Talking Screen (Sep-Oct 1930)

think we're going?" "To Hollywood!" replied Sullivan, dryly. "Hollywood ! What in hell will I do there?" "We've got you a long-term contract with the movies. You're going to play the part of a gangster boss who gets strung up at San Quentin. You'll be able to play the part fine!" A WIRE was sent to the Los Angeles police asking that a dragnet be spread and all suspects held for the Chicago police. When the Chief pulled into Los Angeles with the Czar securely done up in shackles, Sullivan and his men went immediately to Headquarters to look over the catch. When the Chicago detectives came to a swarthy little fellow, a long, lean Mexican and a huge burly blond, they laughed out loud. "Will you look who's here!" said Sullivan. "The whole Chicago Social Register!" been paying me $10 a day for the past month !" "You mean to say that I . . .!" exploded Fishbein. "Just a minute," interrupted Sullivan. He turned to the blond. "You've been working at the Cosmic Studios, haven't you?" The blond grinned. "Old Fishbein ought to know that ! He hired me himself as an extra to play one of the gangsters in the Loop battle!" "What a swell joke!" roared Sullivan in delight. "Joke! I don't see anything funny about it!" said Fishbein. "So that's how you got the key to the electrical equipment storeroom?" "It was a cinch!" said the gangster with professional pride. "The key in your office even had a label on it so I shouldn't make a mistake!" "But how did you manage to work the "Listen to me, Mr. Fishbein, your studio stays closed until the murderers are found, doesn't it?" The three men were taken into another room and given a glimpse of their Boss in shackles. For the first time since their arrest they lost their composure and went pale around the gills. "Listen boys," said Sullivan. "The Big Shot has confessed to ordering you three to bump off the movie directors, Denis and Kearney. Now, either you three hang — or he does ! This is not Chicago, you know, where you can walk right out of the can. If you three boys want to turn State's evidence, I'll see to it that you get uff with lighter sentences and that the Big Shor takes the necktie. If you don't want to talk, the three of you will take the rope the same night in San Quentin. It seems to me you'd better talk!" They talked! Fishbein, with a puzzled expression on his face, watched the huge burly blond tell how they shot Jerome Kearney at the wheel of his car. When the man finished his story Fishbein burst out, "Say, I kriow you! I've seen you somewhere before!" "Sure!" replied the gangster with a triumphant sneer, "you ought to know me! You've equipment?" demanded Fishbein. "That wasn't so tough! I gave the electricians a lift with the heavy apparatus every afternoon when they wanted to put it in the storeroom. That gave me the lay of the land. Salvatore, here," he indicated the swarthy little fellow, "is an old line electrician. Well, when we wanted to doctor the recordings I would hide the right disc while Harrel wasn't looking, and I'd slip it under a box before he locked up. We'd come back in the middle of the night, Salvatore would hook up the synchronizing machine on the testing board and all I had to do was jump in when he gave the signal and say, 'Kearney, this is your final warning! If you return to the lot tomorrow, bring your last will and testament !' " "But the detective was only gone from the door five minutes the last night," said Fishbein. "How could you do all that work in so short a time?" The blond laughed uproariously. "Five minutes! Do you believe what a dick tells you? We could have shot a feature talkie in the forty minutes he was gone!" KENNY, darling," cried Joyce that night, "how did you ever guess it?" "I had a lead that no one else out here had," said Kenny. "You see, when that former Chicago District Attorney, Sam Jackson, sold Fishbein the scenario of Murder In The Loop, he forgot to tell him that // was an absolutely true story! Except for the part about Farley's being punished." "Not really?" exclaimed Joyce. "Yes, to the last detail ! I was in Chicago when it all happened. The gangster leader, whom Jackson called Farley, actually had that wholesale murder committed — had them mowed down with a machine gun. A cop, who was trying to get his girl and the girl's brother out of Farley's clutches, happened to walk in on the massacre. He agreed to keep quiet about the bloody affair if Farley would let his girl alone. Farley laughed at him, so the cop took his information to Headquarters. They went after the Czar with a riot squad, but he killed two officers with his own gun before they got him. Do you see the point of the story now?" "No, I'm afraid I don't," said Joyce. "That's because you don't know Chicago. With all those killings on his hands, the Czar still managed to walk out of the Chicago jail without so much as a trial I" "But what has that to do with the murder of Denis and Kearney? " "Just this: the wholesale murder affair — and its aftermath — was hushed up in Chicago but it cost Farley almost every last penny he owned. Then the former District Attorney, who knew the case backwards and forwards, comes along and writes the entire story into a movie scenario!" , "If the movie of Murder In the Loop had been produced and released Farley would have been done for. The story would have been recognized and the Chicago police would have been compelled to move against him. Public opinion would have forced them to. The Czar was paying out thousands of dollars every month to keep that massacre from burying him. And he knew that if Mtirder In the Loop was ever shown in Chicago, he was a ruined man." "So he arranged to . . .?" "Exactly. He decided to stop the picture. First of all he tried to buy the rights off Fishbein. Fishbein refused. Then he tried to get the owner of the Cosmic Studios to put Fishbein out. Fishbein had a water-tight lease. Farley tried every other stunt he could think of to stop the picture, but none of them was successful. As a final resort, he decided to use violence. He knew that if he killed off a couple of directors no one else would consent to , go on with the picture." "Oh, Kenny darling," said Joyce, kissing him hungrily, "just suppose old Fishbein had chosen you to be the director!" "He has, my girl, he has! We begin shooting in the morning. And this time there will be no interruptions!" HEN Murder In the Loop had its world premiere at the Globe Theatre in New York, Kenny Dow and Joyce Joy (Mrs. Kenneth Dow in private life, if you please!) travelled across the continent to attend the opening. They were given a tremendous ovation by the crowds. Murder In the Loop ran to a capacity house at the Globe Theatre for months. For all I know it may be running there still! 87