Motion Picture Magazine (Feb-Jul 1921)

«OT^£URR Forbidden Fruit (Continued from page S3) Steve had blundered in his exit, had been apprehended. Now, now she was to taste the last misery ; was to face the Mallorys, whom she had come to love as a younger sister ; and Nelson Rogers ... as the wife of a common second-story man, a criminal . . . When she reached the ground floor, Rogers had gone for the police, it was Rogers, still dreaming before the fire, who had caught Steve on his clumsy way out. The Mallorys and the butler were guarding Steve, sullen and resentful. To the Mallorys Mary told the truth ; that it was Steve's first offense, that she should never have left him, he was a terrible child, sure to do damage to himself and others if left alone . . . She didn't cry while she told of their marriage, of her own family, of what she must try to do for Steve, poor weakling, but her eyes were unduly bright and her voice was brittle and harsh. When Rogers returned with the police, a smashed window bore witness to the tale that Mallory told — of the prisoner escaped. Mary had to avert her eyes lest the gratitude she felt for Mallory give away his friendly lie. To Rogers, then, Mary told the truth. She faced the welling bitterness in his face by saying that she hadn't had quite enough to eat for sometime nor quite enough to wear and so when Mrs. Mallory had offered her the opportunity of both helping her and helping herself, she hadn't been able to resist. "Then," she finished, "I did go back, after that first night, intending never to return, but Prince Charming had come . . . and his call was so sweet, so insistent and I was so starved . . . ah, what will not weakness and hunger do? Hunger for things other than bread, and weakness for the need of strength? I have been so weak ... so weak you must think me contemptible, and yet, I swear it, it was the sheer need of beauty — of beauty that made me so !" Rogers took her in his arms. "You darling !" he said, "but that is all over now. You must come to me, to me to whom you belong. I will take care of you, dear, so tenderly, so surely ..." Mary drew away. She shook her head. Her cold hand touched his brow. "If love were all," she said, slowly, "then, Nelson, I would follow you whether, I fear, you wanted me or not. But love isn't all, my dear one, not all. There is responsibility. The responsibility toward those who have come first, be they children or men. I have to live up to his responsibility, for one who is weaker than I. Dont plead with me, dear sweetheart, you make it so much, much harder." And because he knew that to be true, her eyes to be steadfast, her voice unwavering, Rogers stepped back, and let her go. Some women know disillusion slowly. So slowly, very frequently, that, when the final veil has been torn away from the ugly thing they have worshipped and each contorted limb is shown to them in its verity their eyes have grown too dim with age to look on other dreams. Fortunately for Mary, Steve completed the work he had begun more rapidly. He resorted, with the help of Giuseppe, his "friend," who was also butler in the Mallory home and the instigator and stager of the attempted burglary, he resorted, at Giuseppe's suggestion to blackmail of Rogers. His method was to lure Rogers to him on a pretext that Mary was in trouble, that she had sent for him. When Rogers, against his better judgment, but fearful for Mary, appeared, Steve told' him that it would cost him just one thousand dollars to prevent the item of a rich young man making love to a poor man's wife in the Mallory home appearing in the papers. Rogers smiled and wrote Steve a check. He handed it to him. "This isn't fear of you, Maddock," he said, "but an attempt to let Mrs. Maddock see very clearly the manner of man she is being so loyal to." There was a rapid culmination. Mary told Steve he could choose between the money and her. Steve, with the riches in his hand, with Mary cold, disdainful on the other hand, chose the money. He was about to do a vanishing act when Giuseppe appeared and demanded his promised share of the loot. Steve, cornered, cried, angrily, "It war, my wife who made this possible, wasn't it? We'll gamble for it — that's what we'll do — gamble for it as we've gambled for other things." While they were playing, Mary took the check and stole to the window ... to the fire-escape — down . . . She would return the money to Rogers . . . would go away. She felt sickened of the whole thing . . . despairful . . . An hour later, Roger found her at the foot of the building, crouched there. She had heard, she whispered, a shot in the room above. What had Steve done? Was he a murderer as well as a thief and a blackmailer ? She had been too terrified to go back, too terrified to go forward. Rogers was very tender. "Steve lost," he said, "so far as I can make out. He tried to make a grab for the check he thought was still in the envelope. Giuseppe, who, it appears, was ready for such a move pulled a gun on him. Steve . . . you needn't fear Steve any longer Mary — he is beyond your protection — beyond the need of it." Six months later Nelson Rogers came back to the Mallorys' country home. Mary was in the garden with Mrs. Mallory, who had been more a mother than a mere friend to her since the day when Steve had been killed and all the world had fallen to upon her. When they were alone, Rogers came close to her, bent over her; "Once you told me," he said, "that Prince Charming had come into your life . . . now that you are free . . . tell me, dear heart, is he still . . . where he was ?" Mary lifted her glad startled eyes. They misted with tears. Her hand groped for his. "Ah, my dear," she said, "dont jest . . . now that you have come to me . . . and I can . . . come to you !" MA WAS OUT OF THE ROOM Little Lemuel. — Pa, what's a counter-irritant ? Father. — A counter-irritant, my son, is a woman who makes a dry-goods clerk show her every thing on the shelves and then buys a yard of muslin. A teacher in a slums Sunday School remarked that her class was better informed upon motion pictures than they were upon things religious. The lesson was on the subject of that "still small voice." "Have you ever heard the word 'conscience' ?" she asked. The silence was unbroken and uncomprehending. Then the light of knowledge dawned in the face of one little girl, and she announced, "Sure, I know, Conscience Talmadge." "$1,000 Saved!" "Last night I came home with great] news. Our savings account had! passed the thousand dollar mark ! '% "A few years ago I was making $15 a week and it took every cent; to keep us going. Then one day If realized why I wasn't being advanced—I couldn't do anything inparticular. I decided right then to invest an hour after supper each night in my own future, so I wrote to Scranton and arranged for a course of special training. "Why, in a few months I had a whole new vision of my work ! An opening came and I was promoted — with an increase. A little later another raise came — I could save $25 a month. Then another — I could save $50 each pay day. So it went. "Today I am manager of my department. We have a thousand" dollars saved — and there is a real future ahead!" For 29 years the International Correspondence Schools have been helping men and women everywhere to win promotion, to earn more money, to have happy prosperous. homes, to know the joy of getting ahead in business and in life. ; You, too, can prepare right at home in . spare time for the position you want in the work you like best. All we ask is the chance to prove it. Choose your career from this coupon and mark and mail it now. ^— ^— — — » tiapi out Hem — — — — INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENCE SCHOOLS BOX 6617, SCRANTON. PA. Explain, without obligating me, how I can quality for the position, or in the subject, before which I mark X. D SALESMANSHIP D ADVERTISING 3ELE0TRICAI, ENGINEER Electric Lighting and Rjl. Electric Wiring Telegraph Engineer Telephone Work MECHANICAL ENGINEER Mechanical Draftsman Machine Shop 1'ractlce Toolmaker Gas Engine Operating CIVIL ENGINEER Snrveylng and Mapping MINE FOHEMANorENG'K STATIONARY ENGINEER Marine Engineer Ship Draftsman ARCHITECT Contractor and Hnllder Architectural DrafUmao Concrete Builder R Structural Engineer PI.TJl RING AND HE (TING _ Sheet Metal Worker Textile Oveneer or Snpt. CHEMIST 3 Navigation Name_ □ Window Trimmer BShow Card Writer Sign Painter □ Railroad Trainman □ ILLUSTRATING □ Cartooning Q BUSINESS MANAGEMENT Private Secretary BOOKKEEPER __ Stenographer and Typist HCert. Pub. Accountant 3 TRAFFIC MANAGER B Railway Accountant Commercial Law DGOOD ENGLISH 3 Teacher Common School Subjects Mathematics _ CIVIL SERVICE 3 Railway Mall Clerk 3 AUTOMOHILE OPERATING DAnto Repairing IQ Spanish 3 AGRICULTURE !□ Evin.h □ Ponltrj Railing |Q Italian Present OccupationStreet and No City 115 P0 6 t