

### The Pearl Within

### G. J. Dyer

Copyright 2018 G. J. Dyer

Smashwords Edition

# Chapter 1

"Bloody Hell" was all he said.

But those two angry words foretold a mishap of considerable awfulness. My father was not a man given to unnecessary profanity and he frowned on it in others. I had been out behind the stage straightening a stake that my younger brother Eddie had pounded in crooked, and with the wind picking up, the tilt, as we called our canvas roof, was like to lift off and float away, more likely than not during some gripping murder scene or tender soliloquy. Before you knew it the patrons would be demanding their money back, even the cheeky bastards who had gotten in free by crawling under the tent flap.

The worst sin in the old man's doxology was to be the cause of a refund and, though Eddie could be a dozy bugger at times, I didn't wish my father's wrath on his tender backside. Eddie was but 12 and still on the bony side, so he seemed to suffer more than I from the administration of father's boots.

I had just re-tied the guy rope and was pulling it tight to bring our canvas roof into a nice tight square when I heard the old man's voice, loud and clear. My father had spent many years on the stage, and when he raised his voice in anger he could clean the wax out of a sleeping drunkard's ears. I hefted the big mallet and took the short route under the canvas flap to look for the source of the commotion.

Father and Mother were standing in front of the entrance, both staring down towards the Matlock road. "Shite" was all that my mother felt the need to say. Father frowned and leveled his best disapproving stare, but we both knew it was wasted on her. Mother, when not on the boards, chose her words carefully. She would not use two when one would do, figuring that the old man was spendthrift enough in that currency. Shite was a favorite word of hers. She was the daughter of a Leicestershire farmer and shit of one specie or another had been constant companion to her small boots every day of her childhood.

We had arrived in the Derbyshire town of Thorne flat broke, but with hopes of a good run to pad the tin box that Father kept to set aside money for the lean times. But the lean times had outnumbered the fat in recent months and now you could rattle a pea from one corner to the other in that tin box. It had been some time since we had played these parts and both Father and Mother were cheerfully anticipating the eager crowds with money in their pockets who would cram into our tent each night.

I, too, was now looking hard at the Matlock road, at the source of their consternation. Stretched out along that road, half-hidden by the hedgerows, was a motley procession of caravans, carts and cages on wheels. A circus, a bloody circus. This snake in our grass passed out of view for a short while behind a church and a row of houses. We all stood and held our breaths, since by now all work had ceased and our entire company was motionless and staring at those houses that screened the circus from our anxious eyes. We knew that out of our view beyond those houses was the turn-off for the main road to Derby. If the procession did not reappear we would breathe one single sigh of relief. If they did reappear, it meant that there was only one destination in their minds, the same patch of waste ground that was, for now, home to our little company of traveling actors.

For the longest of moments they did not show themselves beyond the last house. Just as we began to allow ourselves a moment of hope, two horses filled the blank space that all our eyes were fixed on. Their heads lifted in response to the reins and turned towards the gate. At a yell from the driver a small boy jumped down from the rear of the wagon and dashed at the gate as if he meant to run right through it. His feet churned, the dust rose, and slowly the gate fell back before him and wedged itself in the dry tufted grass alongside the track. The boy perched on the gate as all the variety of vehicles passed before him, then, when the last was beyond him, jumped down, dug in his heels and put his back to the gate and slowly pushed it closed. He dusted off his hands in boyish pride then launched himself after the wagon from which he had tumbled.

By now we could read the letters on the side of the caravan that led the way, a name repeated here and there down the line: Baker's Circus. Well we knew then that it was all up for us. If this had been some lesser, flea-bitten menagerie with a few broken-down clowns and beer-bellied strongmen past their prime and bearded ladies whose beards were no more real than the tears on the clowns' faces, we might have had a chance. But Baker's was one of the finest traveling shows in the country with a huge company, a traveling organ and Russel the knife thrower, who was a great draw at country fairs in those days. The various wagons and carts rolled by us and we stood in dumb despairing silence as each of our tormentors passed before us until they formed a circle around the edge of the clearing with us its forlorn center, and a single gap showing us the way out.

The locals could not afford both, and, given a choice, we knew they would rather be separated from their brass amid the many delights of the Circus than the subtler pleasures of our poor show.

Now that all of Baker's Circus was within the enclosure, the hustle and bustle began. Men, women and children of all sizes descended from their wagons. Accompanied by a chorus of shouts and exhortations, ramps were laid up, canvas and rope tossed down, poles handed out. A solitary lion, somnolent in his cage, took little interest in the proceedings, just once summoning the energy for a prodigious yawn, but his head came up when the ramp of the largest van was lowered and the ponderous gray bulk of an aged elephant moved sedately down to the ground. His upraised trunk trumpeted a salute to the growing number of scruffy kids who had gathered outside the fence to gape in wide-eyed wonder at the horses, the lion, and now, marvel of marvels, an elephant. To us, his blast was the note of doom and a couple of the veterans of our company had already begun to dismantle the stage without bothering to wait for a word from the old man. They didn't need to be told that we were moving on.

Father turned away from his gloomy survey of the Circus that was springing to life around us and gathered the full company before him as he perched on a keg at the edge of a now precariously supported stage. There was Mother and the baby, me and Eddie, my sister Carrie, Johnny Wilmore and Arthur Cleveland.

"You can all see how it lies," Father said. "There's nowt for us here except empty pockets and humiliation now that Baker's is here. We'd best push off and try our luck elsewhere. So, let's get it packed up. The sooner we're off, the better."

He had decided that we should head for the Potteries, Stoke or some such place. The "show" would travel by train, but there wasn't enough money for anyone to ride along with it. We would have to walk.

Our belongings were packed in short order, for, in truth, we did not own much and were well used to leaving towns quickly, often at night after the close, so as not to waste an evening's show in the next town. Here in Thorne we had barely had time to smooth the creases out of our backdrops and curtains. Now they were again folded and bundled along with everything else that was rolled, lashed, boxed and roped.

We made ready for our tramp. While all of this was going on, a few of the more inquisitive of the circus folk had wandered over to chat and commiserate, for they meant us no harm. One of them must have communicated our predicament to Mr. Baker himself and, soon after, the man himself appeared before my father to wish us well. When he heard that we all planned to walk, he became quite disturbed and insisted that he should pay for mother and the two youngest children to ride the train. Father was a proud man and seemed to be on the point of declining the offer, but a fierce glance from mother killed the words of refusal on his lips. He accepted the offer with as much stiff grace as he could muster, though the words came awkwardly as if his mouth was full of dust.

After we waved goodbye to the train, father led the way. Johnny Wilmore, Arthur Cleveland and myself trotted after him. Father never strolled anywhere, but always moved with the purpose of a man who has a score to settle. The three of us skipped and skedaddled to keep up with him. I was wearing nothing but galoshes on my feet and before long it began to rain, a steady moorland drizzle that, inch by inch, peeled the shoes off my feet. By the time father decided it was time to stop for the night at a lodging house run by an Irish widow, I was walking more or less barefoot with the tattered remains of my shoes hanging around my ankles and mud squelching between my toes.

Janey Beattie was the lady's name, and I can barely say why her name clings to my memory after all these years, but it has never left me. She seemed quite old to me then, though she must have been not much older than 40. From the vantage of my present wisdom, 40 seems to be a woman's prime, but to a boy of fifteen she seemed beyond the reach of youth's recklessness and folly.

She shooed the men into her parlor and laid out some cold meat, cheese and bread that might have served better duty as a doorstop. Noticing my pitiable state, she ushered me into the scullery at the back of the house, stripping off my wet clothes with little thought for my modesty. She set about me with a pair of towels, coarse as rugs, and pummeled my flesh until it glowed. But as she moved to dry off my lower parts, I was mortified to find that my almost-manly member, far from hiding itself out of modesty, insisted on standing out rigid as a barber's pole. I started to squeak out some incoherent apology and turn away, cheeks blazing at both ends, but she held me firm by the buttocks and stared at the shameful thing with cheery grin on her face. "Mary, Mother of Jesus, will you look at that. I haven't seen one of those in too many years, not since the night before my husband, God rest his soul, left to fight the Bloody Boers 20 years since and never came home to give me children to comfort me in my old age."

She glanced over her shoulder, but the chatter and clatter from the parlor told its own story. The fare was meager but the three men were making the most of it. She had left a jug of porter on the sideboard and Johnny Wilmore would have had his face in that long before he ever got to cracking his teeth on the stale cobs, and the others would have been close behind.

I imagined that I heard the creak of a footstep on the stair. The thought that, at any moment, father or one of the other men might find me there, bare- arsed and shamefully erect, propelled me back into my damp clothes with so much haste that I wound up with both feet in one trouser leg and went tumbling to the floor with my arse up in the air, still naked to the world. Our landlady began to giggle and could not seem to control herself, so she pressed her apron to her face until she could recover her composure. At long last I was dressed again, with me out of my damp rags once again and now draped in some old but sturdy clothes she pulled from a wardrobe and we made our way back downstairs.

All three men were still at the table, the pitcher drained and their tongues in full flow. I knew for a certainty that my embarrassment must be written across my face and I did not look their way, but they paid me no particular mind. I took a chair by the fire and soon their chatter faded into the growing night. I was shaken from a nodding sleep by my father's hand on my arm. I stumbled back up those same stairs and rolled into the soft bed next to father. Sleep once again got the better of me and I knew nothing more until he was shaking me to get to the breakfast table before there was no more to be had.

# Chapter 2

The rain had passed in the night and a stiff breeze had dried the road a little. So with my new boots, a relic of the widow's husband, padded with three pairs of the man's socks, I followed the others down the road to Stoke. Soon we all were prattling on about this and that, full of the hope that Stoke would prove a more prosperous pitch for us than had Thorne. The tramp passed easily enough and by noon we had found Mother and the little ones waiting for us in the station yard. Mother was taking her ease atop our various traveling bundles and the children played hopscotch in the dust of the yard. But Mother had not been idle. She had already scouted the town, found some spare ground with good prospects and was in no mood to let us rest. She pointed us in the right direction and strode off with hardly a word of greeting as we trudged on after her to the site of our newest palace of dreams.

We spent four weeks there and good weeks they were. The tin box was, by the end, stuffed tight as a Christmas turkey. The people of Stoke seemed to have been starved of entertainment of even the meagerest kind before we showed up. They could not get enough of us and I'm sure I saw a few of the same faces two or three nights in a row. Even if the play was the same, which was not often the case, we were in the habit of extemporizing to add a little local color. You could never be sure from one night to the next if your cue was exactly as it had been the night before.

If a particular play had the canvas bursting at the seams, with its excess of flash, bang, blood, smoke and tears resulting in an impressive pile of corpses at the final curtain, Father would decide that there was life in this one still. This would come as music to our ears, since it meant we would not have to paint a new set before the sun had barely risen enough to dry it, nor struggle by faint candlelight in the early hours to learn our lines.

But, after four weeks, we could see that we had milked that cow dry, and it was time for new pastures. We packed up once again and headed north. Small town by small town we finally washed up in the borough of Farnworth, not far from Bolton, in Lancashire. For a while we toured the various nettle-choked pastures and rubble-strewn spaces. Here traveling folk could settle themselves in peace and practice their trade in the villages that formed a scattered ring around the buzzing hive that was Bolton. But we always cast a favored eye on the ground in Farnworth. It was up close to the market with its constant throng of gawkers and curious passers-by to make a pitch at.

In due course Farnworth Market became our great stand-by to the neglect of all others. We would take root there from October until Easter, resurrecting a different drama every night except Thursday. On Thursdays I would ride the tram into Bolton and play the part of spectator at whatever drama was unfolding at the Theatre Royal. This was very much the Busman's Holiday, for I was not there to enjoy the play but to borrow it, scribbling down as much of the plot and dialogue as I could in the dim light. Back under our home canvas, the rest of the crew would flesh out the skimpier parts with their own improvisations, adding a murder or two as a matter of principle. We would set to and paint the scenery to match and present the new show the following Monday. Our backdrops had witnessed so many dramas in quick succession that they could almost stand by themselves, so thick was the paint.

Johnny Wilmore's fondness for his ale showed no signs of abating as the months passed, but he was always on cue, line perfect, never missed a show. But the same could not be said of his drinking companion, our first violinist George Allsop. George did not handle his booze well and frequently didn't even make an appearance in the pit, claiming to be unwell. This proved to be a boon for our family's finances, since I would then step up to first violin, with its increased share of the takings. But when George did make it to the stage front, ready to scrape his bow, the notes that escaped from his violin often bore scant resemblance to the notes the rest of us were trying to play. For Father the last straw came when George, unsteady on his feet after too much fortification before the show, tripped over the music stand and fell flat on his face. No-one was too concerned over George himself. We felt sure he was feeling no pain. But underneath him lay a violin with a broken neck. The Old Man could not tolerate such wanton destruction of property that would cost him good money to replace, and George was encouraged to retire early from the orchestra as soon as he had his legs back under him and he could make his unsteady way back home. But now we needed a new violinist. There was little talent around Farnworth, but we had recently seen a rash of posters announcing the imminent arrival of another traveling show in Oldham, about 25 miles away. Of course we made sure these posters were removed almost as soon as they appeared, not wanting the competition. This other show was a musical revue, so there was every chance that there might be a violinist going spare who might be prepared to throw in his lot with us. I was dispatched by train and bus on a rainy Sunday afternoon to catch the matinee performance in the hope of spotting some likely talent. The show was no great shakes, to be honest, and there was no violinist to be found amid the musical dross, but up on the stage there was a lad of 15 or so who did a bit of clog- dancing, followed by a comic song or two, complete with pratfalls and funny faces, that stirred the audience from their lethargy. He had presence and it was obvious to me that if any of this lot were destined to rise above this half-hearted production, it would be him. He was no use to us, of course, being about my age, and I was not about to surrender any of my parts to someone outside the family. But I was curious about him so I looked him up in the program. Chaplin, Charles. I wandered backstage to have a chat with him. He was a confident young man, ambition in his eye, London-born, with a Londoner's disdain for the North. He made no secret of his determination to move back down South. He had been approached by an agent for Fred Karno's pantomime troupe and he would be on a train south just as soon as his stint in Oldham came to a merciful end.

Fred Karno was well-known up and down the country as an actor and impresario, often referred to since as the Father of Slapstick Comedy. The custard pie in the face was a Fred Karno invention. Chaplin, of course, flourished under Karno's guidance and soon began to perfect his character The Tramp. Chaplin's understudy in Karno's Army was a chap by the name of Arthur Jefferson. He followed Karno and Chaplin to America and changed his name to Stan Laurel. I bumped into Chaplin a time or two in later years at gatherings of movie folk, before he moved west and began making films in California. On the first of these occasions I reminded Chaplin that we had met in Oldham. He claimed he didn't know me, and had never been to Oldham. I didn't mention it again.

Not all of those who came to our show could afford a ticket and some found other means to get a glimpse of the show that was unfolding on the creaking boards beneath the flapping canvas. We were always troubled with boys and girls who wanted to see the show for nothing. They would burrow under the sides, climb through the top or, failing that, peer through any nook or cranny they could find. There came a night when the noise they made proved more annoying than I could bear, for they would often relay commentary of the proceedings to those even less fortunate behind them. On this night I marched grandly across the stage towards the source of the noise, though the part did not call for it, and flung open the backstage door. This was followed by a shriek which stopped me dead in my tracks and robbed me of my next line. There in the dirt was a young woman of 16 or so. She had stolen Mother's baking tub from under the caravan and had been using it as a stand to look over the door. She was wearing a big factory apron and now was using it to staunch the flow of blood from her nose, burst by the impact of the door. That was my first sight of the woman who was to become my wife.

I felt a right fool, of course, with the roughnecks in the crowd behind me loudly questioning the reason for this sudden burst of violent action. We were in the middle of what should have been the tenderest of scenes in which a distraught and repentant Joseph Holcombe, played by myself, laments over his dead mother's body. Mother Holcombe lay dying of a broken heart brought on by the evil doings of her only and much-beloved son, led astray by bad company. The play was, of course, " _A Mother's Lament_ " by Arthur Halliwell, a tried and true moneymaker. We had often blessed Mr. Halliwell's name for his prodigious outpouring of pathos-soaked and tear-wrenching masterpieces. Until now, this particular scene had been unfolding in rapt silence. It is a moment that seals the lips of even the rowdiest revelers and hankies appear like so much bunting at a regatta. Several had seen this play before and they did not take kindly to this clumsy and unsettling interruption. I stood in the doorway for a very long second, my mind in a spin, looking for some way to make this seem like a new and ingenious flourish to the old formula.

"Don't stand there like a daft sissy," the Old Man hissed at me from behind the curtain, "get back out there and grab a hold of that lot out there before they bugger off and want their money back!"

I grabbed the girl's arm and dragged her inside. She was hardly willing, but that gave the scene a nice touch of realism. I knelt by the prostrate form of my mother, dying but not departed, and began to speak, making up the words as I went along.

"Look, mother, all hope is not yet lost for me. I have the love of a good woman who believes in me and I know now that through her love I have seen the error of my ways and will never again commit those evil deeds that have brought us to this."

Johnny Wilmore, playing Mother Holcombe, trouper that he was, raised his head pitifully and spoke through his tears.

"Oh, son, it makes my old heart so happy to hear those words. Now I can die in peace."

Then he let his head fall with such a crack that I knew he must have had a few nips at the whiskey bottle before his big scene. Everyone in the house knew my "mother" was dead. The girl kneeling beside me had given up her struggles and now had her face buried in her pinafore. Her body was shaking with emotion, though I had a fair idea that the grief that seemed to be wracking her body was, in fact, her desperate struggle not to laugh at the absurdity of it all. Butto everyone else inside our little canvas universe her performance was convincing enough and the curtain came down to enthusiastic applause. As I took my bow I wondered if this same lot would expect such a novel twist to be repeated next time out.

Backstage, mother was sponging dried blood off the girl's face and as much as she could from the stained apron. Cleaned up and in the light, her face was clearly visible to me for the first time. It was a bold face, but not a Lancashire face. She had dark eyes and high cheekbones, with hair thick and dark as polished coal. But hers was not a solemn face. She was grinning at me as her mouth fought Mother's ministrations with a sponge and rough towel.

"I'm right sorry I blooded your nose, miss. I didn't know you were behind the door. What's your name?"

"Angela Sabini" was what she said, though with Mother still in danger of removing a layer of skin or two from her face, she could have been speaking a foreign language, for it was hardly a familiar name in this part of the world. Father, who was quietly enjoying his pipe in his chair in the corner, asked dryly,

"You're not from around here then?"

"I am, too! Born in Farnworth I was. But my Mam and Dad are Italian. They own the ice cream shop and cafe up Market Street."

We had passed the place more than a few times, but had never ventured inside. Coffee was not high on the list of preferred beverages for the drinkers in our troupe. Mother and father did not hold with such imported frippery and English tea was, to them, the finest beverage on the face of the earth. The other actors, of course, would as soon refresh themselves with the local ale if they had the change in their pockets to buy it.

"My Dad'll kill me if he knows I've been here. I'd better push off before I'm late. I told him I was going to the library with my friend Elsie."

"What about the blood on your frock?"

"Oh, I'll tell him I fell down the stairs at the library. It's always too dark in the corridor. He'll never know, though I'll probably get a talkin' to anyway."

I was too taken by her dark good looks and the flash in her eyes to just bid her goodnight and watch her disappear into the dark. Despite being painfully tongue-tied around girls I managed to blurt out, with as much casualness in my voice as I could muster, "Here, let me walk you home. It's a dark night and I wouldn't want you to come to any more grief."

She started to say no, sending my hopes down to my boots, then relented.

"All right then, but just as far as the corner near the shop. If my Dad sees me with you, I don't know which one of us he'll go after first. He still thinks I'm 10 years old. He thinks I don't know what boys want from a girl."

She saw the blush in my face and laughed.

"I reckon you're no different from the rest."

There had been some rain earlier in the day, but it had stopped some time ago and the ground was wreathed in thin ribbons of mist. We tiptoed around the muddy puddles until we reached firm ground and headed away up Market Street.

My mind floundered for something to say that would make me seem grown-up and strong and clever, but it was wasted effort. I felt as thick as a fence post without a sensible word in my head. In desperation I squeaked out, "Where do you work, then?"

"Mostly in the shop, making sandwiches and serving ice cream. My mam and dad won't let me work anywhere else. I have two brothers and they get to go out and work in the mine, but I'm stuck at home. I fancy working in the mill. At least I could mix with the other girls, but my mam and dad won't have any of it."

After a few more minutes of agonizing small talk she stopped in front of a butcher's shop, now dark.

"My mam and dad will skin me if they see me with you. You'd better turn back here."

I nodded dumbly, shifting my feet, wanting to prolong this time with her, but not knowing how, loving and hating every minute of it.

"Mebbe I'll come and see your next show. But I'm not standing on your mum's washtub behind that bloody door again."

"Next time, ask for me and I'll find you a seat. Alright?"

She stared at me, dark-eyed and curious. "Aye, perhaps I'll do that. Your name's Tommy, right?"

"Make sure you ask for young Tommy or you'll get my dad and there's no telling what he'll have to say about giving you a free seat. Paying customers are more precious than gold to the Old Man."

"Alright then. Next week."

With a toss of her dark hair she was off, bouncing along like she might start skipping any minute. I stared after her, heart still unsteady, stomach in a bit of a twist, already anxious for next week's show.

I had made my first appearance on the stage as a babe-in-arms, and I played many a part, male and female, as a child. My first opportunity to speak was in a temperance play called " _Ten Nights in a Bar Room_ ". Later I played Jenny, complete with chemise and girlish regalia, in " _Jenny the Orange Girl_ " and a hundred and one other children's parts after that but it was as a musician that I achieved my fullest value. In the days before Father became the proprietor of his own show he had made a practice of paying sixpence a time to the leader of any orchestra that we encountered to give me violin lessons. Thus I became second violin. This may sound grand enough but since the "orchestra" consisted of the first violinist, myself, a cornet, a bass trumpet and some other tyke banging on a triangle it soon lost its glamour. But Father had his good reasons for making me a musician. The money for these shows was paid out on the share system. The day's takings were placed on the table and the orchestra's pay was counted out first. After that the proprietor took four shares of what was left on the table for himself and two for his props. The leading man took one and a half shares and the leading lady the same. The rest of the cast got only one share each. Every member of the orchestra was paid two shillings a night as long as there was enough on the table to go around, but on lean nights the leading man might end up owing money to the show. So, since I was part of the orchestra and usually had an acting part, I was paid twice for my night's endeavors.

Angelina came to the next show and the next and the next after that and each time, after a quick scrub, I would walk her back as far as the butcher's shop. In time my tongue unglued itself and I grew more comfortable in her company. Always eager to impress, I sometimes found myself saying daft things just to make her like me. She didn't seem to care. She chattered on about her mam and dad and the shop and her brothers, who had been baptized Giancarlo and Antonio, but in the face of the casual cruelty that young boys so often fall prey to, they had learned to call themselves Charlie and Tony.

At first we just walked and talked, then at some point she slipped her hand in mine and I could barely trust myself to speak. Then came the momentous day when, in front of the butcher's shop, instead of walking away, she leaned in towards me and raised herself on her toes and planted her lips on mine. I could have fallen down I had so little strength in my legs. My knees were trembling. Then she was gone.

Before too long it was decided that her parents had better give me the once-over. Some nosey bastard had spotted us together and mentioned it to her brothers who, in turn, could not resist teasing her at the dinner table and the secret was out. Soon after, on Saturday lunchtime, I presented myself at Sabini's, scrubbed up and pomaded down, ready for inspection. There were just a handful of customers at that hour. Angelina's brother Charlie was behind the counter, sleeves rolled up, white apron over his walking-out clothes, looking like he had plans for later on. He spotted me and walked over to the elder Sabini who was barely visible behind the massive steel and copper contraption that brewed the coffee as it hissed and gurgled. Mr. Sabini stepped to one side to get a better look at me, as Charlie leaned on the counter behind him with a smirk on his face. He wasn't a bad lad, as I later discovered, but at that moment he was enjoying my discomfort.

The old man himself was not large, despite the sizeable stature of his two sons. His moustache was waxed and curled in an extravagant way, just like Johnny Wilmore was apt to do when playing the villain. There was a melancholy look in his eyes, the same soft brown eyes that he had passed on to Angelina. His was a long and lean face, which only emphasized that sad-eyed look. He stepped out from behind the counter, wiping his hands on his starched apron, though his hands weren't even dirty.

"You Tommy?" he asked, the Italian accent still strong.

"Yes, sir, I am." I tried to sound earnest and respectful as Angelina had warned me to be, not too cocky.

"Come on back, please".

I followed him behind the counter and through a curtained passageway. As he held the curtain aside for me to pass I snatched the cloth cap off my head and shoved it in my pocket. Behind me was a public place, but here it was private. Paintings covered the walls of the passageway, not professional-looking but bright and cheerful for all that. There were pictures of flowers, green hills and trees the like of which never grew in these parts. And houses of pale pink and sandy color with roofs of red clay tile, and men and women, fat and cheerful. They might have been miniatures of our backdrop when we put on some exotic play of a Mediterranean nature, all hot passion, wine and bravado. Scenes of Italy, I supposed. I stopped to give them my respectful attention and noticed the rough signature in the corner of each one: A. Sabini.

"Did you paint these?"

"Yes. They are not very good, but they give me pleasure. I keep alive the memory of where we came from, the people we left behind. Come, come."

The passage opened out into a large parlor covered with more scenes of Italy. A large window let in the abundant light, without a shred of curtain, unusual in these parts. Privacy was normally held in high regard and on any other street those on the inside would have felt naked if they were visible to passers-by on the street after dark.

"Please, please, sit down." He directed me to a small table with four chairs around it. I took one and he sat opposite me.

"Would you like a glass of wine?"

Wine was an altogether foreign drink to me and the only time I had ever tasted it was in church where the Dyers were rare visitors.

"No", I said, then added "thank you", remembering to be polite.

"I will have one for myself." He moved over to the sideboard and pulled out a plain bottle with no label and a glass and set both on the table. The wine was the color of pale honey, not dark red as I was accustomed to seeing.

"This is made from apples. I make it myself. Sometimes apples, sometimes pears. Sometimes I am lucky and find grape juice." He sipped and savored the wine, then sat back, hands on his lap. "Angelina tells me and her Mama that she likes you and you like her, that you walk with her in the evenings. This is so?"

"Yes", I nodded, "we like each other very much. We would like your permission to start walking out together on Sundays and such."

"Your family, what is it that your Mama and Papa do?"

"We are traveling actors, or used to be, we don't travel much anymore. We stay in one place now, around Farnworth".

"Actors." His mouth pinched in a way that I knew wasn't good news and his tone suggested that he placed actors somewhere between whores and charlatans.

"What kind of prospect you have as an actor?"

I had anticipated this question, but frankly I couldn't come up with a good answer. The prospect of eventually owning our own theater didn't seem likely to impress. My father had never been within sniffing distance of wealth and never seemed likely to achieve it, and I was unlikely to outdo him in that. It was not a vocation to make a man rich.

"Well, I'm hoping that now were settled in one place we might rent us a little place we can turn into a real theater, maybe do well enough to own it."

As if an actor with property might be a more respectable proposition than a nomadic one. It was lame and I knew it.

"Excuse me if I am not polite, but an actor is not the kind of person we wish for our Angelina. You seem like a nice young man, but it is very important for us that any young man who is interested in seeing our daughter should have the chance to make a good living."

There wasn't much to be said to that, so all I could do was sit and look glum. I didn't know if I should stay where I was for a while longer out of politeness, or make my exit and slink off, suitably downcast. But he made that decision easy for me. He stood up and said, "Forgive me but I have to get back to the shop. These Saturday afternoons are always very busy and my sons do not always work with their hearts."

I followed him back through the shop and made my escape. As I set off down Market Street, Angelina appeared around the corner. "Well?"

That wasn't the end of it, of course. Angelina and I still saw each other whenever we could. She would come to see whatever play we were putting on even though she might have already seen every performance. I would walk her home, stopping a block or two short of her parents' shop. She had a friend, a local girl, Elsie Makin. Elsie was a daydreamer and besotted with the idea of romance and for her the idea of forbidden love was exquisitely and torturously romantic. She was Angelina's excuse for strolling out in the evening, for a visit to the new Carnegie library, which the great man himself had been on hand to open 2 years earlier.

Elsie would present herself at the shop to ask if Angelina might accompany her to the library to study the lives of the great painters. Elsie wouldn't have known a great painter if one had bitten her on the bum, but Angelina's parents never knew that. Her father could hardly object to his daughter's studies unless he was afraid that she might be exposed to the sensual nudity of Goya or Rubens. But so far no such suspicion seemed to have entered his mind and Angelina was allowed to spend two evenings each week in the pursuit of the arts. She and Elsie would enter the library conspicuously by the front door, ask the librarian where they could find a book on such and such a painter and disappear down the appropriate aisle. After a decent interval, they would make their escape down the back steps and sneak along the rear of the building. Every window was blocked by shelves of books, so they would nip round the back of the town hall, cross over to Farnworth Park and make their way to our tent at the market. They couldn't afford to pay for a seat and it would be my arse that Father would be laying his boot to if he knew that I let them in for free, but I was, more often than not, the one collecting the money. It didn't take much effort to pantomime the exchange of money and let them pass.

After the show was over I would give myself a quick scrub in the washtub out back then walk Angelina home with Elsie following at a discreet distance. When we were almost at the shop, Elsie would move up and take Angelina's arm and the two of them would skip away giggling, with little time or opportunity for a prolonged good-night.

Father was no fool and in time it became obvious to him that Angelina, whose face was now familiar, was spending far more time in our drafty tent than she could afford. He must have had a suspicion that she was getting in for free, but with mother's urging soon decided to let me forgo the pretense of taking Angelina's money each night.

Walking Angelina home two or three nights a week was little enough time to get to know one another, but we managed. I had never before thought much about my future and would not have had much of an audience for it if I had. But Angelina had dreams and couldn't abide the thought that I might not. I had imagined myself taking Father's place when the time came and there was some truth to the story that I had told Angelina's father, but the details didn't quite ring true for me. I knew I wanted more than the scratch-penny existence my parents lived. They seemed happy enough despite the occasional rain-drowned performances and muddy, bedraggled exits to the meager comfort of their cramped caravan, but I had little practice at dreaming. I could do little more than see beyond the occasional mud patch to a dry future in a real brick and mortar house of my own, without wheels. Bolton was the most distant city on my horizon at that time, beyond that was out of sight of my ambitions.

But Angelina was a dreamer; Farnworth could not contain her imagination. Despite the subterfuge at the library, she did love to draw and paint. There was little opportunity to learn in her rudimentary schooling, but her father was pleased by her interest and had allowed her to hold a paintbrush from her earliest recollection. What she loved most was to draw and paint flowers and birds. So in fair weather she and Elsie would tramp down Stoneclough and across the mediaeval stone bridge at Ringley with its decaying antique stocks, where local troublemakers had once been chained and pelted with rotten fruit, then along the towpath of the bottom canal or "cut" as we called it. The bottom cut ended in a broad basin where a wide path of steep cobble stones led up to the top cut. The two of them would drop down into the woods until they met the river. Following it downstream to the narrow iron footbridge leading to the short steep incline to Cemetery Road, they would hike the cobbles that led up to St. John's churchyard and its cemetery, past the primary school and on home.

As they walked, at different times of the year, the wildflower and bird life would revolve through the seasons and Angelina would perch on a rock or sit on the grass and sketch flowers. The birds were more of a challenge, but Elsie would always have crusts of bread in her apron and would scatter crumbs on the ground to bring them in. The two of them would sit as still as two young girls could until one bird or another would settle on the ground. Angelina would sketch each one in tiny detail so as not to scare it away with broad strokes, then once she got home she would render it life-size, embellished from memory.

Occasionally, on a Bank Holiday, they would take the bus to Bolton, a bit of bread and cheese wrapped in linen for their lunch, and venture further afield, up on the open spaces around Rivington Pike with its ruins and windy vistas, always with a sketch book and pencil or charcoal. She could draw, there was never any question of that. On one of her visits to our dimly-lit theatre she had dashed off a quick charcoal sketch of the scene on stage with me as some young hero or other. In the poor light it could hardly be more than a few lines and hasty shade on the page, but I could clearly see the likeness. When I showed it to father he was impressed enough to suggest that she might want to paint our scenery in return for a free show or two. It seemed to me that there was a bit of a sly smile on his face, and I couldn't be sure if he was making fun of me. There was little doubt that laughter briefly escaped mother's lips before she regained her composure and turned away to burnish a copper kettle that already gleamed enough to reflect a lantern at the other end of the caravan.

At some point Angelina's family acquired a dog, or rather it acquired them, latching on to Angelina and Elsie on one of their rambles. It followed them home despite their attempts to discourage it. It was an unhappy looking animal, skittering away sideways with its tail slung low whenever either of them tried to approach. It followed nonetheless, loping along a few yards to the rear, halting if either of them turned to look back, head low as if expecting a blow. It was undernourished judging by the eagerness with which it devoured the few remaining crusts of bread in Elsie's apron, and apparently ill-treated, but it seemed eager for company and would not be deterred. It was still at their heels when Angelina arrived home. Of course her parents' immediate response was a resounding "No", but that dog could not be discouraged. He sat in front of the shop, day and night, for three days, venturing away only when Angelina did, steadfast even in the cold and rain. Angelina's mother could stand it no more and allowed him a dry corner of the back yard. Second Chance, Angelina christened him, but the mutt was forever known simply as Chance. In time he grew less wary and learned once more how to wag his tail in friendly greeting at the approach of almost any stranger. The first time I took Angelina's arm in Chance's company, without warning I found my sleeve pinned by yellow teeth, the dog's whole weight dragging on my arm. I pulled away sharpish, but Angelina held on tight and spoke to the dog with an edge to her voice that I've been on the receiving end of a few times since. Chance dropped to the ground but he was clearly not happy and continued to keep a wary eye on me for some time. Angelina beckoned the dog towards her and, as it slithered closer, tail wagging, she took my hand. With soothing noises, she pulled my hand closer to the dog's nose. I confess that this caused me some trepidation but the dog merely sniffed warily then licked my hand, declaring me acceptable. I was now a member of the pack that included Angelina's parents, though Chance never much cared for her brothers, and there was never any doubt where that dog's devotion lay.

It was in much the same way, I suppose, that Alfie Mitton entered my life. Alfie was much like Chance. His mother had died giving birth and his father had disappeared soon after. The infant Alfie was taken in by his mother's brother, but there was not enough affection to go around in a family with already too many mouths to feed, and even less money. Alfie grew up hard, spending much of his time on the streets, without schooling or guidance. His greatest misfortune, as if he needed one, was that a deformity of the upper lip caused him to speak clumsily. He was constantly the target of unmerciful teasing by other children in the narrow blackened streets where he lived on the edge of even that grim existence.

I came across him one night as I walked home from Angelina's house. I had taken a short-cut, or rather an alternate way home to vary the routine although I doubt that it was any shorter. As I walked briskly down the middle of the narrow street, I could feel the shape of the heavy cobbles through my boots. I confess that once I turned the corner onto this ill-lit street I felt uneasy enough to stay away from the shadowed pavement. There was one feeble gas lamp at the end of the first row of grimy houses and under its sad glow there was a commotion of ragged children around another even more ragged figure. I could see as I got closer that their victim was actually tied to the lamp post in some way. His tormentors had pulled down his britches and were taking turns to fling dog shit at him from the end of a stick, lunging and taunting. There was little real violence, but a great deal of meanness. I couldn't ignore his plight and it required little from me to end his ordeal. As I approached, trying to look purposeful, they scattered and he was left alone, sagging against the rags that they had used to tie him up. As I untied him, the smell of dog shit was strong and he stood in silent humiliation, head down, face set hard. He didn't whimper or blubber, just stared at some unseen spot on the pavement. I asked him why they had tied done this and he told me that he supposed it was because they didn't like him. The flaw in his speech was evident and it wasn't hard to see what had incited their cruelty.

"You can walk with me the rest of my way home and you should be clear of them."

He didn't say anything, but nodded and fell in beside me as I made my way home. He was none too sweet-smelling after his ordeal, so I pulled the old washtub out from under the wagon and helped him remove the worst from his clothes, and wash his face. His clothes were shoddy enough even without the sickly smell of dog shit. I knew that mother had some ragged urchin costumes tucked away in a compartment underneath the caravan and I took the liberty of lightening the stash by a pair of pants, a shirt and a coat. These looked more or less his size, though judging from what he was wearing before, correct size had not been a priority for whoever kitted him out. I asked Mother for a cob of bread to chew on and tossed him half. He hesitated, but his need got the better of his caution and it disappeared so fast I hardly saw him eat it. He looked around and curiosity too got the better of him. "What's all this then?"

"We're traveling actors, although we don't move around much anymore, and this tent is our show. Not much, but it's where we put on our plays and entertain the paying customers if we're good, or lucky."

The concept seemed a bit puzzling for him, so I rattled off some of the more bloodthirsty two-acters that were familiar to the locals and always drew a fair crowd, but there was no recognition in his face.

"Have you ever seen a play, with real actors and such?"

"No, but I always watch the Punch and Judy show in Farnworth Park."

"Aye, well, it's a bit like that, only with real people." That seemed enough of an explanation. He straightened himself up and made to leave. "What's your name?"

"Alfie Mitton."

"Well, Alfie Mitton, come back some evening and watch our little show."

He nodded and smiled, but I knew he was thinking "if it costs money, no bloody chance".

He shuffled off and I watched him across the waste ground between our camp and the market until I could barely make out his dark shape. He passed under the yellow light of a gas lamp and stopped to look back. Fanciful as it seems, I felt I could see a brightness in his eyes, sad and fierce.

It was not long before I saw him again. Three nights later as I stood on the upturned washtub haranguing the passers-by to spend a little of their meager earnings on our entertainment, I caught a glimpse of Alfie. He was on the edge of the crowd and then he was gone. Before too long the crowd had thinned, either to take a seat or make their way home and it was time to start the show. Our curtain time was somewhat elastic, depending on the flow of punters through the flap. If there were still potential customers lingering outside, Father would hold the curtain until there was nothing further to be gained, then he would signal me to bring in the washtub and tie-down the tent flap. This time, as I was lashing the flap tight, I heard Father's booming voice. "I've got you now, you little bugger."

I poked my head out to see what was up and Father had hold of a pair of short legs struggling mightily to get free. But Father had the advantage and he pulled backwards to reveal a purple-faced and fuming Alfie Mitton.

"Young man, your enthusiasm for the theatre is commendable, but, unfortunately, edification of the masses does not come free. Pay at the entrance like everybody else. We have a living to make."

"I haven't got the money," said Alfie with as much dignity as he could muster.

"That is unfortunate, my young friend, but if we succumbed to pity for every poor soul who claimed to be penniless, we would soon be as penniless as they."

My sympathy for Alfie got the better of me at this point, so I spoke up. "Father, I know this lad. He was ill-used by some roughs a few days back. Take the price of his ticket out of my share of the takings. I reckon he needs a bit of cheer." Father frowned, but he had no more to say in opposition, though he clearly believed I had failed to inherit his sound business sense. He let the lad go and I held open the flap for him. Alfie scrambled into the darkest seats with the canvas at his back and I finished up with the flap then took my place backstage, since I had no part to play until the second act. It was a bloodthirsty little number with more dead bodies than live ones at the end. The crowd, though sparse, made up for their lack of numbers with a great deal of hissing and cursing at the villain of the piece, and they went home satisfied. I didn't see Alfie leave, but I was to meet up with him again soon enough and in very different circumstances.

My evening strolls with Angelina were uneventful enough despite our increasing interest in each other's lives. But from time to time as we passed one or another of the many public houses that lined Manchester Road, troublesome types, the worse for drink, would burst out from the noisy, pungent interiors and stumble into our path. For the most part they did little more than leer at Angelina, give me the once up-and-down, think better of it and move on. Occasionally they would make some crude suggestion to Angelina and stand swaying as they waited for a response, which was usually not even a backward glance. But on one particular night there was more.

Elsie was trailing a bit behind us as we were passing the entrance to the Cobbler's Last, a particularly unsavory house. Even Johnny Wilmore, who was not known to be too choosy about where he supped his ale, took pains to avoid it as being too rough for his liking. A twisted and mean- spirited man crossed our path and refused to be ignored. He was not a big man, for I dare say matters might have unfolded differently if he had been. But he made up for it in meanness. He was average-tall, but his height was the only thing about him that could be said to resemble normal. His face was thin and long, reminding me of a whippet and curiously enough he was most often seen in the company of one, a cowering beast choking at the end of a piece of rough hemp. This man's eyes were darker than any dog's and there was no charity or kindness in them. One of his legs seemed shorter than the other so that he walked with an odd lurching gait as if he were pacing the deck of some seagoing rig, and there was always a sour odor about him as if he had soiled his clothes. Those who knew him well, and there were precious few who chose to prolong any familiarity with him, told of a time when he was young and straight. He had the misfortune to stumble in the path of a coach and four traveling at speed when he was too drunk to keep his feet on the pavement. The horses had done their damage and something inside him seemed to have been poisoned. For he carried that foul odor and hatefulness with him from that time on. On this night he stood in the middle of the pavement making it difficult for us to pass without shuffling around him or stepping out on to the cobbles. He grinned a leering grin at Angelina. "Come on, luv, have a drink wi' me. I'm sure I'd be better company than this boy o' yours." Angelina declined with a cold stare and made to move past him, but he gripped her arm and held fast. She tried to pull away but could not as he tightened his grip. I don't consider myself brave and I certainly had no experience at dealing with toughs on the street, but I couldn't stand by and let Angelina be misused in this way. I stepped forward and laid my hand on the arm that gripped Angelina tight enough to make her wince. I was about to request, as politely as I could, that he take his hand off her and let us proceed in peace, but I hardly got out more than a word or two before his fist landed on the side of my face and I went down in a heap, half-stunned. I felt his boot lash into my side as I struggled to get up and I heard Angelina and Elsie scream. I tried to brace myself for another blow and I struggled to get clear. But the next blow never came. There was the sound of running feet, then a thud and a sound like the beating of wings. I raised myself to see Alfie Mitton, both fists swinging furiously, beating back the bigger man with the ferocity of his attack. The drunkard finally went down and Alfie encouraged him to stay down with a few blows from his boots. The man groaned and lay still, then vomited in the gutter. Alfie stood over him in a fury of red-faced rage, sweat and spittle dripping from his face. It seemed to me that he was, at that moment, quite prepared to kill.

I got to my feet and put an arm around Angelina and Elsie who were hugging each other and crying softly. Then I pulled Alfie away and moved the three of them down the street.

"Lucky for us you were close by, Alfie."

"I usually am", was all he said.

"How d'yer mean?"

"I keep an eye on you. You helped me out. My job to help you out."

"So you follow me around?"

"No, only when you're out late. Bad people cause trouble. I keep out of sight"

Grateful as I was for his intervention, I confess that I was a little troubled at knowing that he was our constant unseen companion as I walked Angelina home. But it seemed churlish to object, so the least I could do was to thank him. He accepted with some discomfort, then he turned away and disappeared into the shadows. I was relieved to be rid of the drunkard's attentions but I was under no illusion that I had seen the last of him. I knew I had made the first enemy of my life and a dangerous one at that. I suspected that he had friends with as little scruple or charity as himself.

Angelina and Elsie took a little time to compose themselves. Both would be reluctant to acquaint their parents with the incident since that might have put an end to our evening excursions. Finally, both were in command of themselves once more, if a little pale, and they finished the journey without me. I dared not go back the same way, so I took another detour through the ill-lit back streets. This time there was nothing in my path but silence and the pale glimmer from behind grimy curtains that marked the only distinction between one narrow grim house and the next. At one point I thought I heard a step behind me, but when I turned to see if it was Alfie, there was no-one. But I supposed he was there somewhere in the darkness, silent and watching.

# Chapter 3

It was a Sunday afternoon and as usual we were taking a walk down the bottom end of Market Street. Sunday afternoon was the "Monkey Run", when all the likely lads and eager lasses made a pretense of indifference to each others presence and concealed their intense interest behind sharp-tongued banter. There would often be a hundred or more, strictly divided. The left side of the street was the common side, the other for the class element and neither would cross to the other.

Angelina, of course, would never be found on the cheap side. I had never been quite sure up to now which side I should walk on, but since my family often found itself without two shillings to rub together, I tended towards the poorer side. But in the interest of staying in Angelina's good graces I crossed to the other side, donning the trilby hat required of young men on the posh side in those days. I fell in by Angelina's side as she strolled with Elsie and her other young lady friends. They, to their credit, would recede a few steps to give us the pretense of privacy, though their stifled laughter punctuated our quiet conversations. It was on just such a Sunday that Edwin Ainsworth crossed our path for the first time and I came to bitterly regret ever being drawn into his mean-spirited orbit. As we walked on that particular Sunday, deep in meaningless but achingly important conversation, the sound of a carriage on the road grew louder and by the rapid clip of the horse's shoes ringing on the cobblestones, it was clear that it was going too fast amid such a crowd of distracted and foolish young folk. Heads turned to see who was in such a hurry. A half-starved mongrel, tail between its legs, skittered sideways to avoid the throng on the pavement and wound up in the path of the oncoming coach. The horse pulled up its head sharpish and twisted between the shafts. The carriage slid sideways and for a moment one wheel spun in the air as the carriage tilted sending the couples on the pavement scrambling from its wheels, then it righted itself and came to a stop. A young woman stumbled and landed on the cobbles with a thump and a squawk, though in truth, the wheels never touched her. But her admirer, feeling the need to be brave in front of his heckling mates, started to curse the driver and the coach's occupants. The driver was a young man, hardly older than I was, decked out in finery that wasn't bought in any shop in Farnworth. He sported a thin mustache that did more to accentuate his lack of years than conceal it. There was an arrogant tilt to his head that did not bode well for the young fool who had challenged him. He stood with one boot on the front rail, staring down at the blustering boy below him and at the girl, now on her feet, flushed and smoothing down her skirt as her friends set her hat straight and clucked in sympathy. He showed no particular concern for either of them. The girl's suitor laid his hand on the side rail of the carriage as if to launch himself at the driver, who, without any undue haste, set his boot on the boy's hand and ground his heel into the fingers. This precipitated some angry muttering among his friends and they moved in towards the carriage. I could see no good coming out of this, with the likelihood that those on the ground who made any show of violence would wind up before a magistrate for their pains, so I stepped between them and raised my hands. "No harm done, lads, let's just be about our business before the constable shows up to see what all the fuss is about."

The young challenger was nursing his knuckles as his young lady pulled at his arm and in a moment the whole throng was moving once again, with no more than an angry glance backwards.

"Wise advice", the driver said to me. "I dare say I could cause them infinitely more trouble than they could ever cause me. What's your name and your business?"

"My name is Tommy Dyer. I am part of a group of traveling actors. We put on shows over by the market."

"An actor! In my experience of actors, the men are drunkards and the women whores."

"May I ask your name, sir?"

"Ainsworth. Edwin Ainsworth"

The name was not unfamiliar, nor was it much-loved by any man or woman who lived within 20 miles Bolton.

"Any relation to Colonel Ainsworth?"

"He is my uncle. What do you know of him?" The disdain was unmistakable in his voice.

"Only that he closed Coalpit Road and prevented decent, hard-working people from enjoying a stroll up Winter Hill on a Sunday afternoon, just so as he and his soft-arsed friends could wipe out every grouse on the moors".

The moderation I had urged on others just a few minutes earlier had deserted me. The arrogance in his tone robbed me of caution. But if I was expecting some new act of violence from Edwin Ainsworth I was disappointed.

"Quite right, too. Can't have the great unwashed spoiling the sport for their betters can we?" His eyes slid away from me and fixed on Angelina's face. "And who is this beauty you have with you, Mister Dyer? I would keep an eye on her in case someone more deserving decides to snatch her away from you. What's your name, girl, and what does your family do?" Angelina gave a good account of herself in as few words as might not seem to give offense, while most assuredly doing so. Then she turned away with the briefest of curtsies that seemed to have more of mockery than respect in it, and rejoined her friends as they moved on.

"A spirited girl, Mister Dyer, but ripe for taming, no doubt. Not local born, that's for sure. A little too much Mediterranean heat and spice for your simple taste, I dare say. I shall have to pay her father a visit. Good day to you sir."

The heat was in my face from his insults and I stood silent and raging for several moments before I trusted myself to turn and meet Angelina's eyes. Ainsworth and his cronies geed up their horse and drove off with a great deal of guffawing and Ainsworth tipped his hat to Angelina as he drove off.

"So, who's this Colonel Ainsworth and why did he close whatever road it was?" Angelina asked. So I gave her a brief account of the closing of Coal Pit Road and the protests that followed

For generations the people of Bolton had tramped up the moors to Rivington Pike and Winter Hill on a Good Friday to stand on their breezy slopes and take in the panorama that on a clear day stretched from the Welsh mountains to the Lake District. Coalpit Road, the footpath that led the masses up to these windy heights crossed the land of Colonel Richard Henry Ainsworth. Ainsworth's ancestors had made their brass in the West Indies slave trade, but in time they turned to the making of bleach and made a fortune in that too. It was a common enough witticism in those days that the source of the Ainsworth wealth was clear for all to see in black and white.

In the late summer of 1896 Colonel Ainsworth decided to close Coalpit Road and had a gate built to keep out the riffraff who might be disturbing his grouse shooting. Ainsworth also hired extra men to warn people off his property and put up a "Trespassers will be Prosecuted" sign. All of this caused an uproar around Bolton and within weeks the Smithills Parish Council, in whose borders the disputed road lay, took up the case. Its chairman was none other than Ainsworth himself and he surely expected that his considerable clout would soon put an end to the whole affair, but local feelings were running high and he failed to put the matter to rest. In fact, the Council decided to form a committee of inquiry which must have put Ainsworth in quite a rage.

On the same day there appeared in the Bolton papers a small advertisement summoning all freedom-loving Boltonians to "gather at the bottom of Halliwell Road at 10:00 in the morning on the coming Sunday, the 6th of September, for the purpose of a peaceful march over the moors to Winter Hill to affirm their right of way" and to demonstrate against Ainsworth and his outrageous actions. By 10:00 that Sunday morning a crowd of 1,000 or so had assembled and were treated to speeches by a couple of local Socialist radicals after which they set off up Halliwell Road, gathering sympathizers along the way as they progressed through the working class neighborhoods. By the time the demonstrators reached the top of the road at, ironically, the Ainsworth Arms they numbered close to 10,000. Though the local Socialists were at the heart of this effort, most of the folk were ordinary working-class people, some of whom worked for Ainsworth's bleach works along with mill workers, miners, engineers and bakery workers.

The _Bolton Journal_ of September 12th reported that:

"The multitude far exceeded what had been anticipated. Looking from the top of the steep hill leading by the gates of Smithills Hall the sight was a magnificent one. When the processionists emerged from the valley the road was literally a sea of faces, and the multitude comprised thousands of people of all ages and descriptions."

When they reached the gate that blocked the disputed path, a small group of policemen awaited them along with several of Ainsworth's gamekeepers. There were a few minutes of confusion at this, but eventually Joe Shufflebotham, one of the Socialist leaders, took the initiative and reminded them why they had come, to affirm their right to pass along this road whose locked gate now barred their way. He was careful to warn the assembled crowd that legal action could follow, so their cause would be best served if they kept to the footpath and avoided provocation. After these cautionary words, according to a report in the Bolton Chronicle, "a scene of the wildest excitement occurred." A group of the more belligerent marchers rushed at the gate and...

"Amid the lusty shouting of the crowd the gate was attacked by powerful hands, and it is said a saw was also brought into requisition; but however this may be, short work was made of the wooden barrier, and with a ring of triumph the demonstrators rushed through onto the disputed territory."

There was a scuffle with the assembled policeman and gamekeepers, and one of the latter wound up in a nearby stream when he tried to use his stick on the marchers. The Inspector in charge, after being unceremoniously tossed over a stone wall, and expecting more trouble, sent for reinforcements, but the violence was short-lived and the extra officers were eventually called off. The march now proceeded more or less peacefully, though any obstacles in the way of the path were quickly dismantled. At one point a collection was taken up for a defense fund for any who found themselves in trouble later with the law as a result of their participation in the march. Four pounds and ten shillings was the count. By now the excitement had died down and when the marchers reached the village of Belmont they had achieved their aim of marching unhindered, more or less, along Coalpit Road to Winter Hill.

The _Bolton Journal_ for September 12th observed:

"Thus ended a demonstration perhaps unprecedented in the history of Bolton, a great majority returning to the town, and the remainder besieging the local hostelries for refreshments. The demand was said to be so great that the wants of the hungry and thirsty ramblers could not be satisfied; and the appearance of such a mighty host naturally created much excitement in the village."

In the weeks that followed, the events of that Sunday were the favorite topic of conversation in the local pubs and in the local papers. Other demonstrations followed over the coming weeks with the crowds growing larger, and the matter would not be laid to rest. By the time of the third demonstration Colonel Ainsworth was ready to strike back, dispatching the son of his land agent to deliver writs to ten people accused of "forming part of a procession that passed over Colonel Ainsworth's property on Sunday the 6th inst." 32 more writs were issued the following week, though most of these were withdrawn on condition that the accused deny any Socialist affiliations. It was Ainsworth's intention to isolate the Socialists as the rabble-rousing troublemakers.

The trial of the remaining 10 began on March 9th 1897. 77 witnesses were called, with a majority of the prosecution witnesses selected from the ranks of Ainsworth's tenants and workers. Despite considerable evidence that the path had been a public right of way for many decades, Ainsworth's wealth and influence won the day and Vice Chancellor Hall accepted the assertions of Ainsworth's prosecutor that there was not a through way to Belmont village, that there had never been continuous use and there had been no intention on the part of the Ainsworth family to grant unimpeded use of the road to the public and the defendants were served with injunctions forbidding them to trespass on Ainsworth's land. Enthusiasm for the cause waned after this setback, but Solomon Partington, journalist, prominent Liberal, all-around gadfly and pain in the arse to the high and mighty, continued to wage an unending one-man campaign against land owners in general and Ainsworth in particular with his series of six pamphlets entitled "Truth". But it would be decades, long after Solomon Partington was laid in his grave, before that right of way was restored to the people of Bolton

# Chapter 4

Love may drive men to desperate acts, but it was not love that led me to the brink of suicide. We were performing "Sweeney Todd the Demon Barber", with yours truly as the evil Sweeney and in the final scene justice was to be done with me dangling at the end of a rope. Our audience demanded their share of death and gore and it was a hanging they had paid to see. We had a trapdoor in the stage and usually the curtain fell with me taking the drop and landing harmlessly in the dirt below. But I knew these punters would enjoy something more grisly. I rigged up a harness which hung from an old black rope from the roof and slipped it under my armpits with my jacket over it, with a brand-new white rope, slightly longer than the black one, around my neck for all to see. It was a great idea, but it had rained earlier in the day and the new rope had shrunk, so that when the trapdoor opened and I took the drop the new rope around my neck took the strain and the other hung limp. The audience thought it was marvelously realistic and cheered to lift the roof off. The rest of the company took their bows and paid me no mind. The curtain rose again and the crowd cheered even louder at the sight of my tortured face and the others took another bow. Finally, my brother glanced back at me. My face was turning purple and my tongue was hanging out. He gave a yell and jumped back towards me, pulled out one of his Bowie knives (we always carried knives as well as revolvers) and slashed both ropes. I crashed to the dirt eight feet below me and decided not to have any more clever ideas.

We were summoned on one occasion to give what almost amounted to a "Command Performance". It was the Rose Queen Festival in Horwich and our little show was set up in a field behind a pub called the Black Dog. Lord Stanley was the patron that year and we were asked to perform for his Lordship. Father decided that "Little Sureshot" was just the thing and he engaged thirty lads from the village to be Indians, with the rest of us as the Cowboys and we paraded around the town beforehand to work up plenty of enthusiasm for the performance. The action took place in the open air, with a shack rigged up from canvas and lath which the Indians attacked with enthusiasm, finally setting it on fire. Little Sureshot, played with an excess of enthusiasm by my brother Eddie, stood bravely at the door, a revolver in each hand, blazing death and defiance at all and sundry.

One of the "Indians" fell dead just by the burning cabin. I was already dead a few feet away. Soon the "Indian" noticed that the blazing cabin was swaying in the wind and I could see the whites of his eyes turn as he watched it lean towards him then slowly swing back. I tried to whisper to him to give it one more dying roll to safety, but before I could get my message across he got to his feet and solemnly walked two or three yards away. Then he carefully laid down and died again.

It was in Atherton one time that we were giving the Bard his due with our abbreviated version of Othello, with yours truly as the Moor complete with black face, and, of course, several more corpses than strictly necessary. The set was once more outdoors and the stage was made of planks set up on trestles and Desdemona was played by a local woman hired for the occasion. She was, unfortunately, of considerably larger proportions than was sensible in the circumstances. The strangling scene was a favorite with our audiences and we knew we had to put our best efforts into it. We soon discovered that the bed had been placed too near the end of the planks. As I lifted her by the throat and banged her head back on the pillow, up came the other end of the stage, down went the bed and the two of us disappeared under the canvas and hit the dirt with a thud that could be heard in the back row.

Being a family act, there were times that family squabbles spilled over into the action. We were performing "Fair Ellen of Radcliffe" and I was the villain. My sister Carrie was Fair Ellen and my brother Eddie played a page. I had to stab Fair Ellen and, being just a lad, I took a boyish pride in having real knives and keeping them well-sharpened. This time the knife was a bit too sharp or I was too rough and I made quite a gash in her arm. When she screamed, my brother saw the blood, dashed out and hit me on the nose. For a couple of minutes there was a furious fight on stage that the locals cheered lustily until Father realized what was going on, dropped the curtain and dragged us apart.

Our stock in trade was the perennial favorite "Maria Marten and the Red Barn" and it was during one such performance that Edwin Ainsworth once again crossed my path. Before the curtain even rose we could hear the merriment of a party of young men out to enjoy themselves. When the curtain rose, the place was packed and the revelers had taken possession of the front row. From the wings I could see that Edwin Ainsworth was in the midst of the melee and these young men of money set up such a racket that hardly a word could be heard past the front row. In one scene I was called upon to wrestle with "Maria" and as we struggled, the young roughs yelled "Seconds out" and when I finally met my inglorious end at the end of a rope they sang "For he's a jolly good fellow". It was a relief when the final curtain came. I hoped we had seen the last of them, but when the audience had all filed out and it was time to clean up, Ainsworth and his cronies were still loitering, drinking from hip flasks and growing meaner by the minute as alcohol fueled their spitefulness. When Ainsworth spotted me scrubbing off the greasepaint in Mother's washtub by the steps of our caravan he led his cronies to stand over me.

"Well, Mister Dyer, a fine dying you gave us in there. But it's hardly a living is it." His pals guffawed at the witticism, but despite the grin on his face the merriment never reached his eyes. I stopped the toweling and stood to face him, not caring to have him look down at me but I could think of nothing to say that might silence his laughing cronies. What I most wanted to do was smash a fist into his sneering face, but the thought of a thrashing from his drunken friends kept my mouth shut and I renewed my scrubbing, hoping to hide the color in my face.

"And how is that delightful young filly of yours. The one with a touch of the sun in her skin. Still as desirable as ever, I dare say. It's about time that one felt the touch of a gentleman on her pretty neck. She's wasted on the likes of you, don't you think?"

I was on him before he had time to react and my shoulder hit him square in the chest and sent him sprawling in the dirt. His friends stood in shocked silence for a moment as he scrambled to his feet, but Ainsworth's furious glance in their direction propelled them forward and they had me pinned on the ground just as quickly as I had downed him. I felt a cane lash across my shoulder and a fist or two in my ribs and I knew that I was in for a cruel beating. But then I heard a heavy thud and one of my attackers fell back with a scream. Another thud and I was no longer pinned down. I rolled away, expecting another attack, but as I raised myself from the dirt there was Alfie Mitton, the big mallet in both hands, and two of Ainsworth's cronies groaning in the dirt. Alfie took another swing with the mallet at the one who was still on his feet but he vaulted himself backwards well out of Alfie's reach. He glanced at Ainsworth, unsure of his ground, and the hesitation gave Alfie the opportunity to whack him on the knee and he went down in a heap then scrambled out of reach as fast as all fours could take him. Ainsworth had no stomach for facing Alfie or myself without his thugs and he flung himself past us with his face twisted in anger and his pals stumbled after him.

As the months went by, Angelina and I grew closer. Though neither of us knew much of the world, we found a world within each other, built on hesitantly shared confidences and the discovery that we could laugh at ourselves and feel enlarged, not diminished. We shared our weaknesses and helped build each other's strengths and we soon enough took it as read that our lives were bound together. Getting married was out of the question for now. Angelina's parents would never consent to an actor as a son-in-law and Angelina would never defy them. So I began to think the unthinkable. If I was ever to win her parents' approval I would have to find a different line of work. But could I leave the theater? And how would the old man react? Probably disown me. Our traveling theater may have seemed a bit of a tinker's life, but it was in my blood. It was a far cry from the London stage or Shakespeare's Globe but when I stepped on to that shabby stage each night it was transformed and it transformed me. I felt grand and full of power, conscious of the ability to make that meager audience laugh or cry for the brief time they were mine, faithful troops marching for a beloved general. It was an intoxicating feeling and I was not sure I could wrench myself from its grip. And I loved the language, the rhythm of the writers words like the majestic roll of a proud ship in full sail, and the poetry both coarse and sublime. My father, when the fancy took him, would delay the start of the second act, standing alone at the edge of the stage and treat the audience to some rousing poem or grand soliloquy. "Father's Vanities" we called them and chided him with a laugh, but I confess that I loved those moments, carried along by the full majesty of his inspired renditions. Such words deserved to be heard aloud and I felt their power and beauty beating in my chest when Father spoke them and I knew that this was my inheritance. But inheritance can be squandered or forfeit and I had a choice to make.

But what can compare in its power and its awfulness to the sway that women hold in our lives. The growing need for Angelina's physical presence, the laughter in her eyes, the beguiling wickedness in her smile were more than I could withstand. I wanted her too much in all the ways I could think of and some that I could hardly yet imagine and I knew that if I did not make the awful choice, the vagabond life on the boards would become an increasingly cheerless one.

Of course, with the distance of time since passed I can see that there may have been other women that I might have loved and still lived the gypsy life of a traveling actor, but back then, in the single-mindedness of youth and first love, I saw only this one opportunity, the one opportunity from which all the momentous and joyous events of our life would follow.

I had come to know Angelina's brothers a little over the months that followed and they were now both regulars down the coal mine, chopping coal and hacking coal dust for a living. Clearly Mr. Sabini had no objection to coal mining as a way of earning a decent wage and there was never any shortage of work on the coal face, as houses, factories and cotton mill chimneys blackened the skies morning and night seven days a week. It was dirty work and not without its dangers and already the brothers had one or two of the blue-black coal dust scars on their backs and shoulders from falling lumps of coal they weren't quick enough to dodge. But they had something else, a swagger that says I do hard dirty dangerous work and I'm more man than you are. Watching them stride home in the gloom after a shift, smiles bright in their coal-smudged faces and money in their pockets, told you they thought highly of themselves and they expected you to do the same. And most men did and I did, too. I was not overjoyed at the prospect of a life underground in the dark and the damp, but in time I formed the notion of becoming a coal miner. Signing on would be the easy part. The brothers would have a word with the pit head boss, a quick introduction, and I would go to work the next day.

Simple. How to tell father, that was the bugger of it. I was not fearful that he would be angry but already I could feel the weight of his disappointment. I chose to tell him on my 18th birthday. The play that night was "Mrs. Challinor's Lament", yet another wringing out of the familiar sad tale of a son gone bad, a prodigal who broke his mother's heart. His gallows speech, with his mother's sobs for punctuation, never failed to bring tears to the eyes. A fine choice, I thought, though I could not say for better or for worse. The night's performance was over and we were crammed into the caravan scrubbing off the crude greasepaint and I could not put it off any longer. I had rehearsed this scene as much as any I had ever struggled with, looking for any way to soften the blow, but finding none. "Father, since I'm eighteen now I reckon it's about time I gave some thought to my future." My heart thumped in my chest and I took a deep breath to ease the knot in my gut. I could sense a stillness settle over the old man. "Oh, aye?" was his response, him parsimonious with his words for once. He knew what was coming.

"Me and Angelina will be wanting to get wed someday not too far off. Thing is, her parents don't reckon much to players, and the vagabond life. They'd never agree to her marrying an actor and wandering about the countryside like a gypsy. "That last stung Father, I could see the darkness fill his eyes for just a moment. Then he lifted his head and spoke.

"Son, let me tell thee something about this poor profession that we practice. If all the tongues of the world were given voice together in one place, they would sound like nothing more than the fabled tower of Babel, a jumbled, frightened muttering in the dark. But, if one of those voices spoke the glorious gift of English, the words of Shakespeare and Milton and Wordsworth and all the poets who have sung this song we call English, in time all those other barbarian voices would fall silent in awe of the magnificence of that God-given marvel that we are blessed to call our mother tongue. The actor is priest to that sacrament. Without the likes of us, the words that our fellow men utter are hardly more than the grunting of wallowing pigs. The lines that we read as we tread those boards bring pleasure to many, that's for sure. But pleasure is but a small part of what we give. It is our duty, our blessed obligation to bear living witness to the genius that forged miracles out of mere words, in the irresistible fire that we call English."

The force of his words silenced me for a long, long minute. But I suspected that this speech was one he had rehearsed before in anticipation of such a time. I had to press on and make my case.

"Father, I love the language as much as you do. But giving mouth to such beauty without the woman I want to marry would be a melancholy life. A noble sacrifice, but not one I am prepared to make. Angelina's brothers both work down the pit, and are respected for it. They've promised to put in a good word for me with the pithead boss. With a steady wage from honest work, I think Angelina's parents will give their consent, and that is what matters most to me now."

"You must do as you see fit." His words were stiff and without sympathy. In the shadows behind him I could see the wet shimmer in my mother's eyes.

So, the decision was made. As promised, Angelina's brothers took me along to the pit yard early one morning to meet the gaffer. He looked me over, and, seeing that I was young and in good health, encouraged by a good word from the two lads, I was duly signed on to work the coal face, with the two Italians as my mentors.

I had blackened my face a time or two on the stage, for the death scene in Othello, or for the occasional minstrelsy, but the effects of working the coal face could not be bettered by greasepaint. When the whistle blew for the change of shift, the iron gates of the cage would clang open and out we stumbled, dazzled by the daylight, a ragged mob of counterfeit blackamoors, Davy lamps and lunch tins swinging in our hands. The work was hard, and coal dust was the ever-present seasoning to the sandwiches and pasties we chewed on in the meager light a hundred feet below ground, washed down with tepid, bitter tea.

We worked with backs bent, swinging our short picks at the glinting coal, two men to a stall, back to back, amid the heat and the stinking sweat of men and beasts as the pit ponies shuffled by, harnesses jangling, coal cart wheels creaking, with occasional halts that left steaming piles of manure. We learned to step carefully. There was no glamour in it, no applause as we greeted the fading light after each performance. But it was hard, honest work, and there was dignity of sorts, the dignity of strong men with little need to boast, men whose muscles ached each night as they scrubbed off the black dust in the tin tub in front of the hearth, and flung their unspoken fears out with the gray water that washed over the darkened cobbles.

The months passed. I would be lying if I said I didn't miss my life on the stage. And I did make the occasional appearance in one or another pot- boiler that I knew well enough that no rehearsal was necessary. I had little enough time for learning lines. Six days a week down the mine, and in the winter months, as the cage was lowered, the morning light was just creeping over the low, dust-blackened hills and when we emerged at the end of the shift, the thin winter daylight was already fading. I had learned the work quickly, though I went home exhausted in those first weeks and slept the sleep of the blameless. But in time my back and arms grew stronger, and with an extra inch or two in height I began to walk with a newly-muscled swagger. Not cocky, mind you. Angelina was quick to take me down a peg or two if I was getting too big for my boots.

Sunday was our day of freedom. In good weather we tramped all over the grassy hills that cradled the town. Many others did the same, so we rarely lacked for company. It was privacy that was in short supply. A cramped caravan was no place for trysting and Angelina's parents were our constant companions in their own home. There was a kiss and a cuddle here and there. I had more in mind, but it was made clear to me that such pleasures must await the sanctity of marriage, and I did not fancy a thumping from Angelina's quick- tempered and hard-muscled brothers if they were to hear even the merest whisper of liberties taken. So, patience and pious thoughts were the order of the day, or so Angelina told me, though piety was not much practiced among our ragtag band, who only graced a church vestibule on christenings, occasionally, if they were in the mood, and weddings if there was no other remedy, and funerals for the sake of form. None expected to meet his maker in the afterlife and none felt the need for more than the merest nodding acquaintance in this life.

# Chapter 5

Retribution from Ainsworth did not come quickly, but I had little doubt that it would come. I was living each day with a sense of something lurking in the shadows. But he was careful not to do his own dirty work this time. It was six months or so after the roughing up of Ainsworth and his cronies. Angelina and I were walking our customary walk to her parents' home, laughing at some unintended moment of hilarity in the evening show. As we stepped into one of the pools of darkness between the street lamps where no public house cast its light, there was a flurry behind us, movement sensed rather than seen. Strong arms clamped around my chest and a coarse hand covered my mouth. I could smell cigarettes and beer and sweat.

"Don't move, lad. Better for you if you keep quiet". I had heard the sharp intake of Angelina's breath and the muffled beginnings of a scream cut short, then the sounds of struggling, the tearing of cloth, and the sound of fear and outrage forced through the fingers that were now pressing hard on Angelina's face. She was pushed into the alley that had hidden our attackers. The men who held me shoved in behind her. Angelina's attackers stopped a few feet in and turned her to face me. Her coat was dragged from her back and rough hands tore off her outer garments, so that she stood trembling before me in nothing more than petticoat and undergarments. There was the glint of steel across her throat. Despite the dark I could see the terrified look in her eyes. I struggled to wrench myself free and received a sharp knock on the head that buckled my knees. My eyes blurred but remained open. I came to wish that the blow had knocked me senseless. I would not have witnessed what came next. A dark shape stepped between us, back to me, facing Angelina. With collar raised and hat pulled low, there was nothing to recognize. But the sour hateful stink of the man was unmistakable. He raised his left hand. The tip of the blade rested on the knot that tied Angelina's petticoat above her breasts. His right hand snatched at the top of the petticoat and with a few deft movements of his hand he had sheared the petticoat from top to bottom. He wrenched it aside and Angelina squirmed in shame, naked to the waist, unable to cover herself. All that stood between her and complete humiliation were the cotton drawers that circled her waist and clung to her hips. These, too, he cut away and tossed aside. Her body shook with muted sobbing. Tears dripped onto the fingers that covered her mouth. He tossed aside the knife and began fumbling with his trousers, then pulled her in towards him. He reached down to force her legs apart, then thrust himself into her. She tried to cry out and pull herself away, but the hands that held her were too strong. His hands clenched her buttocks and he forced himself against her again and again. Then, with a grunt, he was finished. He withdrew, tidied himself, and stepped back as the other men lowered her to the cold cobbles. Her eyes were closed and she lay limp. The men turned her on her back and spread her legs wide. Two of them unbuckled my belt and pulled my trousers and my drawers down around my ankles, then struck me another blow on the back of the head, harder this time, and there was nothing but blackness as I pitched forward onto Angelina's naked body. That is how they found us. It did not take long. Elsie, as usual, had been walking a short distance behind. She had stopped to look into the window of a jeweler's shop, hoping to spy a bracelet she coveted. When she looked up, we were gone. She had dashed forward thinking that we were playing some kind of trick, but was halted by the sounds of the scuffle from the alley. She feared that she might be in for the same, so she turned and ran, taking a roundabout route to Angelina's home. She burst in breathless just as they were closing the shop and delivered her awful news. Charlie and Tony were out the door almost before she had finished. And so they found me, trousers around my ankles, prostrate and groaning on top of a naked and half-conscious Angelina. To them the evidence was clear enough. This callous bastard with his bare arse hanging out of his trousers had molested their sister. And so it was that their fists and boots slammed into my head and back, and my hair was yanked back to better pound my face. As I was dragged away from Angelina, she tugged frantically at what shreds of clothing she had left to cover her nakedness and screamed at them. "No! No! No! No! it wasn't Tommy! it wasn't Tommy!"

The two of them were not inclined to question the truth of what they saw, but, confused by Angelina's vehemence, they paused in their retribution long enough for me to scramble away a few feet and pull up my trousers and secure my belt. I was saved from a second round of pummeling by the arrival of a policeman alerted by Elsie's breathless summons and the sounds of a scuffle and Angelina's shouts as he patrolled his beat up and down Market Street, expecting only the inevitable belligerent with too much beer in him. He was young, barely older than me, affecting a downy beard for gravitas, and this was clearly a novelty for him, much more interesting than the usual rapping on drunk and disorderly skulls.

"Now, gentlemen, I will take over here if you don't mind. Let's attend to the young lady first".

He swung his blue cape off his shoulders and stepped forward to drape it over Angelina's nakedness. Elsie herself appeared around the corner and her shawl fashioned a skirt for Angelina. "Now miss, let's get you home right quick, then, if you can talk, you may give me an account of what happened here".

So the sorry procession made its way down the street to her parents' house, and, once seated, with a cup of tea to steady her hands, she told him of the attack in short painful sentences. The shame of what she described burned her face red, and some things she could not speak of. Her parents looked on in horror and sadness, silent, anger pulsing in their stony faces. I stood well back, in the doorway, not sure of my welcome in this situation. As I stood there, listening to Angelina recount her humiliation, I could not help wonder about our constant invisible companion, Alfie Mitton. Not that he could have been of much use tonight against such a malignant and frightening attack. They had been too many and too strong and too determined to do damage. I glanced out on the street, searching the dark pools of shadow for any sight of him. I heard a shuffling behind me and ducked in fear, nerves still tight as piano wire. As I raised myself, ready to cry out or strike out I saw Alfie, and the angry words died in my throat. He stood blackened and bloodied and forlorn, hands raised to protect himself from the onslaught he clearly expected. "I'm sorry, Tommy. I'm sorry, I really am" was all he could manage to say.

"What happened to you?", I said, struggling to make it sound like a simple question, rather than an accusation.

"Those bastards were waiting for me. They spotted me before I ever laid eyes on them. Dangerous people, no mistake. They had a coal sack over me before I knew what was happening. Tied me up and tossed me in a coal hole. By the time I got loose and caught up with you, it was too late."

There were wet streaks of coal dust on his cheeks. The words dried up and he thrust his hands deep in his pockets, mute in his misery.

"It wasn't your fault, Alfie. Don't blame yourself. Nothing you could have done anyway, except get your head bashed or your throat cut. We'd best be out of here and head for home. We know who did it and it shouldn't be long before they get what they deserve. The coppers will have hold of 'em soon enough." I made my solemn farewells to Angie's family. They stared back coldly and they would not let me speak to Angelina who had been helped to her room. So, Alfie and I made our own sad procession back the way we had come. At some point, Alfie slipped away down some dark, dirty street without a word. I called a goodnight at his fading shape but there was no reply. When I reached the caravan, I cleaned up as best I could from the washtub underneath and breezed in as casually as I could muster. They both knew something was up but didn't press me for details. "Everything alright, son?" was a concession to the formalities. "Fair enough for now. I'll fill you in later." We both knew that they would hear the full story in time, as likely from some cheerful, spiteful rumormonger as from me.

But my optimism with regards to our attackers proved naïve. Although we did not know the man's name, my account of his twisted body and distinctive odor produced knowing nods and noises of recognition amongst the detectives who interviewed me when I presented myself at Farnworth police station after my shift the next day. They already had Angelina's statement, and what I told them confirmed what they suspected. "John Terence Modbury, that would be your villain, Mr. Dyer. A bad lot, sir, one of the very worst. Not one to get on the wrong side of". He gave me the kind of look that said "not very wise on your part, if you don't mind me saying so".

We hadn't gone looking for trouble on either occasion. It was our misfortune to cross paths with the man that night as he made his drunken exit from that pub. We would hardly have wished for the consequences of that encounter.

I did not expect Angelina to make an appearance for some time and I knew better than to show my face at the café, but I was worried about her and anxious for news. Each day at the pit I rode the cage with Charlie and Tony and, though not hostile, they were distant, as if they blamed me for what happened to their sister. My questions were met with terse and grudging answers, but I did learn that Angelina did not leave her bed for two days after being examined by the police surgeon, but was now able to sit in a chair by her window and take a little nourishment. On the fifth day Elsie appeared at the caravan with a note which she thrust into my hand then dashed off into the night. The note said simply "Be patient".

I became a frequent visitor at the police station, demanding news of our attacker, but he had gone to ground in a serious way. It was two weeks before he was spotted again in his usual haunts. He had, he said, been doing some work for young master Ainsworth on the estate, sleeping rough in a shelter on the moors, away from the comforts of his own lodgings. When questioned by the Farnworth detectives about his whereabouts on the night we were attacked, he was able to produce witnesses who swore he was carousing with them in another ill-famed public house miles from where we had been. Neither I nor Angelina had seen the man's face clearly on the night of the attack and the police informed us politely and regretfully that they could not bring charges against him, even though they were in little doubt that he was the villain. Colonel Ainsworth's nephew, who I was certain had instigated the attack, also confirmed that Modbury was doing some laboring work on the estate for the last two weeks, accounting for his unaccustomed absence. There was nothing more to be done. Justice would be denied for now.

It was two months before I saw Angelina again. I was giving one of my infrequent performances. I knew the lines, entered on cue, said my piece, but my heart wasn't in it. I was going through the motions and there was no hiding that from father. He had, of course, heard all about the attack, from others first, then from me. His efforts to persuade me to take this part or that were his attempt to take my mind off what had befallen Angie, but he soon realized that he was wasting his time He now seemed to accept that the boards no longer held me in thrall. He had little to say on the subject, mother even less, though she expressed much with sad glances and painful sighs. On the night of this particular lackluster performance I was relaxing behind the stage, chewing on a slab of bread and a small piece of Lancashire cheese that mother had brought home that day, when in rushed our Eddie with a piece of paper which he crushed into my hands before dashing off to his post at the flap, taking my place as guardian against the non-paying public. "From your lady friend", he flung over his shoulder before disappearing. I pushed aside the bread and cheese, hunger forgotten, and tenderly straightened out the crumpled paper.

" _Meet me outside after the show_ "

I was barely aware of the second act. I played my part, apparently without mishap, mechanical but efficient, and sprinted off stage without bothering with the curtain call, scrubbed of the greasepaint with more haste than was prudent, and bolted for the tent flap, cheeks ruddy from rough treatment, heart pounding. The last of the contented crowd were making their unhurried exit, shuffling by me, chattering and laughing. But one shape in the darkness did not move, still and silent against the shaded canvas. She was wrapped in a heavy shawl that covered most of her head so that her face was in darkness. She looked up as I ran towards her. Her smile pushed back the darkness as she lifted the shawl and my heart lifted. Her face shone pale in the dim light. I stopped a few feet short, not sure if I should place my arms around her. But her hand reached out for mine. She pulled herself close and leaned against me with her face buried in my chest. "Angie. Angie. How are you? I've missed you so much, but all I can do is gibber like a fool". How do you ask someone you love if they're recovering from a rape? Mundane words seemed to have the best chance of soothing the still-raw wounds of her heart. "I'm......". She paused and started again. "I'm better. Still not myself, but better. I've missed you something terrible.

But I couldn't see you. I don't just mean because of my parents disapproval. You witnessed my shame. I couldn't face seeing that in your eyes, until now. I had to find a way to live with that. This is my first step.

I spent a lot of time just staring at the walls and re-living that night. But I finally realized that I couldn't let them take away the life I wanted to live, so I'd better face up to it and get on with it. I still feel like everybody is staring at me and whispering, like it was my fault. But I'll have to live with that for a while."

I started to speak, though I knew I had little to offer but trite reassurances. She silenced me with her fingertips on my lips. "I don't need you to say anything right now. This is for me, not you. I just need you to act as if everything was just the same as it was before. I have to know that I can look into your face and not see my shame looking back at me." She stared hard at me then, eyes searching and fearful. I felt like a fool, not wanting to adopt some vacuous look of solicitation, not wanting to look frozen or indifferent.

Tears pricked my eyes. She brushed them away with her fingers. "Tommy, Tommy, help me make the ugliness and shame of it all go away." I put my arms around her and she cried.

In time, little by little, Angie was restored to me. It was a time of tears at unexpected times, long silences, haunted looks, fear of dark places, but most of these receded into the past, though a fear of dark places stayed with Angie for many years and whenever we passed a darkened alley she would grip me tightly and hurry us both past until we were out of reach of the demons that lingered in the shadows.

By the winter of 1910, two years after the attack, Angie was once more the girl I knew before that awful night, or almost. Just once in a while some small reminder would send her mind crashing back to that painful memory and her face would twist, not in shame or sadness, but in an anger so fierce it burned in her eyes like a fire that raged both hot and cold. It would disappear as quickly as it came if she knew I had seen it. It was to be some years before that anger was scoured from her mind, but its time would come.

The brothers and I were by now working the Pretoria Pit in Westhoughton. It was a long journey each day, but the pay was good and the savings in the bank were growing by small but steady increments. It was December, and us miners would wake before an icy dawn. How I hated those bone-chilling hours. On the stage there was never any need to stir much before 7:00, but miners on the day shift never saw the morning daylight in winter. The brothers would summon me with a tap on the wagon's window and off we would stumble down the narrow silent street, snap tins swinging in our hands, packed with a pasty and a flask of tea to wash down the coal dust, clogs ringing on the cobblestones. A bus and a train later we would heave ourselves from the hard seats and join the procession of silent men, dressed in clothes that once had seen better days but now were fit for nothing else except working down the pit. There was no such thing as work clothes made for mining. There were best clothes, good clothes, shoddy clothes, old clothes, and finally those ragged specimens that had passed beyond any decent use and all that was left for them was working down the mine. This shuffling, ragged stream of men, shrouded by the mist of their own breathing in the freezing air, clattered on towards the cage that would take them down at a horrifying speed to the fetid darkness and the black dust and the stink of the pit ponies, but a place that was at least warm. Warm enough that even in winter, men stripped to the waist and some even less, toiling all but naked, their bodies black with coal dust, glistening with sweat, mad worshipers before the altar of Almighty Coal, illuminated by the meager light of every miner's friend, the Davy lamp.

So it was on the morning of December 21st. The three of us rode the cage down number 3 shaft that day with 341 others. I was working with Charlie that day, his brother further down the face. On the ride to work Charlie had seemed anxious and fidgety. When I asked him the reason, he told me about a dream he had had the night before, a tangled knot of lightning and thunder, punctuated by awful cries of men gripped with fear and pain. He was the superstitious sort, as Mediterranean types tend to be, and he had half-convinced himself that some awful event would soon descend upon him. I tried to gee him out of it with a joke or two about his mother's highly-seasoned cooking and the lateness of the family dinner hour. But my humor did not touch him, and, truth is, he had got me a little on edge too. As we worked back to back in the cramped coal stall, I could tell by the sound of his pick that he was not putting much conviction into his work and I gave him a nudge. "Gaffer will kick your backside if he sees you farting about like a big soft girl." But he didn't seem to care, and soon his efforts stopped completely. I turned to chide him again and urge him to buck up before the foreman came round, but one look at his face stilled the words on my tongue. His eyes, glowing red and white in the half-darkness, were wide with what I can only describe as terror such as I had never seen before. His mouth was open and he was gasping for air. What resolve he had managed to cling to up to now deserted him. He flung his pick to the floor and started to scramble back towards the shaft, hurrying as fast as he could move with that bent-back, shuffling gait familiar to all coal miners. I turned to follow him, hoping to get him turned around before we both got the sack, but before long he broke into a loping desperate run and I could barely keep up with him. I could see the faint light from the shaft and he was almost to it as I passed the pony stalls, four ponies still tethered, waiting to be harnessed to the rumbling coal carts that moved up and down the coal face all day and all night. And then it came. The end of our world. Some gigantic force I could not comprehend lifted me clear off my feet and flung me into one of the stalls and slammed me against the pony that occupied it. The beast stumbled and fell, crashing into the sides of the stall, bringing the broken timbers down onto both our bodies, just as the roar of the explosion thundered over us. I could feel the pressure of the blast pummeling my body. My head was trapped between the pony's ribcage and the foul layer of urine-soaked straw on the floor, so my ears were spared the worst of it. Long seconds of awful silence followed. I lay stunned, head pounding, ears ringing, hardly sure if I was dead or alive. I tested my muscles. My feet seemed to move freely and my legs moved a little, but from the hips on up I was tightly wedged between the dead pony and the shattered planks that until a few minutes before had been its home. I pushed up against the timbers but they would not budge, and, probing the cracks between the planks with my fingers, I could feel the hide of another pony pinning me down from the other side. Since my legs seemed to be functioning well enough I set about thrashing them back and forth, digging my heels into the hard floor and pulling with all the strength left in my legs and ever so slowly, half-inch by half-inch, I pulled myself free from the suffocating space between the two dead ponies. When I finally was free I could do no more than lie on the cold ground, chest heaving, legs trembling, inhaling the smell of blood and urine and manure from the ponies. From that day to this I have never been able to enter a place where horse or ponies are kept without being overcome with a slight dizziness at the first whiff of that awful, familiar smell. In time I was able to raise myself to my knees and began a slow painful crawl towards the light from the shaft. I did not trust myself to stand up and walk. When I got close to the shaft I could see the cage, still at the bottom, but tilted sideways with the broken cables draped around it. I was almost there when I began to hear a soft whimpering from inside the wreckage of the cage. I dragged myself the last few feet, enough to push my head inside. Against the tilted side of the cage was Charlie, sitting hunched, legs drawn up, arms tight around them. His eyes were fixed and staring and I could see blood trickling from his ears. His face was wet with tears, streaked with coal dust. I crawled to him and put my face in front of his, but he didn't seem to notice. The two of us were alive, at least, and not likely to expire anytime soon, unless this was some cruel joke in the afterlife. I spoke his name, but he made no response. I sat back against the broken timbers of the cage, unable to think too clearly or even care too much, staring at the opposite wall as if there I might find the answer to a question I had forgotten. I had no sense of how long we sat there, unmoving, unthinking. Later reports tell me that it was perhaps 45 minutes, but for me the passage of time had no measure. At some point I became aware of a rumbling vibration, the sound of the winding mechanism, and a change in the light told me that the other cage was on its way down. The noise changed and I knew the cage was slowing. A voice called from above and I looked up at the faint light, like a wintry sun above me. A rope tumbled towards me, and as it swayed it caught Charlie on the side of his face. That seemed to shake him out of his bewilderment and he looked at me, blinking. "Are we alive?" I managed to croak a "yes", but he looked puzzled. So I repeated it louder and nodded my head in an exaggerated way. I guessed that he couldn't hear very well, his ears damaged by the blast. This time he seemed to understand, and the knowledge seemed to calm him. Soon afterwards a heavy pair of boots thumped on the roof of the cage and the first of our rescuers scrambled through the open sides. A grim face peered into mine.

"Can you move? We need to get this cage out of the shaft". I nodded and he helped me to my feet, then had to move quickly to keep me from tumbling to the floor as I swayed with pain and nausea. The two of us shuffled a few feet out of the wreckage and back down the coal face, then he sat me against the wall. He returned a minute later with Charlie. He disappeared again, then brought us each a blanket which he draped around our shoulders, and a flask of cold tea, from which he gently poured a trickle down our parched throats. Then he was gone. I sat there and listened to the sounds of axes and splintering wood and sledge hammers and reluctant metal, but eventually the work of clearing away the broken cage was finished and the winding engine started up again. The rescue cage was lowered the last few feet and 8 or 9 men shuffled past us, lamps lit, faces set hard against what they might find in the darkness beyond. All told, 148 rescuers eventually made their grim way down that sorrowful passage. But for the two of us, the ordeal was almost over. One man had remained behind to lead us back up the shaft to safety, and a few minutes later Charlie and I emerged into blessed daylight. I was helped into the winding hut and handed a mug of scalding sweet tea and I was never so grateful for a hot drink in my life. As I stared down at it, slow, dripping tears dimpled its milky surface.

All that day the solemn crowd at the surface grew, women mostly, waiting, hope turning to despair as only three more men came up alive. These three joined Charlie and me in the winding hut. All three had been found close to the shaft, where the blast had done the least damage. Beyond the places where their lives had been spared, a thick wall of coal and rock sealed in the rest. Rescue teams worked all day and into that night, but no more miners came up alive. 344 men and boys died that day. Up above, diminishing hope turned to grief. Wives wept for lost husbands, mothers for their sons. Both clutched the hands of other children whose fearful and confused faces showed no comprehension that this would be their first Christmas without a father or a brother.

As I sat in that shed, with the blanket clutched around me for comfort, not having the will to move, the 3 other survivors were led in, staring and silent, and slumped beside us. One was a lad of no more than 15 or 16. Once inside, he sat with his mouth hanging open, but his eyes could not rest on one spot, darting here and yon without seeming to register anything around him, nor did he take in the desultory muted conversation going on about him. The rest of us talked about being lucky to be alive. No-one mentioned the dead. After a while the boy gained some possession of his senses and slowly passed his gaze over each of us. When he looked my way I asked him "How long you been working here, lad?"

"This was my first day", he said. His voice trembled.

"Better make it your last then". The bitter words came from across the hut.

"I won't be going down that hole again. I'll not be buried again until the Good Lord takes me in my old age. "No-one spoke, but all of us must have reached that same determination. There was no question of ever making that journey in the cage again. My days as a miner were over, and Charlie never went underground after that day. The power and terror of his premonition and the loss of his brother caused him distress for many years to come. He could not rid himself of the guilt that his dream had so unmanned him that he had given no thought to his brother's safety and he had fled the coal face with his own survival the one single frenzied thought in his mind. No amount of reasoning could ever persuade him otherwise.

So, I returned to the life of a poor actor. Father greeted the news of a permanent, more or less, return to the stage with a gruff "About bloody time!" Mother, as usual, had little to say, but her relief that I had survived the Pretoria Disaster (it had now received capitalized status in common discourse) and her joy at having me back as a full-time, fully attentive member of the cast was evident in small ways. She could be found, from time to time, staring at me with tears in her eyes, and I would chide her for her maudlin foolishness, but there was more tenderness than irritation in me when I did.

On the day of the explosion, it had been late in the afternoon when we were finally cleared to go home, after each had been examined by the local quack. Alerted by the shaking of the ground under his feet and the dull rumble that followed it, he didn't need to be told. He was ready for the summons when it came, though he had expected to be needed more as physician than coroner.

Charlie was tended to by the doctor, bandaged around the head to protect his burst eardrums. I was treated for nothing more than cuts and bruises. Having my head jammed between two pit ponies had saved my ears. The five of us were handed free transport passes, and with little reason to linger, we shuffled off to Daubhill station like defeated soldiers leaving the battlefield. A steady stream of anxious faces passed us by. Each wife and mother would stare at us intently as we approached, staring at our dirty faces, hoping that one or other of us might be the husband or son they had waved goodbye to from their doorstep that morning. We brought nothing but disappointment to these worried faces. They had only sadness and loss waiting for them in the weeks and months ahead.

I didn't care to leave Charlie to make his own way home, so I walked with him from the station in Farnworth, up the cobbled lane past St. John's Church and on up Market Street to the family shop. News of the explosion had not yet reached Farnworth, so that the people we passed eyed us with curiosity. Our clothes and blackened faces marked us as miners and the bandages around Charlie's head meant only bad news and soon the more curious had the sad few words out of us, and in a matter of a few hours the whole town knew. When we were almost to the shop, Charlie stopped. He was trembling and his face drained of color. He was struggling for the courage to deliver the awful news that only one son was coming home. I dreaded the prospect almost as much as he did and I would have welcomed any excuse to leave him there to walk those last few feet alone. But no sufficient excuse presented itself, so I took him by the arm and with my heart pounding, sick to my stomach, scarcely able to breathe, I pushed open the café door. The old man was at the counter, head down, writing carefully in a ledger. He lifted his head at the tinkling of the bell. The practiced, friendly smile that greeted every customer shaped his mouth for only a moment, then died the instant he saw Charlie, and the light faded from his eyes. He rushed forward to seize Charlie, words tumbling from his mouth, words that I did not understand, but could guess their meaning, fear and anxiety clear in every syllable. Charlie with his bandages and ruptured eardrums, could not hear clearly, but he needed no interpreter. He could only stare at his father, shaking his head, tears streaming down his cheeks. The old man looked at me, searching for some sign that would give him hope that Tony would follow soon.

"There was an explosion at the pit. We were lucky. We made it out."

"What about Antonio?" It was almost a scream, almost an accusation. He saw my eyes slide away from his face and he knew. He turned to his wife who had just now emerged from the back, worried by the commotion. He looked at her and spoke a few words. There was a crash of china, and she fainted.

Once again Angelina became a stranger to me, as if our relationship was star-crossed, a test of our strength. For Angelina's parents, the loss of one son and the debilitation of the other seemed to take much of the cheerfulness and joy from their lives. The old man still smiled at each and every customer who walked in the door, but the smile could never hide the sadness that had settled permanently in his eyes. When he looked at you there was the mournful air of a lost dog about him, and his wife rarely showed her face in the café from that time on, preferring to spend her time in silent reflection, seeking solace in the comforts of her faith. She took up knitting and turned out a steady supply of socks, jerseys and winter caps for the orphaned children of the Pretoria disaster. Each week she would bundle up her impressive pile of woolens and carry them to St. Gregory's Catholic Church, just a short way down Market Street, with a solemn determination that discouraged idle chatter among the woman she invariably found gathered there for tea and gossip. She continued this ritual long after the need had passed and no-one at the Church had the heart to disillusion her. Her gifts always seemed to find a home somewhere, though it was not always the needy who enjoyed the benefit.

In time, Charlie's hearing was restored and there was little outward sign of the effects of that day. But he would not go outdoors on Guy Fawkes Night. The sound of fireworks unsettled him and he took no pleasure in the bonfire and shook his head glumly when offered parkin or treacle toffee, while the rest of us stuffed our cheeks shamelessly. Even though months had passed since the explosion I could not let go of a sense of responsibility for him. He was something of a lost soul now that his brother was gone, but he seemed cheered by my company, so I took to spending more of my free time with him than I had in the past, and at my urging he became a frequent face in our audience, and whenever I was on stage I knew where he would be, always occupying a seat nearest the exit. At first he was little more than a silent, unmoved presence. But the day came when I heard him laugh at some impromptu nonsense I was forced to invent, owing to the late arrival onstage of Johnny Wilmore, after being unavoidably delayed by the contents of a pint pot in the nearest pub. Soon after that Charlie seemed to notice, for the first time, the charms of Angelina's friend Elsie. Elsie was not a beauty, but she had the gift of a guileless and ever-sunny disposition that brightened the day of anyone who came into contact with her. She had been an admirer of Charlie's for some time, but had never confided in Angelina for fear that it would damage their friendship. But circumstances were different now. Elsie knew that her good heart and cheerful nature were just what Charlie needed and shared her feelings with Angelina. Angelina was, of course, delighted in their interest in each other. Elsie was just the tonic that her brother needed and it was not long before Charlie and Elsie joined the parade of courting couples showing themselves off up and down Market Street each Sunday afternoon.

There was but one bit of good that came from the Pretoria Disaster. For Angelina's parents, working down the pit lost its appeal as a proper occupation for a young man and the life of an itinerant showman no longer signified the first step on a slippery slope to sin and ruin. The loss of Antonio made them reflect that much more on Angelina's happiness and it was clear to them by now that I had an important part to play in their daughter's future. The possibility that her happiness might be snatched away by an accidental spark in a hidden pocket of afterdamp 200 feet below ground was too much for them to contemplate. Angelina's future happiness seemed much more secure in the hands of a young man whose prospects, though meager, were, at least, above ground in clean air. There was no longer any impediment to our courtship and eventual marriage.

# Chapter 6

It was the summer of 1911 when a visitor who would change our lives in unimaginable ways announced himself with an impatient rat-a-tat on our wagon door. My parents were inside, I was at work nearby, whitewashing the backcloth ready for the night's change of scenery. There were three steps up to our door and the door opened out so as not to rob those inside of any more of the precious space inside than was necessary. Those in the know always stepped back smartly down the steps after knocking. It amused Father to open the door smartly and listen for the consequences. Well, this gent was not in the know and his nose-in-the-air composure was somewhat punctured when mother, not father, swung open the door. He was forced to cling to the handle and swing back behind the opening door, with only his shoes and a few inches of his trousers visible, scrambling for a foothold on the tiny landing. Mother stepped down a tread and closed the door behind her, with the stranger still attached, and he swung wildly forward and came to a cushioned halt when he collided with mother's unwelcoming bosom. This embarrassment caused him to lose his grip and he backed down the steps with more luck than judgement and deposited himself, backside first, on the ground. He was up like a shot, stiffened his spine, drew himself up to his full height, which was not considerable, snatched his bowler hat from his head and flung himself into an extravagant bow. Such behavior may have been familiar enough in some Elizabethan drama on our modest stage, but outside those confines it would be considered an effete gesture in these parts. Mother looked down upon him with astonishment.

"Madame, may I have the pleasure of addressing the proprietor of this establishment? " The heavy accent nonplussed mother. The only accent she knew, other than her native Leicestershire, was the rough and ready speech of Lancashire. At that moment she was not entirely sure that this little man was speaking English. Fortunately, his companion stepped forward, a young man who had held himself at the ready a few paces behind. He explained, in speech that mother could fathom, that Monsieur Zecca would like to speak to the owner. Monsieur Zecca smiled, nodded and once more dipped at the waist. Mother, recovering her place in the script, veteran as she was, said wryly, "Why didn't he just say so?" Father was summoned and shortly appeared in the doorway, hiking up his suspenders and peering down at the Frenchman with eyebrows raised. Monsieur Zecca made up for his lack of physical stature with the particularity of his bearing and the fine quality of his clothing. Dapper might describe him, but not adequately. He was immaculate, even after landing on his arse, even a little overdressed in a way that we might call "Continental" in a dubious way. Waxed moustache, of course, carnation in the lapel, now a little flattened from being pressed between himself and mother's amplitude, and a silver-topped cane, no less, hung in the crook of his arm. Perfectly pressed trousers, creases sharp as the business end of an axe. The only way I knew to keep creases that sharp was to run a bar of soap along the inside of the crease before ironing, an old soldiers trick. Gleaming shoes, the dust from his pratfall only serving to highlight the sheen. As perfect as a shop window mannequin and manners to match. Father stepped down, well aware that his position at the top of the stairs put any visitor at a disadvantage. Monsieur Zecca stuck out his gloved hand, which Father grasped warily.

"Sir, you are the proprietor of this company of actors?" Father, who was raised in Clerkenwell, London and had encountered a few cross-channel onion sellers in his youth, and I suspect had parley-vooed with a mademoiselle or two in his wilder years before he met mother, seemed to find the man's accent less impenetrable than mother had. "Yes, I am. Thomas Findley Dyer, at your service". He couldn't resist a little Gallic flourish.

"I am Ferdinand Zecca of Pathe Freres, the brothers Pathe, that is. You may have heard of us?" Father made no comment, ignoring the invitation. "We are in the business of creating moving pictures for the entertainment of the public in France and now, of course, in England. We have opened a studio in Blackburn, which is near here." That Blackburn was nearby was hardly news to Father, but he refrained. "We are searching to employ actors, sir, for the production of our artistic masterpieces. A kind gentleman in Blackburn told us that there is no better company of actors within a hundred miles than your own."

Father smiled regally, and nodded his acceptance of the flattery, no doubt dubious that anyone in benighted Blackburn had discernment enough to recognize a talented thespian if one bit him in the bum. Zecca continued with his blandishments. "We would be honored, sir, if you and your company would consent to assist us in our work of creating the finest quality entertainment for your own countrymen, for the good people of France, and perhaps even for the citizens of the United States of America."

This was grand sounding stuff indeed. From a ragged canvas tent seating a hundred or so of the ragged proletariat, to an audience of thousands, from all walks of life and circumstance. To think that our humble faces might be seen in Paris or New York! Enough to turn the head of even a hard-headed realist like Father. Paris we could picture, with its Tower and Arch of Triumph. We had seen them on postcards of the more respectable kind. But New York! America! It could have resembled the jungles of Borneo for all we knew of it. We suspected that some parts of the Wild West might still be under threat from the savage redskin, Apaches and the like. Buffalo Bill's Wild West Traveling Show had appeared in London to great acclaim the previous year, complete with whooping Indians, so we knew they were still free to roam the countryside, which we imagined to look something like the Yorkshire moors.

Father's thoughts, I'm sure, were not distracted by such bucolic visions. He always had an eye to the cash box. "I imagine, signor, that we might be available for hire. At an appropriate rate of pay."

"Of course, of course. Shall we sit and discuss the proper reward for such a talented group of players?"

In fair weather, a crude table and benches were set up outside the wagon as a place to entertain visitors, welcome friends and conduct the occasional bit of business. The interior of our wagon was so cramped that in dry weather us lads often slept outdoors, underneath, for the chance to breathe a little fresh air untainted by Father's aromatic pipe. The wagon's interior was certainly no place to conduct business. So the table and benches were dragged out and Father and "Monsieur" Zecca seated themselves, with the mostly silent young man attentive at the Frenchman's side. A satisfactory rate of payment was hammered out and agreed upon. Father sent young Eddie scurrying over to the nearest alehouse for a jug of porter with which to seal the deal. When it arrived, Mother dug out a pair of dusty tankards, made them presentable with her apron, and poured. Father took a hearty swig and wiped his moustache with the back of his hand, breathing a contented sigh. Monsieur Zecca eyed the contents with deep suspicion, took a polite sip, smiled politely, then showed no further interest. It was agreed that on the following Monday, weather permitting, the entire company would present itself at the railway station in nearby Clifton, where, apparently, the sandy hillocks peculiar to that location would provide a passable imitation of the African Veldt, in a bloodthirsty one-reeler set during the Boer War. It was safe to assume that very few of the adventurous souls willing to part with a penny for this morsel of entertainment had ever been within a thousand miles of the land of the Boers though father couldn't resist remarking that he'd lived in the land of the Bores on a few occasions, meaning Yorkshire.

So, as instructed, we presented ourselves at the station in Clifton on the following Monday. The quiet young man from our first encounter greeted us and we were escorted to a lorry waiting outside, loaded to the roof with all manner of theatrical paraphernalia: costumes, greasepaint, weapons, and the heavy black boxes on legs that filmed the proceedings. In no time at all, some of us were decked out in military uniforms, all brass buttons and stiff collars in an "easy target for the enemy" red to represent a regiment of her Majesty's finest. The rest were kitted out in less rigorous drab of various shades to represent the less disciplined forces of the skulking Boer. Two cameras were set up on nearby hillocks and we were instructed, once we were given the call "Action!" to charge about hither and yonder, looking fierce and warlike, to act out the killing with a kind of well-bred sadness, and, on occasion, die nobly in the case of those who were on the British side, or to skulk about and look fearful and grim, and to die without show if we were playing for the opposition. We galloped about those modest hills with gusto, yelling and cheering. Though these scenes would be presented silently, we were stage actors and we were trained to be heard, and heard we damn well were, such that at one point, the station master summoned the local constable for fear that real mayhem was under way on his doorstep. Fortunately, the constable was an enthusiast of the cinema and was promptly invited to don a costume and spend a half hour or so dashing up and down the sand piles to be recorded for posterity, with an assurance that no-one at the police station could possibly recognize him under the overabundance of mustachio that we pasted to his upper lip. He left us in great spirits after that, with his blessing, and a promise to calm the natives.

The day wore on, and the British postured nobly, fought with valor and died magnificently. The Boers merely looked grim and died ignominiously. After a while, one of the Boers, Johnny Whitmore, I think, complained that the redcoats were having all the fun, and it was agreed, with some reluctance, that we should exchange costumes. Now the British postured with even greater vainglory and the Boers flung themselves into their dying moments with excruciating pathos and melodrama. By mid-afternoon the day had turned gray and the light was no longer suitable for outdoor scenes, so the Boer War came to an abrupt end with much laughter and backslapping and a summons to tea.

It had been an exhilarating day. Freed from the constraints of an audience's reaction, we had flung ourselves into the action with abandon and behaved like children, play-acting for no-one's satisfaction but our own. We tramped back to the station weary but well-satisfied with our first taste of this new-fangled way of making a shilling or two. Father received our payment and promised that we would return the following Monday for more of the same.

But that Monday dawned with a wet mist and bilious skies that promised worse. We had been instructed not to waste the price of a train ticket if the weather was uncooperative, so we stayed close to home, fidgety, unsettled by the disappointment. The mist coalesced into a downpour and most of us gathered in the tent, drinking strong tea, whitewashing the backcloth in readiness for that night's performance, worrying that it might not dry in time, listening to the rain pounding on the loose canvas, occasionally attacking the ominous puddles that gathered above our heads with a broom handle, and thinking gloomy thoughts about the meager takings we could expect if there was no improvement. In the midst of this dreary afternoon, my younger brother Eddie was sent out in the rain to tighten the guy ropes which tended to slacken in the rain, bringing the canvas oppressively close to our heads. Soon after, he scuttled in, sou'wester dripping, boots squelching mud, and announced that Angelina was outside, asking for me. I found her pressed against the side of the wagon, sheltering from the rain. Her smile the instant she saw me brought cheer into the dismal day and I didn't wait for an invitation to take her in my arms. I looked around for prying eyes before kissing her. She was, by now, the Angelina of old and there was warmth and promise of more in that kiss, but no place to take advantage of it.

"I didn't come here just to excite your passions", she teased. "Not that I mind the thought of a little passion. But that will have to wait. My parents sent me to invite you to tea on Sunday. Please say you'll come. It's important. For us."

# Chapter 7

Angelina's parents did not go in for afternoon tea as a rule, but in their time in England they had come to recognize its significance as a social ritual, when matters of family significance were to be broached in a formal way. Obviously, this invite had something to do with our future together and lately the signs had been favorable. Whenever I visited the café now, both parents greeted me cheerfully and even, on one occasion, declined payment for the cups of milky steamed coffee that I was now drinking much more frequently. This largesse, according to Charlie, was unheard of outside the family. Mr. Sabini believed that generosity had no place in sound business.

"I think they want to talk about us." Angie confirmed what I was thinking.

"I'll be there, don't worry. Now I have to get back inside. Still work to be done for tonight's show and romance doesn't carry much weight with the old man." I kissed her one more time. It wasn't easy to pull myself away, but the curtain called.

The following Sunday I presented myself, double-scrubbed and chapel-dressed at the café door just before four o'clock, early closing time on the Sabbath.

The last of the day's customers were cleaning the crumbs off their plates and sucking the dregs from their cups. The door jangled shut a few minutes later, the blind was pulled down and the bolts slammed shut. Angie's father shook my hand with a solemn formality, then stepped aside and waved me through to the back parlor. The table was laid in style. A red and white checkered tablecloth was overlaid with a smaller one in ivory-colored lace. Mrs. Sabini had dusted off her best china platters, patterned in intricate blue and white, though the pattern was mostly obscured by mounds of sandwiches, cakes and biscuits and a bowl of fruit in greater variety than I ever sampled at home. This turned out to be their habit when expecting guests, as I later learned. It was, apparently, a sin in Italian hospitality to run out of any food item. I was instructed to sit at one end of the oval table and Mr. Sabini sat facing me. Mrs. Sabini then called up the stairs for Angie and Charlie who must have been waiting for the signal to make their entrance, appearing almost instantly. Angie took the seat to my right, Charlie the left, with their mother between Angie and her father. That left an empty chair, where Tony would have sat. Mrs. Sabini poured the tea, which in this house always tasted a bit fragrant and foreign, and was taken with lemon and little sugar, unlike the sturdy, sweet, milk-splashed brew I was used to. The cups were small and delicate and I was forced to hold mine with both hands for fear of it slipping between my fingers. Small sandwiches were passed around and I made my choices sparingly, not wanting to appear ill-mannered and boorish. I nibbled with the restraint of a vicar's wife and chewed in slow motion, swallowing infrequently to avoid the demands of polite conversation. The hot tea, uncooled by milk, and the tight stiff clothes started me sweating. At home I would simply have loosened my collar and removed my jacket. Not here, for fear of giving offense. I glanced at Angie from time to time. Our eyes would meet, then dart away to dispel any suggestion of premature intimacy. The conversation tiptoed along, inconsequential, and I smiled an abundance of inane smiles, whether called for or not. After what seemed an age of this, my buttocks began to ache from the unaccustomed rigidity of my posture, perched nervously on the edge of the hard chair, but I could not relax. The large clock on the wall ticked away at a dreadfully slow rate, mocking me with its funereal pace. At last we were all finished, though we hadn't made much of a dent in the hillocks of food. Mrs. Sabini pushed away from the table and began to clear the plates. Angie immediately rose to provide assistance and soon both women, along with the remaining food, disappeared into the kitchen. Then the sound of tidying and washing of dishes, performed with a little more vigor and diligence than seemed necessary.

That left the three of us men. Three glasses and a bottle of wine were dispatched from the kitchen. Wine was poured, glasses raised, first to celebrate the memory of the missing son, then to celebrate the one who still remained, then to give thanks for Angelina's recovery. The combination of the wine and my discomfort at the occasion began to take its toll. I wasn't dizzy, exactly, or sick to my stomach, but somehow detached from my body in a disconcerting way, as if I was observing the proceedings from a distance, not altogether present. I was losing my grip on things but removing myself was impossible. After the round of solemn toasts, Mr. Sabini set down his glass and looked at me with an expression that was both sad and hopeful.

"Signor Tommy. From the first day you came into my café it was clear to me that Angelina had in her heart a special feeling for you. In the beginning my wife and I were not in favor of encouraging a relationship with someone whose profession did not offer many prospects, forgive me for saying. But our children are our joy. They are what we live and work for. Their happiness is our happiness. We had three children, two fine handsome sons and a beautiful daughter. We are blessed more than we could say. Then one of our blessings was taken from us". He was silent for a while, struggling with the grief that threatened to force its way to the surface. The muscles in his jaw tightened to hold back the tears.

"But our other son was saved, and it was you who brought him back to us. To have lost both sons would have been a sadness I could not bear. My life would be worth nothing. But you brought him back to us."

It didn't seem right to point out that his son's fearful premonition was what had saved us both, so I kept quiet.

"I do not have enough possessions in the world to repay you. But I can give you some of the happiness that you helped to save for me. It was my thought that a coal miner would make a better husband for our beautiful daughter than a poor actor. But if Antonio had been married, his wife would be a widow now. I do not want that happen to Angelina. I was foolish. Angelina tells us that she loves you. Her happiness is everything to us. We have now the sad knowledge that a coal miner's life is dangerous. They die underground and their bodies may never be found to give them a proper burial. The thought that Angelina's happiness might be snatched away in a moment's explosion and that my foolishness may have led to that loss fills me with shame." He looked down at the tablecloth and for a moment and took a sip from his glass before looking at me with a fierce look in his eyes.

"I want Angelina to be happy. You make her happy. I expect that you will live longer and healthier as an actor than a coal miner. So, Angelina will have more years of happiness if you never go down that pit again. My son has sworn that he will never work as a miner again. You must promise me the same. If you promise that, I will permit you to marry my daughter."

With that he was done and he looked at me, waiting for an answer. I looked back at him and for several seconds there was nothing but silence. Then my wits returned to me and I opened my mouth to speak but could only manage a feeble croak. I tried to swallow, took a sip of wine for lubrication and was finally able to mumble a promise and a few words of thanks, miserably inadequate, but sufficiently coherent that I did not appear as complete a fool as I felt. Or so I hoped. My utterances seemed to satisfy Mr. Sabini, and once again he raised his glass and, with a tear or two rimming his eyes he announced "To Tommy and Angelina's happiness", loud enough to be heard in the kitchen and this appeared to be a signal, as Angelina and her mother re-appeared and seated themselves again at the table, everyone smiling and heads bobbing, with no-one quite sure what to do next. There was some inconsequential chatter, then Mrs. Sabini began to collect the wine glasses and I took this as a signal that my role in this ritual was over, and I could make a half-dignified exit. I muttered some foolishness about "the show must go on" and got to my feet with some difficulty and held on to the chair back to keep from swaying. My legs did not seem to be entirely under my control. But a display of drunken leglessness would surely undo some of the progress I had made, so I locked my knees, clenched my buttocks, shook hands all around and made a slow and deliberate march to the door with Angelina at my side, for which I was grateful in case I wobbled. A public display of affection in front of her parents was unthinkable even at this moment, so I contented myself with gently taking her hand and lifting my hat with the other, a gesture she found so comic that I could see her struggling not to laugh. When I reached the door, which Angie thoughtfully opened for me, not wishing to see me struggle, I turned around and attempted a bow, but abandoned the attempt after the first few dizzying inches convinced me that it was unwise. I stepped out into the street, made a smart turn, took a few steps to the pavement's edge and stumbled headlong into the street. Fortunately, I was out of sight of Angie's parents, but she was an amused witness to my humiliation and, once she was assured that I was not injured, her laughter refused to be repressed any longer. She stood with her back to the shop, shoulders shaking, and it must have seemed to anyone watching from inside that she was in the grip of a powerful emotion. Which she was, though I did not entirely appreciate the uncharitable nature of her feelings. I stumbled upwards and forwards and made my unsteady way down Market Street with her mocking words ringing in my ears. "I hope you handle your wine better on our wedding night. You'll have duties to perform!"

Our "Mondays on the Moors", weather permitting, continued to provide some relief from the workaday routine under the canvas. They provided much-needed fresh air and occasionally sunshine to a company afflicted with an extreme indoor pallor. Not to mention a welcome addition to our cashbox. We played all manner of hero and villain, Cowboy and Indian, white explorer and dusky native. Occasionally Angie would find some excuse to absent herself from the café and join us, and she could not resist the opportunity to dress up, slap on greasepaint and fling herself into the fun. Monsieur Zecca and his cameramen seemed well pleased with our efforts, and after several pleasant months of moving picture making, he proposed that out little company should sign on as the stock acting company for Pathe Freres, and give up our shabby life on the creaky boards. But, to no-one's surprise, the Old Man snorted in derision and uttered those immortal words that have since been enshrined in family lore. "I don't reckon much to these moving pictures. They'll never last."

Father may well have missed the tide in a spectacular way, but Angie and I, on our occasional trips to Bolton, couldn't help but notice the eagerness with which long lines of the curious would part with a penny or two to watch a peep show or 5-minute moving picture, whatever the subject matter. Back then film of even the most mundane activities could draw a crowd simply because such things had never been seen before. It was a novelty and a sensation. If there was derring-do and bloodshed, bloodthirsty battling and glorious dying, the punters couldn't get enough of it. Not to mention the more risqué "What the butler saw" variety. From time to time I stumbled upon some such sauciness, and, I confess, I sometimes lingered a little longer than strictly necessary. Not that I ever felt the need to mention this to Angelina, though she was well aware that the moving picture studios didn't hesitate to take advantage of the power of the cinematograph to stir the more basic instincts.

To the two of us, moving pictures seemed to be where the future lay and we had a sense that there was an opportunity here that should not be left ungrasped, an opportunity for a life beyond the gray world of coal dust and cotton mills and the shabby, scrimping world of an itinerant actor that would never make a man's fortune, no matter how noble the calling. Our ambitions were modest. Enough money to buy a little house and not to have to count the night's takings to know how well we would eat the next day, and that our children should never go hungry. We talked about this many an evening. We both knew that we would, in time, leave our parents behind to travel in a larger world than they had ever imagined. So the decision was made to place our trust in the hands of Monsieur Zecca and the Pathe Brothers and tie our future to the future of moving pictures. We had no notion then of how far that would take us from that gray world.

But the leap came sooner than we could have imagined, and we almost lacked the courage to take it. We had been making short films for Zecca for almost a year, and plans for our wedding were well set, by necessity a modest affair that did not require much preparation. Then Monsieur Zecca announced that the studio in Blackburn was to close, and that the entire operation was moving to New York, and that any of our company who wished would be welcome to make the move. The company was well aware by now that the American market was enormous. Americans were hungry for innovation, their appetite whetted by the genius of Thomas Edison, less provincial than their European cousins, more adventurous, more brash, more inclined to enterprise, and with deeper pockets. It was an enormous opportunity, but so soon. It was hard for both of us, but especially so for Angelina, whose family ties were so typically Mediterranean, given to a closeness bordering on suffocation, lots of embracing and clinging and kissing of cheeks even between men. Not the way things were done in our part of the world, where men hugging was enough to set scandalized tongues wagging. Angelina and I agonized over our decision for hours, but there was no disagreement between us. It was the chance of a lifetime and it might never come again. Could we be strong enough to face the awful disappointment and sadness in our parents' eyes when we broke the news? And the inevitable silent reproaches, as they made a noble sham of not wanting to stand in our way?

# Chapter 8

We sailed for New York on the 10th of April 1912. We had arrived in Southampton in the early hours of that day after a wearying series of train rides, Farnworth to Manchester, Manchester to Crewe, Crewe to London and finally, the late night train from which we had staggered, stiff and bleary-eyed at 6:30 in the morning. A cab ride later we were standing quayside, a small pyramid of baggage beside us, staring up at the biggest man-made object either one of us had ever seen, a huge ocean liner. Though it was barely light a steady parade of humanity was already trudging its determined way up the ramps to go on board, the first-class gangway a fluttering ribbon of the elegantly-dressed, rich and powerful, confident in their position in the world and eagerly anticipating the pleasures that this great ship had to offer to distract them from the tedium of a featureless horizon day after day. I parted company with Angelina at the second-class gangway. Men and women in the lower classes were separated, of course, in the interest of protecting the ladies' modesty from prying eyes in those close confines and to prevent any temptation towards lewd behavior. But in the interest of economy, I had purchased a third-class ticket for myself, so we were to be separated not only by virtue of our different sex, but also by our unequal standing in the matter of class, at least for the duration of the crossing. But I promised her that, once I had mastered the layout of the ship, I would try my best to make myself visible to her whenever I could, and she did the same.

The first class passengers, I'm sure, reveled in their luxurious surroundings, which I only learned about after the voyage, but in third class we had few amenities to be grateful for. We did have a bunk to sleep in, though the confines of the narrow cabin allowed for little else. If two of us decided to climb out of bed at the same time, we were forced into a proximity not entirely comfortable if they were a stranger's knees you were knocking, and inadequate bathing only made matters worse. But in such close quarters the cabin's occupants cannot remain strangers for long if they possess the least amount of conviviality, and my companions did not lack for that. They were three Irishmen, brothers, Driscoll by name. Their first names I knew only for a short while because I could barely tell them apart, so strong was the family resemblance. They were close both in age and height, and each had the dark curls and mischievous eyes of their Celtic ancestors. I often mistook one for another, to their great amusement, as they strolled down "Scotland Road" as we came to call the long promenade that ran almost stem to stern. This was clearly a party trick they had played many times on unfortunate strangers. I finally gave up and took to calling all three of them Paddy, which caused even more amusement. In fact, almost everything in life seemed to cause them amusement. I have never since met a better-natured trio than those three. Their frequent laughter and colorful stories helped me pass the hours on board ship more pleasantly.

I prowled every inch of that ship that was permitted to me, which was not very much. Any attempt to mount the stairs up to second class was rebuffed by a stout gate and an even stouter steward, stationed at the head of the stairs, who would allow no familiarity between classes. But in the course of my limited exchanges with these guardians of social order, it became clear to me that one of them was a Northener, and most likely a Lancashireman. When I asked the source of his accent I was rewarded with the admission that he was from Bury, not far from Bolton and that he had chosen a life at sea to escape the prospects of a life underground, since his father and grandfather were coal miners, and proud of it. He was expected to follow in their footsteps, but could not stomach the prospect and, at 15, ran away to Liverpool where he stowed away on a merchant ship until he was discovered, vomiting over the side, and put to work. He had been a sailor ever since. I shared my story with him, and he was well aware of the Pretoria Disaster. From then on his attitude softened towards me. He would still not allow me onto the third class deck. The risk of dismissal was too great. But he was kind enough to carry a note to Angelina instructing her to meet me at the head of these stairs each day at noon when he was on watch. And so it was that in the middle of each day we would face each other across that low but insurmountable gate, with our accomplice looking astern, pretending not to notice unless another passenger wandered that way and he would make a show of shooing me back downstairs to where I belonged. But as long as we were undisturbed we would chatter about anything and everything, not wanting to run out of words when we might feel compelled to take our leave of each other. I told her of my three companions. She shared her experiences, describing her accommodations in exhaustive detail, her routine a little more comfortable than mine. We rattled on at great length until we had exhausted our supply of stored-up conversation, then we would talk about how life would be for us in America. We had little idea, of course, but what little we did know of America we dressed up in various costumes in our imaginations, just to keep our spirits up and delay the inevitable parting. Ever since the Pretoria I had a dislike of closed-in places and any length of time in our tiny cabin made me restless, so I spent as little time as possible there. I would spend most of my time pounding up and down "Scotland Road". During the day I was ever watchful in the hope of getting an extra glimpse of Angelina, and in the evenings I would continue my dogged promenading until I was dog-tired and then I could crawl into my bunk and fall quickly asleep.

The monotony of our life on the ship was enlivened by the two stops we made before we turned due west into the Atlantic for New York. Less than a day after leaving Southampton we made a brief stop in Cherbourg around dusk to take on passengers and pick up mail, getting under way again about 8:30 in the evening. We all gathered at the rails to catch whatever excitement there might be on offer, but there was little to see in the gathering dark. From Cherbourg we sailed west then north towards the southern coast of Ireland. Not that I had any clue where we were heading once the sun was down. But passing members of the crew were only too willing to educate us clueless landlubbers. We reached Queenstown about mid-day, in brilliant sunshine that bathed the impossibly green hills and grey cliffs that stretched along the shore with light. We held off well out to sea, as the harbor could not accommodate us, and two tenders chugged and bobbed their merry way over the blue-green waves to meet us with even more passengers and mail. As the new arrivals clambered up the rough ladders, without the benefit of the steady and sturdy gangplanks that had brought ourselves onboard, their faces would register grim-faced alarm or cheerful bravado. As they passed by our perch at the third class rail, I was suddenly struck by something familiar in the way that one of the men carried himself, cocky and brave, but something more, something that gripped my heart before I could even put words to my suspicions. His head was down as he kept his eyes on the sea-splashed rungs of the ladder as he climbed. But at one point he paused to take in his surroundings and look over his shoulder at the shoreline that would soon be a memory. As he turned his head, his face was turned directly towards me. There was a moment's shocked recognition, and I knew him now. There was no mistaking the arrogant, sneering features of Edwin Ainsworth. The shock of seeing that hated face caused me to take a sharp step backwards and I stumbled into the man standing behind me, throwing us both off balance. He cursed in some foreign language, Swedish, I think, because there were a good number of them in steerage. When I recovered my balance and looked back over the rail, Ainsworth was gone. The thought of his presence made me physically sick. But this was news I could not share with Angelina. She would never be at ease if she knew he was aboard. But he would be traveling first class, and there was little risk of Angelina coming into contact with him. And, in fact, I was only to see him one more time and that was in very different circumstances.

The next two days passed uneventfully. We in third class ate in shifts, a hundred or so at a time. The dining room, even though it was the size of a football pitch, was too small to accommodate our number at one time. So we ate, the smokers smoked, the readers read, the gamblers played cards, and above all, we walked, endlessly up and down our "Scotland Road" to pass the time. Each day at noon I would separate myself from my companions, to much nudging and winking, and make my way to that same staircase that led up to the second class deck and exchange small talk and insignificant intimacies with Angelina, as the gatekeeper turned a blind eye.

It was late on the fourth night when the monotony of shipboard life was shattered for good. It was a cold night, the coldest yet. The temperature had dropped suddenly in the last few hours. I was still awake, walking Scotland Road to wear myself out for sleep and because of the chill I was wearing my warmest clothes, for which I am ever thankful. It was close to midnight and I was just about to give it up for the night and head for my bunk in the stuffy cabin. As I turned in the cabin's direction I felt an odd shudder pass through the ship and, shortly after, the engines stopped. I looked out to see what was happening. There was no moon but there were more stars in the sky than I had ever seen before and the sea was so calm you could see the starlight reflected in it, with not a breath of wind to ruffle the surface. I had always imagined the "high seas" to be in constant rolling turmoil but, this night, the sea was as calm as the pond in Farnworth Park. I could see or hear nothing that might cause alarm, and with the landlubber's trust that sailors knew their business, I shrugged off the incident and was about to continue on to my cabin when I heard hurried footsteps coming down Scotland Road. It was my friendly steward, the gatekeeper. I was ready to exchange a cheery goodnight as he came nearer, then I saw his face. There was nothing cheerful in his expression, only a knot of anxiety.

"Whatever's the matter?", I asked him, beginning to worry myself now. He looked at me for a few seconds, weighing his thoughts. "Look Tommy, mebbe I shouldn't say owt, but I'm told we've struck ice and there's water comin' in.

Too early to tell right now, but my advice: stay alert, just in case." He looked me straight in the eye, a hard fearful look. "If it's bad, I'll make sure your missus gets off safe. You just take bloody good care of yourself."

Sleep was out of the question now. "If it's bad", he had said. But this was the unsinkable ship. Everyone knew that. The newspapers had trumpeted it for months. The Chairman of Cunard, Mister Bruce Ismay himself, was on board for this maiden voyage. Surely every precaution had been taken to protect the many important people who had chosen this voyage precisely because it was the first sailing of this great liner. Surely nothing could damage this ship badly enough to put all those lives in danger.

I decided to go forward to the bow where the shudder in the ship's frame had seemed to come from. Where Scotland Road ended near the bow, a row of narrow windows looked out on the exposed deck. There, visible in the starlight, were hundreds of small pieces of ice scattered from port to starboard. A few adventurous souls were already out there, kicking ice around as if they were playing football, laughing and unconcerned. Was it possible that we had struck an iceberg? Where else could that unwelcome cargo have come from? Was it possible that an iceberg had actually penetrated the thick steel plates of the hull? I just could not imagine that a floating block of ice could damage an enormous ship over 800 feet long. It was inconceivable. And yet Reggie, my steward friend, had been willing to accept the possibility and forewarn me that trouble might follow. I could not take it in. I could not think clearly. I could feel the beginnings of panic rising in my chest. I had to take some action to calm the fear in my chest, but what? Should I wake my Irish friends and as many others in third class as I could? But if this was a false alarm, I could imagine that there would be serious punishment in store for anyone who spread false alarms and incited unnecessary panic.

But I felt I had to at least warn the three Paddys, and tell them what I knew. I hurried back down to the cabin and opened the door without preamble. I fumbled for the light and pressed the switch. As light flooded the small space the older Paddy, shocked from sleep, was already upright in his bunk, fists raised to defend himself and his brothers against the intruder. It took a few slow, sleepy blinks before he focused on me and realized there was no danger. "Why in God's name did you come bursting in here like that". His tone was cross but relieved.

"Listen to me. The ship has hit ice. I don't know how bad it is. But Reggie the steward up on second says it wouldn't hurt to be ready, just in case. I'm not about to spread the word and cause a panic, but I want to make sure the three of you know the score. You might want to put some warm clothes on and stay alert. But not a word to anyone else. Understand?" He nodded, frowning. "But this ship is unsinkable, everybody knows that. What danger could there be in the middle of a calm sea?"

"I don't know. I'm no sailor, and I'm not exactly first in line for information. But I came close to dying once before, and I don't intend to repeat the experience. I'm not taking any chances. You can call me a fool afterwards if it all amounts to nothing, but I plan to be ready". The other two were, by now, dragging themselves reluctantly from sleep and I left Paddy the Older to fill them in.

Outside there was no sign or sound of commotion. The sea was still calm as a millpond and there was not a breath of a breeze. I really was beginning to feel a little foolish and uncertain about what to do next. Should I just go back to the cabin and reassure my companions that I had been the victim of undue nervousness? As I took the first few steps towards the cabin with that in mind, it seemed to me now that there was just the slightest leaning of the ship to the port side. In a sea so calm, that only suggested one thing. And for the first time I could hear the sound of running feet somewhere below me. Sleep was impossible now, and I could not just stand and wait for some awful event to creep up on me, listening for an alarm that came too late. I hurried towards the familiar stairway to second class and climbed to the gate. It was late enough now, past midnight, that there was not a soul around. I stepped over the gate and kept moving towards the bow. I had traveled about a hundred feet or so when I heard footsteps, much closer this time, and moving towards me. Luckily for me there was a darkened passageway just ahead and I slipped into the shadows and waited. A few moments later a small group of crewmen, stewards mostly, passed my hiding place. They were visible to me for only a few seconds, but there was no mistaking the seriousness of their expressions, and I heard just a few words of their conversation, but it was enough; "...... if she goes down". I waited until the sound of their footsteps receded into silence, then stepped smartly out and turned once more towards the bow. When I came to the stairway leading up to first class I stopped, listening. Normally I would never have ventured up those stairs for fear of a reprimand and maybe more. But none of that mattered very much now. If I wanted to know what was really happening, up those stairs was the surest place to see for myself. I paused at the top of the stairs. There was a group of men at some distance, standing close and talking in low tones, too distant for me to hear their conversation. Their backs were towards me and they seemed to be looking forwards, so I took advantage by hopping the gate and trying to look, as casually as possible, as if I belonged there. I took to the shadows and moved quietly forward until I could hear some of their conversation.

"...eighty or ninety feet at least....... scratched off some of her new paint....... the Captain doesn't want to proceed until....... painted again".

There was laughter at this, laughter with more than a hint of nervousness.

"...along and see if there's any ice small enough for a glass of whiskey".

Again nervous laughter. A few of the men moved away and headed towards the cabins as if satisfied that there was little to alarm them. But more emerged to join the group and in time a small number of women added to their number, asking why the ship had stopped. They were reassured that the ship was moving again and I could feel the slightest of vibrations suggesting that we were, in fact, under way. Slowly, but moving. Soon after that I saw an officer climb up to one of the lifeboats, attempting to pull back the canvas cover, but with no appearance of great urgency. No-one else seemed to notice him. My mind was in turmoil by now. We were moving, which seemed a good sign. But why would an officer be attempting to ready a lifeboat if there was no danger? By now, the slight list which I had sensed earlier seemed more noticeable, though it was still not what you might call a slope. I stood there in something of a dither. No-one seemed to be in any state of anxiety or panic. The occasional laughter that erupted from the cluster of men on the foredeck suggested that this was all a bit of a lark, something to joke about at breakfast and entertain their cronies once we were safely home. Should I follow their example and shrug it off? I was tempted. But something would not let me dismiss it. I could not calm myself. Perhaps my experience at the Pretoria had given me some prescience when danger was close. I caught myself chewing at my fingernails and flung my hands away from my mouth in irritation.

But, at last, all uncertainty was swept away for me and all others on that deck when we heard a loud clear voice from above:

"All passengers please assemble on deck with life jackets on".

# Chapter 9

When I left my cabin I had not even given a thought to my life jacket and there was no question that I could now descend two decks to retrieve it. I must make do without. Chances were I would never need it. We might have to suffer the discomfort of an hour or two in the lifeboats, but we would surely return to the ship when the danger was averted, the damage fixed, and the ship ready to steam ahead once more. Passengers now began to congregate on the boat deck in increasing numbers, men and women both, some dressed warmly with lifebelts tightly strapped about them, others in little more than they had retired in, with a coat or shawl flung over their shoulders, faces angry at what they must have perceived as nothing more than the annoyance of a poorly-timed lifeboat drill. Crewmen also began to assemble in numbers now, attending to the lifeboats, readying them to be lowered. As the first one dropped to the level of the boat deck, the order came to load the boat. There was a general movement towards the boat, men and women both, calmly and without panic. Few words were spoken. A young officer barred the way and ordered the men back. "Sorry, gentlemen. Women and children first, if you please".

At this, all the men stepped back as if this was the most reasonable request, without a murmur of protest, and ushered the women forward. Strong hands reached out to help the ladies step into the swaying boat. Some stepped aboard with confidence, others seemed to lose their nerve, their faces tight with fear. But eventually no more women stepped forward. There was still room in the boat and the young officer called for the remaining ladies to step forward. But some women refused, insisting they would rather drown with their husbands than be separated from them. Others were not yet convinced that the danger was real. And so, in strict adherence to the rule, when no more women and children came forward, the lifeboat was lowered without its full complement of passengers. As it was lowered a dark shape dashed from the shadows and leapt into the disappearing boat. It was clearly a man, and he was roundly cursed as a coward and a scoundrel from the deck above, but there was no question of recalling the boat now. And so he made his way to safety. We could only hope that the women would give him his just desserts.

There was a call from up above for men to assist in the loading of lifeboats on that deck, and several men, including myself, hastened up the stairs and attempted to make ourselves useful, holding out a steadying hand as each female passenger made her awkward leap across two or three feet of open space between ship and lifeboat. At one point I was called on to hold a bundle while its owner made the crossing. It was only when she turned and called anxiously, "Where's my baby?", that I realized what I held in my hands, which almost caused me to drop the poor tyke out of nervousness. Once again this lifeboat too was lowered without its full complement. From where I stood I could see boats being lowered from other decks below, and I scanned the occupants of each with a growing anxiety until at last I saw her. I stepped away from my duties for a moment and leaned over the rail to call her name. I called three times, each louder, until she finally heard and looked up, at each deck in turn, and finally saw my arms waving. Her face looked bloodless in the starlight, fearful but composed. "Don't worry, I'll meet up with you soon". She waved and forced the slightest of smiles. Then her boat began its lurching descent, and she was gone. I returned to my duties and as we worked we were startled by a sudden roar and looked up to see rockets trailing in the night sky, then the darkness was split with streaks of red light, which flared for several seconds before disappearing into the sea, and the darkness returned. We turned again to our duty, escorting the remaining women and children, until no more answered the summons. One rather robust- looking woman with her head shadowed by a heavy shawl turned out to be a man in disguise, but was discovered before he could make his way into the lifeboat and was roundly cursed as a cad and then kicked unceremoniously down the stairs to the deck below. In his haste he left behind one of the two life jackets he had worn to enhance his appearance as a woman and I had no hesitation in claiming it for myself. Then there were no more lifeboats. We knew then that our chances of being saved had left with the last of the boats. But a crewman told us of the "collapsibles", Engelhardt boats, canvas and rubber contraptions which were folded and stowed on the roof of the officers' quarters. With all women who chose to leave now clear of the ship we could, in good conscience, take consideration of our own safety. It was either a collapsible, or take a chance in the icy water if the ship did go down. There was an undignified scramble up to the officers' quarters where several crewmen were already at work, struggling to free the boats, without success. The lashings were too tight for cold fingers. Someone called for a knife, and, one by one, the ropes were cut. Now all that was left was to get the boat down to the deck and launch it. Oars were placed against the walls of the cabins to make a crude ramp. Everyone who could get a hand to it pushed and she came crashing down, breaking the oars. And there she sat, waiting for us to catch our breath and move down to attempt the launch. The crew seemed in no hurry, and I seethed with impatience, but I could not do it alone. Then we heard the sound that drove fear into our hearts, the rush of water up the hatchways and striking the bridge. There was no question now that she was going down. To a man, our instinct was to turn and head upwards toward the stern. But we had barely made a few yards when we were confronted with a wall of humanity, men and women surging up from the lower decks, seeking higher ground away from the onrushing sea, blocking our path. But as soon as they saw what we had seen, they, too turned and rushed for the stern but almost at once they were blocked by an iron fence that separated first and second class. They were trapped and so were we. The only way out was up. On the roof of the officers' quarters a man was lying flat, legs dangling over the edge, struggling to right himself. We could hear the water rushing towards us and our only chance to avoid being smashed by the deluge into the mass of bodies at the iron fence was to jump for the roof. I tried a lunge, but missed. I only had time for one more attempt. I looked back to see the surge of water boiling towards me. My best hope was to ride its crest, so I waited until it was almost upon me, then jumped, and the force of that water carried me like a cork, buoyed by my life jacket, up and along, and I slid heavily onto the officers' roof. I lay there, trying to catch my breath. But before I could recover and get to my feet a second wave hit me as the ship began its fatal slide down to the depths, and without even the time to take stock of my predicament, I was plunging down into the sea alongside the sinking ship. All I could do was kick for dear life away from the hull and swim as I had never swum before, jaws clenched so hard I thought my teeth would break, but I knew if any sea water entered my mouth I was done for. And for a few seconds I knew that it I would not make it. But just when I reached the point that I could hold my breath no longer, my head broke the surface and I took in huge gulps of pure, blessed, frigid air. For a few long moments I could do nothing more than suck in air and give thanks for my deliverance. But danger was imminent in the chilling water and the prospect of rescue seemed dim. I turned on my back and took in my surroundings. I could hear the cries of injured and struggling men, but I could see little other than faint lights in the far distance. Thank heavens the sea was calm. A rough sea would have swamped me and surely sent me to the bottom. The ship had not sunk immediately. The bow had disappeared below the surface and the stern was high in the air. And there she stayed, poised for the plunge, but not yet ready. When she did go, she would surely take me with her if I didn't pull away, so I struck out and I could sense her awful ominous bulk behind me. I was never a strong swimmer and I knew I could not swim for long. The cold would lull me into a drowsy indifference, followed by senselessness, then I would slip below the surface, gone forever. I had swum about 50 yards or so when I heard voices and sensed a dim shape barely visible ahead of me. This spurred me on and with new energy a few more strokes brought me in sight of what was now clearly the Engelhardt boat that we had struggled and failed to launch from the roof of the Officers' quarters. She had apparently been washed overboard at the same time that we were pitched into the sea and had landed just as I had last seen her, upside down. On her upturned bottom I could see three or four men standing, close in together, clinging to each other so as not to unsettle their precarious perch. A few more strokes brought me alongside her but there was no rail, no rope, nothing to pull myself aboard with. I called to the nearest man, pleading with him to give me a hand. He cautiously detached himself from the huddle and slowly made his way towards me. He knelt very slowly, then reached an arm out towards me. Up to this point I had been entirely focused on his hand as salvation inched towards me, but now I peered upwards to see his face and thank him. There was little enough light but what there was revealed enough of his features, and my blood froze. Staring down at me was the face of Edwin Ainsworth. Recognition dawned for him, too, and an awful grin spread across his face as he considered his next move. I pleaded with him to haul me aboard his fragile raft. But he made no move, and I knew I was done for. He reached out his arm and I thought I had misjudged him. But his gloved hand clenched into a fist and struck me in the face and I fell away from the boat, half-stunned. I opened my mouth to make one last appeal, but whatever came out of my mouth was never heard. At that moment there was a wrenching, metallic roar behind me as one of the ships enormous funnels tore itself loose and crashed into the sea barely a hundred yards from where I floundered. There was a thunderous noise followed by a great surge of water that flung me up and slammed me onto the keel of the upturned boat. I clung on with every bit of the strength I had left as the water washed over me, then receded. Several minutes passed before I could attempt to right myself, but inch by inch I forced myself to a standing position and the relief was so great it made me physically sick and I stood trembling and gasping, but exultant to have been delivered to safety in this extraordinary way. But I knew that I was not yet safe from Ainsworth, and I looked around for the other men who had occupied the raft. There was not another soul on that boat. I was entirely alone. Ainsworth, along with the others had disappeared with the wave that had lifted me to safety. I could regret the deaths of those other men, but for Ainsworth I felt absolutely no pity. I knew it was not charitable, but I felt it keenly nonetheless. No trace of him was ever found, and I was glad of it. But my sense of justice paled in comparison to Angelina's savage pleasure when she learned of his fate.

Before long I was made aware of the cries of desperate men in the water, some grasping with numb fingers at the cold rubber of the raft, barely able to grip, some still floundering in the cold water. I made my way, reluctantly, to the edge of the raft, knowing that too much motion might land me once more in the water, and, with infinite caution, helped one man aboard, then another and another until there were perhaps a dozen of us huddled in the sagging center of the upturned rubber boat. For those of us who remained on that precarious place of salvation, our ordeal that night was just beginning. As more and more men dragged themselves on to our waterlogged platform, the boat sank lower into the water until the cold sea washed over our feet, then our ankles. We could not sit, though we ached to do so. We stood, close up for warmth and safety, so each smelled the stink of fear on his neighbor's rank breath. We prayed that we would stay afloat and that rescue would find us before the peace of a slow death did. From time to time one of us, despite the awfulness of our situation, would succumb to a brief moment of sleep and stumble into his neighbor as his knees buckled, only to be startled awake by the curses breathed in his ear. In the first hour or two of our exhausted vigil, all heads were turned towards the black silhouette of the great hulk, half a mile away by now, whose lights still shone. But slowly, inch by inch, the bulk of the stern of that great ship rose higher and higher until she was entirely, improbably, vertical. She stood so for several minutes, then came a terrible wrenching, rumbling roar as her massive boilers broke loose and plunged, unhindered, towards the bow. In that instant all the lights were extinguished and she slid silently below the surface. There was an awful silence at that moment, heavy and crushing, and no words could do justice to that dread moment. A few murmured "Oh my God", but nothing more was said for several minutes.

We had, of course, no way to propel or steer the upturned boat towards any rescuer or any other lifeboat whose pale green lights could be seen at a distance as their oarsmen pulled away from us. So we were at the mercy of the current. All we could do was stand and wait and hope. Long, dark, silent minutes passed by so, so slowly. Occasionally hope was raised that a light seen in the distance was another ship coming to our rescue, but none of these lights ever seemed to come any closer, and some disappeared completely. But the minutes and the hours did pass and we were still afloat. In time the faintest streak of gray light showed itself where the horizon should be and dawn finally found us, weak and dispirited, but alive.

But as the dawn came, so did the wind and the swell. We had been standing precariously in icy water for 5 or 6 hours, unable to rest and now our discomfort grew. Although we had lost much of the feeling in our feet we had managed to maintain some glimmer of warmth in the stillness of the night, but now this was being drained from us and our raft was shifting alarmingly. Thankfully, as the darkness receded we were able to make out, a mile or so distant, a small flotilla of lifeboats strung out in a line, tied together as we soon discovered, the lead boat driven by a crude sail, useless throughout the night, but now snapping in the morning breezes.

We hailed these boats with as much volume as we could muster, voices quavering in the cold air. But heads were turned towards us and arms were waved and we knew we had been seen. The oars were quickly put to use and the two lifeboats that were least crowded detached themselves from the string and came to our deliverance. We were welcomed aboard with great kindness, but were barely able to show our appreciation, most of us collapsing from exhaustion in the bottom of the boat, without the desire or ability to move or speak. A few kind souls offered us spare blankets and a few items of clothing for which we could only mumble our thanks.

It was an hour or so, I think, after this first rescue that our second glorious deliverance descended upon us. There was a single shout, quickly taken up by more, joyous voices. "A ship! A ship! Coming towards us!" It was the Carpathia, steaming towards us, and never in my life has any sight been more welcome. She made her way towards us cautiously as there was still much ice about. But by now there was no doubt. We would be saved. Already other empty lifeboats ranged alongside her. But the danger was that we might be swamped, so we approached with caution and anxiously awaited our turn to climb the rope ladders that hung over the rail down close to the water line. Some were too afraid or too weakened to attempt the climb, and several ropes were lashed together to form a crude chair and I'm not ashamed to admit that I was hauled aboard the Carpathia in a rope sling. Once aboard we were immediately presented with hot coffee, sandwiches and blankets, then escorted, with much solicitation to the Dining Saloon. I, like most others, slumped against the wall of this great room for perhaps a half-hour, unable to move, astonished at my deliverance, until I could feel my feet and fingers again. Then I could wait no longer. I forced my body upright, stiff and sore, and began to shuffle about, searching every face in every dark corner of that elegant room, now crammed with all manner of human flotsam. I did not allow myself to think that Angelina might not be here somewhere. I convinced myself that in time one of these faces would turn towards me and it would be her. And so it was. Even before she turned, I was almost sure. Then I saw her eyes, her mouth and there was an exquisite explosion of joy and relief in my chest. She screamed my name and we fell together. The tears came and we cried silently in each other's arms, the donated blankets wrapping us in our own private joy, soaking up our tears. After the tears we sat holding hands in silence, thankful just to breath the same air, to share the same small space and to be alive together.

Angelina told me of her own ordeal. Our friendly steward had been true to his word and had come to find her and make sure she found her way to a lifeboat. He himself, mindful of his duty to the end, stayed to help as many as he was able and went down with the ship. In the lifeboat, without sufficient crewmen to man the oars, she had volunteered to row just to keep warm. She had the good sense to put on gloves before leaving her cabin and she was able to stay at her oar most of the night. Her hands were stiff and sore, but the gloves had saved them from any more serious punishment. At one point a stowaway, a ragged and weary-looking man, without a word of English, had crawled out of the dark recesses of the lifeboat, to everyone's astonishment. How fortunate for him that he had chosen a lifeboat for his hiding place when he stole aboard in Southampton.

Angelina's lifeboat had been in the command of the Quartermaster, a Mr. Hitchens, who proved himself to be a thoroughly unpleasant man, refusing to row and speaking to the women in a most ungentlemanly manner, so much so that a male passenger, who had been permitted in the boat to row in the absence of sufficient crew, was forced to rebuke him with the words "Sir, you are speaking to a lady!" to which the Quartermaster's response was: "I know who I am speaking to, and I am in command of this boat." When asked if the Carpathia was coming to rescue them, he replied callously "No, she is going to pick up bodies". But despite this man's unpleasantness, Angelina and the other passengers in the lifeboat had passed the night without too much discomfort and were among the first to be taken aboard the Carpathia. She knew only too well that women made up almost the entire contents of the various lifeboats and that so many men had stepped aside to allow their wives and daughters and sisters and female companions to be saved. It had become shockingly and painfully clear to all the women that there were barely enough lifeboats to save themselves, and that the men had little chance of survival even if they had managed to fling themselves into the icy water and were not sucked down by the vortex of the sinking ship. And so, once aboard the Carpathia, her every moment was filled with the dread that she was a widow so soon, that it must be impossible that I could have survived the sinking, despite my words when she last saw me leaning over the rail as her boat descended to the chaotic sea.

It was to be four more days before we finally came in sight of land, four days filled with every kind of weather: more icebergs and bitter cold in the beginning, then brilliant warm sun. A thunderstorm in the dead of one night startled a number of the survivors into fearing that rockets were going up once again. There was rain, too, and wind and fog in those four days. But, at last, we were told that the Nantucket lightship had been sighted on the Thursday morning. Nantucket meant nothing to most of us, but clearly it was a sign that we would soon be in New York, so we cheered with rest. There was little comfort in those four days, the ship crammed with our motley horde far beyond its capacity, with no privacy and overtaxed toilet facilities. For some, spirits were high. They had survived, and their hard-earned savings with them, they were traveling alone, so their losses were minor and replaceable, solitary immigrants to an unknown country, but high in hope for a future in a land that could not fail to reward them for their suffering at sea, an ordeal that seemed to mark them as chosen for a more deserving destiny. Others had lost almost all that could be taken from them except their own bereft lives that seemed of little value now, without husband or wife or children or brothers or sisters to love them and keep them in their embrace. For these lost souls the prospect of the bustling city of New York was nothing more than a mad incomprehensible turmoil that they must now face alone, untutored in the language and customs of these strange people called Americans.

# Chapter 10

Almost a week had passed and the horrors of that night on the Titanic were already fading into history as if they were part of some dramatic invention in the New York papers or some cliffhanger in the "flickers" that had so recently begun to enthrall the eager masses. After the sensational headlines and overwrought dramatizations had subsided and the more or less true story of the Titanic had been told in the more sober and less mercenary accounts taken from reliable witnesses who had actually sailed aboard the Titanic, including Mr. Archibald Gracie. He was kind enough to take down our own accounts of what we endured that night and later include them in his own extensive account of the sinking of the Titanic. Angelina and I were finally free to resume our lives in moving pictures.

A gentleman from Pathe Pictures had sent word to us that once we were released by the investigating authorities and had evaded the bloodhounds of the press, we should present ourselves at the company's office in Manhattan. From there we would be directed to temporary accommodations until more permanent lodgings could be found for us in the little town of Bound Brook, New Jersey, across the Raritan River. For all we knew the eastern shore of the Raritan might have been the last outpost of civilization. But we were delighted to discover that Bound Brook was a peaceful community, farmland for the most part, its modest inhabitants somewhat taken aback by the Bohemians who had lately invaded their lives and disrupted their community's slumbers. The temporary rabble that had invaded Bound Brook were from all corners. We were working-class English, city-slicker Americans, smooth and ingratiating Frenchmen, rough and cheery Irish, and an Italian or two. The place was always abuzz with film crews and actors scurrying here and there, chasing the light, raising a set, breaking it down, motoring off to some location or other. In the first few months I found myself busied with all manner of work, but none of it involved acting, in front of a camera or otherwise. I raised and painted sets, I pushed and pulled every conceivable kind of equipment that moved, pointed the big Cooper-Hewitt lights this way and that, and even held the towel for the latest starlet to emerge dripping from the big shallow water tank after she had swum for her life as her capsized boat, a miniature, sank beneath the fan-blown waves taking the villain of the day with it. And through all of this Angelina trudged cheerfully at my side, fascinated by this world of novelty and illusion. She was not on the payroll, of course, but, as my wife, she was made welcome in a desultory way, tolerated as an outsider rather than encouraged. Our celebrity as Titanic survivors was a short-lived currency, and soon forgotten. Only one man showed more than a passing interest in Angelina, Louis Gasnier, the French director, who had an eye for the ladies. Angelina's olive skin and dark eyes spoke to him of sun-blessed countryside and the soft, seductive ways of his homeland. He always had a bow and a smile for Angie. I was none too pleased with his attentions, but to say so would have brought our life in films to a precipitous end, so I kept my mouth shut, aided by Angie's assurances that she found the Frenchman's attentions distasteful but tolerable.

As the weeks passed into months it finally seemed to dawn on Gasnier that I had been invited to join the company for a particular reason, that I was an actor, with experience both on the stage and in front of the camera, though treading the boards was hardly ideal preparation for being in the camera's eye. The camera was kindest to those who pretended it wasn't there, as a young woman might undress in deliberate view of a keyhole through which she knows an admirer is watching her, thinking himself unsuspected. So, finally, I found myself in the camera's eye, often obscured by a villainous moustache and beard, shrouded in an evildoer's garb. My own mother would not have known me. Though these were silent films we spoke the lines with conviction for the look of authenticity, and in the beginning I spoke mine as if I were still treating the locals back in Farnworth to my best Shakespeare. Gasnier would murmur a stop to the proceedings and take me aside. "To-mas", he would begin, clutching my arm with the lightest of touch, smiling. "To-mas, why are you shouting? We are not deaf, but the camera is. It will never hear you. But let it watch you. Let it spy on you. Play your part as if it is not there. The audience will hate you for it", and he would laugh at his joke. And in time I became a half-way decent moving picture villain, but never the hero, dashing to rescue the heroine in danger. Gasnier's increasing interest in Angelina condemned me to the lesser roles. Then one day, after the shooting was over, Gasnier asked Angelina to step in front of the camera. She refused, embarrassed and awkward, but he was insistent and finally she consented, stepping in front of the lens, shifting from one foot to the other, not knowing where to put her hands, smiling too much, looking off to the side for direction and reassurance. Gasnier fussed around the camera, looking through the lens, then bobbing up again asked Angie to tell him about her family. Her stiff stance softened and a slow smile filled her face with light and as she spoke of her mother and father, her eyes glowed with love for them, tinged with a sadness that it might be many years before she would see them again. Awkwardness fell away from her and she was mistress of the small space the camera defined around her. Gasnier could not hide his delight with the camera's infatuation.

But his attentions were soon to be directed elsewhere. It must have been October or November of 1913. I remember that it was a cold and blustery day of the kind that sent every one of us scurrying between sets to avoid the sharp stab of the wind, and no-one relished an outdoor shoot on the back lot. There was a lull in the action, a malaise of sorts, brought on by the weather, work to be done, but no-one eager to do it. A motor car crunched to a halt in the yard, chauffeur at the wheel, sending dry leaves scuttering across the gravel. A young woman, heavy collar pulled up around her neck and cloche hat pulled down over her ears, waited for the driver to open her door then hurled herself out of the car and into the production office, slamming the door behind her. She bore down on the glowing stove in the corner, hands outstretched. "It's god-damn freezing out there!"

The occupants of the office at the time were myself and Joe Cuny, part-time actor, driver, stuntman and Gasnier's right-hand man, playing cards with Charley "Pitch" Revada, the props man. Pitch looked up when he heard the familiar voice and grinned wide. "Pearl, babe! Good to see your pretty face. I heard you was coming back to us."

"Hey, Pitch, great to see you, too. Got any booze? I think my ass is frozen.

The heat in Gassy's old Packard works about as well as his lines with the girls. Where is the dirty old Frog, anyway?"

"Here, take a swig of this." He handed her a bottle of bourbon that served as the centerpiece for our card table. She wiped the neck with her sleeve, then took a generous swallow. "Jeez, this must be a really low-budget flick if this is all you can afford!"

Pitch was quick off the mark. "My tastes have gotten less refined in my old age. That's why I'm so glad to see you."

"Yeah, I love you too, Pitch. So, for the second time, where is the old lecher?"

"Out on the back lot, trying to make cotton look like snow for some 'Sergeant Preston of the Yukon' dud he's got festering in his brain. The cotton looks great on the screen, but nobody can get through a scene without sneezing all over the heroine."

"Who's the lucky girl?"

"Marguerite Shelbourne."

"That fat cow! Is she playing an Eskimo's wife or a dead whale?"

"Charitable as ever, Pearl. Gasnier likes her work."

"Likes her bovine boobs, more likely. Well, I suppose she does have some talent, but the camera isn't exactly kind to her is it. Well, enough of this crap". She looked across at Cuny. "Joe, how are ya? Still chauffeuring Gassy to his late night rendezvous with his young hopefuls?"

"They pay me to open doors and keep my mouth shut. How are you Pearl? It's good to have you back. Gasnier must have something special in mind for you if he went to the trouble of buying out your contract over at Crystal."

"Is that what he told you! Trying to act like a big shot. They fired me because they said I couldn't act. As if that matters. This malarkey is all about making love to the camera on the set, and occasionally the cameraman and director off it, and the camera will love you back and make you a star". She paused to take a swig, then looked over at me.

"So, who's the quiet one, sittin' there with his eyes bugging out?"

"This here's Tommy. The company brought him over from England. We still haven't figured out why. Sailed on the Titanic, no less. One of the lucky ones."

"So, did your tongue get stuck on the iceberg or are you just naturally on the quiet side?"

I had been listening to this exchange with silent fascination up to now, never having met a woman quite so forward in her manners or down-to-earth in her speech, but now it was my turn to speak.

"How do you do, Miss White. The lads have told me quite a lot about you." This must have seemed a rather dull and predictable response, but I had indeed heard a great deal about the plain-speaking and robust Pearl White, and none of it was dull. Refinement was not her forte and swooning was not in her repertoire. She was a Missouri country girl, as she liked to tell us, though I scarcely knew where Missouri might be. She could ride a horse as well as most men and wasn't afraid to work up a sweat. She didn't pose, she did the work that the part demanded. Whichever villain was required to subdue her better make it look good, because she would. Pearl White was not a society page beauty. She was too healthy-looking for that, her jaw firm, her complexion ruddy. Her features were almost too regular, lacking a fetching flaw to set off the rest. But she did have those large, dark, wide eyes, guileless yet mischievous. She was a pleasure to behold, no doubt about it, but no siren or vamp, rather a girl you might like along on a walk in the woods, an outdoor girl, a good companion. Pearl was also a great story-teller and never let the facts get in the way of good copy. She claimed many things about her past, but we, at least, learned to take much of what she told the world with a pinch of salt. Some wag on the set once said of her that she had patented more inventions than Thomas Edison.

"Well, Tommy, I just got back from visiting your chilly country as well as France and Italy. What a circus that was! I sure as hell made a fool of myself from starting gate to finishing post. Before I left New York I met this handsome fellow I took a shine to who turned out to be sailing on the same tub as me. He was a Lord, too! I took it into my head that he had more than just a passing interest in me. Imagine my daydreams of being a Lady or Duchess or some such in London High Society! Turned out he wasn't a Lord at all. His first name was Lord. What kind of parents would saddle their firstborn with a moniker like that? Asking for trouble, that is. I think by the end of the voyage he had gotten wind of my confusion, but he was awfully nice about it, just laughed and invited me to have dinner with him and his wife when we got to London. Gee thanks, but no thanks!

One of the other passengers I had gotten friendly with was an elderly Colonel who had taken a fatherly interest in me, and promised to arrange lots of parties for me when we got to London. They say he used to be thought of as the handsomest man in London, and he had broken a few hearts in his time, but by now he was getting old and bored with the fair sex. When we landed in Southampton he introduces me to a pal of his who actually is a Lord or Duke or Count or something of the kind and they offer me a ride to London, so off I go and the next thing I know I'm being introduced around London like some prize baboon, this hick farm girl from the colonies, how quaint and charming. Great fun and all that, but a bit of a nerve if you ask me! I didn't know a thing about London, but I'd heard that The Carlton was the place to stay so I showed up there expecting to be given a room only to be told that there was not a room to be had in the entire place! My disappointment must have been obvious to everyone there because another old fellow who I had also met on the boat offered me his room, said he could bunk with some friends, so I landed on my feet once again" She paused long enough to take a healthy swig from the bottle, then resumed her tale. "Once I was settled in I decided to put on one of my sport suits and take a hike and see a bit of London. I was just crossing Pall Mall on my way to Hyde Park and, of course, I'm looking the wrong way to cross the street and I almost got run over by two young men in a racing car. I jumped back, then had to dodge another car behind me and wound up jumping onto the tire rack of the racer. And who do you suppose was driving that racer? None other than my imaginary nobleman, 'Lord'. He and his companion, who was an actual Count, hope this is not too confusing for you, well, they decide to treat me to lunch to celebrate my narrow escape, then invite me to play a round of golf. I didn't want to show my ignorance so I pretended I knew how to play. I really didn't have a clue which club was for what, so I bribed my caddy to hand me the right club at the right time and beginner's luck and some gallantry on their part got me through without too much disgrace. I suppose I must have made an awful hit with the Count, who I called Bobby because he had so many names I couldn't quite figure out which was which, because he kept kissing my hand and fawning all over me. He was a bit silly really but when we walked into the tearoom and the waitress asked which table "Monsieur Le Count" preferred, I felt pretty stuck up and aristocratic. We chatted away all afternoon, and he was all over me from then on, sending me flowers and flattering me from dawn to dusk. He even sent me a dog, a Russian wolfhound, a beautiful dog, but dumb as dirt. But I decided that it made rather a striking picture alongside me, so I took it everywhere I went". Her narrative was interrupted at this point by the flamboyant entrance of Louis Gasnier, who had obviously been tipped off that Pearl had arrived. He was effusive in his greetings and flung his arms around Pearl and kissed her wetly on each cheek. "Ma cherie, comment allez vous? Je suis enchante a vous revoir". He laughed at his own cleverness.

"Since you are just returned from a stay in Paris, I'm sure you now are quite fluent in French, n'est ce pas?"

"Louis, I know how to order a steak and French fries, and to tell the waiter 'make mine a double', but that's about it. I was too busy resisting the advances of gigolos of various degrees of smarminess to attend to any French lessons, pardonez-moi".

Gasnier smiled indulgently and took her by the arm. "Come Pearl, we have many things to discuss. This new serial will make you a big star, I'm sure of it".

"You told me that once before Louis, and all I got out of it was a sore butt from your ass-grabbing. Save the soft-soap for the new girls fresh from Hicksville. Just tell me what the plot is and keep it short. I'm tired and I don't need to fall asleep with you hovering over me".

Gasnier seemed not at all put out by Pearl's banter and he led her off to the production office to present her with the outline for his latest brainchild. But over the course of the coming days we were regaled with more of Pearl's European adventures. In London she had taken it into her head to play the part of an American heiress complete with chaperone and maid. Her story was that she had an invalid aunt for a chaperone, who unfortunately was always too ill to go out with her, and a very shy maid. She answered the phone in three different voices, which served the purpose with minimum expense. More servants would have made a greater impression but she couldn't do more than three voices. A few hints about her father the coal magnate added to the harmless deception, and all her new acquaintances seemed to believe it. Pearl had promised her new friend the Colonel that she would phone him as soon as she got located. She told him about her new dog, which, of course, he insisted on seeing at the first opportunity, so he sent a car around for her that afternoon. Off went Dog and Pearl and pretty soon they were stepping into the most luxurious and well-appointed place either had ever set foot in, though I can't honestly speak for the dog. A butler showed them into the drawing room, with rather dubious looks at the dog, and presented them to four serious-looking gents. Pearl assumed that some meeting of high finance was going on and felt a bit out of place. But they were about to break for lunch and insisted she join them. The dog was given the once-over by all and pronounced a handsome beast, then led away by the sour-faced butler. Pearl was no fool and she reckoned they thought she might be good for a laugh, which, of course, she usually was.

"You should have seen that table! Gee-rusalem, it looked like a Christmas tree. And there were at least a dozen different knives and forks laid beside my plate, so my best bet was to follow somebody else's example, but no such luck. Since I was the only lady, I was served first and the parade started, with a battalion of butlers, one after another, each designated with a different piece of the performance. The first platter looked like fish, but since I couldn't figure out which was the edible part and which was for show, my only choice was to say "No thank you" and leave it to the next guest. Next course was soup, tomato I think, and this I could manage since there was only one spoon that looked right for soup, which was just as well since I was starving and my stomach was beginning to announce itself. Only problem was that I didn't have a napkin. Then I noticed one draped around a piece of bread to make it look like a rose. So I made a grab for it, not wanting to get red spots all over my new white gown, but in the process of trying to be surreptitious I grabbed the end of my next door neighbor's napkin by mistake and when I yanked on it, his bowl of soup did a belly flop in his lap, spattering his gleaming white waistcoat. Well, the game was over. So I stood up and chucked my cards on the table. Gentlemen, I says, I am sorry I've wrecked your lunch. To be truthful, I'm all wrong for this kind of malarkey. I am absolutely bewildered by all this and I have no idea what all this collection of kitchenware means. Your gang of servants make me nervous and I don't know what to eat or how or when. In other words, I'm sunk and there's no use trying to bluff it out.

I ended my little speech and leaned on the table to steady myself and my hand slid into my soup and the bowl did a neat little backflip and landed upside down on the carpet. I just wanted to disappear and wished I could have fainted, but as you boys know I'm not exactly the fainting type, but at the very least I might have burst into tears except that everyone at the table began to laugh, so I joined in.

'By Jove', says the gent whose waistcoat I'd just ruined, 'What a confession for a woman to make. Your frankness is charming'. There I was, the charmingly unsophisticated rube from the Colonies again. Mind you, I didn't really mind, because by being honest and admitting my ignorance, I won some applause from one of the greatest men in history – Lord Kitchener, no less, one of the most brilliant and wonderful human beings I've ever met."

Pearl had expected to be shown the door, but they wouldn't hear of it and she stayed the rest of the afternoon and amused them with stories of her poverty-stricken past, a condition none of them could ever have come within a million miles of. She spent quite a few happy hours with them after that and the Colonel gave her quite a social education, even got her a real chaperone who steered her through a whole avalanche of functions, though Pearl still managed to provide these gents with their fair share of laughs at her own expense. This went on for two months, but money was dwindling away and she still hadn't seen Paris or Rome, so, on impulse one day, Pearl packed her bags, didn't tell a soul she was leaving, dispatched the dog to the Colonel, with her compliments, and caught the train from Charing Cross to Paris by the Folkstone-Boulogne ferry. So, of course, she got sick as a dog crossing the Channel and was in no mood for any nonsense at the other side. Standing in the Customs line she was woozy and feeling none too jolly when this grim-looking Frenchman with a droopy mustache and a lazy eye opened her bag and let out a holler that almost gave her the vapors. He came up brandishing a revolver, which Pearl always carried with her. Single girl traveling alone, can't be too careful. He fired off a volley of French, which Pearl didn't understand a word of and there was no-one left in line to help her out. She grabbed her bag to run for the Paris train which was just about to leave, and, accidentally or otherwise, elbowed the gendarme in the eye. He set to howling, then two more officers grabbed Pearl by the arms and hauled her off to meet the Magistrate, a very gloomy gent who looked like he'd swallowed a serving of snails while they were still in their shell. How was Pearl to know it was against the law of the French Republic to bring in a firearm, and a couple of daggers, just souvenirs, that happened to be in her luggage? Well, by the time they found a translator and the horrible extent of her crime was made clear, she pleaded her ignorance and innocence, to which they shrugged and harrumphed a few times in great Gallic style. Pearl was released, without weapons, but with a stern speech that she assumed was a lecture of some kind, but was never really sure since her translator had fallen asleep and was snoring softly on a bench in the back of the court. After all this she had missed the train to Paris. The next one didn't leave until after midnight and she didn't reach Paris until four in the morning.

# Chapter 11

Over the next several months, in the dead time between scenes, Pearl gave us the rest of her colorful account of her travels in Europe, most of which we suspected she made up, but if she did she deserved credit for a colorful imagination. After a few weeks in Paris, contemplating marriage to a French count whom she called "Bobby", just for the pleasure of parading him in front of her friends in New York, she took flight for Italy, headed for Genoa to get acquainted with her "fiancé's" sister. But she got cold feet en route and took the train to Rome instead. She hung around the "Cines" film studios with a couple of local artists who spoke English, watching how the Italians made movies. "Bobby" must have had his spies in Rome and he showed up on the set in a foul mood demanding an explanation for Pearl's disappearance. Pearl soon settled his ruffled feathers and, since the social season was not yet in full-swing, he decided to take Pearl to the Cinema, assuring her that she would find it amusing. And, of course, as the lights went down and the screen lit up, who should come bouncing into the limelight but Pearl. The movie turned out to be an early Pathe effort, the worst she ever made, according to Pearl. "Bobby" looks at the screen, looks at Pearl, looks at both again and she knows the game is up. They left the Cinema before the end and Pearl admits that yes, she is a working girl, and that's why she can't marry a French count. He insists that this is no impediment, that he is madly in love with her, their love will conquer all etc. etc. but Pearl knows darned well that actresses are not readily welcomed as daughters-in-law by French dowagers, and they agree to remain friends. And, besides, his monocle kept slipping out when he was agitated and Pearl was quite sure that she would not be able to resist the impulse to laugh whenever that happened, as it surely would, and often, if she were to continue her working life after the marriage. She had no intention of giving up her independence.

So they continued their travels, moving on to Naples where "Bobby" had an aunt. Pearl spoke not a word of Italian, but everyone there seemed to find her fascinating, and she and "Bobby" spent a pleasant few days sightseeing and shopping. In a jeweler's shop he had his watch chain made into two bracelets, one of which he wore on his wrist, while Pearl attached the other to her ankle. He swore his undying devotion, promising that he would never marry anyone else. Pearl made no such promise, though she still wore the chain around her ankle.

The lure of new adventures in new and exciting places, as well as Pearl's growing discomfort with "Bobby's" ever more insistent attentions, was too much a siren song for Pearl to ignore and, after meeting a group of fellow Americans bound for Nice, she hitched a ride as far as Monte Carlo to try her luck in the Casino. Pearl was no gambler and the roulette wheel was unfamiliar territory, but, with money running low, she bought 50 dollars' worth of chips and placed them all on red. And she won! So she did it again. And won again! Four times in a row the ball dropped in red and four times Pearl won. Among those sharing the table was a large portly man with heavy black beard and moustache. Pearl had seen this same gent gambling at The Ritz in Paris weeks earlier but had no clue who he was and never did discover his name. But he was enthralled with Pearl's run of luck and begged her to play her system using his money. Pearl, of course, had no system, just dumb beginner's luck, but she had once been jokingly advised that the only winning system was to play with other people's money and so she did, and the winning streak continued. When the stout gent finally called a halt, exhausted by the excitement of winning again and again, his winnings totaled the equivalent of eighteen thousand dollars, half of which he insisted belonged to Pearl. She was flabbergasted, but he would not be denied, and Pearl stuffed her winnings in her pockets and hightailed it to her hotel and the next morning was on a train to Paris to refresh her wardrobe. From Paris to Brussels, where she spent a week writing a rotten play that she tore up, and then to Berlin which she hated, so she finally bought a ticket to Hamburg intending to take a liner home, but at the last minute tore it up and once more gave in to the siren call of Paris. Another round of parties and theaters and visits to The Ritz. On one such visit she literally bumped into the fat man with the beard who her friends had told her was a notorious gambler. But he merely begged her pardon and moved on without a hint of recognition, which left her vanity a little dented.

There was to be one more adventure for Pearl before the lure of New York and plain American speech and manners called her home. Before sailing from New York almost 7 months earlier Pearl had met a Frenchman at the studio, a type altogether different from the over-attentive Louis Gasnier. This man was what the French called "Apache", a dark and dangerous sort more familiar with the subterranean world of Montmartre and its dangerous seductions than the labyrinthine byways of Paris high society. He gave her a letter of introduction to his sister, promising a thrilling time, with a hint of wickedness, and Pearl finally slipped this letter into an envelope courtesy of her hotel and instructed the desk clerk to send it on its way, not entirely sure if she would get even the ghost of a reply, and not entirely sure that she wanted one. Several evenings later Pearl was just about to leave for the opera, dressed in her finest, when the rather haughty Englishman who presided over formalities at the desk called to inform her that some highly unsuitable people were loitering in the lobby asking for her. It was clear that he would gladly have summoned the nearest gendarme and have them escorted to a more suitable habitat, but Pearl, guessing that these must be friends of her Apache back home and that a fun evening might be in the offing, dashed down to meet them. None of them could write English, and this deputation in person was the only way to respond to her letter. But one of the pack did speak a little English, so Pearl decided that they were safe enough and even if they weren't, a little excitement wouldn't go amiss for her last fling.

They began their evening at the Folies Bergere, where all Parisians assumed Americans would want to go, but Pearl had already seen enough of the Folies to last a lifetime and soon persuaded her companions to move to a more stimulating venue, where they would go themselves if she were not part of their group. So off they burrowed into the depths of Montmartre, and finally down into a smoky, low-ceilinged cellar, where Pearl immediately became the over-dressed center of attention, lit up like a Christmas tree in an orphanage. The place was jammed with exotic looking creatures of the half-world, wild-eyed and improbably dressed, drinking, laughing, embracing and kissing each other on both cheeks with abandon, enough to make Pearl's head spin even if she were sober, but no sooner had she stepped into the depths than a glass of unfamiliar liqueur from a green bottle was thrust into her hand and she gulped it down without hesitation. A dashing young man all done up in cap, flowing cravat and velvet coat grabbed Pearl by the arm and flung her into some wild dance, literally sweeping her off her feet, which barely touched the floor as he sent her spinning this way and that, and only her natural athleticism kept her from being swept entirely under the tables. When the music ended he led her back to her table and pinned a couple of crumpled franc notes to her left shoulder, a gesture which entirely mystified her. The liqueur and the dance left her breathless and dizzy but no sooner was she seated than another of the wild crowd had seized her arm for another go around of the same. Her next partner was a little less frenzied and spoke passable English. He explained that her first partner had laid claim to her for the evening with his crumpled bouquet of francs, and each time they danced past her "owner" he would scowl, and finally showered them with a volley of moist French curses. Her new partner insisted that she should not tolerate this insult and coached her rapidly in an appropriate response. Pearl didn't understand a word but gamely volleyed back in a voice that rose high above the frenetic music. Whether she got it wrong, or more possibly because she got it right, the next thing Pearl remembered is being carried out of that dark hole, bleeding profusely from her scalp, shards of green glass clinging to her white dress and smelling strongly of licorice. In short order she was deposited, with minimal ceremony, on the steps of the Ritz, to be viewed with the most supercilious of Gallic suspicion by the night watchman, who was eventually convinced to summon the hotel doctor who laid a neat row of stitches in Pearl's scalp, much to the amusement and disdain of the English desk clerk. That adventure cured Pearl of any further desire to explore the darker side of Montmartre, although she was once persuaded to don gypsy garb and set herself up in the basement of the notorious "Bal Tabarin" and spent the evening telling the fortunes of the English-speaking cocottes and listening to the sad stories of their downfall.

Exactly seven months after sailing from New York, Pearl boarded a steamer in Southampton and sailed for America. Before departure, when she opened her morning paper she was greeted by her own face and the caption "Pearl White, a Rising Star of America, who is Visiting London to Get Ideas for Her Forthcoming Photoplays." How it got there Pearl had no idea, and she never did find out, but the days of Pearl's anonymity were just about over. Before too long rarely would a day go by without some mention of Pearl in the dailies and the weekly magazines. Her life would never be the same.

# Chapter 12

Pearl had played local theater while still in high school, and at the age of 18, to her parents' dismay, had joined the Trousedale Stock Company, touring the Midwest and marrying Victor Sutherland, a fellow actor. The way Pearl told it, on Oct. 12th 1907, a date she claimed she could never forget, in Oklahoma City, Minnie Remaley, who was playing the lead in Amid the Hills Astray, told her that the owner of the theater was offering 25 dollars to any couple who would get married on the stage after the show. Pearl and Victor were sweet on each other and chronically short of money, so they stood up and took the money, then blew it on a champagne breakfast. Seven years later it cost Pearl five thousand dollars to get rid of him. Pearl was only 18 when she got married, and Victor had modest ambitions that did not match her own, so the marriage was doomed from the start. After that, according to Pearl's own legend, she toured the country as a singer and even wound up in Cuba and parts of South America, singing under the name Miss Mazee. By 1910 her stage voice was beginning to fail her and her singing and stage career was over, but silent movies offered the perfect solution.

The Perils of Pauline was her second engagement with Pathe Freres. She had flirted with a movie career ever since 1910 when she was hired by Pat Powers for a series of one-reelers filmed in the Bronx, but Powers was a cheap bastard, according to Pearl, and so were his films. So she moved on to the Lubin Film Company in Philadelphia, a step up but a very small one. After another handful of undistinguished one-reelers she was released the next year and Pearl made no secret of her limited range as an actress and her lack of seriousness about film-acting back then. So she trudged back to New York to try her luck once more. She was hired by Pathe, but once again stayed only long enough to make a few unremembered shorts before joining Universal Crystal in 1912. Her output at Crystal was not much better than her past efforts but this time at least she was given star billing, and Crystal went so far as to feature her name in the titles. So it was that Pearl finally woke up to the possibilities of this upstart medium and began to take her acting more seriously. She became a success. Not a star, but a modest success. Finally, in 1914 Pearl returned to Pathe to an explosion of success that no-one at the time could possibly have foreseen. The premise of Perils of Pauline was that Pauline's wealthy guardian, Mr. Marvin, upon his death, has left Pearl's considerable inheritance in the stewardship of his secretary, Mr. Koerner, until she should marry. Pauline wants to wait a while before getting married in order to enjoy an adventurous life and accumulate the kind of experiences that will provide a lifetime of material for her ambition to be a writer. Koerner is determined that Pearl should not inherit. He wants to keep the fortune for himself, so there is considerable scope to showcase Pauline in all manner of dangerous situations which Koerner then tries to take advantage of and get rid of Pauline once and for all.

The Bound Brook film set became a much livelier place once Pearl arrived. She was a free-spirited girl and most of the men knew her and harbored a secret longing for her. In Gasnier's case the longing was hardly secret: he made his intentions known to Pearl, and to every other attractive young starlet, whenever the opportunity presented itself. But Pearl would have none of him and frequently made fun of his conquests. On the set Pearl was game for almost anything and once in a while the crew would play tricks on her which, after some initial explosive language, would set her laughing as heartily as the rest. In one scene Pearl is trapped in an old mill which was being flooded and the water rises perilously close to Pearl's chin. Pearl's instructions are to look appropriately horrified, then, in desperation, to start swimming for her life. Donald Mackenzie, the director on this epic, yells "More horror, Pearl, more horror!" Then as Pearl launches herself into the water for the swim of her life, Mackenzie yells "OK, Pitch, let 'em go", and Pitch Revada, the props man, opens a cage full of rats that he had kept hidden from Pearl and dumps them in the tank where they, too, began to swim for their lives in Pearl's wake. She screams, not so much in fear as in anger at Mackenzie. "You bastard, I'll kick your head in!" Her voice is cut off by the sound of breaking glass as Crane Wilbur, who is playing the hero in this one, crawls through a window and drags Pearl, along with a few of the speedier rats, to safety. "Cut!" yells Mackenzie "Great acting, Pearl! Never seen you look so terrified!" She walks up to him, slaps his face and stalks off to her dressing room.

The most infamous Pearl White escapade that I was witness to at least part of, and the one that was much publicized in newspapers across the country, was Pearl's unscheduled ride in a hot air balloon. The setting was a carnival. The persistent Koerner, played by Paul Panzer, has tricked Pauline into posing for a photograph in a tethered hot air balloon. His hired henchman, unknown to Pauline, has instructions to gallop into the scene as if on a runaway horse and "accidentally" knock down the men holding the ropes, of which I was one, and Pauline floats away to almost certain death. Once again Mackenzie was behind the megaphone. "Action!" he yells and us anchor men slowly let out rope a few feet at a time and the balloon and passenger rise in stately fashion until they hover some fifty feet of the ground, which is just fine with Pearl, thank you very much. Just as Mackenzie is about to call in the henchman on his horse there is a tearing crunching sound. The anchor which is intended to keep Pearl firmly rooted to the ground has torn free. The four of us at the end of the ropes fight to keep the balloon under control, but a gust of wind catches the balloon and none of us can hold on for long. I am lifted about 6 feet in the air before I have the good sense to let go, as do two of the others, but the fourth is whipped high into the air and flung about 25 feet, bruised and battered, but not too much worse for wear. Now the balloon is floating free and rising fast, with those on the ground staring stupidly after it. Our trance is dispelled by Gasnier's big Packard screeching to a halt in the space recently occupied by Pearl White and a balloon.

"Mon Dieu! Pearl, where are you going!"

Mackenzie is first to react. He explains the situation to Gasnier then leaps into the Packard and tells the driver to "Follow that balloon!" As they roar away he flings instructions over his shoulder to Cuny on the horse and soon a cavalcade of one Packard, one horse and many more of us on foot sets out after the rapidly disappearing balloon. It is a futile chase for those of us on foot, of course, and we soon slow to a confused halt. The Packard has almost disappeared, solitary horseman in pursuit, but he, too, soon abandons the chase and turns to join the dazed mob as it mills around with no idea what to do next.

Several hundred feet above us Pearl is alone in a runaway balloon without the faintest idea of how to pilot such a thing. The air is cooler and the wind is brisk and Pearl is not dressed for altitude. Her initial anger at the thought that this was another of Mackenzie's dirty tricks has quickly faded as she realizes that this is no trick. Or if it had been, it has gone terribly wrong. "What the hell do I do now?" As she wrestles with this thought and the beginnings of panic start, a voice asks quietly "Is it alright for me to come up now, Miss White?" This sudden unexpected intrusion into her solitary thoughts half scares her out of her wits. Is she about to come face to face with her maker? Or is it the Devil himself calling her to the place her mother always told her she would end up in. But out from under the canvas at the bottom of the gondola emerges a face clearly of this world, pale, round and bespectacled. "Who the hell are you", screams Pearl.

"I'm Leo Stevens, Miss White, owner of this here balloon".

"Well, Leo, I am mighty glad to see you, since you must know something about flying these contraptions. What on earth were you doing under that canvas?"

"Well, balloons are funny things. Never know what they might do, especially in the hands of the untrained who think there's nothing to it. I came along in case anything went wrong".

"A whole lot of things went wrong, buster, as you can see if you look down. How do we get out of this mess in one piece?"

"Not much to see down below, Miss White. Looks like a storm building. We'll just have to ride it out".

"Leo, there's not much I haven't ridden in my acting career, but this damned flying gasbag ain't on the list. Must be something you can do!"

"Chew on this gum, it'll keep your ears from popping and your nose from bleeding." The wind was picking up and the basket was beginning to buck. Thunder rolled and a heavy rain began to pelt the two of them.

"I'm going to pull this cord and let some air out of this gasser so we can get down to some visibility, look for a landing place". The balloon began its descent and the clouds opened below them.

"My God, Leo, we're heading straight for that river!"

"Not to worry, this wind should kick us right over it". He pulled on more cords and the descent slowed and the balloon scudded just a few feet over the gray, churning waters below. The storm ended as quickly as it had begun. The clouds split and sunlight burst through. Ahead of them they could see a large gray square of a building surrounded by nothing but open ground. "That looks like our spot. Hold on tight". Pearl did as she was told as the ground approached at dizzying speed.

"We'll bounce a couple of times when we land, Miss White, so keep a tight grip". Pearl's knuckles were white on the rails of the basket but even that did not altogether prepare her for the impact of landing and she found herself flung half-across the rail, legs flailing in air. The next bounce flung her back in and she landed on her backside with the canvas for a seat. The final bounce flung her straight up and down and the basket came to rest with Pearl on all fours, teeth rattling, heart pounding. As the airbag sagged slowly and gracefully around them, there was a moment or two of blessed silence as they checked their various limbs to confirm that everything was in its proper place. Pearl stood and treated Leo Stevens to her most beatific smile. "Leo, I reckon you just saved my life. For that you get a great big kiss", and she planted her lips on his cheek with a resounding smack and the little man reddened with pleasure. But as they stood there grinning at each other like fools, their moment of blessed relief was interrupted by three men in uniform, carrying rifles, rushing towards them. "Get out with your hands up!"

"Gentlemen, there must be some kind of mistake!"

"Lady, the mistake is yours. This is the Pennsylvania State Penitentiary. You just landed in the prisoners' exercise yard." Pearl drew herself up, stiffened her spine and raised her chin in defiance. "In that case, gentlemen, take us to your warden."

Gasnier had given up the chase once the balloon was out of sight and the weather had worsened. He returned to sit fretfully at his desk waiting for some word, hoping it would not be tragic news. Soon he was alerted to a phone call from Philadelphia. "What!? Pearl!? Where are you? Philadelphia! How on earth did you get there? Thank goodness you are alright. You're sure you're not injured? I will send Cuny to pick you up. Do you need anything? Of course, I'll tell Joe to bring a bottle of my best." His relief quickly gave way to more practical considerations. Gasnier saw immediately how he could turn this mishap to his advantage. He yelled to his secretary in the next room.

"Tell Joe to get out to the Pennsylvania State Penitentiary as fast as he can. And tell him to take Pearl's favorite booze with him. What? How in the world should I know where it is? Tell him to head to Philadelphia and ask a criminal, I'm sure he knows a few! Then get me Mr. Hearst on the phone! The newspaper Mr. Hearst, of course! Then bring me a large brandy!"

A short time later the phone rang again. It was William Randolph Hearst himself. "Mr. Hearst. I have a great story for you, an exclusive to you, of course." He gave Hearst a brief account of Pearl's adventures, finishing with "and she will be in my office in 6 hours for an exclusive interview. Of course. Thank you, Mr. Hearst". He jumped out of his chair and danced a gleeful jig around his desk. "This will make us another million!"

Most of that day's events we learned from Joe and from Pearl herself once she was safely back amongst us. As soon as Cuny pulled into the yard with his passenger, Pearl was whisked away for her interview with Hearst's man on the ground. She emerged an hour or so later looking tired but triumphant and dragged herself into the hut where the crew were hanging out, waiting to hear the full story. She accepted a drink with enthusiasm, then propped herself up on the table where a desultory card game had now been quickly abandoned.

"What a day, boys, what a day! And I didn't even have to make most of it up! Gassy must be wetting his French silk underwear dreaming about the free publicity".

She gave us her unblemished account of the day's events and Joe filled us in on the ride back to Bound Brook. "So Pearl says to me 'Does Gassy have the press waiting for me when I get back?' Of course he does, says I, so Pearl yells 'Stop the car!' and I'm thinking she's gonna throw up or something but she jumps out and starts rubbing mud all over her face and tearing her clothes. Pearl, are you sick, I ask. 'Naw, she says, I'm just getting ready to meet the press!' You should have seen her when she walked into that room! She looked like she'd just wrestled a lion, and the lion came off second best! That reporter was just lapping it up like a kitten"

The next day the Hearst newspapers across the country carried a lurid account of Pearl's misadventures that showed only a nodding acquaintance with the facts. Pearl, of course, embellished the dangers and drama of her unscheduled flight, though no mention was made of the Pennsylvania Penitentiary. The warden had sworn Pearl to secrecy, presumably out of fear that desperate gang members might try to duplicate the feat in attempting to spring their pals. A suitable location was substituted, from which Pearl was rescued from imminent death by suffocation, as she lay semi-conscious, shrouded by the deflated canopy, saved by mounted policemen summoned in the nick of time by the valiant Leo Stevens. Pearl's growing fame was catapulted to new heights.

# Chapter 13

The power of the movies came as a shock to all of us. It was a new enough phenomenon that all its consequences were yet to be counted. 10 million people a week were watching The Perils of Pauline and Pearl White was a familiar face in half the households in America and many more across Europe. She was recognized and adored wherever she went and her villains were equally recognized and reviled by the movie-going public. For stage actors used to a degree of anonymity and privacy, the intrusion was a rude awakening. They were pointed out on the street and chased by children, hissing and booing. For the paying public there seemed no distinction between the actor and his character. The two were the same. The camera's artifice was complete.

So we churned out more of The Perils of Pauline. The paying public couldn't get enough of Pearl and her adventures, at home and abroad. Some years later we heard the story told by Spanish novelist Vicente Blasco Ibanez, whose _Blood and Sand and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse_ were turned into vehicles for Rudolf Valentino. Ibanez was in Paris as the German cannons bombarded the City of Light in the waning months of the Great War. As the roar of the Big Berthas grew louder, he stumbled through the darkened streets looking for shelter. He fell in with a line of people who he felt must lead him to safety and when they began to descend into a cellar he was overcome with relief. But no sooner had he found a cramped seat in the gloom than a square of light formed on the wall and onto it burst the image of a pretty blonde woman, leaping to safety from a fire escape. He asked the woman next to him what was going on.

"Monsieur, it's the last chapter of a Pearl White serial! We are most fortunate to have the chance to see it, no matter what the filthy Boche are trying to do."

On filming days, while I busied myself on the set, either behind the camera or in front of it, Angie found herself a quiet spot in a corner where she could get a good view of the action. She always carried her sketchbook and never lost the habit of recording her surroundings on paper. Many of Pearl's scenes were immortalized in this way. If anyone ever tried to look over her shoulder, or asked to see her work, she would dismiss her scribblings as hardly worth anyone's attention. I had peeked into her sketchbook a time or two and I knew that wasn't true. To my eye her drawings looked as good as many I had seen in magazines. Her style was sparse with strong lines, much suggested by the spaces in between. I never could convince her that she had real talent. But William Randolph Hearst did. At the height of Pearl's success as the indefatigable Queen of the Serials, Hearst would run a synopsis of Pearl's latest episode to coincide with its release. He was prohibited from printing still photographs from the film, so each was accompanied by an artist's rendering of the most dramatic moments of the action. A number of artists were employed during the first half of "Perils of Pauline". Hearst was clearly not enthralled with their work, since a new byline appeared every few episodes. Midway through the filming of "Pauline", Hearst himself visited the set to pay his respects to the young woman who was helping him to sell newspapers in unprecedented numbers. He strutted around like the wealthy and influential press baron that he was and made eyes at Pearl, but what seemed to interest him most were the mechanics of film-making. Whenever possible, he would duck his head behind the camera and peer through the viewfinder. He would talk at length with the cameramen between takes, taking notes as he listened. When it came time for him to leave, he signaled his goodbyes to all and sundry, backing out of the set like royalty, which is why he didn't see Angie camped in her dark corner until it was too late. He collided with her chair and tumbled backward. Angie scrambled to avoid him, but she too tumbled to the ground, pad and sketches scattering around her. Hearst was quick to his feet, none the worse, and quick to help Angie to hers, profuse in his apologies. I sprinted over, but she was already upright and laughing in embarrassment. Hearst bent to help her retrieve her drawings, then paused to look at the pages in his hand. Then he looked at Angie with a certain suspicion.

"Who are you working for?" Angie was clearly nonplussed by the question.

"I'm sorry, I don't quite know what you mean".

"Are you working for one of the magazines?" Clearly he took Angie for an artist for one of his rivals. "I don't work for anybody. I just draw for my own pleasure. My husband works on the set. That's why I'm here".

"I like these drawings. They're good. Better than the ones I'm paying good money for. Would you consider doing some sketches for me on commission? I'd like to use them in my newspapers to go along with the serial". Angie looked startled, unsure of herself, but she had the good sense to croak out "I suppose so. I never thought about selling my work before".

"Excellent. When the filming on this episode wraps up, I'll send one of my press room boys out here. Give him what you have and he'll pay you for them". So it was that Angie went to work for the Hearst Empire. The following week one of Hearst's men showed up, as promised. He took charge of a small bundle of sketches and handed Angie a check for $100, with a promise that, if Hearst decided to use any of them, another check would follow. I'm proud to say that he did use them and Angie was duly rewarded. From then on Angie's sketches appeared alongside every one of Pearl's serials in print, from "Perils of Pauline" in 1914, to "The Black Secret" in 1919. In 1916 Pearl had been voted most popular movie star in "Motion Picture" magazine. Two years later she was out- voted only by Mary Pickford and Marguerite Clark. Waifs and little girls lost were all the rage that year. Her star had dimmed only slightly. Everybody remembers Mary Pickford and Pearl White, but who remembers Marguerite Clarke?

In 1919, Pathe, sensing that public taste was changing, decided that Pearl should write her "autobiography". The hope was that the renewed attention would place Pearl firmly back on the top rung of the ladder. Pearl immediately asked Angie to provide illustrations. Angie was thrilled. The book itself is largely a work of fiction, as Pearl was quick to point out to her pals on the set. Truth was never to get in the way of a good story, so all of us were invited to add our embellishments to Pearl's account of her life. I'm not ashamed to say that some of the fictions in "Just Me" by Pearl White were my own work. Pearl seemed to think that, being English, and having a love for Shakespeare, I had a more facile grasp of the English language and a greater talent for creative fiction.

But the world did not know that The Perils of Pauline would be the last time that Pearl White would entirely inhabit the character of Pauline, that the actress who appeared on the screen as Pearl White after Pauline was not always Pearl White. Only a handful of people knew it back then, it was the best kept secret in the movie world. Now all but one of those people who knew the secret are gone. During the filming of one episode of Pauline, Pearl was to be carried up a flight of stairs by one of Mr. Koerner's henchmen, whose intent was to throw her from a second story window to her certain death. As the scene progressed and the villain mounted the stairs, he was almost to the top when he stumbled and lost his grip on Pearl and she came crashing down 2 flights of stairs. That villain was me. I can never forget that moment, the awful sound as Pearl's body thudded down those stairs and she lay groaning at the bottom, surrounded by the film crew who were shocked into horrified silence, unable to move for a moment. I came leaping down the stairs, my heart pounding, feeling sick at the thought of what I'd done. Pearl was looking up at me, her face twisted with pain, blinking back tears.

"Pearl, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I don't know what happened". I almost said "Are you hurt?" but stopped the stupid question just in time. "How badly are you hurt?"

She clenched her jaw and lifted her upper body a few inches, wincing as she did. She held up her arm to me. "Help me up, would you, Tommy?"

I wrapped my hand around her wrist and pulled gently and she started to sit up, but the pain it gave her was obvious. I beckoned Joe Cuny towards me. "Joe, help me get her on her feet." We locked our arms behind her back and under her legs and lifted her up, then placed her feet on the floor so she could stand. Now she was upright but clearly not enjoying it much. Her jaw was set tight and she was breathing heavily through her nose. She nodded towards a table with a couple of chairs and we walked her over to it. She sat down gingerly and a small scream escaped her lips when we let her full weight down on the chair. She was trying to smile, to be the fearless Pauline of the silent screen, but she lacked conviction. All I could do was keep repeating how sorry I was, feeling awful.

"It's OK Tommy, it wasn't your fault. I got carried away with being the brave heroine and I grabbed a stair rail while you were carrying me. Trying to make it look good. Threw you off balance. Made a bloody mess of that, didn't I".

She was now surrounded by the entire crew, including Gasnier, clucking like a hen. Everyone was fussing until Pearl yelled "Jesus Christ give me some room to breathe! I'm not dead yet!" But it was clear that this was not something that Pearl could just walk off in 5 minutes. A doctor was summoned and filming was suspended for the day, but not before a bottle of Bourbon was summoned and Pearl poured herself a stiff shot.

Pearl was never the same after that day. She showed up for filming each day, did what Gasnier or George Seitz asked of her, though she no longer did her own stunt work. It was clear to us that her efforts cost her, though the camera never saw it and it was fortunate that these were silent films because a soundtrack might have revealed her slurred speech. She was drinking more heavily than before to dull the pain and the doctor was giving her some heavy sedatives. Some days the combination of the two made it almost impossible to get any filming done. Gasnier and Seitz spent hours in secretive meetings, sometimes just the two of them, sometimes with Pearl. Finally, Gasnier called us all together and explained that because of Pearl's injury and the pain she was having to endure it might be necessary to abandon any more episodes of The Perils of Pauline. There was much disappointed muttering among us, but then Pearl walked on the set in her blond Pauline wig and make-up and sat herself down in Gasnier's chair, looking livelier than we had seen her in weeks. We could hardly believe she could have made such a rapid recovery. "How does Pearl look?" asked Gasnier. We all agreed that she looked as good as the Pearl of old. Gasnier called us all in closer. "Gentlemen, take a closer look". We all stepped up to where Pearl was sitting. But now we could see it wasn't Pearl. It was Angelina. I was stunned.

"And you didn't even tell me!" I was upset with Angie for keeping me in the dark and, if I'm honest now, a bit jealous that she had now been thrust into the spotlight when she had no acting experience while I still labored behind the moustache and dark hat. "I'm sorry, but I just wanted to see the look on your face. And Gasnier asked me not to tell anyone, not even you. Please don't be upset with me". But I was in the mood to be upset for a little while longer yet. "It's ridiculous, we'll never get away with it. You don't even know how to act." Still feeling a bit spiteful.

"Gasnier says he can teach me a few simple acting tricks to look like Pearl".

"I know just what kind of tricks Gasnier has up his sleeve for you, and they're not acting ones either".

"Oh I know all about his reputation with actresses. He's a bit ridiculous really. But I'll soon put a stop to him if he tries any funny business, him or anyone else. It's not as if I'm so desperate to be an actress that I'll do anything to get a part. It's just a bit of a lark for me. I think he needs me more than I need him. Pearl is his golden goose and he would lose a packet if he couldn't put Pearl White up there on the screen. He'll use Pearl's face for close up work when he needs to, but much of the time it will be me". She smiled her finest for me and put her arms around my neck, pulling my face towards hers. I tried to resist but I was losing steam. "What if somebody twigs the switch?"

"Then he's the one who looks bad, not me."

"But what's in it for you besides a lark? If it works, you'll be making a lot of money for Gasnier and for Pathe."

"I've been promised a weekly wage and a small percentage of the profits. It won't make us rich but we'll do well enough out of it. But, honestly, if you say no, I won't do it."

I was already familiar with her feminine wiliness. Put the responsibility right back on me so I'd look bad if I denied her. I couldn't think of any more good reasons to object, only bad ones born out of jealousy and envy, and my peevishness was beginning to feel a little foolish. To deny her this opportunity would have been petty and selfish with nothing to be gained.

"Well, I suppose there's no harm in giving it a try for one episode and seeing how that goes. And if it works, who knows?'

The first day of shooting the next episode of Pauline did not go well. Angelina looked uncomfortable from the moment she stepped on to the set. There was no doubting the magic that the make-up people had conjured up to make her look like Pearl, complete with blond wig. But her movements were stiff and awkward, without the athletic grace that Pearl brought to the screen. She had the non-actor's disconcerting habit of looking at the camera, as if it could tell her whether she was getting it right. When she spoke, as she was required to do even though these were silent films, the appearance of speech was necessary to carry the story forward, her delivery was wooden and unconvincing as if she was reading from a script which she had just now seen for the first time. She knew the words; she knew the plot. We had spent hours the previous night rehearsing them. But the formality of the set, the presence of the crew and particularly Gasnier made it impossible for her to relax and simply play the part. After three takes, each one less satisfactory than the last, Gasnier called a halt. He said nothing for several minutes, deep in thought, as Angelina fidgeted and the rest of us avoided catching her eye, even me, I'm sorry to say. Then Gasnier roused himself and ordered everyone except Angie off the set. I was nervous about his intent, fearing that he might berate her in some unkind way, but, after some ineffective muttering, I left with the others. We milled around outside, some smoked, some read newspapers or looked for winners in the racing news. One or two nipped discreetly from hip flasks. I chewed my nails, a childhood habit I had never been able to break. We waited out there for almost a half hour before Gasnier summoned us. "Gentlemen, we may proceed."

We did another take and to our great relief Angie was relaxed and smiling, she hit her marks with confidence, she played her part with energy. She was not yet Pearl but she had taken a great step forward in convincing us, and herself, that the subterfuge could succeed. We called it quits for the day, with the beginnings of a confidence that tomorrow we would have a print that would have Pearl's adoring public shelling out their hard-earned cash, blissfully unaware that the blonde heroine before their eyes was not their beloved Pearl.

Joe Cuny drove us back to our cramped quarters in a slightly run-down rooming house that we called home in those days. Every room housed some portion of the crew as did the house across the street as Bound Brook's main thoroughfare petered out from town to country, so that we spent most of our waking hours in the company of movie folk. They were a gregarious even over-familiar bunch and there seemed to be few occasions when we had our rooms to ourselves. But I made sure that I dragged Angelina inside and firmly closed the door as soon as Joe left us so that I could interrogate her before the nightly invasion began. "So what did Gasnier say to you that made you so different out there today? It must have been good because it worked like a charm". She laughed, as pleased with herself as the cat that got the cream.

"Well". Then she paused. I could tell by the tone of that one word that she had a good story to tell and relished the prospect of telling it.

"Well. I felt really silly out there on the set, I just wasn't comfortable with everybody staring at me and expecting me to be Pearl. So Louis said we were just going to play the scene for fun, no camera, no crew, just me and him as if we were kids playing make-believe and he started prancing about as if he were Pearl and told me to act the villain's part. He was so funny playing Pearl he had me in stitches. He was like Widow Twanky in the pantomime. Then he asked me what I thought of his Pearl and I had to tell him how silly it was. So then he asks me to show him where he was going wrong and before I hardly knew it I was showing him how to play Pearl playing Pauline. And he just stood there watching and smiling like the cat that got the canary and after I'm done he tells me that he had another camera hidden behind the blackout curtain with a cameraman working it and that my first day of acting in moving pictures was already wrapped up. Said he didn't even need to look at the rushes, he knew it as good. So there!"

She stuck her tongue at me and laughed again.

# Chapter 14

And so it was that Angelina Dyer was transformed into Pearl White. My stomach was in a knot for the first few days of shooting the next episode of "Perils of Pauline". I just couldn't believe that it could work. Gasnier dismissed my doubts with a Gallic shrug. "To-mas, in my hands she will be transformed into an actress. She is already a star. Pearl has already done that for us. Don't worry, nobody handles actresses like Louis Gasnier." There was some snickering from the crew behind the camera, but the Frenchman didn't hear it or chose to ignore it.

It was soon after this that Pearl got married for the second time. Wally McCutcheon was another Englishman on the set, but one with a better pedigree than Angie or I could boast. He was a Major in the English army, with the vowels to match and an extra helping of upper class charm. "Handsome and dashing" were the words most often heard alongside his name and he never seemed to lack for female company. Pearl was smitten from day one and she was seen more and more often in his company. He was a charming bastard, no mistake, but a bit too charming for my liking, especially when he was around Angie, but she found him as distasteful as I did. He wasn't on active duty, of course, but he made the most of the gallant soldier routine and wore his uniform far more than good sense required. It was a great hit with the ladies and Pearl was not the only one who thought him handsome and dashing. With the war looming in Europe there was every chance that McCutcheon would be recalled from his gay life in moving pictures to fight the Hun, which made him all the more appealing to Pearl and her rivals. And, sure enough, the call did come, just a few months after they met, so Pearl, perhaps seeing herself as the tragic heroine in real life, agreed to marry McCutcheon in a hastily-arranged secret wedding two days before he set sail for England. The crew were invited of course, but sworn to secrecy. The champagne and Scotch flowed freely and McCutcheon was at the head of the line for refills with Pearl close behind. Whiskey seemed to be her constant companion now as she sought to dull the pain that never seemed to leave her. We didn't see her on the set very often with Angie doing most of the work in front of the camera and she spent most of her days secluded in the grand house she had recently bought for a quarter of a million dollars in Bayside, Long Island, with her sister Grace and her maid Margarita for company, emerging to the outside world only for promotional appearances when she was as radiant as ever, determined that the world would never see her pain and she would still be the Pearl of old for her adoring fans and the insatiable newspaper men who knew that nothing could sell papers better than a story about Pearl White.

It was about 6 months after the gallant Major McCutcheon had waved a soldier's goodbye to Pearl as his ship steamed out of New York harbor. Pearl had made the trip from Bayside to Bound Brook in her Stutz Bearcat which she always drove too fast. The cops who patrolled the routes she took most often watched its approaches with a weary familiarity, knowing that they might pull her over but she would never have to pay the fine. She was watching a rehearsal for the final episode of "Perils of Pauline", ready to plunge into the celebrations that would follow the wrap up, with a glass already in her hand. She was always generous with her advice for Angie as she faced the camera, and although Angie had been uncomfortable in the beginning, playing Pearl in front of Pearl, Pearl's easy good nature had put Angie at her ease. As we sat and waited for the actual shoot to begin a motorcycle crunched to a skidding halt outside our hut and a uniformed messenger peered cautiously around the door, knowing from previous incautious intrusions that he might be met with a barrage of insults in French whose gist did not need translation. But he was waved on in and handed Cuny a telegram addressed to Pearl. Joe signed for it, slipped the lad a few coins and off he went. Joe brought the telegram to the sound stage where Pearl was seated in Gasnier's director's chair, which the Frenchman, always restless, never used. She looked at the envelope for a long time, then took a deep breath and tore it open. She stared at it in silence for a few moments. "Well, boys, listen to this. 'DEAR PEARL, HAVE NOT WRITTEN BECAUSE I WAS WOUNDED AND HOSPITALIZED AND THEN UNDERWENT SURGERY--STOP—HOPE YOU CAN STILL LOVE A CHAP WITH A SILVER PLATE IN HIS HEAD—STOP—BACK TO STATES IN A WEEK OR TWO—STOP—LOVE WALLY'

"Well, I guess I can go back to being a regular married woman soon and top hanging around with you deadbeats".

Wally McCutcheon was back among us soon enough. Too soon for some of us, all swagger and suffering his war wounds with a brave smile and stiff upper lip, ever eager to describe his ordeal at the tilt of an ear or tip of a bottle. We were eager enough to hear how The War to End All Wars was being waged across the pond, and the reports we read in the newspapers of the horrors of the trenches and the utter bloody-minded madness of those in command, willing to risk thousands of lives for a few yards of French mud, these were all compelling enough. But to hear McCutcheon talk it was all a jolly good show and he played a leading role in battling the vicious Hun until he had the bad luck to take a mortar fragment to the helmet denying him the chance to win the war single-handed. The uncharitable view was that he had quite likely been smacked in the head by a French Madam seeking payment or stumbled headlong into a French lamp-post after a bout with some cheap and corrosive vin ordinaire. None of this was ever voiced in Pearl's presence, of course. To Pearl he was the noble hero returning from the War after gallantly serving his country, with his occasional twitchiness a poignant reminder of the price he had paid for his service. But he turned that silver plate in his head to good advantage, trading his tales of derring-do and heroism into many a round of free drinks from his cronies or any unsuspecting stranger who might make the mistake of asking about the scar on his forehead. As the months passed he spent more and more time in the company of his cronies and less and less at home with Pearl and she found it more and more difficult to make excuses for him. In the early months it was easy enough to pass it off as a process of readjustment to normal life after his ordeal, but in time it became clear that McCutcheon had no intention of settling down to life as the dutiful husband and every intention of drinking away a good part of Pearl's substantial income or squandering it on the horses. He was rarely seen in Pearl's company and we soon learned not to inquire after his health for fear of opening the door to the less charitable side of Pearl's nature

# Chapter 15

And what of Alfie Mitton? Was Alfie destined to be nothing more than a footnote to this history? No. Alfie had one more part to play, a part that put one of our ghosts to rest for good, though I did not learn of it until several years after the event. When we had said our goodbyes to all and sundry in Farnworth as we prepared for our long journey to America, we were treated to much hand-shaking and back-slapping and fare-thee-wells and best wishes. But Alfie had stood mute, as if he could not fathom that we would desert him. I had tried to jolly him along, but he seemed determined wear his disappointment for all to see. He walked away from me without a word and I wondered if that was the last I would ever see of him.

Although I was a poor correspondent, and my parents were equally poor letter writers, Angelina received regular communications both from her parents and from her old friend Elsie who was now happily married to her brother Charlie. In one of Elsie's letters Charlie had insisted that she make us aware that John Modbury, our cruel tormentor of years before, had come to a rather gruesome end. He had been found hanging by a rope from a tree in a desolate stretch of woods, his clothing in shreds and dog shit smeared all over his body, especially his private parts. Elsie, of course, described his condition more delicately, the euphemisms only serving to paint the picture in even more vivid detail in the imagination. The police apparently had no clues as to who may have done this and I suspect that no great effort was being made to find out, though some show of industrious to-and-fro-ing would have been called for to appease his former employer. The mention of dog shit did make me think, but it seemed that, so far removed, I would never know the truth. Sometime later I heard that Alfie had been sent to prison for an assault on a misguided butcher's boy who had taunted him for his disfigured lip and the lad was now struggling to recover the mastery his own speech with a poorly fitted set of false teeth. I heard no mention of Alfie for several years after that and when I did it was from an entirely unexpected source. During a lull in the shooting of a particularly tedious opus, not one of Pearl White's, naturally, a group of lads were sitting around playing cards and planning a jaunt into New York City to watch the latest defense of his middleweight boxing title by current world champion Al McCoy. I had no interest in prizefighting and was paying little attention until I heard one of the lads mention the British challenger's name: Alfie Mitton. That got my attention. I asked him to repeat the name. Could it be the same Alfie Mitton? I asked what they knew of this Alfie Mitton. Very little, as it turned out. But one thing they had read in the papers. He had a disfigurement of the upper lip, which had led many of his opponents to underestimate him, to their cost. There seemed to be little doubt.

Angie was as astonished as I was when I relayed the news, and we both agreed that we must make some attempt to see Alfie. She had no stomach for such violent sport and I was hardly more enthusiastic, since I had seen Alfie in action with his fists. But we felt we must try to get a message to Alfie and arrange to meet him. The newspapers reported the name of the hotel that Alfie's entourage would be staying in, so we sent a letter addressed to Alfie asking if he could spare an hour or two to meet with us at Delmonico's the day after the fight. We had never been to Delmonico's but it was a name that everyone in New York knew, making it easy to find. A reply came a few days later, written in a crude, unpracticed hand. "Can't wait to see you! 8 o'clock. Alfie". The fight was on a Saturday night, and there was no filming on the Sunday, so Angelina and I had plenty of time to make the leisurely trip into New York and even do a bit of sightseeing ourselves. We still managed to be at the restaurant early and I left word with the maître d' that we were expecting someone who would ask for us by name. A small amount of money changed hands and we were assured that our visitor would be escorted to our table as soon as he arrived. We sat and drank coffee and watched the bustle of the place, the comings and goings of confident and affluent New Yorkers as they ate and talked loudly at the same time. It was about quarter past eight when a familiar face appeared at the entrance to the dining room, a couple of large quiet men in close attendance. Alfie spoke to the maître d', who pointed in our direction and Alfie's eyes followed the outstretched hand until his eyes fell on me. A shy smile slowly warmed his face and he strode forward so eagerly that the waiter who had been dispatched to escort him could barely stay ahead of him. It was clear that there were a number of people in the room who knew who he was and why he was in New York as they pointed him out to their dining companions and there was a slight hum of conversation that followed his progress. The waiter attempted to present him at our table with as much dignity as he could, but Alfie was having none of it. He brushed the poor man aside and grasped my hand firmly as I stood to greet him.

"Tommy! Bloody great to see yer, mate! And you too, miss, oh sorry, missus. I 'ad heard back in Farnworth that you weren't too far from New York but I never thought I would see thee. Bloody hell! Marvelous it is, bloody marvelous!"

His enthusiastic greeting left Angie and me both grinning like fools, with little idea what to say in reply. It was the longest and most animated speech I had ever heard from Alfie. Clearly this prizefighting business had loosened his tongue.

"Well, sit down", I managed, "and tell us what you've been up to".

He settled himself at the table and a cup of coffee immediately appeared at his elbow. He looked at it dubiously and said, "I could murder a good cuppa tea, but I don't reckon this lot knows how to make a good brew, right? Well, I suppose you know already that I'm middleweight champion of the British Isles and that I came over 'ere to fight for the World Championship. I gave it a good go but yon Yank were a bit too clever for me, if I'm honest. I hit him wi' some good 'uns, but never could quite land the big one on 'im and 'e got the better of me over 20 rounds. Never knocked me down, though. I'll get 'im next time if they give me another chance."

Losing the fight didn't seem to have disappointed him too much. We had already read the account of the fight in the morning paper and it was clear that ringside observers were unanimous in their praise for Alfie's strength and his toughness in refusing to be knocked down and that many felt that in time, with a little more experience, he would be crowned Champion.

"Well then, here's to next time", I chimed in on cue, as I raised my cup.

"So, tell us how you got into this prizefighting business in the first place".

He took a few moments to reflect on his answer to my question and his thoughts seemed to retreat behind his eyes and he was silent for a few long moments.

"I don't need to tell you two that I had a nose for trouble when I were a lad and that I learned to scrap early on. After you two left I seemed to be in trouble all the time, up before the magistrate every other week. Then I roughed up a butcher's lad a bit more than I should have, even though he deserved it, mouthy little bastard, sorry miss. Anyways, they put me away for twelve months after that, Strangeways prison in Manchester. What a bloody 'ole! Young lad like me got picked on something rotten by the older cons, bloody errand boy I was. But not for long. I laid out the first old lag who tried to get rough wi' me and a few more who thought they could teach me a lesson. There were an old con in for life who had done a bit of prizefighting before he picked one fight too many in the local boozer and pounded the man's head into the floor. Well, he reckoned I could make some money out of prizefighting once I got out seeing as how I was good with my fists. So the two of us would do some sparring, you know, practice like, in the yard, how to throw a punch, how to block one, and he would show me a trick or two for when the referee was on the blind side. So by the time I got out I was ready. He put me in touch with a chap in Manchester, shady sort, but he knew his way about in the prizefighting world and before you knew it I was knocking 'em down regular like and getting paid to do it. Mostly factory boys and farm lads to begin with, but before long they wouldn't fight me anymore and the gaffer started putting me in with the serious lads who were in it for the money. Didn't make no difference, they couldn't beat me neither. Next thing you know, I'm Northern Counties champion and they're talking me up for champion of England. I got beat the first time I went for the title, but I knew I could take him the second time. He got too cocky after the first fight and I could see he wasn't in shape, been enjoying the good life too much, and I knocked him out cold in three rounds. After that, a couple of easy paydays against contenders who never had a chance, then the Yanks came calling. They're the ones with the real money in the fight game, so here we are. I'll be back next year and next time I'll be champion".

He grinned wide and proud at the pair of us and we couldn't help but be proud of him. I thought back to the day I met him, sullen and humiliated, smeared with dog shit. How much he'd made of the little he had! He had used the only real talent he possessed, beating some other man senseless while staying on his feet, and seemed to be on the way to making himself a small fortune from it.

I had to ask him the question that Angelina and I both had on our minds.

"What about Modbury? Do you know anything about what happened to him?"

He didn't answer right away. He sat very still and stared into his cup for along time.

"Whoever did that did the world a favor, right? I don't have to tell you two what a bastard he was. But Ainsworth made sure he never got what he deserved. I'm not saying that I know much about it, mind you. But I've heard a thing or two. The way it was told to me, somebody with a practical sense of justice, somebody who knew how to move about without being seen when he needed to, somebody who had time to wait, set about following Modbury around, staying out of sight, learning his habits, his haunts, the moments when his guard was down. There was this tinker woman, half-gypsy, half something not quite human. Most folks were afraid of her and stayed well clear. But I think she and Modbury saw something in each other, some mean twistedness that made both of them cruel. Folks say she used to trap cats, tie 'em to a post and let 'er dogs loose on 'em, just for amusement. Not that she had much fondness for the dogs either, mind you. Treated 'em something rotten she did. Kept 'em hungry, kicked 'em for no good reason just so they'd always be mean, tear apart any living thing that wandered into her yard. I always reckoned your dog Chance were one of 'ers that got away before it went all the way mean, they all have that same look. So when Modbury went up there for his bit of pleasure, he wasn't watching his back. They'd both hit the bottle hard and both be senseless before the evening's pleasure was hardly done, reckoning the dogs would sound the alarm and see off any stranger fool enough to approach that midden. But hungry dogs will feast before they'll fight, so when this particular stranger approached with his pockets full of the butcher's finest, still dripping fresh blood, and tossed it in the yard, they were only interested in filling their bellies and growling at each other. And since this particular stranger had the foresight to rub the rags he wore with dog droppings before setting out, his smell was more dog than human. He carried two other things, a knife to cut the ropes that held the dogs and a live rabbit that set to running as soon as this stranger loosed it on the ground. The dogs were gone in no time. There was no lock on the door, as I heard it. None was needed. There was nothing inside to interest a thief and the rank stench that met anyone brave enough to enter would make most men gag. So this stranger, so I was told, cut the lengths of rope that had held the dogs and tied a noose in the end of one, then looped them over his shoulder, lifted the latch and stepped inside. It was dark inside, I imagine, but the sound of two drunkards snoring made it easy to find the filthy bed the two of them were sprawled on, her head to his feet, him laid the other way, dead to the world. The stranger stood over them until his eyes got used to the dark, then without a sound he moved forward and slid the noose over the man's neck, draped the other end of the rope over the iron rail at the end of the bed, sat on the floor and placed his feet firmly against the feet of the bed and began to pull firm and quick. I imagine there was a fair bit of choking and thrashing, but there was no escape and soon there was no more thrashing, probably no more noise except the sounds of the woman as she struggled to make sense of the turmoil in her bed. The stranger apparently took another length of rope and flung it over her shoulders and pulled it tight around her and around the bed post and lashed her to it, according to what she told the police. She set to wailing and spitting curses, but who would hear her? This stranger didn't care about her. He took hold of the rope that held the man's dead body and began to pull. She said she heard the body come off the bed with a thump and the skull cracked on the boards. He dragged the body backwards across the floor and through the open door, then turned and humped the rope over his shoulder and trudged across the yard to the muddy lane as far as the first tree that had a sturdy low-hanging limb and decided he had gone far enough. He tossed the free end of the rope over the limb and again began to pull until the body was upright. He took a knife from his pocket and began to slash at the dead man's clothing until the body hung with tattered rags, then scraped the shit from his own rags and smeared it on the corpse. When he was satisfied with his work he wiped the knife clean and slipped it back into his pocket. Then he set to pulling again and soon the body was swinging in the dim light. A quick loop flung around the trunk and the rope was secure. The stranger walked away into the night. Nobody ever knew who he was. And if they guessed, they kept silent. 'That bastard Modbury got what he deserved' was all they said"

We both sat silent as he finished his account. The cold calm with which he described Modbury's execution robbed us both of words. We had no doubt as to the identity of the stranger, and, though Alfie's violent nature was well known to us, we had never thought him to be so calculating and so patient. But it was impossible to feel any shred of sympathy or regret for Modbury's fate, and we knew Alfie had done it out of affection for the only two people he cared about, the only two people who had ever shown him kindness in those distant days back in Farnworth. After his account of Modbury's death, the conversation was muted, idle chatter about people we knew back home, news of friends and family that we had not gleaned from the infrequent letters that made their way across the Atlantic, and we gave him details of our life in moving pictures, which fascinated Alfie. The tales of the colorful characters that we found ourselves in the midst of each day did much to dispel the somber mood that had lingered for a while at our table. Alfie was astonished and delighted that we actually knew and worked with Pearl White, who was well known even to the folk back in Lancashire. We did not dare tell him the truth about the impostor sitting across the table from him. Gasnier had made it clear from the beginning that not a word of our deception must ever leak out or we would all be disgraced, and we would most likely never work in pictures again. Alfie would have begged for an opportunity to meet Pearl in person, but his ship sailed early the next morning and there would not be time. The best I could do was to promise to send Alfie a photograph of Pearl with a personal message addressed just to him. This thrilled him no end. He could already see himself showing it off at the local pub. We talked on for a little while longer, then we all seemed to feel the need to put a brisk end to the evening before it ran out of steam, and we stood and made our awkward goodbyes, the three of us still Lancashire folk, not given to the kind of public embrace and extravagant farewells that we could see and hear all around us. A quick handshake and a shy smile and he was gone. Angelina and I left shortly after. When we tried to pay our bill we learned that it was already paid by one of the large silent men who had accompanied Alfie, though we had not seen them again after he walked in. As we walked to the station to catch our train across the river to Hoboken, we both carried in our heads the image of Modbury's lifeless and stinking body swinging from that tree, but we struggled to find words. Finally, Angie said "I wonder what happened to his dog".

# Chapter 16

If it was The Perils of Pauline that made Pearl White a star, it was The Exploits of Elaine that confirmed her place as America's darling. Even Europe was in love with her. Long before Pauline's triumphant final episode faded to dark on hundreds of picture screens around the world, with her tormentor vanquished for good, Gasnier and his team of script writers were scratching out new stories of heroism that saw Pearl triumph once again in the face of repeated danger. The Frenchman was not about to miss out on the opportunity to cash in on Pearl's fame, and plans for a new serial were put in motion, using the tried and true formula, and filming was soon under way. The Exploits of Elaine told the story of a young woman, played by "Pearl", of course, who, with the help of a detective, tries to find the man who murdered her father, wealthy businessman Taylor Dodge. In The Perils of Pauline, the identity of Pauline's tormentor is known from the start. In The Exploits of Elaine, the villain's identity is a mystery, he is known only as "The Clutching Hand". He turns out to be Perry Bennett, Taylor Dodge's lawyer, eager to get his hands on Dodge's fortune. Throughout the various attempts on Elaine's life, he wears a cap, and a scarf pulled down over half his face, and his hand is always shaped in a claw, so that no-one recognizes him as Bennett. Gasnier, with his genius for promotion, convinced Arthur Reeve, who had written the novel on which Elaine was loosely based, to rewrite the book in serial form, and it was published in installments in the Hearst newspapers each week, accompanied by Angie's drawings, at the same time as the film was showing on screens all over America, and readers flocked to the theaters to see these stories brought to life.

Pearl was on hand to step in front of the camera for close-ups, and was always made available for interviews with the clamoring press, but more and more of the on-screen work fell to Angelina, whose confidence grew with each exploit. She was, I had to admit, a competent actress, and the camera continued to love her. She was a little giddy with her success but never took the whole business very seriously, thinking that once filming of the 14 episodes of The Exploits of Elaine was finished, she would once more step back into obscurity. But Gasnier could not get too much of a good thing and after Elaine proved to be an even more popular heroine than Pauline, two more serials featuring the indomitable young heiress soon followed. It was clear to those of us who played a part in both Pauline's and Elaine's imaginary adventures that with each new set of adventures the storytelling, the acting and the camera work improved. These were intoxicating days when we were only slowly realizing the potential of this new form of entertainment. There were no film critics in those days. The notion that movie-making might someday lay claim to be an art form would have seemed preposterous. We were merely making entertainment for the masses. But even then we could tell that the more we made the better we made them.

Over the course of the 14 episodes of The Exploits of Elaine, our heroine would survive near-death by drowning, by a poisoned wristwatch, by wallpaper impregnated with arsenic, by having her body completely drained of blood and by being embalmed by a Chinese gang. In one memorable episode Elaine actually died and was resuscitated by a makeshift contraption that restarted her heart. Preposterous stuff, really, but Pearl's fans lapped it up. These near-death escapes earned Pearl yet another nickname: "The Girl with Ninety-Nine Lives". Elaine's principal ally and love interest in the search for the whereabouts of The Clutching Hand was Dr. Craig Kennedy. Kennedy was already well known to the readers of Cosmopolitan magazine, which had serialized Arthur Reeves short stories two years before. Kennedy was a scientist as well as a sleuth, well-versed in both chemistry and psychoanalysis, and used both to solve his cases, creating exotic devices along the way to foil the villain, devices that became ever more outlandish in the hands of Gasnier's writers. Even before filming began on "Elaine", Kennedy had already been dubbed "The American Sherlock Holmes", so it was another stroke of genius on Gasnier's part to pair up America's favorite heroine with its favorite scientific sleuth. Arthur Reeve showed up on the set a time or two to watch the filming, but I always got the feeling that he was less than impressed with the lowbrow treatment his scientist detective received in front of our cameras. Reeve was a Princeton man, who fancied himself an intellectual, and after graduating from New York Law School he must have relished the prospects of a successful career in law or politics, but doors never opened for him, so he found himself work as a journalist and editor. When that didn't match his ambitions, he turned to detective fiction and churned out a series of short stories and novels which enjoyed considerable success and brought him to the attention of film producers and he was introduced to Louis Gasnier. He adopted a rather superior tone in his dealings with the rabble that inhabited the back lot at Pathe, especially when Pitch Revada and Joe Cuny took to calling him "Art' knowing full well that it would annoy him. Pearl, mischievous as ever, took to making fun of him behind his back, strutting around with her nose high in the air and her hands clasped behind her back in the mock pose of a college professor. He soon lost interest in our efforts to debase his creation and we rarely saw him again.

The Clutching Hand was the first masked villain to be introduced in the movies, and that device has seen many imitators since then, but I doubt that any has had the impact on film-goers that this masked murderer did. Sheldon Lewis played the "Hand". He was a veteran stage actor as well as having played the handsome lead in several early silents, and he was entirely unprepared for public reaction to the character. Although the villain was supposed to be masked, only a portion of his face was obscured on the screen, so that the actor behind the mask was often recognized in public, followed by booing and hissing, and on one occasion he was chased by a gang of children who took him for the real thing, and police were called to intervene. To his credit Sheldon, who I always found to be a charming fellow, and helpful to me in learning the film actor's trade, eventually took all this notoriety in his stride. In time he was able to leave the masked murderer's persona behind him and resume his career as a player of more respectable roles.

With the success of "The Exploits of Elaine" still fresh in his mind, Gasnier knew that there still more appetite out there for adventures featuring the fans' favorite, Pearl White. The opportunity to cash in was irresistible, and Pearl, anesthetized by bourbon and pills, was not immune from the temptations of another big payday. She had never forgotten her dirt-poor beginnings and was determined to insulate herself from any risk of a slide back into poverty. And she enjoyed the fame. Who could blame her. Over a million people had watched her in "Exploits" and her public were clamoring for more. Of course, over a million people had watched Angelina too, and me, for that matter, but we knew we would never share in Pearl's fame. To be honest, we didn't give it much thought. We had a job to do, we did it, we were adequately paid. There was really nothing to be disappointed about. I might have had occasional longings to do a bit of Shakespeare, but that never paid the bills back home. It wasn't likely to here.

So filming began on "The New Exploits of Elaine". In the final episode of the first exploits, The Clutching Hand is unmasked and meets his demise, betrayed by Long Sin, a Chinese gangster who forms an alliance with the Hand, only to double-cross him to save his own life. In the first installment of the new serial, Long Sin attempts to revenge himself on Elaine and Craig Kennedy for his loss of face, but he is foiled, of course. Shortly afterwards Elaine comes across a ring which contains the key to locating the treasures illegally acquired by The Clutching Hand. Elaine is oblivious to this, but the ring's significance is well known to Tong leader Wu Fang, and the entire series chronicles his efforts to retrieve it. Elaine is kidnapped by the Chinese villain and a ransom note is delivered to Craig Kennedy demanding the return of the ring. Kennedy, with his scientific talents, makes a copy of the ring which he hands over to Wu Fang. Wu Fang is not fooled. But rather than kill Elaine, he releases her with a threat almost worse than her own death. Wu Fang will plot the deaths of each of her friends in turn, beginning with Craig Kennedy. When she has been forced to witness the cruel deaths of all of her friends, he will finally come for her.

Wu Fang's first attempt to do away with Kennedy is to plant a tick infected with poisonous bacteria in Kennedy's telephone. The toxic tick fails to do its work. Next, Wu Fang bribes a skilled pilot into attempting to drop a bomb stolen from the government onto Kennedy's home, but once again the plot is foiled before it can be carried out. Undeterred, the Chinese mastermind plants a chair in Elaine's bedroom which is designed to imprison its occupant then burst into flames, but that plot also fails. The increasingly frustrated Wu Fang next sends Elaine a dozen roses, six white and six red. Elaine must place one or other color in her window thus signaling who is to die first: Kennedy or Elaine's Aunt Josephine. Kennedy places a red rose in the window, without telling Elaine, the signal that he is to be killed. But Kennedy is waiting for the assassins when they arrive and they are no match for the clever and robust Kennedy. Regretting his earlier decision to release Elaine when he had her in his power, Wu Fang again kidnaps Elaine and imprisons her on a boat bound for Shanghai where she is to be sold into slavery, but, of course, he is foiled again. And so it goes on through ten episodes, until the brave and resourceful Kennedy is killed in a watery showdown with Wu Fang who also loses his life. It was no coincidence that this dramatic conclusion echoes the supposed demise of Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty at the Reichenbach Falls in Switzerland.

I was frequently cast as a Chinese henchman in support of Wang Fu's evil schemes. Wang Fu himself was played by Ed Arden, who is no more Chinese than I am, but every part in those days was played by white people. To be honest, we didn't know any Chinese actors, but even if we had, it was inconceivable that we would have given him a part. That may seem hard to accept decades later as I write this, but no-one questioned it back then. That's just the way it was. The make-up was hardly sophisticated, with taped eyelids and fake Fu Manchu moustaches, and Angelina laughed heartily at my attempts to look like villainous Oriental, but our audiences did not demand authenticity. The crude suggestion of the Far East in our appearance was enough to satisfy the need in Pearl's fans for only the merest of illusions. One of the lesser villains in "The Romance of Elaine" was Warner Oland, a Swedish immigrant and Shakespearean actor who was later to achieve much greater fame as both the evil mastermind Fu Manchu and then the celebrated Chinese detective Charlie Chan. Warner never needed much make-up to look like Oriental. He was naturally dark and gloomy looking, and he claimed that he was descended from nomadic Mongolians who had ventured west as far as the Swedish village where he was born and took a fancy to the local fair-haired lasses. All Warner needed to prepare for his role in "Elaine" was to glue on a goatee. He later added a mustache for his role as Charlie Chan and the illusion of the inscrutable investigator was complete. Warner was a decent sort, not without a sense of humor despite his lugubrious looks. He enjoyed his booze, so he fit right in with Pearl and her drinking buddies Joe Cuny and Pitch Revada. He would bring his lunch to the set with him in a tin lunch box. Inside were two thermos bottles, one that he called "Mother's lunch" and the other "Father's lunch". In "Mother's lunch" was the split pea soup that he loved so much because it reminded him of his childhood, though Pearl eventually banned it from the set because of the inevitable aromatic aftereffects. "Father's lunch" was a bottle of martinis. He always insisted that a couple of drinks made him a better actor, though I suspect that it had more to do with his disappointment at the roles he was given. He had been a serious actor, and as a young man had been considered good enough to be invited to tour with the flamboyant and celebrated Russian actress Alla Nazimova. His travels with Nazimova proved quite rewarding and Warner found himself in possession of a very healthy bank account and in collaboration with his American wife, who taught herself Swedish, he translated into English the works of the Swedish playwright Strindberg. But his drinking and some unwise career choices soon saw most of his money disappear down the drain. Long after he left us, Fu Manchu and Charlie Chan restored him to a life of financial independence, but booze got the better of him in the end and his wife eventually left him. I always felt that he drank to forget the future he once imagined for himself as a serious actor.

# Chapter 17

Oddly enough, the final series of Elaine's adventures was titled "The Romance of Elaine" which was a bit of a puzzle for Pearl's fans, given the fact that Elaine's love interest, detective Craig Kennedy was killed in the final episode of the previous series. The speculation was that a new romance for Elaine was in the offing. But who could replace the handsome, ingenious and erudite Craig Kennedy?

"The Romance of Elaine" opens with Elaine and Kennedy's reporter friend Walter Jameson, mourning Kennedy's death by drowning. At the same time a submarine surfaces in the harbor, a solitary figure emerges and is rowed to shore. This enigmatic figure is Marcius Del Mar, renowned foreign agent and saboteur, played by a young Lionel Barrymore, no less. Del Mar is after the plans for the new torpedo that Kennedy was working on before his sudden death, and he is convinced that Elaine must know where the plans are hidden. He poses as a detective and ingratiates himself with Elaine and Jameson, but Jameson has received a mysterious note warning him to be wary of Del Mar. The writer of the note is a strange old codger, athletic despite his age, who has sworn to fight Del Mar to the bitter end. The old man is Kennedy, of course, still alive. He barely survived his struggles with Wu Fang, but was able to swim to shore, exhausted, and crawl away to a nearby cave to recover his strength.

Soon after, Elaine, unaware of Kennedy's escape, attempts to put her grief behind her by throwing a costume party. As the party gets under way, Elaine receives a note telling her that Kennedy is still alive, and is on Del Mar's trail. The spy, meanwhile, has disguised himself as a guest at the party and searches the house for the model of the torpedo that Kennedy completed just before his "death". He finds it, stashes it in an old trunk and makes off with it, but not before planting one of his female cohorts as a maid in Elaine's household to spy on her. Soon after, the trunk is returned to Elaine by the mysterious old man. The model of the torpedo is still intact inside the trunk. Del Mar has been foiled again. But he is persistent. Soon the members of his gang show up at Elaine's home and attempt to retrieve the trunk by force, but they are confronted by the old man who foils their attempt by destroying the model and they are forced to retreat in confusion. Del Mar is now ordered by his spymasters to focus his efforts elsewhere and begins making plans to sabotage strategic bridges and harbors around the country. By this time Jameson has become aware of Del Mar's activities and attempts to pass his information to government agencies, but Del Mar's men intercept him and destroy the evidence.

Next, the old man, who has by now identified himself as a "Professor Arnold", tips off Elaine that Del Mar is planning a major act of sabotage: cutting the Great Atlantic Cable. Elaine, now in possession of the whereabouts of Del Mar's secret submarine hideaway, disguises herself as a man and infiltrates the base. She discovers that Del Mar and his gang of saboteurs are secretly stockpiling supplies and ammunition at a nearby country club, but when she returns home and attempts to warn the authorities, Del Mar uses the bogus maid to plant a bomb in the house. Elaine discovers the bomb just in time and sets out to show it to Professor Arnold, but is waylaid by Del Mar's henchmen. Little do they know that Professor Arnold has anticipated such an attack and armed Elaine with a high-powered rifle equipped with a newly-invented sight that concentrates a beam of light to focus on the target and Elaine, now a sure-shot, fends off the attackers.

Del Mar's next act of treachery is to set a trap for Elaine in a dressmaker's shop. Elaine, Del Mar and the ever-lurking Professor Arnold commence an epic struggle for a set of defense plans that the saboteur is desperate to get his hands on, and, once again, Elaine and the Professor prevail. Shortly afterwards, the Professor captures one of Del Mar's men and finds a letter from Del Mar's spymasters instructing him to step up his campaign of sabotage. But first Del Mar decides to make one more attempt to dispose of Elaine to prevent her from revealing the location of his submarine base. He kidnaps her once again, but Professor Arnold is on the trail. He locates the secret base, then calls in the Navy. Warships pulverize Del Mar's hideaway and the saboteur finally meets his end. And Professor Arnold's true identity is finally made known to all. He is, of course, Craig Kennedy.

Decades later, these plots now seem to me as ludicrous as they do to modern film-goers, but back then times were more innocent and our audiences less sophisticated. They loved it, they lapped it up and they adored Pearl White. She was by now the best known actress in the world, reportedly earning $5000 a week by the time the third Elaine serial ended, and over a million people had paid good money to see their beloved heroine Pearl White cheat almost certain death in a dozen ingenious ways. And they were begging for more. Louis Gasnier and George Seitz both knew this all too well. After a brief pause to make the film "Hazel Kirke", a melodrama guaranteed to draw a tear or two, work on a new serial began in earnest. It was the serial format that fans clamored for. They craved the anticipation of wondering what awful fate would befall Pearl White in the next episode. And soon enough Gasnier and Seitz came up with "The Iron Claw". Pearl plays Margery Golden, who had been kidnapped as a small child by Legar, nicknamed the "Iron Claw" after his hand had to be amputated following a fight with Margery's father. The hand was replaced with an iron hook. Legar was played by Sheldon Lewis who had been such a success as that other arch-villain "The Clutching Hand". So good had been Sheldon's portrayal in that first role that a fan of Pearl's with an overactive imagination had summoned the police when she saw him on the street. In this story Margery has been raised among thieves and knows no other life than crime. She is about to embark on her own criminal career when she is rescued by a mysterious stranger known only as "The Laughing Mask". But The Iron Claw refuses to loosen his grip on Margery and the two men battle each other over twenty chapters until Legar is finally vanquished for good, and the "Mask" reveals himself as Margery's hitherto rather placid boyfriend Davey, yet another milquetoast role for Creighton Hale, who was a great favorite of Gasnier's. The camera loved his patrician good looks, and he never failed to find himself a role in one of Pearl's serials, usually as the hero's sidekick, but this time as the hero. And so it went on, serial after serial, the "Iron Claw" was followed in quick succession by "Pearl of The Army", "The Fatal Ring", "The House of Hate" and finally in 1919, "The Lightning Raider". So many episodes, so many twists and turns, so many deaths defied and improbable rescues that I can barely remember them. They are mostly a jumble in my memory now. After a while we started to lose interest and so did the public. Pearl's popularity had begun to fade along with our enthusiasm. Even Angelina, who had thrown herself into this madcap world with gusto, was beginning to tire of its hectic pace and constant physical demands. Pearl herself appeared less and less in front of the camera for these chapter plays. She continued to make films but her career as the "Queen of The Serials" was almost over. Her personal life was in disarray. She was drinking more than ever, and her once athletic body, which had carried her through so many physical challenges that none of her rivals would even attempt, was beginning to thicken. Her marriage to McCutcheon had long since foundered as he continued to squander her fortune and play the field behind her back. Pearl finally gave him the boot in a sullen but uncontested divorce. Despite her declining interest, Pearl was persuaded by George Seitz to undertake one more serial before the format played itself out. Louis Gasnier had by now shifted his operations to the up-and-coming movie colony in Hollywood, California, where the weather and the light were so much more favorable to film-making, and back on the East Coast, George Seitz had been handed full creative control of Pearl's latest project. "Plunder" ran to 15 episodes and buried pirate treasure is at the heart of its story line. The villain, Jud Deering, discovers a map to the hidden booty, but the location is now covered by a newly-erected New York skyscraper, so he sets about acquiring ownership to the building by any means at his disposal, legal and otherwise. Pearl Travers, a stockholder in the company that owns the building, gets wind of his scheming and sets about foiling his plot, which, as always, after facing many dangers she does. But the making of "Plunder" was marred by tragedy. The location was 72nd Street and 3rd Avenue, and the stunt called for "Pearl" to leap from a moving bus onto an elevated railway. Pearl herself had long since given up such stunt work, and this one was considered too dangerous for Angelina to attempt. Most of those days of setting up scenery and acting the heavy are just a dim haze in my memory now, but that day is as clear in my mind as if just happened. August 10th 1922, the day that changed film making for all of us. Johnny Stevenson, Seitz's part-time chauffeur, was desperate to get into the picture business. He had been begging Seitz to give him a part and George finally gave him a chance to be an extra for the bus leap scene. It was early in the morning and Angelina and I were huddled on the double-decker bus along with all the other extras waiting for the day's shooting to begin. The wind cut through the summer clothes most of us were wearing and we were reluctant to leave the shelter of the bus unless we had to. But once George Seitz had the cameras and props placed to his satisfaction we were all summoned to his spot on the sidewalk to get our instructions.

"Pearl, are you okay with doing a couple of close-ups on the top deck?"

"Sure, George, anything to relieve the boredom. Where's the stunt guy you hired for the bus jump?"

"He hasn't shown up, but Johnny Stevenson says he's willing to do it. I told him it's no job for an amateur, it's risky, but he really wants to do it. If we take it nice and slow, everything should be fine". Just then Johnny Stevenson walked up to where we were all standing, complete with a blonde wig and slightly larger version of the coat that Pearl was wearing. "I'm all ready to go, Mister Seitz. How do I look dressed up as you, Miss White?"

"You look prettier than me Johnny. But are you sure you want to do this. It's a bit tricky".

"I know I can do it, Miss White. I've been watching the professionals do it for a while now. And I can sure use the money. I've even got my wife and kid riding the bus as extras".

"Okay, Johnny. Just remember it's an eighteen-foot drop to the pavement".

"Don't worry, mister Seitz, I did a lot of tumbling and wrestling in high school. I know how to take a fall".

Seitz and Johnny walked over to the man who was driving the bus. "Just keep the bus at five miles an hour, so if Johnny does fall, he'll fall back in the bus. We can speed up the film when we edit it to make it look good".

"Sure thing, mister Seitz". George walked Johnny back to the bus.

"So Johnny, you jump on the bus and run to the front with the bad guys in pursuit. Then you dash upstairs. Make sure your wig doesn't blow off in this wind. When the bus starts to pass under the bridge you jump up and grab the girder, then climb up out of camera range. Then we'll set up another shot of you from the tracks".

Seitz stepped down from the bus and took his position behind the camera. After viewing the scene, he stepped back and lifted the megaphone to his mouth.

"Lights! Camera! Action!". The bus crawled forward just as Seitz had instructed, barely faster than walking pace. George's raised hand was the signal for Johnny to leap aboard the bus, with the villains in pursuit. Johnny sprinted to the front, paused to look back then dashed up the stairs. He stepped up to the front rail as the bridge approached, then began to climb onto the rail. Just as he was about to lunge for the girder, a gust of wind started to lift the blond wig off his head and he made a grab for it. But as he did, his foot slid sideways on the polished rail and he fell. He made a grab for the rail as he toppled but it was too late. His hip slammed into the rail and his momentum carried him over the edge. A scream broke the silence. His wife dashed forward to the rail where we had last seen him. Frantic waving from the camera crew brought the bus to a halt. We sat on the upper deck in stunned silence. Then we heard the voice of George Seitz.

"Call an ambulance!" We finally found our wits again and dashed to the side of the bus. Down below us the camera crew were huddled over the spot where Johnny lay motionless on the sidewalk. There was an awful moment of silence. Then a voice. "My God, he's dead!"

There was no more shooting that day. Or the next. Pearl retreated to her Bayview mansion and was not seen for days. Reports were that she was drinking heavily. The rest of us had no mansion to retreat to. We worked and lived together. Everywhere we went we saw only downcast faces and haunted eyes. Angelina and I could not rid ourselves of that awful image of Johnny Stevenson's body sprawled on the pavement with his wife and daughter weeping softly beside him.

In time we did finish filming that episode, and the other fourteen chapters. But no-one on the sets had much enthusiasm for "Plunder" after Johnny's death.

Pearl took it especially hard. She knew that an amateur stuntman should never have been allowed to try that stunt. Since Pearl's money had financed much of the filming, and she had made many of the decisions involved in making the serial, she felt the responsibility for that decision too. We never saw her on the set again. Whenever a close-up was called for, the filming would be done in secret with only George Seitz and a cameraman present. She could not face the rest of the crew. A check for $5000 paid into the fund we had set up for Johnny's widow and child did little to ease her conscience.

# Chapter 18

By the next spring Pearl had had enough of her voluntary confinement. Movie-making had no appeal for her. She needed a vacation. She still had the fondest memories of the time she had spent in "Gay Paree". By now Angelina had become more than just a stunt double for Pearl. She was Pearl's confidante, and Angelina shared with me as much as she felt I ought to know. Pearl did not want to travel alone, as she had done the first time. She insisted that she had no intention of re-living the hedonism of her first visit. Angelina was invited to be Pearl's traveling companion, and, since Angelina would not consider traveling without me, I was invited to tag along, all at Pearl's expense. Rumors had it that Pearl was worth a couple of million by this time. She had invested her considerable earnings wisely, in property and racehorses, and could afford to spend the rest of her life in idle comfort. But idle comfort was not Pearl's style even though her injury and her drinking had slowed her down. And she was always generous. But the trip to Paris was to be more than just a vacation. Pearl's old friends in Montmartre had for several years teased her with invitations to perform in France, where Pearl's star was still in the ascendant. European fans were as yet insulated by distance from reports of Pearl's declining popularity and her poor health. We set sail for Cherbourg in early June on the Aquitania, Cunard's newest and most luxurious trans-Atlantic liner. The voyage lasted just seven days and Angelina and I traveled in much greater comfort than we had in crossing the Atlantic 10 years earlier, thanks to Pearl's generosity. The crossing was uneventful and the seas were calm, though even the slightest shudder of the great ship would remind us both of the events of that awful night on the Titanic and cause our hearts to stop for just a second. At Cherbourg we boarded a train for Paris and took up residence in Pearl's comfortable town house in Passy. Rumor had it that it was the same house that Benjamin Franklin lodged in during his time in Paris. Angelina and I had been largely ignorant of American history when we first crossed the Atlantic, and, to be honest, there had been little need to remedy that during our time in Bound Brook, but inevitably over time we had acquired a passing awareness of the Founding Fathers and the American Revolution. Every July 4th, we were treated to some good-natured teasing about the war that our side had lost. So Benjamin Franklin's name was familiar to us by the time we arrived in Paris. There was an antique printing press collecting dust in a shed behind the house in Passy, but no-one seemed to know for sure who its owner might have been.

Angelina and I spent our first few days in Paris doing what all new arrivals in Paris do, visiting the Eiffel Tower and strolling the Champs Elysees. One evening we found ourselves on the streets of Pigalle, but it soon became clear to Angelina that this was a rather sordid district, not a place for respectable people. When we happened to find ourselves in front of the infamous Moulin Rouge, and I tried to take a peek inside she quickly dragged me away.

Pearl had agreed to perform in a revue at the Casino de Paris, featuring skits reminiscent of her exploits as Pauline and Elaine, directed by the celebrated impresario of the Moulin Rouge, Jacque-Charles. Rehearsals were to begin on July 1st and Jacque-Charles had a reputation as a bit of a martinet when it came to punctuality. But Pearl, despite her promises to steer clear of the pleasures of Paris nightlife, couldn't resist the allure of visiting her old haunts in the company of old friends. July 1st came and went at the Casino de Paris with no sign of Pearl, only an apologetic note pleading an attack of the "grippe", delivered to a fuming Jacque-Charles. Two days later Pearl finally made her appearance at the Casino and took possession of her dressing room. Angelina and I waited in the wings. Jacque-Charles fidgeted on stage, fussing with the set. Finally, he was ready to conduct rehearsals. He turned to his assistant.

"Please escort Mademoiselle White to the stage. We are ready to rehearse".

Pearl was summoned and made a less than grand entrance, looking pale and tired. Jacque-Charles launched himself across the stage and planted a Gallic kiss on Pearl's hand.

"Ah, Mademoiselle White, you are as lovely as you appear on the screen". Pearl knew French flannel when she heard it.

"After that all-night bash at the Moulin Rouge, you're lucky I'm here at all. But there's something about Paris that lets you kick up your heels all night and still punch the time clock in the morning. What's my first skit?"

"It's not a skit, exactly. It's more in the style of one of your marvelous serials."

Pearl gave him a cautionary look, then glanced over at us in the wings, rolling her eyes, unseen by Jacque-Charles, who continued with undiminished enthusiasm.

"The curtains will open to reveal an opium den. A Chinese ballet troupe will perform a wild, drug-crazed dance, while a masked Negro beats a giant gong and the orchestra plays hideous music on flutes and strings".

Pearl eyed the moving platform set up on one side of the stage.

"Then I suppose I come floating in on that thing, reclining on a sofa, like the Queen of Sheba, puffing on an opium pipe?"

"Mais non, Mademoiselle White. You will launch yourself on a rope from the balcony! Just like one of your serials! Then, when you land on the stage, you will dance a wild orgy with the dancers and at the end you will drop through a trapdoor and disappear in a cloud of smoke. Marvelous,no? All of Paris will be at your feet!"

The assembled cast and crew burst into applause at the thought of the spectacle they were about to bring to life under the direction of Jacque-Charles. Pearl stared at him in disbelief.

"And I will be in the hospital with a broken neck!"

Jacque-Charles looked at Pearl with astonishment. "I do not understand".

Pearl took his hand and walked him over to one of the ornate Chinese chairs on the set and invited him to sit down.

"You may have seen me do all kinds of athletic stunts on the screen, but I don't really do all of those things. If it's something really dangerous like swinging on a rope or jumping off a bridge, a stunt man does it".

Jacque-Charles stared at Pearl in open-mouthed astonishment. He tried to speak, but could only sputter in French for a moment or two. Finally, he rediscovered English.

"But I read your book, the story of your life. You were a trapeze artist and a bareback rider in a circus. I saw all these dangerous acts on the screen. I saw your face in close-up. It had to be you!" Pearl slowly shook her head at him and shrugged.

"Listen, JC. Surely you realize that a film star has to tell a few lies to give her audience what they want. Sure, I was raised on a farm and I know how to ride and climb a ladder or two, but I'm not crazy. I'm not about to risk my neck for the sake of a film shot. And most of the guff that's in my autobiography was made up by the studio press people and Louis Gasnier. I just put my name to it. I don't jump off cliffs and I sure as hell don't swing off balconies hanging on to a rope".

Jacque-Charles sank back in the chair, utterly deflated. From then on he would be known to us as "JC" whenever we spoke of him, and sometimes in our more irreverent moments we called him "Jesus Christ". "But you signed a contract! Do you have any idea how much money I have invested in this revue? Over a million francs! And now I will be the laughing stock of Paris. I offer them the biggest star in the world and what do they get? Somebody's grandmother! You might as well walk around with a cane! Two canes!"

Pearl gave him her best sympathetic face. "I'm sorry, JC, but swinging on a rope from a balcony is not in my contract. I may be a dumb farm girl from Missouri, but by now I do have enough sense to read a contract, even the fine print and I can tell you, it ain't there. I'm not risking a broken tailbone for anybody". And with that she walked off the stage and beckoned us to follow.

Eventually Jacque-Charles found a way to salvage his show with Pearl still as its centerpiece. Pearl was once again summoned to the Casino and he laid out the new plan. She would make her entrance in an airplane strung by wire from the ceiling, gently lowered to a soft landing. She would step out of the cockpit, shed her aviator's costume, milk the inevitable applause, then sing a song or two. But Pearl balked at singing. She had been a cabaret singer in South America in the early days of her career, but a throat infection had scarred her vocal chords and put paid to her singing. She could carry a tune, but only in a croak. Singing was out. The increasingly frustrated Jacque-Charles pleaded with Pearl for some form of entertainment to satisfy the eager crowds who would show up in numbers to see the world-famous Pearl White. "You cannot just stand there on stage and bow!"

"If they know I'm Pearl White, they'll applaud. What else can we do?" Jacque-Charles had no answer.

When the plane was ready, the cast were once more summoned to the casino. The model aircraft sat gleaming on the stage suspended by wires, waiting for Pearl to climb aboard. Pearl put on her costume then stepped up on stage. Just as she was about to step into the cockpit, a heavy champagne bottle crashed at her feet. Pearl jumped back and landed on her backside. The cast and crew stood and stared open-mouthed. Nobody moved for a long moment. Then Jacque-Charles, and Leon Volterra, the theater manager, sprinted for the stairs to the rafters hoping to apprehend whoever tossed the bottle. But they soon returned looking glum. They had found no-one.

"Mademoiselle White, perhaps we should postpone our rehearsal until tomorrow".

"No need to on my account. I've had worse scares. I don't know what the hell happened there, but there's no harm done. Let's get on with it."

So the rehearsal proceeded, but there was little conversation and less enthusiasm.

Pearl, after a discreet nip from the hip flask that was always close by, was hoisted aloft in the model plane, then lowered as gracefully as the mechanics of the device would allow, smiling regally as the whiskey calmed her nerves. She stepped out of the plane, bowed, blew kisses at an imaginary cheering audience, then left the stage and retreated to her dressing room. The three of us sat quietly, relieved to put the real drama behind us. Pearl picked up an envelope that was lying on her dressing table. She opened it and read the note inside. "Son of a bitch! Listen to this! 'Mademoiselle White, if you value your life, leave Paris tonight. You are not welcome here. The Tongs never forget'. What the hell is that all about?"

Angelina and I didn't have a clue. We had no idea who or what The Tongs might be and neither did Pearl. There was a knock at the door and I opened it warily only to find Leon Volterra waiting to enter. As he stepped into the room he grasped Pearl firmly by the shoulders and planted a kiss on both cheeks. Angelina and I found this kind of familiarity very strange but Pearl, who was more familiar with French customs seemed quite comfortable with it. "I wish to congratulate you, Mademoiselle White. Your descent in the plane was quite marvelous. The audience on opening night will go crazy, since they will have no idea that you are about appear from the heavens. It will be spectacular!"

A distracted Pearl muttered her thanks, then handed him the note. "What do you make of this?" Volterra read the note and his face reddened. "Mon Dieu! The Tong! Do you have any idea who they are?" We all shook our heads in unison. "They are Chinese criminals, the most vicious, the most feared gang in the world".

"What the hell do they have against me?"

"Did you ever insult the Chinese people in any way?"

"Well, most of the villains in my serials were Chinese, but the last one was played by Warner Oland, and he's Swedish! But he does a great slant-eyed villain". Volterra didn't seem much impressed by Pearl's attempt to make light of the situation. "I will call the police. You must not worry. We will have guards at every door". As he closed the door behind him, Pearl grinned at us. "I'm starting to enjoy this revue. It's getting to be just like one of my serials".

Rehearsals continued without any more of these sinister incidents and opening night was finally upon us. Jacque-Charles summoned the entire cast and crew backstage. "I want absolute silence when the curtain rises. No-one moves, no-one says a word until the plane lands safely on the stage. It will appear empty and the audience will have no idea what is supposed to be happening. The tension will build for several seconds and then Mademoiselle White will reveal herself and step out of the plane. The audience will go crazy, they will shout and cheer. Then we begin the dance of the devils. Understood?" The cast were all well aware of the plot by now, so they nodded, nothing more. The stage manager stepped forward.

"Mademoiselle White is in the plane, Monsieur".

"Places everyone". The dancers moved to their marks and Pearl climbed aboard the plane and huddled down out of sight. Jacque-Charles stepped to the middle of the stage as the orchestra increased the volume and the house lights began to dim. He began to walk around the plane, tugging at the wires as the crew readied themselves to hoist the plane with Pearl in it. Then he muttered a curse that only Pearl heard. He waved frantically for the stage hands to back away from their wires. "Someone has tried to cut these wires! Hold the curtain. Quick, bring me new wire". New wires appeared from backstage and the crew began frantically threading them through the pulleys and attaching them to the plane, cutting away the old ones. It was all completed in an astonishing five minutes and the plane, with a nervous-looking Pearl inside, was finally hoisted out of sight. The curtain rose to an expectant hum from the auditorium. After a few tense seconds the plane re-appeared and slowly descended. It landed softly on the stage, and once more the seconds ticked away without any action. Then slowly an arm was raised from the open cockpit followed by a second. The two arms grasped the edge of the cockpit and slowly the familiar blond wig and the unmistakable face rose into full view. The audience gasped and you could hear Pearl's name in every corner of that auditorium. The place erupted. Some stood and cheered, the rest applauded loudly as Pearl stepped out of the plane. She bowed and let the applause wash over her. She had come to love Paris and Paris was certainly in love with her.

The wild dance was over, the songs had been sung, Pearl had clowned her way through a few simple skits and the standing ovation had long since faded. The audience had left the theater thrilled at having seen their favorite heroine live in the flesh. They could not have been happier. Backstage a party was in full swing, cast and crew now joined by a handful of celebrities who wanted to wish Pearl well. Maurice Chevalier stepped forward to take Pearl's hand and raise it to his mouth. "A fantastic entrance, Mademoiselle, and a thrilling introduction to the Paris stage. I cannot wait to see what you come up with next". The incomparable Mistinguett, the current toast of Paris, added her good wishes.

"Mademoiselle White, it was just like one of your serials. I adore them. I hope the next chapter is just as good". And Jack Dempsey, taking a hiatus from the ring and enjoying the pleasures of travel and the lifestyle of a celebrity, even appearing in the movies himself, insisted on attending Pearl's backstage bash. And who in their right mind would deny him entry? "Pearl, you were a knock- out". Pearl's dressing room was overflowing with flowers and famous faces, and the place was beginning to get insufferably warm. "Hey everyone, thanks for coming. But it's getting too crowded in here. Let's move this shindig to Maxime's. JC has already paid for the champagne. I just need to change then I'll be right there".

The crowd began to thin, heading for the line of taxis outside. Jacque-Charles stayed behind and introduced Pearl to two men in sober clothes with gloomy expressions on their faces, clearly not party-goers. "Mademoiselle White, I do not wish to spoil the triumph of your first night on the Paris stage, but after what happened tonight I had to call the police. These two gentlemen are from the Surete".

"Mademoiselle White, I am Antoine Du Plessis of the Surete. May I ask a few questions?"

"Fire away".

"Mademoiselle, do you have any enemies here in Paris?" Pearl was seated at her dressing table. She took her time lighting a cigarette, blew out the smoke, considered the question, then spoke.

"Absolutely none. Not here in Paris, not anywhere in the world. I've got a couple of deadbeat ex-husbands who might wish I was dead, but neither one has the guts to do anything about it".

"Do you still have the note from The Tong?"

"No, I thought it was a joke, so I threw it away".

"There have been two attempts on your life. We don't consider that a joke. But we don't have any idea who is responsible. We need your co- operation. There will be an armed policeman with you at all times during the day. He will escort you to the theater and back to your home. He will walk with you to the stage and back to your dressing room, and he will stand guard outside your dressing room while you are inside. That is all can do at the moment until we talk to criminals on the street and have a better idea of who is responsible. Good day, Mademoiselle". He bowed and left. Jacque-Charles looked pale. He was sweating.

"We have had bad luck from the first day. This show is cursed. Tonight was a triumph, of course, but we cannot do that same trick every night. Your audiences will expect something new from you every night, just like in your films. I am afraid that this show may be a financial disaster".

Pearl gave him a hard look. "Well, don't expect me to go out there and sing to them. I'm no Mistinguett. And don't expect me to go out there in black- face, with a bunch of bananas or any other fruit for a costume. Sexy dancing ain't my style, either".

"Would you be willing to work with our orchestra leader to find a song that suits your voice. There has to be something you can sing".

Pearl gave him a weary look. "OK, I'll give it a try. But I'm telling you, I'm no singer. My voice is shot".

She was right, of course. Her attempts to sing did not go well. She could carry a tune, but the sound that came out was thin and raspy. No audience was going to accept Pearl White as a singer. They wanted athletic stunts and tricks. On film we could give them that. But we could not affect that illusion on stage.

Pearl tried gamely to belt out that song, but as she admitted to us back stage, she sounded like a frog. She knew that after one glorious opening night she was now a flop on the Paris stage. And after 2 more lackluster performances, the reviews were merciless, laying all the blame at Pearl's feet.

The three of us were sitting in the parlor of the house in Passy. Pearl was tired and frustrated. "This whole business is getting ridiculous. Nothing has gone right since we started rehearsing this damn revue. And everybody is blaming me for the whole damn mess". I had been mulling over a thought for a couple of days and I decided to try it out on her. "Pearl, do you think it's possible that all of these incidents have been arranged by Jacque-Charles and Volterra to scare you into breaking your contract so they don't have to pay you?" Pearl showed no surprise at the idea. "I've had the same thought, to be honest. But I'll be darned if I'm going to let them stiff me. I'll stick this out until I get my money. They're not going to scare me away that easily". We left it that, but later that day we heard the phone ring. Pearl picked it up and after a few moments silence we heard Pearl's raised voice.

"What the hell! Was anybody hurt?" There was a pause as she listened.

"That's a relief. I don't wanna be blamed for that too. Where are Jacque-Charles and Volterra. Both of them? Ask 'em to call me when they get back. Thanks". I heard Pearl's footsteps in the hall way. She burst into the kitchen where I was attempting to make a pot of tea without a kettle and a teapot.

"You'll never guess what's happened now! There's been a fire at the theater. It started right under the stage where I was supposed to rehearse tonight. What the hell is going on? And Jacque-Charles and Volterra are both out of town. That's a bit of a coincidence, don't you think?" I had to agree that it seemed a bit suspicious.

The investigation into the fire produced no evidence of any deliberate attempt to burn down the theater and the police investigation into the various threats and attempts at sabotage failed to find a culprit. Rehearsals had been few after the fire and the ones that did take place were marked by a lack of enthusiasm. The revue closed as quietly as possible with the announcement that ill-health had forced Pearl White to give up her role in the production. Pearl accepted a percentage of her original fee with as much grace as she could muster. She knew that she could hardly demand full payment, but she never lost the suspicion that her producers had contrived the Tong plot to get out of paying her once they realized that she was not the fearless athletic heroine they had imagined on screen.

After this sorry business, Pearl seemed to have lost much of her enthusiasm for being in the public eye. She didn't need the money, she had invested wisely, she owned property in France, she had a stable of successful racehorses and a casino in fashionable Biarritz. The whiskey bottle was never far from her reach and a shady doctor kept her supplied with medication for her pain and made no attempt to persuade her that her reliance was becoming an addiction. She continued to enjoy a life of carefree frivolity, entertaining the celebrities of the Paris stage. Chevalier and Mistinguett were frequent visitors, and the three were frequently seen together at favorite watering holes along with other minor celebrities and hangers-on. I always thought that Chevalier had more than a friendly interest in Pearl, but after her experience with McCutcheon, she was wary of charmers and Mistinguett, who was rumored to have more than just a working relationship with Chevalier, kept him on a tight leash. Pearl had recently met a Greek businessman, Theodore Cossika, who did not fawn over her, but treated her with the utmost kindness, and it soon became clear that Pearl was becoming increasingly attached to him. They both loved to travel and when Cossika suggested that they take a trip together to meet his mother, Pearl was delighted to accept. Angelina and I had the house to ourselves for a month at Pearl's expense, so with no other demands on our time, we played the tourists in Paris while Pearl paid her respects to her prospective mother-in-law in Athens. When she returned, she gave us a cheerful account of her travels in Greece, but her mood darkened when asked about her visit with Cossika's mother. "The old bitch doesn't think I'm good enough for her son, and she doesn't bother to hide it. Being American is bad enough for her, but being an actress is almost as bad as being a whore. I couldn't wait to get out of that house. Problem is, Theodore won't do anything to upset his mother, and he would never marry without her approval. So I guess we'll just have to live in sin. Suits me. I've been married twice and I'm in no hurry to repeat the experience".

Chevalier and Mistinguett once more became frequent visitors, though, with Cossika's influence, Pearl spent less time savoring the Paris nightlife. On one of their visits her friends were accompanied by a teenage boy. We assumed he was some Apache urchin who they had taken a shine to, but when he opened his mouth, it was clear that his origins were more East End than Left Bank, a Londoner to the core, born in Brixton. His name was Max Wall, he was 17 years old, and he was already a success in vaudeville, sharing the stage with Chevalier and Mistinguett on their European tour. He was a lively young chap, a dancer, a musician and a clown, usually all 3 at the same time, with a mobile face and an entertaining line in Cockney patter. He didn't seem to stop moving or talking the entire time we spent with him, happy to be in the company of fellow English folk, and a glass or two of Pearl's best wine loosened his tongue. He had made his debut on the stage at the age of two, dressed in a kilt since his father was Scottish. Both his parents, and his grandparents, were in show business, so Max had been on the road ever since he was born. He grew up in a world of adults, his playmates were singers and dancers, clowns and comics. His expressive face made him a natural mimic and every part of it got a workout when he was in full flow. He was a never-ending fount of stories of life in the English music hall. He remembered the great Marie Lloyd asking his mother "What's the matter with your kid, then? Has he got bleedin' Saint Vitus dance, or what?" But his face lost its liveliness when he told us of losing his little brother William, whom he called "Bunty", in a German air-raid in 1916. "Me and my older brother Alec was asleep in one room and Bunty was in the other bedroom with our Aunty Nell. The Krauts sent over a Zeppelin with a bomb and the bastards dropped the bloody thing right on our 'ouse. When it exploded it turned our bed upside down with us in it, and all the rubble fell on to the upside-down bed, so we wasn't hurt. But Bunty and Aunty Nell weren't so lucky. Most nights I have nightmares about being buried under all those sodding bricks until I finally see the light when the rescuers found us. Then I can bloody well sleep in peace".

Max had continued to perform even after the family tragedy, perhaps because of it. He could never make up his mind what kind of act he wanted until he got to see two great comic performers of the day, Harry "Little Tich" Relph, all four feet six inches of him, who performed in shoes with reinforced 28 inch soles which allowed him to perform an alarming "en pointe", swaying back and forth on his toes but never quite coming to grief. Tich had already toured America with great success and performed with Marie Lloyd and Dan Leno when young Max and his family shared the bill with him in London. Max heard the riotous applause from backstage and knew then what he wanted to be. Little Tich had performed in Paris with Mistinguett the year before Max arrived in Paris.

Grock, "the king of clowns", had moved to London when hostilities broke out in 1914. Max, as a part-time performer himself since the age of six, was well-known to backstage door guardians, so he had the privilege of watching Grock rehearse as well as perform his act of clownish pantomime and musical blunders before a delighted audience. Max began to fashion his own comic dance style inspired by his two stage heroes, and at the age of fourteen made his full-time professional debut as "The Boy with the Obedient Feet" and "Max Wall and his Independent Legs". Audiences warmed to him immediately and by the time he was sixteen Max was one of the most popular acts in London's music halls, and at seventeen he was on his way to Paris to follow in the extra-large footsteps of Little Tich. Angelina and I had heard of both Grock and Little Tich but never had the pleasure of seeing them perform, so we both hung on Max's every word about these two legendary comics. Mistinguett on the other hand looked decidedly bored by Max's non-stop recollections. We guessed it was not the first time she had heard them. She was saved from further boredom by Pearl. She burst into the kitchen with her usual noisy energy and greeted her friends with the customary Gallic gusto. She paused in her effusiveness when she spotted Max.

"So who's this young fella? Not your latest boyfriend, Misty? They're getting younger every day!" Mistinguett sputtered her denials, of course, and introduced Max. He had not uttered a word since Pearl's entrance. He stood and stared. Turns out he was a big fan, struck quite dumb in the presence of his heroine of the silver screen. He did manage to mumble a few shy words of admiration and to ask Pearl for an autograph, which she was more than happy to give, and Max left with a delighted grin on his young face.

Max had taken a shine to us, and we to him, so, whenever he could take time from rehearsals and performances we would keep him company, trying to impress him with our poor command of the French language and escorting him around the sights of Paris, frequently getting lost in the process. Max took it all in stride with unfailing good humor. The end of his Paris engagement was approaching when he was booked to appear in one last show. He was to share the bill with his hero Grock at the Paris Empire. Max showed his appreciation for our friendship with orchestra seats for opening night. We were thrilled. The show was a riot. Max had been nervous about performing on the same stage as Grock, not wanting to try too hard to outdo the man he admired so much, but still wanting to put on a good show for his final audience in Paris. He need not have worried. Before the show Grock came to see him to make sure neither one was planning any similar routine. He was anxious that he should not overshadow the 17-year old Max and put an early dent in his career. They managed a perfect balancing act. They stayed away from any material that was similar and each produced the best of their diverse talents. It was a hilarious night and the audience roared their laughter from curtain to curtain, rewarding both with standing ovations. We were invited backstage after the show to share in Max's triumph and to meet Grock himself. He was gracious and greeted us in near-perfect English. "Your young friend was quite brilliant, don't you think? When I retire he will be a worthy successor as Europe's greatest clown". Max beamed and blushed.

After his success in Paris, Max was hailed by the London press as a star on the rise, and he was invited to make his first appearance in the West End, starring in the London Revue at the Lyceum Theater. Shortly after Max returned to England, Pearl received an invitation to appear with Max at the Lyceum. Her experiences with the Paris Revue had left Pearl restless and in need of a change of scenery, so she was delighted to accept, and she looked forward to renewing her acquaintance with old friends among London's upper crust. Pearl took it for granted that we would accompany her, and so it was that after 13 years away from our home country we returned to England in the summer of 1925. It was a delight to be back once more among people who spoke the same language and understood the same jokes, though London was hardly familiar territory to the two of us. Pearl had spent more time in London than we ever had and was more than willing to play tour guide, taking more than a little pleasure in our country-bumpkin ignorance of the capital and its sights. But we could only play the tourist for so long. Farnworth was less than 200 miles away, and its proximity tugged at our hearts. We had not seen our families in 13 years and the desire to be among familiar faces in familiar places was strong. When Pearl's run at the Lyceum came to an end after only modest reviews, she decided it was time to for her too to return to the country of her birth, though she no longer considered it home. But first she would return to Paris, to make her final film "Terreur" as a favor to an old friend, the Belgian director Edward Jose, who had directed some of her old serials. When Pearl returned to New York after its completion, the film was released in America as "The Perils of Paris", but Pearl's star was on the wane. The film enjoyed only modest success, and its cast and plot are now largely forgotten. Pearl visited America only briefly on a couple of occasions after that. She returned to Paris and settled into a comfortably sedated retirement at Passy or on her country estate at Rambouillet, just to the north of Paris. She would write to us occasionally, but her letters became more infrequent and her handwriting seemed to suffer increasingly from the effects of alcohol and painkillers. And finally, in late 1938, the local Bolton newspaper reported, in a small article buried in the back pages, that Pearl White was dead of liver disease at the age of 49.

# Chapter 19

We had said our goodbyes to Pearl at London's Victoria Station on a blustery morning in September and none of us wanted to linger. We had begun our relationship with Pearl as mere extras, hardly expecting more than an occasional word of encouragement from the stars of the film. But in time we had become friends and confidants and after a dozen years Pearl felt like family. It was sad to see her go, but I've never been good with goodbyes, with the standing around waiting for time to pass, watching the clock tick by agonizingly slowly, and I was relieved to hear the platform guard finally blow his whistle. The two ladies dabbed at their eyes, I pretended to study the choice of newspapers. The guard waved his flag, the train's whistle blew and Pearl's train pulled away in a cloud of steam. We all waved until her carriage disappeared around the bend. The last tangible reminder of our American adventure was gone. The next morning, we took our leave of London. Max was at Euston Station to wave us cheerfully off. He performed a little comic dance for our entertainment as the train pulled out, and then we were gone. By the end of the day we found ourselves and our trunk on the familiar pavement of Farnworth's Market Street. The anticipation had been growing all day for both of us. By now the dark was gathering in and streetlamps were flickering into light. The shops were closed, but the pubs were beginning to ring with the sound of revelers, and the smell of stale beer brushed our nostrils as we made our way slowly to the familiar doors of Sabini's cafe, with the trunk slung heavily between us. Our hearts were pounding as we stood and knocked. There was a time when Angelina would have walked in without hesitation and without knocking, but after 13 years we worried that our arrival might startle her parents out of their wits. We had sent word of our return, but in those days letters were often delayed or never delivered. So when the door was opened to our knocking, the look of astonishment that greeted us was no great surprise. It was Charlie who stood in the doorway, with his back to the hall light, peering out as if he was not quite sure whether his eyes were playing tricks on him. But Angelina gave him little time to overcome his confusion, rushing forward to embrace him and land a kiss on both cheeks. A flurry of surprised exclamations followed, then a scraping of chairs in the parlor, and in moments the hallway was filled with the entire family in a heaving mass of tears and laughter, Italian mixed with English, all solemnly observed by two small children peeking out from behind their mother's pinafore. These were Charlie and Elsie's brood, Tony, named in his uncle's memory, and Violet, after Elsie's grandmother. I stood quietly on the doorstep, waiting for the turbulence to subside. Eventually it did and I was able to step forward into the light and my hand was seized by Angelina's father, then her brother and finally, more gently by her mother. Their years in England had taught them that we English did not care much for displays of emotion, and no kisses or embraces were offered. Elsie and I, being well-accustomed to Lancashire ways, nodded and smiled at each other. No further intimacy was felt necessary. We were ushered into the parlor, wine was uncorked, and a bottle of stout for Elsie who had never much taken to wine, and I was more than happy to help her drink it, fearing that after a long day's travel with little satisfying food in my stomach, the wine would unman me. Angelina's mother could not sit still. She would sit for a moment, listening to the babble of conversation, then disappear into the kitchen to forage for whatever she could find that might do justice to a daughter's homecoming. The drinking and the eating finally slowed in the early hours of the morning. The children's curiosity had long since given way to sleepiness and they were both stretched out on settees in the darkened cafe. Charlie and Elsie graciously surrendered their bedroom to us, refusing to listen to our protests that we would be happy to bed down on the parlor floor.

The next morning, we strolled up Market Street and made the familiar left turn up Brackley Street to the market. We could see the familiar caravan parked next to the rough tent at the far end. My heart was beating fast as we approached the open flap. It had been thirteen years since I had said goodbye to this backdrop of my childhood and youth, and the family beyond the opening in the canvas. We could hear voices from inside and the familiar sounds of readying the scenery for the night's performance. We stepped from the bright autumn glare into the shaded interior. It took a moment to adjust to the diminished light, then I could see my father sitting with his back to me, staring at the still-wet backdrop on the rough stage. It took a few moments for me to realize that the tall young man with brush in hand, waiting for father's nod of approval for his artwork was my "little" brother Eddie. He stared at the two figures silhouetted in the doorway, squinting, a look of puzzlement on his face. "Bugger me, it's our Tommy". Father's head spun round at that, and he took a long look over his shoulder, then stood and turned towards us. "Well, well, well. You haven't forgotten where we live, then? I'm right glad to see you, son. Your mother might just faint from the shock. Eddie, go get your mother and give her some warning. We don't want her swooning all over the stage, at least not without a paying audience to see it".

Eddie jumped down from the stage and seized my hand, pumping it up and down hard enough to make my teeth rattle. "By gum, it's bloody great to see you, Tommy. How long's it been? Ten years, or more, right? Thirteen! Bloody hell! Wait till mother sees you. She'll have kittens". Then he was off through the flap.

"So, is this just a visit, or are you back for good?"

"For good, I hope. We've had our fair share of adventures. It's time to make a home among our own kind, settle down a bit".

"Quite right, too. Never much cared for the idea of foreign lands. There's no better country than this one, and no better part of it than Lancashire".

His homily was interrupted by the arrival of my mother, who stood in the doorway, blinking back tears, a rare sight for any of us. Then she rushed forward and pulled me towards her. Neither one of us had much practice at such physical displays and we wrestled awkwardly with the emotion we both felt. Then she stood back at arm's length to get a good look at me. "You look well. Angie must be feeding you well". Angelina's name reminded her of her manners and she turned to where Angie stood off to the side, playing the same role that I had the night before. "Angie, love, it's good to see you, too. You've looked after my lad well, by the look of him. I'm happy to have you both back. Back to stay, I hope. I wouldn't mind a grandchild or two to push around in a pram on a Sunday afternoon". Angelina blushed a little at the suggestion. Truth is, we had made every effort not to have a child while we were away from England. We wanted our children to be born and raised in our own country. Now we could actually consider starting a family, which I knew was dear to Angie's heart. And mine, too.

The first order of business was to find a place to live. Our modest film careers had provided us with a small nest egg, but we weren't willing to toss it all away on the purchase of a house. Our families didn't know a single person who owned their own home. Except for our own parents. Angie's family owned the building which housed the cafe and the accommodations above it. My parents owned the caravan they lived in, though they almost always had to pay something to the owner of the land it sat on for any length of time. When I was a boy and we moved often, we could always plan on a few days free on some public land that was left undeveloped for the temporary use of gypsies and travelers such as ourselves. Now that Farnworth was more or less a permanent home for our little theater troupe, everyone in our immediate circle rented a council house, at subsidized rents. There was always a waiting list for these, so the first priority was to get our names on the list. We knew that families with children were given priority, so Angelina and I wasted no time in getting down to business, now that we were back home where doting grandparents would gladly take on the role of part-time child minders. And so it was that when Christmas rolled around, we had two blessed events to celebrate, with Angie due to give birth in the late summer of 1926. We were now bumped up the housing list, thanks in part to the councilor who managed the list. He was a frequent visitor to Sabini's for his Saturday morning espresso, and he soon found himself the recipient of the occasional bottle of home-made wine, which he himself had little taste for, but his wife had little trouble getting down with the addition of a little "corporation pop". Tap water, that is. She had a reputation as a rather nervous woman, but the wine seemed to work wonders for her nerves. She would never have resorted to spirits, considering them vulgar and not respectable. But home-made peach wine could never be thought "common", and to leave it undrunk would have seemed ungracious.

The house on Clammerclough Road in Kearsley, down by St. John's Church, was a modest red-brick row house, two up and two down, nothing fancy, but for us it had all the charm of a first home. St. John's Primary School was a short walk away for when our little one was ready to be educated. Farnworth market was a ten-minute walk away and Sabini's not much further. We settled in quickly with a few pieces of second-hand furniture and donations from Angie's parents. Then came the business of deciding what to do with the rest of our lives, how to make a living. Our own experiences in Bound Brook and Paris had shown us the enormous appeal of moving pictures, and though Farnworth did not have a cinema of its own, Bolton had several. Angie and I became regular visitors at the various picture houses, and our interest was not entirely recreational. We had tossed about the idea of opening our own cinema in Farnworth and we needed the reassurance that the locals were willing to part with their hard-earned cash on a regular basis for the pleasure of watching a "flicker". To our delight, they were. And the folks of Farnworth, we felt, would be delighted to save themselves the bus fare into Bolton if they had a cinema of their own. In these early days of moving pictures, popular American films sometimes took years to show up on local screens in the North of England, and on more than one occasion we had the dubious pleasure of seeing ourselves up on the big screen as one or other of Pearl's old films, still popular in England, unfolded before our eyes. We would elbow each other like over-excited children trying not to laugh whenever one or other of us appeared on screen. It seemed to us that my parents' life as itinerant actors, with no permanent place to live, the comforts of life dependent on the fullness of the old tin box, were a thing of the past. It was time to convince the old man that it was time for me to take over the family business. I had no intention of taking up the life of an actor once more. It was my hope that father would allow me to turn our rough theater into Farnworth's first cinema. But the theater was to be placed in my hands sooner than I expected, though it brought me no pleasure at the time, only sadness. My father was no longer the vigorous patriarch of my youth and I knew that managing the company and playing the leading man were in the past for him. Mother too had begun to show signs of weariness with her hard life and her cheerful face couldn't hide the sadness in her eyes. She knew what none of us knew. Father had been suffering from stomach pains for several months now and had lost weight. His face was gaunter now, and the effects of his discomfort were in his face, no matter how much he tried to hide them. He distrusted all doctors and looked upon hospitals as places the dying were condemned to for their final days, once they and the quacks had given up hope. Mother suspected he was dying and was afraid to say it, because he might just have the same suspicion. He lasted just two more months. Cancer of the stomach, we were told. He never got to see his grandchild. He was buried in St. John's churchyard, a stone's throw from our new home. It was a cold blustery day when we laid him to rest. Angie's family along with Elsie and her children, and the rest of the company stood quietly behind Angie and Mother and me to pay their respects as we laid him in the ground. We all made our way to Sabini's after the ceremony and stood around making subdued conversation, eating sandwiches and cake with little enthusiasm. From my family, there was no public display of grief. That was not our way. Angie's mother had a handkerchief to her eyes. My mother remained composed, stoic in her loss. My sense of loss was for my mother not for myself. I knew she was lost without him. I had never seen my parents display any affection towards each other even in the privacy of our home. Hugging was not something they did. But I knew they had a bond, undeclared, without the need for public show.

Though I felt the loss of my father, I couldn't help but be relieved that I did not have to face the ordeal of trying to convince him to give up the showman's life. My mother had neither the strength nor the desire to continue with the show. It wasn't difficult to persuade her to move in with us, in anticipation of the arrival of a grandchild. My brother Eddie decided to keep the wagon, but he had no plans to be an actor. He headed south, and months later he sent word that he had signed up with a traveling fair. Three years later he bought a shooting gallery, and once a year the fair would make its week-long stop in Farnworth, and Eddie would allow his niece and nephew free goes with the rifles. They always left with a prize.

Across King Street from our pitch on the Market stood The Palace Theatre. Once a Music Hall, it had sat empty for a year or two, and was now in need of new tenants. We didn't need much persuading. Little was required to turn it into a cinema, and that's what we did. We bought a second-hand projector, signed up with a film distributor in Manchester, and just like that we had us a picture show. And in those early years, whatever other films we showed, every Saturday afternoon it was Pearl White's time to light up the silver screen. In time the old celluloid began to show its age and, since Pearl was largely forgotten, new copies of Pearl's films were not to be found. But we never forgot Pearl. She lived on in our conversation until the day Angelina died. And she still lives on in my most cherished memories.

Once we were settled into the life of cinema owners and the children were old enough not to demand her constant attention, Angie dug out her sketchbook. The children were her first subjects, of course, then family. She and Elsie resumed their old habit of afternoon excursions, this time with small children in a pair of prams. They would settle in some well-remembered spot, the children would play and Angie would draw. Our film distributor in Manchester, Mr. Aspinall, did not at first realize, when we always requested something of Pearl White's, that we had actually known Pearl, and that I had played the villain in more than a few of her serials. But we couldn't resist the temptations to brag a little. He was skeptical at first, but once we regaled him with tales of our adventures in America, he was convinced. He would visit us in Farnworth from time to time to view our modest set-up. We would invite him back to the house for tea and entertain him with reminiscences of our life in Pearl's company, though we never fully revealed Angie's role in her grand deception. On one these visits, Angie pulled out her old sketches from the sets of Pearl's films and the drawings she had done for Pearl's autobiography. He was quick to express his astonishment and then his admiration for Angie's talent. "You know", he said, "my eldest, Vivian, works for a publishing company in Manchester. Children's books mostly. Would you mind if I showed her some of these drawings? I don't know if you're interested, but there might be some work in it". Angie was flattered once again, and after her successful efforts for Hearst newspapers, she knew that her work was good enough for publication. She agreed to let him take a sample of her work. Two weeks later she received a letter from Vivian's boss, asking her if she would be willing to come to his office to talk about her work. She took with her more of her recent drawings, especially of the children, and from her parents she retrieved the sketches she made of birds and flowers all those years ago before we were married. The publisher was sufficiently impressed with her work to ask her to submit some drawings for a children's book not yet published. Angie brought home a copy of the manuscript, and once it was read began to produce her illustrations for it. They were packaged up and shipped off to the publisher. After a slightly nervous wait of 3 weeks, she got word that they had been approved and Angelina was offered a contract as a freelance illustrator. This suited her down to the ground. She could stay home with the children, she could indulge her creative impulse, and she could substantially increase the family income. What could be better?

From these modest beginnings, of course, sprang a very successful career as an artist. Her name now is much better known than mine and her work will live on long after I'm forgotten. She continued to illustrate children's books for more than four decades, working almost to the day she died. Eleven years ago, that was. I miss her very single day, even as I draw close to my own end. I have no illusions about any kind of afterlife. But the years I spent with Angelina in this life were heaven enough for me.

* * *
