"And then what?" I encourages him.

"And then nothin'!" he says. "That's all! Except I'm off the Golden West Club, the movies and this part of the country! I got enough.

Them guys over there to-night gimme the tip-off--I don't belong, that's all! I was a sucker to ever stop fightin' to be a actor, but I got wise in time. You go ahead and sign me right up with anybody but Dempsey, and if Genaro don't start my picture to-morrow, I'll give 'em back their money and you and me will leave the Golden West flat on its back!"

Say! I was so happy I couldn't sleep. I just turned over on my side and registered joy all night long!

The next mornin' we go to Genaro the first thing, and the Kid puts it up to him right off the bat. Either he starts "How Kid Scanlan Won the t.i.tle" or he kisses us good-by. Genaro raves and pulls his hair for awhile, but they ain't no more give to the Kid than they is to marble and finally Genaro says he'll start the picture right away.

We find out that another director is usin' the whole camp to put on a trick called "The Fall of Babylon," so we got to go over to an island in the well known Pacific Ocean and take what they call exteriors there. They rounded up Miss Vincent, De Vronde, the cuckoo that wrote the thing, and about a hundred other people and load us all on a yacht belongin' to Potts. We're gonna stay on this trick island till the picture is finished, and we eat and sleep on the yacht.

On the trip over, we all go down in what Potts claims is the grand saloon and Van Aylstyne, the hick that wrote the picture, reads it to us. It starts off showin' the Kid workin' in a pickle factory on the East Side in New York. They're only slippin' him five berries a week and out of that he's keepin' his widowed mother and seven of her children. One day he finds a newspaper and all over the front page is a article tellin' about all the money the welterweight champion is makin', so the Kid figures the pickle game is no place for a young feller with his talent, and decides to become welterweight champ.

First he tries himself out by slammin' the guy he's workin' for, after catchin' him insultin' the stenographer by askin' her to take a ride in his runabout, when the buyer is already takin' her out in his limousine. When the boss comes back to life, he fires the Kid and our hero goes out and knocks down a few odd brutes here and there for gettin' fresh with innocent chorus girls and the like. Finally, he practically wrecks a swell gamblin' joint where he has gone to rescue his girl, which had been lured there by the handsome stranger from the city.

"Well!" says Potts, when Van Aylstyne gets finished. "How does that strike you?"

"What I like," pipes Miss Vincent, with a funny little quirk of her lip and a wink at De Vronde. "What I like is its daring originality!"

Van Aylstyne stiffens up.

"Of course," he says, kinda sore, "if I'm to be criticised by--"

"Ain't they no villains or nothin' like that in it?" b.u.t.ts in the Kid, frownin' at him.

"Joosta one minoote!" says Genaro. "Don't get excite! That's joosta firsta reel!"

He waves his hand at Van Aylstyne, and this guy gives a couple of glares all around and then turns over another page. It seems at this stage of the game, a lot of gunmen get together to stop the Kid from winnin' the t.i.tle, so they throw him off a cliff. He gets up, dusts off his clothes, registers anger and flattens half a dozen of 'em. A little bit later he gets fastened to a railroad track and the fast mail runs over him. This makes him peeved, and he gets up and wallops a couple of tramps that's pa.s.sing for luck. Then the villain's gang of rough and readys grabs him again and he is throwed off a ship into the ocean. A guy comes along in a motor boat, and, after shootin' a few times at the Kid without actually killin' him, registers surprise and runs over him. When the Kid comes up there ain't nothin' to wallop, so he swims six miles to the island. The minute he crawls on the beach he faces the camera and registers exhaustion. Then a lot of guys jump out and stab him. He knocks 'em all cold and then he goes on, fights the champ and wins the t.i.tle.

"Is that all there is to it?" asks the Kid, when Van Aylstyne stops for breath and applause.

"Practically all," Van Aylstyne tells him. "Of course I'll have to go over it and spice it up a little more--get more action in it here and there, wherever it appears to drag. But we can do this as we go along."

"Yes!" says Potts. "You'll have to do that. I want this picture to be the thriller of the year!" He scratches his chin for a minute and looks at Van Aylstyne. "You better ginger it up a bit at that!" he goes on. "It sounds a little tame to me. See if you can't work in a couple of spectacular fires, a sensational runaway with Mr. Scanlan being dragged along the ground, or you might have him do a slide for life from the topmast of the yacht to one of the trees along the sh.o.r.e here."

"Wait!" pipes Genaro. "I have joosta the thing! While I listen, I getta thisa granda idea! Meester Scanlan, he'sa can be throw from the airsheep and--"

"Lay off, lay off!" b.u.t.ts in the 'Kid. "They's enough action in that thing right now to suit me! Don't put nothin' else in it. I'll be busier than a one-armed paperhanger as it is!" He turns to Van Aylstyne. "Where d'ye get that stuff?" he scowls. "Would _you_ jump off a cliff, hey?"

Van Aylstyne throws out his little chest, while the rest of them snickers.

"I _write_ it!" he says.

"Yeh?" pipes the Kid. "Well, you'll _jump_ it, too, bo, believe me!"

"What's a mat?" hollers Genaro. "What's a use hava the fighta now?

Wait till we starta the picture, then everybody she'sa fighta!

Something she'sa go wrong. _Sapristi_! we feexa her then. Joosta holda tight your horses!"

He pats the Kid on the shoulder and slips him a cigar.

The rest of the trip to the island took about two hours, durin' which time the Kid and Miss Vincent sat on the top deck, and she give him his daily lesson in how to speak English, eat soup and a lot more of that high society stuff.

We finally got to this island place and by three o'clock the next afternoon they was half way through with the first reel. I horned in on the thing myself, takin' off a copper, for which they gimme five bucks even.

That night they was big doings on board the yacht. They had music and dancin' and what not galore. Van Aylstyne, Potts, De Vronde and most of the other help was there in the soup and fish and the twenty odd dames that was actin' in the picture was all dressed up to thrill. I never seen so much of this here de collect stuff in my life. I heard a lot of talk around the studios at the camp about "exposures," and, well, I seen what they meant all right that evenin'. It got me so dizzy, never havin' no closeups like that before, that I ducked for my stateroom about nine o'clock when the joy was just beginnin' to be unconfined and I hadn't been up there five minutes, when the Kid comes up and knocks at my door.

"I'm goin' to hit the hay," he tells me. "If I gotta fight Battlin'

Edwards in two months, I'm gonna start readyin' up now! I been puttin'

on fat since I been here, and it's got to come off. I'll get up at five to-morrow and do a gallop around the island, and I just dug up a couple of ex-bartenders among the extry people which will gimme some sparrin' practice every mornin' till they give out!"

"Great!" I says. I was hardly able to believe my ears. It sounded like the old Kid Scanlan again!

I closed the door, and just as he was turnin' away, I heard the swish of skirts and then I got Miss Vincent's voice. It was low and sweet and kinda soothin' and--well, she was the kind of dame guys kill each other for! Do you get me?

"Oh!" she kinda breathes. "Why are you up here all alone?"

I heard the Kid's deep breathin'--it was always that way when _she_ spoke to him, and I knowed without seein' 'em that his nails was engravin' fancy work on the palm of his hand.

"Why," he says, tryin' to keep his voice steady. "I'm off this tango thing--and the last time I had one of them dress suits on, I was mistook for a waiter!"

Y'know there was a funny little catch in the Kid's voice when he pulled that, although he tried to pa.s.s it off by coughin'. That boy sure did want to mix with the big leaguers, and, bein' Irish, it come hard to him to miss anything he wanted. Usually he got it!

I heard Miss Vincent sneer.

"Don't flatter these conceit-drugged travesties on the male s.e.x by caring about anything _they_ say," she tells him. "You have so many things they never will have! Why, you're a big, clean, two-handed man and--" She breaks off and gives a giggle that I would have took Verdun for. "But there!" she goes on. "I--I--guess I'm getting too enthusiastic!"

I could almost feel her blush, and I knowed how she looked when she did that thing, so I says, "Good-by, Kid!"

"That's all right!" pipes the Kid. "It wasn't these guys here. But I can't go downstairs anyhow, because I gotta start trainin' for Battlin'

Edwards."

"Oh, bother Battling Edwards!" she says. "I thought you promised me to give up prize fighting!"

This was a new one on me, and it cleared up a lot of things I hadn't been able to figure out before!

"I gotta take it back," I hear the Kid sayin' in a kinda dead voice.

"I pulled a bone play when I did that! I can't give up fightin' no more than you can give up the movies! The only thing I got is a wallop, and that won't get me nowhere in the movies or society, but it got me the t.i.tle in the ring. I guess I'll stick to my own game!"

"Oh, come!" she tells him, kinda impatient. "You have the blues!

Shake 'em off--I don't like you when you scowl like that. Come on down and have a dance with me. You'll feel better."

"You said somethin'!" answers the Kid. "But I can't--on the level. I gotta train for this guy, or he's liable to bounce me, and, if I lose this quarrel, I'm through! Y'see, this ain't no movie, this is gonna be the real thing! If this guy flattens me, he'll be the champion and you _know_ that bird is gonna be in there tryin' till the last bell!"

I peeked through them little wooden cheaters on the window and I seen her kinda stiffen up and register surprise.

"I am not accustomed to coaxing people to dance with me, Mr. Scanlan,"

she says, "and--"

"Yes, and I'm not used to havin' dames like _you_ ask me!" b.u.t.ts in the Kid. "But I gotta beat Edwards--and I can't beat him by stayin' up late!"