Picture Show (May-Oct 1920)

20 Picture Show, October Ibth, 1920. Tke Stainless Ba (Continued from page 19.) ■ " I killed him because Ue ruined my sister," replied Suction. There was a stillness in court for a second that seemed like a minute. Then every eye was turned on Betty Shelton. The girl faced the stares with a dull, unseeing gaze. She got up from her seat as she heard her name called by the judge, and having been sworn, she bore out her brother's statement. As she left the box she fell in a dead swoon. It was Calvin Stone who reached her first, and as he brought her back to consciousness he felt her shudder as she turned her eyes away from him. Richard Shelton was acquitted. In a southern country the sworn testimony of his sister that he had killed the man who had dishonoured her was more than sufficient to save him from the hangman's rope. Dick Shclton became a hero in Myrtle ville, and as he watched the young man accepting the congratulations' of his friends, Calvin Stone felt a fresh loathing against Shelton. " Dick Shelton would never have risked his life for anybody," he said. " There is some mystery here, and I mean to get to the bottom of it " He tried to see Betty, but the girl sent word that she could not speak to him. Despite this, never once did the faith of Calvin Stone in the girl he loved waver. One day he found her in the garden. " Why do you try to see me after what has happened ? " said Betty reproachfully, as he came to the bench on which she was sitting. " Because I love you, and I am never going to give you up," replied Calvin firmly. " But you must ! " cried Betty, as she tried to take off a locket Calvin had given her. " I will not take it, Betty," said the lawyer. " 1 believe in you, and have never lost faith. I shall come back again." That night Calvin Stone saw Dick Shelton in his office, where he had forced Betty's brother to meet him. The young lawyer put Shelton through a crossexamination compared with which the Third Degree iuquisition would have been merciful. And at the end of the sitting he had solved the mystery. Shclton confessed that when Betty had visited him in his cell he had persuaded her to agree to let him tell the couft that Kndersleigh had ruined her as the only way to save his life. There was not a word of truth in the story. Betty was as innocent as the day she was born. " So you let your own sister sacrifice her honour to save your worthless life ! " said Calvin Stone, in a fury of rage. " If you were worth killing, I would kill you myself ! Go home to your sister, and tell her I know the truth ! Then I will give you twenty-four hours to get out of the town. You know if the" truth were known you would be lynched." Having once more saved his miserable hide, Uichard Shelton trawled out like the yellow cur lie was, and Myrtleville knew him no more. In the evening of the following day Calvin Stone and Betty Shclton were walking arm in arm in Aunt Kuth's garden. "• I can't understand how you continued to believe in me after what I said in court," said the girl. " I would believe in you against all the evidence that has 'ever been sworn in the entire world." replied Calvin as he took Betty in his arms and kissed her. (.Adapted from incidents in the Western Import film, by permission.) ROSEMARY AND REMINISCENCES. MARY MILES MINTfcR. A Clever Story composed of tke Titles of ker Films. " rTrHE Gho3t of Rosy Tay'or " haunted I " Charity Castle " so " Periwinkle " ran away to " Anno of Green Gables " for safety, where for " A Bit of Jade " she impersonated " Melissa of the Hills," and she was so full of " Youth's Endearing Charm " that the " Mate of the Sally Ann " fell in love with her. Then '* The Intrusion of Isabel " made it look like " No Wedding Bdls " at all, but as " Rosemary Climbs the Height9 " on most occasions, she did so then, and love won despite V Powers that Prey." So they went to see " Emmy of Stork's Nest," where " Barbara Freitchie " told them that " Dulcie's Adventure " had been a very fortunate one, pnd so, upon becoming one of the " Social Briars," true happiness came at last to " The Amazing Impostor." Written by Dolores Shelby, a reader of the Picture Show. • :: SHOW YOUR FRIENDS :: Tke" Picture Show. Tke Tkeb lan Angle on Rosemary Tkeby s Personality. ROSEMARY' — that's for reminiscences; Theby — that might bo a variation on Thebes, suggesting simultaneously Egypt and Spartan women. Together they make the name Rosemary Theby, aud incidentally give a perfectly suitable impression of the conversation and personality of a perfectly satisfactory leading woman of the cinema. As to Rosemary, she knows more .about everybody in the pictures than anybody but themselves. She can relate how — but then, I'm not giving everything away that I know either. Sufficient to say that Miss Rosemary ought to be official biographer. Now as to Miss Theby — the Spartan part is no exaggeration, the Egyptian perhaps is. Yet not . altogether ; because at one time this actress portrayed Oriental roles. She even did a picture called " The Reincarnation of Karma," and that is one of the landmarks of picture exhibiting. It's a long way from Egypt to Mexico, and it is evident that Miss Theby has been following the line of progress westward. That doesn't prevent her making a return occasionally to the Far East, with which she was primarily associated locally. No More Comedy. SHE'S done with comedy, however. Despite the fact that every director who offered A charming her a part during two years wanted her to play in comedy. For a long time, too, she was considered for nothing but vamp roles, like the Parisian adventuress in Griffith's picture, " The Great Love." Every once in a while she again becomes identified with the vempirish type, although, like every other screen actress, she says she doesn't want to have anything to do with them. " Fighting for your rights as a woman are as nothing compared with the energy with which you have to fight to be versatile as a screen actress," said Miss Theby. " Because I happened to get a part in a Vitagraph comedy originally, and followed this up with some other comedy appearances, no director would believe that I could be serious. "As a matter of fact. I couldn't be nnything but serious. 1 couldn't discover anything in the comedies wo made that was funny, aud so I just played my parts straight. Why, I could not even see a joke until four years ago. " People would tell them to me, and then I'd have to have them explained. " And yet they persisted in referring to me as a comedienne. • " Now that I have learned what the plans and specifications of a joke look like, they always want to cast me in the most serious roles imaginable. But I don't mind that so much, because I feel that the confining of seriousness and humour is my fortfl." Declined With Thanks. MISS THEBY' is one of the picture actresses only. She has never been on the stage. She had an ofter, however, a few years ago to go with Chauncey Oleott. " It was for seventeen "pounds a week, and I was making about twenty-five pounds in the films, so my commercial nature asserted itself, and I declined with thanks," she declared. "Sometimes, though, 1 wish I had accepted, just for the experiencn." The stage did, however, furnish the first influence in shaping her career, for it was with the ambition to appear in the footlight drama study 'of Rosemary Theby taken in one of the gardens of California. that she studied at Sargjnt's school in New York. " But when I went around to apply for a job, I found there were too many on the same track, and decided that I'd try the pictures. "Armed with a letter from a friend, I went out to Vitagraph studio, and they cast me as one of three charming damsels who did nothing, but had to do that fairly well. This picture w as called ' The Wager.' " Below the Sea. MISS THEBY had her first thrill in picture, making when she had to don a diver's outfit. She went down in twelve feet of water near Catalina Island and crawled all around the bottom. Rosemary said she mieht have been able to see more if tho suit had fitted her. " You see," she said, " they don't make diver's outfits for women, and the one I wore was entirely too large for me. That allows air to circulate about one and makes navigation difficult. When I clambered up the ladder with the water pressure and the heavy leaden weights of the suit to bother me, I thought I never could p it one foot up above the other. On Holiday. MISS THKBY has left for New York with the object of spending a holiday, doing some shopping and visiting the theatres, and everything else that picture people do when they go to New York nowadays. It, is the first tune she has been back 'I ere in four years, or about "six to lie correct, because she was working in Florida most of the last two years she spent in the East. The Spartan habiliments ft very nicely around the personality of this actress, because she is medium height, well proportioned, with regular features and dark hair. There is nothing of the typical screen actress about her. SI,.' is :i delightfully agreeable woman, who knows enough about women not to be catty.