?" demanded Mr. Pertell, angrily.

The other did not answer.

"Now, you get out of here!" ordered the manager, "and never come back."

"I'll not go until I get what is coming to me," was the sullen retort.

"If you got what is coming to you it would be arrest!" declared Walsh.

"I want my money!" mumbled Wilson.

"Here is an order on the cashier for it," said Mr. Pertell. "Get it
and--go!"

Hastily writing on a slip of paper, he tendered it to the actor, who
took it without a word, and slunk off. The others watched him curiously.
It was something they had never before witnessed--an attempt to gain
possession of the secrets of the company--for a moving picture concern
guards its films jealously, until they are "released," or ready for
reproduction.

"Curious," remarked Mr. Pertell, "but I had a distrust of that chap from
the first. Do any of you know him?"

"I acted mit him vunce in der Universal company, but he dit not stay
long," said Mr. Switzer.

"Probably he was up to some underhand work," observed Walsh.

"I wonder what his object was?" went on the manager. "He evidently
wasn't doing this for himself." Idly he turned over the scrap of paper
on which the other had been making notes in the testing room. Then the
manager uttered a cry of surprise.

"Ha! The International Picture Company! This is part of one of their
letter heads. So Wilson was working for them! They very likely sent him
here to get a position, and instructed him to steal some of our secrets
and ideas, if he could. The scoundrel!"

"He didn't see much!" chuckled Walsh. "The film broke after a few feet
had been run off, and I switched on the lights. He didn't see a great
deal."

"No, his notes show that," said the manager. "But only for that
accident he might have learned of our plans and given our rivals
information sufficient to spoil our big play."

"Have you new plans?" asked Mr. DeVere, who was on very friendly terms
with the manager.

"Yes, we are going to make a big three-reel play, called 'East and
West,' and while some of the scenes will be laid in New York, the main
ones will be filmed out beyond the Mississippi. One of the most
important New York scenes has already been made. It was this one which
was being tested when Wilson went in there. Had he seen it all he might
have guessed at the rest of our plans and our rivals, the International
people, would have been able to get ahead of us. They are always on the
alert to tak