d animals. They talked of
blizzards and of high water and of short grass and of thunderstorms.
They added little touches to the big range picture Luck had planned to
make. Starting off suddenly in this wise: "Say, Luck, why don't you
have--?" and the fires of enthusiasm would flare again in Luck's eyes,
and the talk would grow eager.

But--and here was the key to the remarkable interpretation which Luck
permitted the Happy Family to give the Bently Brown stories--some time
before the evening was too old, Luck would swing the talk around to the
work they were doing. He would pull a Bently Brown scenario from his
pocket and read, with much sarcastic comment, the scenes they were later
to enact. He would incite the Happy Family to poking fun at such lurid
performances as Bently Brown described in all seriousness and in detail.
He would encourage comment and argument and the play of their caustic
imaginations upon the action of the story. He would gradually make them
see the whole thing in the light of a huge joke; he would, without saying
much himself, bring the Happy Family into the mood of wanting to make
Bently Brown appear ridiculous to all beholders.

Is it any wonder, then, if the camera man and the assistants should
exchange puzzled glances when Luck put the Happy Family through their
scenes? Exits and entrances, the essential details of the action, Luck
directed painstakingly, as always he had done. Why, then, said camera man
to assistants, should he let those fellows go in and ball up the dramatic
business and turn whole scenes into farce with their foolery? And why had
he chosen Tracy Gray Joyce as leading man? And that eye-rolling, limp
sentimentalist, Lenore Honiwell, as his leading woman? Luck was known to
despise these two, personally and professionally. They could not, to save
their lives, get through a dramatic scene together without giving the
observers a sickish feeling. To see Tracy Gray Joyce lay his hand upon
the left side of his cravat and cast his eyes upward always made Luck
shiver; yet Tracy Gray Joyce would he have for leading man, and none
other. To see Lenore Honiwell throw back her head, close her eyes, and
heave one of those terrific motion-picture sighs always made the camera
man snort; yet Luck, who before had considered her scarcely worth a civil
bow when he met her, had actually coaxed her away from a director who
really admired her style of acting.

And when Luck, who had always gone ab