Picture Play Magazine (Mar-Aug 1916)

AS much to attest the fine manliness of my friend, Phillip Curtis, as to illustrate how a beautiful woman may become a destroyer of supreme happiness, I have set down this personal narrative. Up in the North country, among the snows, where I had ceased to be Roscoe Steele and was known as Peter God, I had lost faith in humanity ; in the darkest hour of my misanthropy it was Phillip Curtis who was the means of bringing me back to sanity and a residue of life that promises to be full to the brim with joy. I start the story with this tribute to one friend because it was the severing of another friendship that set me adrift upon an ocean of despair and agony. This other friendship dates back to childhood, when Robert Lawler and I were playmates in a little Southern town. Looking back, I can recall but one trait of his that I did not like — this was his peace-at-any-price policy. Myself, I liked a scrap ; but Robert Lawler would wriggle out of a difficult situation without recourse to his fists — much to my disgust. He became a lawyer, and finally drifted into politics, becoming eventually the boss of what I subsequently learned was one of the most corrupt political machines in the country. I had gone into business, made money quickly, and married a girl from the home town. Lawler was welcomed at our home, and many a night Josephine and I laughed over his stories of politics without suspecting that he was playing the political game solely for his own pocket and becoming wealthy at the expense of the taxpayers. He was in the running for governor of the State, and we were ready, my wife and I, to wish him success — then the bomb fell ! I had been wheedled into accepting the honorary position of head of the Civic Reform League, and one of the