l over."

"What do you think about 'Kings'?" Helen asked her father.

He leaned back in his chair and Janet thought she saw a touch of
weariness in his face.

"I don't know," he said softly. "It should be a good picture, but
whether it will be a great picture is something else again. We can only
wait until it's out of the cutting room."

Janet, although in a comparatively minor role, had been a key figure in
the making of "Kings of the Air," for a rival company, attempting to
hinder the progress of the picture, had hired an actress in the company,
blonde Bertie Jackson, and two renegade airmen, to make every effort to
slow up production. Janet had been kidnaped and held prisoner overnight
while the ghost town, where the company was located, was burned and a
big set on the desert bombed. But the resourcefulness of Curt Newsom,
cowboy star who had a role in the picture, had helped expose the
sabotage and Janet had been speedily released. As a result she had been
promoted to Bertie Jackson's role and had handled it like a veteran
trouper.

Just then George, the cook, looked in to see if more bacon and eggs were
needed, and Helen's mother, in a dressing gown, joined them.

"Someone should have called me," she said.

"But you don't have to report on the lot and we do," Helen reminded her
mother.

It was 5:30 o'clock when they finished breakfast.

"I'll drive you over to the lot," said Henry Thorne. "Mother, you dress
while I'm away and we'll take a long drive into the mountains and stop
someplace for lunch. We'll sort of have a day's vacation for ourselves."

Then they were away, speeding toward the studio in an open car. It was a
glorious morning and the cool air was invigorating. Later in the day it
would be uncomfortably hot.

Billy Fenstow, director of western pictures, was on stage nine, well to
the back of the Ace lot.

There were few around the rambling studio at that hour, for production
was past its peak and only two or three of the huge sound stages would
be in use that day.

The director, who had only a fringe of hair around his shining pate,
greeted them cordially.

"Have you read over the script of 'Water Hole'?" he asked.

Janet nodded. "I like it better than 'Broad Valley,'" she smiled.

Billy Fenstow fairly beamed. "Good. I wrote it myself. The other was
only partly mine."

Helen laughed and turned to Janet. "What are you trying to do,
compliment Mr. Fenstow so he'll give you the leading