Poor Caroline (10 page)

The Christian Cinema Company had at the moment a
bank balance of £87. Its assets were the company seal, the
furniture of the room in which the directors sat, and the
rights, not yet formally acquired, to reproduce Macafee's
Tona Perfecta Films. The appeal for shareholders was now being made, but it was perfectly clear that the British public was slow to realize its possibilities. Up to date the invest
ments amounted to exactly £528 11
s. 6d.,
apart from the
directors' contributions.

Miss Denton-Smyth explained all this without uneasi
ness, 'These of course are only preliminary inquiries, Mr.
Chairman. Now that our circulars are printed, I expect to
see a great difference. I have up to date managed to get two thousand envelopes addressed, but of course I work single-

handed, and I do not like to wait too long. I wondered if I
might get a little clerical help. That was one of the things
I wanted to ask the Board. There are another five thousand
I could send out, and I hate to think that we may have lost
a really valuable shareholder, just because I was unable to
address the proper envelope. And yet I find that I cannot
do any more than I do now.'

It was amazing. If she did all the work that she claimed
to do, she must have slaved from morning until night.

'These women, Almighty God, these women,' thought
Joseph. 'If I had her in my office . . .' But all the same
he was glad, on the whole, that he did not have her in his
office. She set a pace which only fanaticism, not business
method, could maintain.

'Well, Miss Denton-Smyth,' St. Denis was saying. 'I think
we must trust to your discretion. You know the state of the
company's finances better than anyone. You know the need
for economy. I am sure that the Board will agree with me
that in this matter of clerical help we can safely leave all
decisions with Miss Denton-Smyth.'

'Agreed, agreed,' growled the directors, all but Hugh
Macafee, whose Scottish voice broke harshly in upon the
meeting.

'I suppose we have some guarantee that the company's
funds will not be squandered in unnecessary clerical extrava
gance,' he said angrily, looking round the Board with fierce
challenging eyes. 'We're out to make Tona Perfecta Films,
I take it. Not to provide employment for a lot of girl
typists.'

'Quite, Quite. But you will see, I am sure, Mr. Macafee,
that before we make the films, we must raise the capital.'

'If we go on at this rate we shall be waiting till Dooms
day. I always said that these
£
1
shares were like trying to empty the Atlantic with a thimble. If the thing's a decent business proposition . . .'

'It is, Macafee. It is. But you remember that we agreed
that in an enterprise like this, run not only for commercial
but for artistic and moral profit, the wider we throw our
nets, the better. We want to make it possible for all those
interested in the future of the cinema to contribute.'

'That is so; that is so,' interpolated Johnson in his hybrid, pseudo-American accent. 'We're idealists, Macafee, idealists. We want to allow all practical idealists to co-operate
with us to put Beauty on the map of England.'

'I take it then,' St. Denis said, 'that we authorize Miss Denton-Smyth to employ occasional clerical help, remem
bering of course the need for strict economy. Thank you.
Now-let us see. The next item
on the agenda-ah! the
circulars. Would you be good enough to let the Board see
the various suggestions in proof, Miss Denton-Smyth?'

The circulars had been compiled by the chairman and
the honorary secretary. Their composition had given Basil
exquisite pleasure. He had designed appeals to captivate
country clergy, Anglo-Catholic missionaries, Nonconformist
town councillors, pious maiden ladies in seaside boarding
houses, Puritan manufacturers with strong prejudices, and
artistic young ladies and gentlemen from Chelsea, Maccles
field, or Liverpool, who longed to strike a blow for Liberty
in Art, against the Philistine horrors of the commercial
cinema.

St. Denis was proud of his circulars. He had baited his
hooks cleverly. He had been charmed by his occupation,
and the earnest co-operation of Miss Denton-Smyth added
the final flavour of delicious unreality to the business. Miss.
Denton-Smyth was his criterion. Her eager affirmations,
or criticisms provided the tuning-fork which gave the pitch
of commonplace credulity. She prevented him from becom
ing a victim of his sense of humour. What she passed as
possible that he too accepted.

He was eager to watch the reactions of his fellow directors-
to his work. He feared that they might refuse to take seri
ously these lyrical appeals marked 'Seaside Spinsters,' these
common-sense proposals 'To business men.' But he had reckoned without the entrancing fascination of a new technique. He had not experienced, as Joseph had experienced,
the spell wrought upon a bored and lethargic meeting by
the necessity of passing judgment upon green- or orange-
tinted paper, type, and capitals, borders and spacing.

'Look here, St. Denis. We ought to alter the lay-out of
this cover. These wavy lines are too indefinite.'

'. . . Good straight block capitals.
Black -
easy to read.'

'Well, I always say, Mr. Chairman, that a little verse breaks up the lines and gives a sense of- of
...
intimacy.'

'I like these with the Old English lettering for the parsons.
An ecclesiastical air to them. What about a violet-coloured border?'

'Now, what we want, gentlemen,' roared Johnson, in his
backwoods, lumber-camp voice, 'is psychol'gy. Psych'-
logical appeal's the thing.'

They forgot that the Christian Cinema Company was a
crazy adventure, without adequate capital, without pros
pects, without even strict business honesty. They forgot that
each of them except Miss Denton-Smyth had entered it for
entirely irrelevant reasons. They had become completely
absorbed in the excitement of the thing-in-itself. They
wanted those circulars to conform to their own individual
notion of what circulars should be. They were swept by a
wave of excitement. They scrambled over the proofs; they
argued; they shouted. They drew diagrams on the nice,
clean rose-coloured blotting-paper. They wasted recklessly
sheet after sheet of the smooth cream writing-pads. Even
Joseph, who had come to watch his fellow directors expose their capacity for self-deception and dishonesty, found himself carried away from his detachment. He disagreed about the appeal to business men. He had suggestions for the cir
cular marked 'High-brow Artistic. Chelsea. Bloomsbury,
etc.'
He
began to scribble designs, suggest, correct,, or argue,
like any of them. He grew hot and excited. He became elo
quent. He even forgot for a moment that he was enduring
all this nonsense so that St. Denis might make it possible for
Ben to go to Eton.

In the middle of his excitement he glanced up from a
violent dispute with Johnson, and saw Macafee sitting aloof,
sullen, indifferent, scribbling private calculations on his
writing-block; and he saw St. Denis, whose enthusiasm for
the circulars had had time to cool since the completion of their design, watching him with amusement, entertained to
see that even the little Jew could not resist the excitement of
quarrelling about lay-out and type-setting.

§4

Joseph was about to leave the office after the meeting
when Miss Denton-Smyth approached him. 'Could you spare a few moments when the others have gone? I want
to speak to you. It's rather urgent,'

'Well, let me see. I have a dinner engagement.'

⁴
I really shan't keep you a moment.'

The other men were collecting hats and sticks, continuing
arguments, and shaking hands with the secretary. Joseph waited. The thought that he would arrive home too late to
see the boy before he went to bed made him irritable with
impatience. Ben was splendid in his bath - great at gym
nastics on the nursery floor. He looked forward to half an
hour with his father. Damn the woman. Damn the woman.
Why did she want him now?

Guerdon and Johnson followed St. Denis. Joseph was left
with Macafee and Miss Denton-Smyth. The young Scots
man stood by the table, unhappily turning over slips of
paper.

'Well?' inquired Joseph.

'It's all right, Mr. Isenbaum. Mr. Macafee can stay for
our little talk. It concerns him.'

Macafee did not look up. His young sullen face was heavy
with trouble.

'What's the matter? What can I do for you?'

The nurse would be taking Ben up from the drawing-
room now. Probably he would resist, kicking and shouting
for Daddy. A boy ought to be full of spirit.

'It's Mr. Macafee,' said Miss Denton-Smyth. 'I told him
to go to you himself because I always say that there's nothing
like the
direct
appeal. But he asks me to explain. You see, Mr. Isenbaum, I've been
trying
to
make him understand that
pioneer
work is not like ordinary business. We must expect
rebuffs, mustn't we? We must take the
long
view and the
broad
vision, When crushing the commercial octopus and
fighting against principalities and powers and spiritual
wickedness in high places. But I keep telling him that the ultimate
reward is certain if we have
only
faith, though I do
know the temptation to catch at glittering prizes.'

'What is it, Macafee? How does this concern me?'

The Scotsman raised his head.

'I wanted to tell them all at the Board meeting, but Miss
Denton-Smyth asked me to wait and speak to you. I want
to know when the company's going to start making Tona Perfecta Films, Isenbaum. You're a business man. Guer
don's an old sheep and Johnson's an adventurer and you
never know what St. Denis thinks. But you're a business
man. I want to ask you a straight question. Is the company
going to be able to manufacture my films? If not, I'll go elsewhere.'

'Why, Mr. Isenbaum, tell him he mustn't be so impatient.
We couldn't do without the Tona Perfecta, could we? It's
just because the thing's so big that it takes time. It takes
time, of course, to tell the public all about it. Why, the
circulars haven't gone out yet.'