Is Your Little Girl Safe?

A Stirring Scenario of Sex, Souls and Slavery, According to the Accepted Movie Pattern

DOROTHY PARKER

Cast of Characters

MARY Blakf.—just a girl,—like your daughter or mine.

MRS. BLAKE, her widowed mother.

JOHN MURDOCK, a man's man.

HARFORD NEVILLE, a wealthy millionaire.

VERA LA TOUR, one of Those Women.

GUNMEN, THIEVES, GAMBLERS, KIDNAPPERS, SECOND-STORY WORKERS, WHITE SLAVERS, INEBRIATES, DRUG FIENDS, MAGDALENS, etc.

CAPTION: "Mary Blake—one of God's sweetest flowers, blossoming in the pure sunshine of mother love, all unknowing the bitter winds of men's evil passions that rage outside of the sheltered garden of her life." (Suggested decoration for caption: Crossed Easter lilies.)

Close-up of Mary, taken on a windy day, against a background of apple-trees in full bloom. She is bending down one branch and chatting vivaciously to an unresponsive pigeon balanced on the end of it. Slow fadeout.

The Blake's house—respectable poverty indicated by shop-worn furniture, oil lamps, and stained wall-paper, but the impression of a cultured and artistic taste conveyed by the chenille portieres, the ribbon rosette on the canary's cage, the reproduction of "The Soul's Awakening" over the mantel, and the lace tidies on the footstools. Mrs. Blake is lying on a sofa with a shawl over her, registering extreme ill-health. Mary runs in, excitedly waving a newspaper. She drops to her knees beside the sofa, and lovingly thrusts the paper in her mother's face.

Close-up of the lower half of a help-wanted page in the Evening World, supported by a spatulate thumb in the lower left-hand corner. In the middle is pasted an advertisement—in type three times as large as that surrounding it. It reads, "Young lady wanted for important position in refined office. Must be young and attractive. No previous experience necessary. Apply to Harford Neville, Wall Street."

Mrs. Blake and Mary embrace rapturously, and Mary rushes to get ready to answer the advertisement. She runs to the mirror and begins to unbutton her dress. Immediate change of scene.

Neville's outer office—his tremendous business interests are shown by tickers, stock reports, insurance calendars, revolving chairs, hordes of clerks rushing in and out, wearing pencils on their ears, and three stenographers strumming on typewriters. A large glass door at the end of the room bears the sinister legend "Harford Neville, Private." Mary enters timidly and speaks to the office boy. He motions languidly to the glass door, and she falteringly approaches it.

CAPTION: "Harford Neville—rich and powerful, who crouches behind his bags of gold, waiting his-chance to cruelly spring on the helpless ones that relentless Fate sends across his path." (Suggested decoration for caption: Bag of gold, on which sits a longtailed devil, his hands clasped around his crossed knees.)

Close-up of Neville, a large and heavily built man, with hair touched with talcum at the temples, wearing a cutaway and nervously chewing the end of a thick black cigar.

Neville's inner, or private office. He is sitting in a large leather chair before an impressive desk, frowning at a pile of letters. He glances up impatiently as Mary enters, then looks amazed, and springs up to meet her. He brings a chair for her and they talk, Mary gradually losing her shyness. Finally she rises and grasps his hand in impulsive gratitude, then runs happily from the office. He goes to the door and stands looking after her, registering lust.

CAPTION: "And so Mary became Neville's private secretary, little thinking, as the busy days slipped by, that he who she so trusted in was but biding his time, craftily spinning the trap in which to some day snare her." (Suggested decoration for caption: A spider and its web.)

Neville's private office. Mary is improvising on the typewriter, while Neville sits at the desk, watching her. She looks »t the clock, which registers 4:50, and springs up to put on her hat and coat. Neville follows her, and puts a hand on her shoulder.

CAPTION: "Why will you not dine with me this evening, Miss Blake? I am very lonely, and you will be doing me a great favor by giving me the pleasure of your company. I will escort you to your home at an early hour —your mother will not worry, I feel sure." (Suggested decoration: Bottle and overturned glass of wine.)

Mary stands a moment in doubt. A flash of her mother, lying on the sofa, wearing an expression of intense suffering, appears on the upper left-hand corner of the screen. Mary puts her hand over her eyes as if to shut out the vision, then squares her shoulders, tosses back her curls, and nods at Neville. They leave the office together.

Close-up of Mary and Neville in Neville's limousine. He is leaning close, talking to her, while his arm rests on the cretonne upholstery behind her. Mary sits very straight, as far from him as possible. Both sway constantly, giving the effect of the limousine's rapid motion.

CAPTION: "The White Light restaurant— the heart of the night life of the pleasurecrazed metropolis, where many a fluttering moth has had her frail wings singed in the dizzy whirlpool of folly." (Suggested decoration: Girl dancing on table.)

Private room in the restaurant. Table set for two, mostly with glasses. A waiter hovers over the table. The door opens, admitting Mary and Neville, followed by a head-waiter. Mary gazes delightedly around the room, registering, "So this is Paris." While she isn't looking, Neville draws the head-waiter aside and gives him a small vial, making elaborate gestures of secrecy. The waiter bows reassuringly, and tiptoes over to the serving-table, looking nervously around him. As even this does not attract Mary's attention, he slowly pours the contents of the vial into one of the two cocktails which are standing on the serving-table.

Close-up of slightly soiled hand holding vial, the contents of which drop slowly into the halffilled cocktail glass, causing a succession of evil-looking bubbles to rise slowly to the top.

Mary and Neville sit at the table, and the waiter serves the cocktails, giving Mary the drugged glass. (This is done very slowly and carefully, so that every one in the audience can get it—without a struggle.) Mary at first refuses to drink, then, as Neville urges her, she raises the glass. A small trick picture of Mrs. Blake (tossing feverishly about on her sofa) appears in the glass. Mary puts the glass down hastily. She and Neville argue, for about a hundred feet of film, to prolong the dramatic suspense; then Mary recklessly drinks the cocktail. She instantly becomes dazed, looks about her, bewildered, then falls in graceful unconsciousness on the table. Her hair promptly comes down. Neville carries her out of the room.

CAPTION: "John Murdock, reporter on the 'Daily Sphere.' Unheard of in the gay life of the metropolis, because he is not one of its so-called aristocrats or society idlers, but a member of the nobility of toil." (Suggested decoration: An acorn and a sturdy oak.)

Close-up of John Murdock, wearing the conventional belted coat and Fedora hat. He carries a pad and pencil, thus showing that he is a reporter. He looks fearlessly into the camera and rapidly raises and lowers his chest, registering virility.

The exterior of the White Light restaurant. John is just passing when Neville comes out, carrying the unconscious Mary—a scene which is regarded with utter indifference by the doorman of the restaurant. John sees them, stops, and watches Neville and his burden get into a taxi. He waits till the taxi slarts, to make it more difficult, then takes a running jump and hangs on to the back of the cab.

CAPTION: "Vera La Tour, a product of the metropolis,—a creature without soul or shame, in whose gilded halls such men. as Harford Neville find ready welcome." (Suggested decoration: A coiled serpent, rearing its head.)

Close-up of Vera La Tour, lying, in curves, on a divan which is covered with tiger skins. She is leaning on her elbow and flaunting the movie badge of shame—a cigarette. Picture fades slowly into

The Den of Iniquity; Vera La Tour's apartment,—a place evidently about the size of the Grand Central Palace. A large, high-ceilinged room, caked with furniture of the late Robert E. Lee period, and lined with paintings and mirrors. Vera reclines on her divan. Glimpses may be had of adjoining rooms with men and women in evening dress crowding about a roulette wheel, and of other depraved creatures shamelessly dancing the two-step and the oldfashioned waltz. Powdered footmen pass in and out, carrying bottles of synthetic champagne.

Neville enters, carrying the still unconscious Mary. Vera looks at him in languid surprise, laughs contemptuously, and flicks the ash from her cigarette. She rises and leads the way to a smaller room (which is thrown on the screen in a gruesome green light). The room is poorly furnished and contains a cot. Neville places Mary on the cot, and he and Vera leave the room, in order to give Mary the center of the screen. The moment they leave, she regains consciousness.

(Continued on page 78)

(Continued from page 46)

Close-up of Mary, registering "Where am I?" Flash of Mrs. Blake, lying on her sofa, pathetically watching the clock. Close-up of a clock registering 9:25.

Seville re-enters the room, smiling wickedly at Mary, who backs away from him in terror. He locks the door lingeringly ; meaningly puts the key in his pocket, and approaches her. She struggles with him desperately,—her clothes tear in all the most becoming places. She at last breaks away from him and rushes to the window. Close-up of her face, with plump tears of glycerine sliding slowly down her cheeks. Flash of John Murdock in the street below, registering Nobility of Purpose. He sees Mary's face at the twelfth-floor window, immediately flings down his Fedora hat and tears off his girdled coat, revealing a Byronic shirt, and begins to douglasfairbanks up the outside of the house.

Neville sneaks up on Mary, and the struggle begins JTgain. He slowly overpowers her. The entire picture is about to be stopped by the National Board of Censorship when John appears on the outside of the window. He leaps into the room, landing on Neville. They battle—one of the great moments of the film. Chairs and tables are overturned, and both men bleed dark paint profusely. John's shirt tears picturesquely, but nothing interferes with the glistening perfection of his coiffure. Mary conveniently faints again. The fight looks like a draw when it is interrupted by a flash of Vera La Tour, pounding furiously on the outside of the locked door.

CAPTION : "For Heaven's sake, unlock the door. The Police !!! The Police!!!!!!!" (Suggested decoration: Pair of handcuffs, held together by a festoon of heavy chains.)

The fight ceases abruptly. Neville, cursing visibly, staggers to the door and unlocks it, admitting Vera. All register excitement except Mary, who goes right on fainting. The scene changes abruptly to

The Raid. The Big Scene. Here is the chance for the director to show his real stuff. Battalions of policemen swarm all over the apartment, completely surprising the roulette-players and the waltzers. General panorama of the conflict. interspersed with close-ups of handto-hand struggles. Grimly realistic notes are given by flashes of policemen penetrating dark corners and bringing blinking drug-fiends into the light, and closeups of wild women at bay. All the furniture is upset or pulled about, and the wounded lie around on the floor. At this point a gang of gunmen arrives, through a back passageway, almost overpowering the police. (This not only makes things more exciting, but it brings in the requisite touch of the underworld, and also gives employment to innumerable supers.)

At the critical moment, however, a fresh battalion of police arrive and efficiently clean up the place.

The scene reverts to Vera, Mary (who is now regaining consciousness), Neville, and John. Vera, who has not registered the least surprise at seeing John in the room, turns furiously on Neville.

CAPTION: "For me has come the end, for I can never face the darkness of the prison cell. But. before I go. Harford Neville, I shall send you back to the Hades from which you came from, for it was you who made me the thing you now see before you." (Suggested decoration: Tigress about to spring.)

Vera draws a pearl-handled dagger from her bodice and stabs Neville in the heart. He dies—for fifty feet or so,— and finally sinks to the floor. Then, without even cleaning the dagger, Vera kills herself. Mary registers terror, and clings to John, who puts a strong arm around her.

CAPTION: "Come, little girl, this house of horror is no place for you and I." (Suggested decoration: Same pair of handcuffs as before, but this time with all the festoons of chains hanging broken.)

John climbs to the window-sill and helps Mary up beside him. A telegraph wire is conveniently stretched from the window to the roof of the house opposite. John turns his back on Mary; she clasps her arms around his neck. With Mary clinging tightly to him, John grasps the wire, and works his way along it, hand over hand, to the opposite roof. (There is no special reason why they shouldn't go right through the front door and walk quietly out into the street, but the picture has to live up to its advertisements.) John's hair remains absolutely unimpaired. Apparently much refreshed by this little wire act, they run across a long expanse of roofs. On the last roof they pause, looking for a means of descent. An open automobile passes below them. John takes Mary's hand and they leap, landing neatly in the tonneau.

Close-up of them both in the speeding automobile, showing that John's hair still retains its original glistening order.

The Blake's house, again. Mrs. Blake and Mary are embracing while John stands benignantly above them, his arms folded, the torn shirt sleeves displaying the muscles admirably. Mary turns shyly to John.

CAPTION : "How am I to ever really thank you for saving me from a fate far worse than death? Although I do not even know whom you are, my deathless gratitude is forever yours." (Suggested decoration: A wreath of orange blossoms.)

John looks at Mary, who shyly drops her eyes. Mrs. Blake turns discreetly away.

CAPTION: "But Gratitude is very close to that purest of all God's gifts to us—True Love." (Suggested decoration : Cupid shooting at a winged heart.)

John holds out his arms and Mary walks into them. They embrace—at great length. Then, still embracing, both turn their backs on the camera for the first time in the entire production. Fade out as slowly as possible.

CAPTION: "And so the wedding

bells rang out, and a year passed by, bringing to Mary and John merciful forgetfulness of life's dregs in the great metropolis. For two soft little hands have now come to gently lead them up the pathway of love to the warm sunshine that always lies even beyond life's darkest shadows." (Suggested decoration : High chair, with a rattle lying on the floor beside it.)

A large brass bed containing Mary, in an elaborate boudoir-cap and negligee. Beside her is her new-born child—a large, strong baby, at least eight months old. John, his hair still orderly, hovers happily above them, clothed in a full dress suit.

Slow fade-out.

The word "Finis" flashes upon the screen.

Then, without a pause, follows the announcement in red, yellow and green: "At This Theatre, Next Wednesday and Thursday Positively—Theda Bara, in the Six-Reel Drama of Thrills and Passion. 'The Love Drunkard.' "