Mr. Ward.

“I wonder—” began Jim. “Could I possibly talk to you alone?”

“I trust Mr. Ward,” said Pamela frowning. “He’s been over here twenty-five years and he’s practically my business manager.”

Jim wondered from what deep loneliness this relationship had sprung. “I hear there was more trouble on the set,” he said.

“Trouble!” She was wide-eyed. “Griffin’s assistant swore at me and I heard it. So I walked out. And if Griffin sent apologies by you I don’t want them—our relation is going to be strictly business from now on.”

“He didn’t send apologies,” said Jim uncomfortably. “He sent an ultimatum.”

“An ultimatum!” she exclaimed. “I’ve got a contract, and you’re his boss, aren’t you?”

“To an extent,” said Jim, “—but, of course, making pictures is a joint matter—”

“Then let me try another director.”

“Fight for your rights,” said Mr. Ward. “That’s the only thing that impresses them.”

“You’re doing your best to wreck this girl,” said Jim quietly.

“You can’t frighten me,” snapped Ward. “I’ve seen your type before.”

Jim looked again at Pamela. There was exactly nothing he could do. Had they been in love, had it ever seemed the time to encourage the spark between them, he might have reached her now. But it was too late. In the Hollywood darkness outside he seemed to feel the swift wheels of the industry turning. He knew that when the studio opened tomorrow, Mike Harris would have new plans that did not include Pamela at all.

VIII

For a moment longer he hesitated. He was a well-liked man, still young, and with a wide approval. He could buck them about this girl, send her to a dramatic teacher. He could not bear to see her make such a mistake. On the other hand he was afraid that somewhere people had yielded to her too much, spoiled her for this sort of career.

“Hollywood isn’t a very civilized place,” said Pamela.

“It’s a jungle,” agreed Mr. Ward. “Full of prowling beasts of prey.”

Jim rose. “Well, this one will prowl out,” he said. “Pam, I’m very sorry. Feeling like you do, I think you’d be wise to go back to England and get married.”

For a moment a flicker of doubt was in her eyes. But her confidence, her young egotism, was greater than her judgement—she did not realize that this very minute was opportunity and she was losing it forever.

For she had lost it when Jim turned and went out. It was weeks before she knew how it happened. She received her salary for some months—Jim saw to that—but she did not set foot on that lot again. Nor on any other. She was placed quietly on that black list that is not written down but that functions at backgammon games after dinner, or on the way to the races. Men of influence stared at her with interest at restaurants here and there but all their inquiries about her reached the same dead end.

She never gave up during the following months—even long after Becker had lost interest and she was in want, and no longer seen in the places where people go to be looked at. It was not from grief or discouragement but only through commonplace circumstances that in June she died…

When Jim heard about it, it seemed incredible and terrible. He learned accidentally that she was in the hospital with pneumonia—he telephoned and found that she was dead. “Sybil Higgins, actress, English. Age twenty-one.”

She had given old Ward as the person to be informed and Jim managed to get him enough money to cover the funeral expenses, on the pretext that some old salary was still owing. Afraid that Ward might guess the source of the money he did not go to the funeral but a week later he drove out to the grave.

It was a long bright June day and he stayed there an hour. All over the city there were young people just breathing and being happy and it seemed senseless that the little English girl was not one of them. He kept on trying and trying to twist things about so that they would come out right for her but it was too late. He said good-by aloud and promised that he would come again.

Back at the studio he reserved a projection room and asked for her tests and for the bits of film that had been shot on her picture. He sat in a big leather chair in the darkness and pressed the button for it to begin.

In the test Pamela was dressed as he had seen her that first night at the dance. She looked very happy and he was glad she had had at least that much happiness. The reel of takes from the picture began and ran jerkily with the sound of Bob Griffin’s voice off scene and with prop boys showing the number of blocks for the scenes. Then Jim started as the next to the last one came up, and he saw her turn from the camera and whis­per: “I’d rather die than do it that way.”

Jim got up and went back to his office where he opened the three notes he had from her and read them again.

“—just passing by the studio and thought of you and of our ride.”

Just passing by. During the spring she had called him twice on the phone, he knew, and he wanted to see her. But he could do nothing for her and could not bear to tell her so.

“I am not very brave,” Jim said to himself. Even now there was fear in his heart that this would haunt him like that memory of his youth, and he did not want to be unhappy.

Several days later he worked late in the dubbing room, and afterward he dropped into his neighborhood drugstore for a sandwich. It was a warm night and there were many young people at the soda counter. He was paying his check when he became aware that a figure was standing by the magazine rack looking at him over the edge of a magazine. He stopped—he did not want to turn for a closer look only to find the resemblance at an end. Nor did he want to go away.

He heard the sound of a page turning and then out of the corner of his eye he saw the magazine cover, the Illustrated London News.

IX

He felt no fear—he was thinking too quickly, too desperately. If this were real and he could snatch her back, start from there, from that night.

“Your change, Mr. Leonard.”

“Thank you.”

Still without looking he started for the door and then he heard the magazine close, drop to a pile and he heard someone breathe close to his side. Newsboys were calling an extra across the street and after a moment he turned the wrong way, her way, and he heard her following—so plain that he slowed his pace with the sense that she had trouble keeping up with him.

In front of the apartment court he took her in his arms and drew her radiant beauty close.

“Kiss me good night,” she said. “I like to be kissed good night. I sleep better.”

Then sleep, he thought, as he turned away—sleep. I couldn’t fix it. I tried to fix it. When you brought your beauty here I didn’t want to throw it away, but I did somehow. There is nothing left for you now but sleep.

Published in Collier’s magazine (16 April 1949)