t moment decided
he might as well have a little food. He opened the screen door of the
cafeteria, half expecting it to prove one of those structures equipped
only with a front. But the cafeteria was practicable. The floor was
crowded with little square polished tables at which many people were
eating. A railing along the side of the room made a passage to the back
where food was served from a counter to the proffered tray. He fell into
line. No one had asked him how he dared try to eat with real actors
and actresses and apparently no one was going to. Toward the end of the
passage was a table holding trays and napkins the latter wrapped about
an equipment of cutlery. He took his tray and received at the counter
the foods he designated. He went through this ordeal with difficulty
because it was not easy to keep from staring about at other patrons.
Constantly he was detecting some remembered face. But at last, with his
laden tray he reached a vacant table near the centre of the room and
took his seat. He absently arranged the food before him. He could stare
at leisure now. All about him were the strongly marked faces of the film
people, heavy with makeup, interspersed with hungry civilians, who might
be producers, directors, camera men, or mere artisans, for the democracy
of the cafeteria seemed ideal.

At the table ahead of his he recognized the man who had been annoyed one
day by the silly question of the Montague girl. They had said he was
a very important director. He still looked important and intensely
serious. He was a short, very plump man, with pale cheeks under dark
brows, and troubled looking gray hair. He was very seriously explaining
something to the man who sat with him and whom he addressed as Governor,
a merry-looking person with a stubby gray mustache and little hair, who
seemed not too attentive to the director.

"You see, Governor, it's this way: the party is lost on the
desert--understand what I mean--and Kempton Ward and the girl stumble
into this deserted tomb just at nightfall. Now here's where the big kick
comes--"

Merton Gill ceased to listen for there now halted at his table, bearing
a laden tray, none other than the Montague girl, she of the slangy
talk and the regrettably free manner. She put down her tray and seated
herself before it. She had not asked permission of the table's other
occupant, indeed she had not even glanced at him, for cafeteria
etiquette is not rigorous. He saw that she