Джеймс Хилтон - Morning Journey

“Oh, he does, does he? Perfectionist. I’ll bet he doesn’t understand you half as well as I do.”

“In some ways he doesn’t understand me at all.”

“No? Really? I’d like to meet that guy some time.”

“Maybe you will.” She laughed, but nervously, as if the thought gave her a mixture of fear and pleasure. “It’s too bad I once told him you were a writer. He hates writers. But perhaps by that time you’ll be a doctor.”

The maid entered with extra things to be packed, and there was no more chance to talk.

On the train to Chicago she had a moment of supreme dejection when she wondered if she were doing the most foolish thing of her life. At the peak of misgiving she would have gone back, no matter at what cost in surrender or complication, but of course it was impossible, and the moment passed.

She had waved through the window at Grand Central and seen father and son standing together as the train moved out. There had also been a photographer from the New York office of Majestic Pictures. She had posed for him on the platform and he had wanted to take the three of them in a group, but Austen, with his usual phobia about publicity, had curtly declined. Or had his reason been only that? It would have been a good way to contradict the rumours already in circulation, if he had wanted to. She could not read into Austen’s mind, and she realized now that she had never been able to, completely.

Soon it was evening and she felt less troubled—she could enjoy the cosiness of the drawing-room, the lights of the little towns as they flashed by, the glances of fellow-passengers in the diner, some of whom doubtless recognized her. She went to bed early and slept fairly well, and in the morning, after the transfer at Chicago, settled down to a couple of usefully contemplative days alone. It was for this reason she had not travelled by air or with Paul. He was to fly out in time to meet her, possibly at the train when she arrived.

As the miles passed and she stared out of the window for long stretches, it seemed to her that she remembered more than she observed, for it was over twenty years since she had made this same westward journey, but then by road, with Paul, in a model-T Ford. She herself had driven, and in those days it had not been such an easy trip—long spells of dirt road between towns, changing tyres in the dust, the radiator boiling over on mountain grades, nights spent in cheap hotels, sometimes in the car to save a dollar. But to her (as that vacation in Ireland to Norris) the whole experience was deep in the mythology of the heart… the tree-shaded towns of Ohio, a whiff of snow in Kansas, sunrise on the redlands of Arizona. And now the air-conditioned luxury of the Super-Chief was the measure of the years of change.

One day about half-way through the shooting of Morning Journey the leading man, Greg Wilson, called Carey to come and look at what was going on. She had been resting during a scene in which she did not appear, and the portable dressing-room, tucked away in the corner of the big stage, had a privacy that no one would wantonly disturb. But Greg, whom she had come to like during their work together, evidently thought the reason good enough. At first glance nothing was unusual. There had been one take already and there was to be another. Technicians were checking the lights; the camera was being reloaded; the customary appearance of noisy chaos was in full show. Paul had slumped in the canvas chair, his head sunk forward as if he were half asleep —a characteristic attitude that often concealed a sharp scrutiny of what was in progress. Greg, ill-clothed and unkempt for his part, looked very different from the hero of his usual type of film, and clearly he was excited at the difference and a little vain of himself. Two other actors, one a girl, were also waiting to begin. The scene was the interior of a country cottage, nothing special or expensive about it.

Paul said something and the bell rang for silence.

“Well, here we go,” Greg whispered to Carey. “Watch me—I’m good, but watch Barrington too—he’s better.”

Carey watched. Morning Journey was really nothing but a cops and robbers picture (as Paul had said scornfully at the outset), and any similarity between itself and life would, in the ordinary way, have been purely detrimental. However, once Paul had schooled himself to the actual job of shooting, the usual change in his attitude took place; Morning Journey became then contemptible only to the extent that it owed its origin to a mediocre novel and its later shape to a couple of script writers. There was, of course, the permanent slur (liable to be brought up at any moment in any argument) of its being a Majestic picture and therefore a victim of over-all and predestined contamination. The odd thing was that with all this Paul managed to combine a tremendous intention of his own to make every scene as good as he knew how, and an overmastering pride in every fragment of his work. The result was something in which life-likeness, if not life itself, sneaked in by all kinds of crannies; or, to quote a later critic who was mainly hostile, the picture was full of “directorial flourishes”. It was one of these that Greg had called on Carey to witness. The opening situation was simple: at night two escaping prisoners-of-war approach a woodcutter’s cottage high in the Bavarian Alps. The men are weary and famished, almost ready to give themselves up; in this mood they enter the cottage seeking food and shelter. To their astonishment they encounter no one, though lamps are lit, there is a fire burning, and a table is set for a meal. The men fall to on what is to hand—hunks of bread and cheese and pitchers of milk; then, with the edge of hunger dulled, they become aware that there IS someone else. They hear footsteps and a girl’s voice singing. They stand transfixed when the door opens and the girl, beautiful of course, brings in more food for the table. Amazingly she does not seem to notice them, though they have had no time to hide. The men are desperately uncertain what to do. Should they seize her, gag her, and tie her up, so that she cannot give the alarm till they are well away? Or should they throw themselves on her mercy? One of the men (Greg), realizing the truth sooner than the other, covers his companion’s mouth in a frantic signal for silence. FOR THE GIRL IS BLIND. But already she has HEARD. They try to edge towards the door while she greets them cheerfully: “Hello. Sit down and have some food. Who are you? How many are there of you? Did you find them yet? They’re probably across the border by now. Did you meet my father?—he said he’d climb to the ridge.” The men dare not speak and their silence puzzles her. First she thinks it is a joke. “Hans, I know it’s you—answer me—stop being silly. Who is it with you?” All at once, in the continuing silence, panic is born and she suspects the truth—that the intruders are not the pursuers, but the pursued. Her aim is then as much to escape as theirs is, and in rushing out of the room she stumbles over a chair. The second man, with instinctive kindliness, takes a step to help her, but has to be restrained by Greg. Once outside the room the girl screams for help while the two men make their exit from a side window.

A remarkable scene, if only because the star of the picture had nothing to say in it. But two other things made it equally remarkable. One was the almost intolerable suspense, the ballet-like dumb show of the two fugitives counter-pointing the fluttering rhythms of the blind girl. The other was the identity of the actor sharing the dumb show with Greg. He was Jerry Barrington, an old-timer from silent-picture days, whose failing (apart from drink) had always been regarded as an invincible inability to speak lines. But now, in a rather unexampled way, he did not have to speak lines. It was really very fortunate for the picture. Yet that impulse of his to help the blind girl when she stumbled had had a rare beauty in it, something that had momentarily transfigured the face and movements of a rather second-rate performer.