Please believe me, you who will read; I know that part of the narrative will strain any credulity, yet I am ready with the now-threadbare retort of Lord Byron, of whose works more below: “Truth is stranger than fiction.” I have, too, three witnesses who have agreed to vouch for the truth of what I have set down. Their only criticism is that I have spoken too kindly of them. If anything, I have not spoken kindly enough.
Like Peter Quince in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, I have rid my prolog like a rough colt. Perhaps, like Duke Theseus, you my readers will be assured thereby of my sincerity.
We, the undersigned, having read the appended statement of Gilbert Connatt, do hereby declare it to be true in substance.
I
Drafted
The counterman in the little hamburger stand below Times Square gazed at me searchingly.
“Haven’t I seen you somewhere?” he asked, and when I shook my head he made a gesture as of inspiration. “I got it, buddy. There was a guy in a movie like you—tall, thin—black mustache and eyes—”
“I’m not in pictures,” I told him, quite truthfully as concerned the moment. “Make me a double hamburger.”
“And coffee?”
“Yes.” Then I remembered that I had but fifteen cents, and that double hamburgers cost a dime. I might want a second sandwich. “Make it a single instead.”
“No, a double,” piped somebody at my elbow, and a short, plump figure climbed upon the next stool. “Two doubles, for me and my friend here, and I’m paying. Gilbert Connatt, at half-past the eleventh hour I run onto you by the luck of the Switzes. I am glad to see you like an old father to see his wandering boy.”
I had known that voice of old in Hollywood. Turning, I surveyed the fat, blob-nosed face, the crossed eyes behind shell-rimmed glasses, the thick, curly hair, the ingratiating smile. “Hello, Jake,” I greeted him without enthusiasm.
Jake Switz waved at the counterman. “Two coffees with those hamburgers.” His strange oblique gaze shifted back to me. “Gib, to me you are more welcome than wine at a wedding. In an uptown hotel who do you think is wondering about you with tears in her eyes as big as electric light bulbs?” He shrugged and extended his palms, as if pleased at being able to answer his own question. “Sigrid Holgar!”
I made no reply, but drew a frayed shirt-cuff back into the worn sleeve of my jacket. Jake Switz continued: “I’ve been wondering where to get hold of you, Gib. How would you like again to play leading man for Sigrid, huh?”
It is hard to look full into cross-eyes, but I managed it. “Go back to her,” I bade him, “and tell her I’m not taking charity from somebody who threw me down.”
Jake caught my arm and shook it earnestly. “But that ain’t true, Gib. It’s only that she’s been so successful she makes you look like a loser. Gib, you know as well as you know your own name that it was you that threw her down—so hard she ran like a silver dollar.”
“I won’t argue,” I said, “and I won’t have charity.”
I meant that. It hurt to think of Sigrid and myself as we had been five years ago—she an inspired but unsure newcomer from Europe, I the biggest star on the biggest lot in the motion-picture industry. We made a film together, another, became filmdom’s favorite lovers on and off screen. Then the quarrel; Jake was wrong, it was Sigrid’s fault. Or was it? Anyway, she was at the head of the class now, and I had been kicked away from the foot.
The counterman set our sandwiches before us. I took a hungry bite and listened to Jake’s pleadings.
“It would be you doing her and me a favor, Gib. Listen this one time—please, to give Jake Switz a break.” His voice quavered earnestly. “You know that Sigrid is going to do a stage play.”
“I’ve read about it in Variety,” I nodded. “Horror stuff, isn’t it? Like Dracula, I suppose, with women fainting and nurses dragging them out of the theater.”
“Nurses!” repeated Jake Switz scornfully. “Huh, doctors we’ll need. At our show Jack Dempsey himself would faint dead away on the floor, it’s so horrible!” He subsided and began to beg once more. “But you know how Sigrid is. Quiet and restrained—a genius. She wouldn’t warm up, no matter what leading man we suggested. Varduk, the producer, mentioned you. ‘Get Gilbert Connatt,’ he said to me. ‘She made a success with him once, maybe she will again.’ And right away Sigrid said yes.”
I went on eating, then swallowed a mouthful of scalding coffee. Jake did the same, but without relish. Finally he exploded into a last desperate argument.
“Gib, for my life I can’t see how you can afford to pass it up. Here you are, living on hamburgers—”
I whirled upon him so fiercely that the rest of the speech died on his open lips. Rising, I tossed my fifteen cents on the counter and started for the door. But Jake yelled in protest, caught my shoulder and fairly wrestled me back.
“No, no,” he was wailing. “Varduk would cut my heart out and feed it to the sparrows if I found you and lost you again. Gib, I didn’t mean bad manners. I don’t know nothing about manners, Gib, but have I ever
