carrying gossip from one studio to another,--and was wasting no time in
offering him a position. His Western director, Robert Grant Burns whom
Luck knew well, had been carried to the hospital with typhoid fever which
he had contracted while out with his company in what is known as Nigger
Sloughs,--a locality more picturesque than healthful. Dewitt feared that
it was going to be a long illness at the very best. Would Luck consider
taking the company and going on with the big five-reel feature which
Burns had just begun? Dewitt was prepared to offer special inducements
and to make the position a permanent one. He would give Burns a dramatic
company to produce features at the studio, he said, and would give Luck
the privilege of choosing his own scenarios and producing them in his own
way. Could Luck arrange to meet Dewitt at four that afternoon?

Luck could, by cancelling his appointment with a smaller and less
important company, which he did promptly and with no compunctions
whatever. He did more than that; he postponed the other two appointments,
knowing in his heart that his chances would not be lessened thereby.
After that he built a castle or two while he waited for the appointment.
The Great Western Company had been a step higher than he had hoped to
reach. Robert Grant Burns he had considered a fixture with the company.
It had never entered his mind that he might possibly land within the
Great Western's high concrete wall,--and that other wall which was higher
and had fewer gates, and which was invisible withal. That the great
Dewitt himself should seek Luck out was just a bit staggering. He wanted
to go out and tell the bunch about it, but he decided to wait until
everything was settled. Most of all he wanted the Acme to know that
Dewitt wanted him; that would be a real slap in the face of Mart's
judgment, a vindication of Luck's abilities as a director.

What Luck did was to telephone the hospital and learn all he could about