"Shadow - 360215 - Back Pages - Grace Culver - Hit The Baby" - читать интересную книгу автора (Brown Roswell)

From: The Shadow, The North Woods Mystery, 2/15/36


Hit the Baby
by Roswell Brown

Grace "Redsie" Culver didn't know much about the movie business-but when
a director cried

HIT THE BABY!
she knew it was time to go for a gun!


"Blue Monday?" The redhead yawned, stretched, looked up from her desk in
the quiet office of the Noonan Detective Agency. "Who started that whoop-de-da
about Mondays being blue? You got a whole new week's work ahead of you on a
Monday morning. Saturdays, it's all over. Nothing but a picnic in the country or
washing out your stockings to look forward to."
Young, good-looking Jerry Riker straightened from the filing cabinet where
he was culling routine entries. He grinned at the girl who sat scowling on the
other side of the desk sign reading: "Miss Culver, secretary." "Bored, huh?"
"Alongside of me," said Grace Culver, drearily, "a guy in the last stages of
sleeping sickness feels as spry as a kangaroo. Saturdays! Whoever invented
'em?"
Jerry saw an opening and dove into it. They came few and far between with a
fast-action girl like "Big Tim" Noonan's red-headed aider-and-abetter. But from
long habit, young Riker kept on trying. "Saturday nights are Heaven's gift to the
movie business, Redsie. Every right-minded citizen goes to a show then with her
Big Moment." He reached a morning newspaper from his own desk, flicking it
open to the amusement page as he laid it down before her. "There's the ads. Take
your pick. And a free feed with Jerome A. Riker goes with it."
"Why bother with a show, then? Watching you eat spaghetti is funnier than
any comedy."
Grace glanced down at the printed spread propped against her typewriter.
Gossipy columns of news from Moviedom separated other columns of
advertising on "epic features" and "colossal superspectacles."
"How's about it, lady?"
The redhead smiled at him absentmindedly. "I see Moe Eisman opened up his
Long Island studio again. Shooting a picture with Lulu Dore," she said, dreamily.
"Very interesting. But what about my date for--"
"Listen to this," Grace commanded. "The headline reads, 'Eisman Defies
Witch Jinx To Film Dore Extravaganza.' Then it goes this way."
She continued to read aloud, oblivious to the dark looks she was getting from
Jerry's corner. The article stated:
Suddenly opening the Eastern studio of Dictator Pictures Corp. for the first
time in seven years, Moe Eisman yesterday began surprise production on "Love
Locked Out" at his Maysville lot. The elaborate screen spectacle features Lulu
Dore, famous French song star now appearing personally on Broadway in "Errors
of 1936."
Interesting to the show world in this connection is the producer's disregard of