days of the one reel and General Film.

It is commonly known in picture circles that an actress who
screens well, even if she is only a moderately good artist, can
be made a star with one or two or three good stories and that,
conversely, a star may be ruined by a succession of badly written
or badly produced vehicles. Those of us not blinded by an
idolatrous worship for the girl condemned her severely for
throwing her husband aside at the height of her success. The
public displayed their sympathy for her by a burst of renewed
interest. The receipts at the box office whenever her films were
shown probably delighted both Manton and Stella herself.

I had wondered, as Kennedy and I occupied a seat in the train,
and as he left me to my thoughts, whether there could be any
connection between the tragedy and the divorce. The decree, I
knew, was not yet final. Could it be possible that Millard was
unwilling, after all, to surrender her? Could he prefer
deliberate murder to granting her her freedom? I was compelled to
drop that line of thought, since it offered no explanation of his
previous failure to contest her suit or to start counter action.

Then my reflections had strayed away from Kennedy's sphere, the
solving of the mystery, to my own, the news value of her death
and the events following. The Star, as always, had been only too
glad to assign me to any case where Craig Kennedy was concerned;
my phone message to the city editor, the first intimation to any
New York paper of Stella's death, already had resulted without
doubt in scare heads and an extra edition.