The swarthy man, with eyes that snapped back and forward on a rubber band from the rear of his head, answered to the alias of Dick Dale. The tall, spectacled man who was put together like a camel without a hump — and you missed the hump — answered to the name of E. Brunswick Hudson. The scene was a shoeshine stand, insignificant unit of the great studio. We perceive it through the red-rimmed eyes of Pat Hobby who sat in the chair beside Director Dale.

The stand was out of doors, opposite the commissary. The voice of E. Brunswick Hudson quivered with passion but it was pitched low so as not to reach passers-by.

‘I don’t know what a writer like me is doing out here anyhow,’ he said, with vibrations.

Pat Hobby, who was an old-timer, could have supplied the answer, but he had not the acquaintance of the other two.

‘It’s a funny business,’ said Dick Dale, and to the shoe-shine boy, ‘Use that saddle soap.’

‘Funny!’ thundered E., ‘It’s suspect! Here against my better judgement I write just what you tell me — and the office tells me to get out because we can’t seem to agree.’

‘That’s polite,’ explained Dick Dale. ‘What do you want me to do — knock you down?’

E. Brunswick Hudson removed his glasses.

‘Try it!’ he suggested. ‘I weigh a hundred and sixty-two and I haven’t got an ounce of flesh on me.’ He hesitated and redeemed himself from this extr............