Paramount Press Books (1918)

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CAST AND STORY OF “THE FIREFLY OF FRANCE” For Use of Exhibitors for their House Organs or For General Publicity “THE FIREFLY OF FRANCE” STARRING WALLACE REID IS STRONG WAR PICTURE Story that of Young American Who Becomes Involved in a German Spy Plot but Who Wins Love and Honor in the End THE CAST Devereux Bayne Wallace Reid Esme Falconer Ann Little Von Blenheim (alias Jenkins) . . . .Charles Ogle The Firefly Raymond Hatton Dunham Winter Hall Von Blenheim’s Aides, Ernest Joy, Clarence Geldert, William Elder Georges Henry Woodward Marie-Jeanne Jane Wolff THE STORY DEVEREUX BAYNE is a wealthy young American, about thirty years old. He determines to join the American Ambulance Corps in France and while dining with his guardian, Peter Dunham, the night before his departure, Bayne is attracted by a pretty girl seated near him. A reporter calls him up asking for his photograph and he goes up to his rooms to get one, noting the maitre d’hotel is agitated by his departure. Gaining his room he finds a German rummaging in his trunk, but the latter turns out the lights and escapes. The man is seen to enter a room on another floor and when the officers knock at the door of this room it is opened by the pretty girl Bayne saw in the hotel dining room. She grants them permission to search her room, but Bayne declines and asks the officers to note that the entire hotel staff is composed of Germans. Next day Bayne sails on the Italia. In a newspaper he reads that Franz Von Blenheim, a German spy, has eluded the authorities and is being sought on all outgoing vessels. He also reads that a French nobleman, known as “the Firefly of France," because of his daring aerial feats, is missing, together with plans of the German defenses wanted by the French army. The girl appears and reads over his shoulder, seemingly agitated, and asks him to let her see the paper. She says it will cause trouble for her and asks him to throw it overboard, and he complies. At Gibraltar British officers examine the pass engers, and Bayne learns the girl’s name is Esme Falconer. When Bayne is examined he is asked what he threw overboard. To protect the girl he makes an excuse. Jenkins corroborates the statement, greatly to Bayne’s surprise. His trunk is examined and the officers find cipher papers belonging to Von Blenheim. Then he tells of his hotel experience and asks that America be wirelessed to prove his identity. He is held till Genoa is reached, when the Embassy UnderSecretary, Herriott, clears him of all suspicion. Bayne goes to France indignant at the girl and Von Blenheim for getting him, as he supposes, into this scrape. His train is held up and at a small cafe in a little outlying town Bayne meets the girl and Jenkins. The latter warns Bayne that he, Jenkins, is a United States secret service operative and the girl is a German spy. Next morning he finds Jenkins’ car gone and Esme’s chauffeur murdered. Bayne dons the driver’s garb and with Esme starts for the war zone. Her destination is an old chateau, and, reaching there, they discover the caretaker bound and gagged, and Jenkins, in the uniform of a French officer, with his companions, greets them and announces that he is Von Blenheim. He demands from the girl the plans the Firefly has hidden and which he knows she is in search of. She refuses. The spy prepares to torture the girl while Bayne is held prisoner, but she whispers to the latter that there is a secret panel under the gallery. After a desperate fight, the two escape. In a secret room they find the Firefly, weak and ill. He gives them two sets of papers — one spurious, the other genuine. Bayne believes the girl and the man are lovers and is jealous because he, too, loves her. Bayne takes the false papers, goes out and meets the spies, giving them the packet. He is forced to put on the uniform of one of the men killed in the fight and they leave. Challenged by a sentry Bayne calls out they are spies. At that moment a shell strikes the road nearby and Bayne next awakens in a convalescent ward in France. Then he learns that the United States is in the war and that Esme is the sister-in-law of the Firefly. Bayne is decorated with the Cross of War, and the two are left alone together to seal their love with a kiss.