Motion Picture Story Magazine (Feb 1914 - Sep 1916 (assorted issues))

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■— (Majestic) ■ ■ byDorothyDonnell "■' This story was written from the Photoplay of PHILIP LONERGAN IN the deep canyons of moneymaking the dusk falls early and the tinsel stars of electricity dot the gloom, while beyond the roofs the sober sun still plods down toward the west. In the dingy recesses of the Battery Bank only the dusty clock above the coat-rack marked the passing of time. The air of the office was chill and tomb-like, as tho it were a place of buried hours, and hopes and ambitions. A film of dust lay smoothly over the oil-cloth of the floors and the stoop-shouldered desks; even the clerks themselves had a pasty, unsummed look to them as they bent patiently above their ledgers, computing other men's gains. From nine o'clock to half-past five they were mere adding machines, impersonal and mechanical. But on the wheezy stroke of the half-hour, as now, they wiped their inky fingers, donned their overcoats and became personalities. "Lord! I'm tired," muttered one to the other; "me f'r home — 'night, ol' man. ' ' Jack Richards gave a worried glance at the clock and bent closer to his ledger, late as usual. He was one of the men who are born to be a step or two behind others; his birthright was apparent in the meek, downward lines of his face, the unfashionable cut of his collar and suit. His companion at the paying-teller's window grunted contemptuously, watching him, but. his own entries apparently finished, still lounged on his stool and played irresolutely with his pen. Occasionally he glanced obliquely at the other's kindly profile, his lips moving as tho he were adding up its points of weakness and strength into a total for his own purposes. At length he appeared to have reached a trial balance. The front legs of his stool met the floor with a jarring crash that sent Richards' slow-moving pen slithering nervously over the page. "Man alive!" exclaimed the toiler; "you here still? — 's matter? Wont they come out O. K. ?" He jerked an alpacaed elbow toward the other's ledger. His assistant nodded sullenly, and brought a sudden furious fist down on the desk. "I'm sick an' tired of this dog's life," he snarled. "Sick an' tired! Grind, grind, grind, day in an' day out, for a measly twenty per, and no hopes of anything ahead. I'm about ready to quit !" — above the words his eyes watched Richards' face. The senior teller sighed, the patient sigh of unsuccessful, uncomplaining forty. "You're young, Taylor," he smiled. "That's just a growing pain. I've had 'em — Ave all do, sooner or later, before we give up being the president or a millionaire and settle down to rustling for our daily bread. Grind? That's just life, boy; just life." 71