened his long horse’s face and demanded, in a falsetto voice which sounded as if it came from a ventriloquist: “Anybody here know how this old shyster got his start in life?”

Apparently nobody did know; and Orpan put another question: “Anybody ever seen him in swimming? I bet you never! When it’s out-doors, he’ll tell you the water is too cold, and when it’s indoors he’ll tell you it’s dirty or something. The reason is, he’s got one toe missing, and he’s afraid to have it proved on him. When he was drilling his first well, he ran out of money and was clean done for; so he went and took out an accident insurance policy, and then went rabbit-hunting and shot off one of his big toes. So he got the cash to finish the well! Is that true, old socks, or ain’t it?”

The company laughed gleefully and clamored for an answer; and Vernon laughed as much as anyone. He didn’t mind the story, but you could never get him to tell. Instead, he countered on his assailant, “You ought to hear about this old skeezicks, how he got rich leasing oil lands from Indians. They tell this about a dozen oil men, but Fred was the real one that done it, I know because I was there. It was Old Chief Leatherneck, of the Shawnees, and Fred offered him one-eighth royalty, and the old codger screwed up his eyes and said, ‘No take one-eighth, got to have one-sixteenth!’ Fred said he couldn’t afford that, and begged him to take one-twelfth, but he said, ‘One-sixteenth or no lease.’ So they signed up for a sixteenth, and now it’s the Hellfire Dome, by Jees! Is that so, old skeezicks, or ain’t it?”

Said Fred Orpan, “You might complete the story by telling what the old chief does with his royalties. He’s got a different colored automobile for each day of the week, and he figures to get drunk three times every day.”

“Oh, take me to the Hellfire Dome!” wailed the voice of Harvey Manning. “They won’t let me get drunk but one time in a night, and none at all in the day-time!”

There was a large organ in this cathedral, a magic organ of the modern style, which played itself when you put in a roll of paper and pressed an electric switch. It played the very latest jazz tunes from Broadway, and the company danced, and Vee Tracy came to Bunny and said, “My doctor allows me only one drink in an evening, and I want a sober partner.” Bunny was glad to oblige, and so the time passed pleasantly. He danced with his hostess, and with the blonde fairy, Bessie Barrie. In between dances they chatted, and the Chinese spectre continued to flit about, and the deeps of the human spirit were more and more unveiled.

In front of Bunny stood Tommy Paley, super director, handsome, immaculate if slightly ruffled, flushed of face, and steady upon his legs if not in his thoughts. “Look here, Ross,” he said, “I want you to tell me something.”