The Cutthroat

When the Jekyll & Hyde Special started out for St. Louis, Bell joined the closing-night cast party in the dining car. While pretending to trade small talk, Archie Abbott explained the gas-fitter connection to the Cutthroat.

“If we’re right that he’s had backstage experience, it’s no coincidence that he’s a gas fitter. These days, lighting effects are all electrical. But theater electricians also manage water effects, like rain and floods. That’s because plumbing and gas fitting are similar trades and used to fit pipes to light theaters with gas.”

“He’s an actor, first and foremost,” said Isaac Bell. “It’s one thing to know how to be a gas fitter, but to impersonate a fitter — to costume himself and portray himself as a workman so believably that he could fool an operator as sharp as Jerry Sedgwick, inside our field office, which has his face on a wanted poster — the Cutthroat has got to be one heck of an actor.”

39

ST. LOUIS

“My so-called St. Louis Express was late,” said Marion Morgan Bell. “I missed the show, and I haven’t even changed, but I hoped I could catch you before you left the theater.”

Isabella Cook was removing makeup in her Grand Opera House dressing room.

She inspected the tall blonde and liked what she saw. Stylish in a traveling outfit of tweed jacket, boot-length straight skirt, and a snug cloche hat, Marion Morgan had forthright sea-coral green eyes and a sure-footed smile — clearly a woman like herself who got things done and done right.

“Your husband claimed he was faithful to his wife. One look and I’m not surprised.”

“Sounds like you tested him.”

“It would have been a mug’s game. Have you eaten?”

“On the train, thank you.”

“Would you like a glass of wine — I’m having several.”

Her maid poured a glass of Billecart-Salmon Brut champagne for Marion and topped off Isabella’s, who said, “Your telegram was the first I’ve ever had that offered immortality.”

“Isaac wrote me that you expressed a low opinion of ‘movie manufacturing.’ I wanted to capture your attention.”

“You have it. What’s your pitch?”

“There will come a day when the last men and women who were thrilled by you tonight in St. Louis will pass from this earth and take their memory of your performance with them. But if you allow me to film your performance, it will live forever.”

“But I won’t live forever.”

“But we will both live longer than we can imagine when we’re this young. Isaac was just in London and he saw my film of King Edward’s funeral procession. I haven’t been in London in a year, but it’s still showing in the movie theaters. If you let me film your performance in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, you can see your Gabriella Utterson again and again, year after year, for the rest of your life — and so can your audience.”

“They’ll get bored after the second decade.”

“Not of the performance I saw in Columbus,” said Marion, and Isabella Cook laughed.

“Are you always so persuasive?”

“Only for good causes.”

“Do you have your Isaac wrapped around your finger?”

“We wrap each other.”

Isabella Cook sighed. “I’ll bet you do… Would he happen to have a brother?”

Marion shook her head, with a small smile. “He’s an only child. His mother died when he was a little boy… I want to move the play out of doors, beyond the confines of the stage.”

“Why?”

“When Mr. Hyde stalks your Gabriella in a storm, I want beautiful Central Park buffeted by a gale.”

“Why?”

“Death is a thief. It steals our joys. When we take Gabriella Utterson out of doors, we will see her joy in the sun, in the rain, in the snow and trees and sky — the joy she will lose if the evil in Jekyll and Hyde takes her life.”

“How do you go about ‘buffeting’?”

“I haven’t done any yet, but while I was shooting a comedy at Biograph last month, a scenic designer, Mr. Sennett, invented a wind machine that I’m going to try.”

“What is a ‘wind machine’?”

“An enormous propeller spun by an airplane motor.”

“Pointed at the actors?”

Marion Morgan smiled. “Did I promise it would be easy?”

Isabella Cook laughed.

“What do say, Miss Cook?”

“I am leery of any performance I can’t control. Technically, Mr. Barrett and Mr. Buchanan direct the play. But I do nothing on that stage that I don’t want to. I am an intelligent woman who trusts her instincts. But when your camera stops rolling, the show is only half done. I won’t be around when you make the final decisions pasting up the film the audience sees.”

“Of course you’ll be around.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m also an intelligent woman who trusts her instincts. My instinct tells me that you make decisions for the good of the show. Editing is a painstaking process. You may stand beside me as long as you can bear it.”

Isabella Cook put down her glass. She shook her head. “Why don’t we discuss this in the morning?”

Marion looked crestfallen.

Isabella Cook said, “Let me guess. You don’t want to see your Isaac if you can’t tell him you talked me into this.”

Marion nodded.