Part 4 (2/2)

”Why do you draw the little fellow so small?”

”Because as long as something is small enough to pick up and throw around, you'll probably be able to keep the upper hand with it,” snarled Fields.

Charlie J. Wuest took off his ceremonial robes, folded them carefully and slipped a flask from his inside pocket. Rituals over, it was time to relax and be sociable. There was more than one benefit to being a Mason.

He spotted Mac McCay across the a.s.sembly hall. Charlie studied his old friend before approaching him. Mac was dressed more elegantly than ever, a sure sign of prosperity. A cheroot tipped at a lively angle from between his lips a” he'd taken to smoking those thin, expensive cigars wrapped in pink paper, layered into hand-stamped tin boxes.

But Mac didn't look good. It wasn't just the years . . . h.e.l.l, none of them were getting any younger. Charlie, friends with Mac since the pre-Maude days, was one of the few that knew Mac lied about his age.

But even taking into consideration that Mac was older than he claimed to be, the man looked worn beyond his years. His face, though thin, was flabby with fatigue. His eyes still tried to sparkle with leprechaunish mischief; the mischief looked frightened and desperate to get out.

Charlie took another long swig of gin from his flask before going over to talk to Mac.

”Mac! Haven't seen you in, what, three years?”

Mac seemed cheered by Charlie's greeting, but he winced when Charlie pumped his hand up and down. Charlie softened his grip, shocked that Mac even felt fragile.

”Hearst's kept me too busy drawing political commentary on the war to get to the annual meetings,” Mac said. ”I was lucky to make this one.”

Charlie nodded. There had been a lot fewer newspapermen attending since the beginning of the Great War. And most of the younger members of the Order were over in Europe as soldiers, fighting the Hun.

”Is that why I don't see so many of those fantastic comic strips of yours anymore?”

Mac looked more pained, and Charlie regretted bringing the subject up.

Mac forced a smile. ”I suppose so. Mr. Hearst always seems to be able to find more than enough to keep me busy.”

”Does that mean you've had to shelve your moving picture work for the duration too?” Charlie knew that would be a safe question to ask. He'd heard rumors Mac was up to something.

Mac smiled. ”One of the few benefits of being kept on a short leash is it's meant more chances to work in my own studio. I'm developing an important animation, Charlie. Something serious, an adult topic a” the sinking of the Lusitania.”

Mac brightened further. ”My son Robert's been helping me. He's turned into a talent, a fine artist in his own right. His a.s.sistance has been invaluable.” Mac's face fell again. ”Or I should say was invaluable. Robert joined the armed services two months ago.” The creases of a father's worry joined the other lines rumpling Mac's face.

Charlie squirmed. What could he talk about with Mac that wouldn't cause the other man pain? He wanted to ask after Mac's daughter, and his wife Maude, but was afraid to.

Mac could tell he was making his old friend suffer; it would be unkind not to make the conversation easier for Charlie. He reached up and patted the other man's shoulder. ”Just listen to me! I sound like a fussy old hen. I doubt that Robert will even make it out of the country, let alone to the front, before this rumpus is cleared up.”

Charlie looked relieved that Mac had bounced back. ”You're right. He'll be fine, Mac. And when he gets back maybe he'll be able to take over your animation projects so you can get on with whatever brilliant innovation you decide to concoct next. You know, there's times when I see what you've done that I really regret getting out of the pictorial side of the business.” He shook his head. ”But who am I kidding? I just never had the vision and talent that people like you and some of the others a” Outcault, Bud Fisher a” have.”

Outcault, that other artist who had emerged from Cincinnati, equally favored by the Queen of Cities. Why in G.o.d's name did Charlie have to bring up Outcault, Mac wondered?

Outcault had haunted Mac's life like a precognitive ghost. Comic strips, vaudeville sketching tours, musicals based on comic strips, merchandising schemes (Buster Brown Shoes were household catchwords) and even animation: Outcault had always preceded Mac, until Mac wondered if the man was clairvoyant, or if he was somehow privy to Mac's thoughts and stealing his ideas. Had Outcault found a way of coasting ahead on the creative energy of Mac's life?

And not for the first time Mac wondered if that was what his brother Arthur had meant when he'd accused Mac of stealing his life.

Had Outcault been visited upon Mac as repayment in kind? And was that only one of the rest.i.tutions life was demanding from Mac? His comic strips, his animation, his vaudeville act; his wife, his daughter, his son; all that Mac loved was slipping from his control.

And in reaction, as a defense, had he just begun the cycle all over again? The more he lost from his own life, the more he had invested of himself in his secret, pseudonymous comic strip. Mac wondered, guiltily, if in living vicariously through his strips of the life of W. C. Fields if he'd also stolen the life Whitey might have had. But he knew that it was the life that Whitey would have wished for himself. It was different. It was like a gift to the long-lost vagrant boy. Mac kept telling himself that over and over again.

Charlie looked embarra.s.sed and disconcerted. Mac realized an uncomfortable length of time had elapsed; that he'd let the repartee flounder again. He could imagine the expression on his face after thinking about Outcault. No wonder Charlie seemed so chagrined. Mac would have to turn this conversation around.

He pretended that Charlie had just finished speaking. ”Oh, I don't know about that, Charlie. It looks to me as though making editor-in-chief has agreed with you. I've heard nothing but great things about your work the last few years. Maybe this is what you were destined to do a” to bring that keen, perceptive artist's eye of yours to bear on the written word. Not to mention that offbeat sense of humor you were famous for even back in our National Printing and Engraving company days.”

Wuest looked surprised that Mac knew about his promotion. He blushed with pride at Mac's compliments.

From there both men, with great relief, let the conversation lead naturally into reminiscences of what seemed to be, in the nostalgic glow of retrospection, the all too brief period of time when they were printing and engraving apprentices together.

They reclaimed the years, their faces younger and their voices lighter as they remembered their run-ins and adventures together after they'd both left Chicago and become newspaper ill.u.s.trators.

”Remember the lynching in that tiny town . . . what was it called?” Charlie recalled.

”Logan. Outside the town, by a long wagon ride.” The incident should have been unnotable to Mac; just one of many steps to an elevated success. But for some reason everything surrounding the hanging had always filled him with profound unease.

”Well, of course the hanging itself was grim, the way all hangings are.” Charlie had misread, in part, Mac's reaction. ”But everything else about the affair was so, well, wild and unexpected. Remember how the farmers hid the outlaws from us? The tornado? Getting stranded and having the world's longest and most drunken poker game?”

”I'm surprised you remember it so charitably,” Mac said drily.

Charlie nudged Mac in the ribs. ”Think I forgot how you outfoxed us all? Not d.a.m.n likely! Took me years to get over being annoyed with you. But I knew I was really more irritated with myself for not having thought of it first.”

Mac realized that he'd never mentioned to Charlie that he had pa.s.sed through Peebles in the course of his coup. ”Charlie,” he said, ”did you ever get to see that Great Serpent mound you talked about on that trip?”

The other newsman s.h.i.+vered. ”Yes, I did. Years later. I wish I hadn't. You know, it's one thing to conjecture about mysterious powers, to play with them around the edges, like we do here.” He gestured around the meeting hall at the other Masons. ”But it's another thing to come up against them face to face. Unnerving. Especially being an artist.

”I got a feeling about all those Indians who'd worked so hard to build that mound a” that somehow their souls got appropriated in the process. That's what made the thing seem so d.a.m.ned alive. It made me understand how art could really take on a life of its own. I think only artists like us can truly understand that,” he s.h.i.+vered again, ”and maybe be vulnerable to it. It was beautiful, but I got away as fast as I could. That's when I made the decision to get into editing instead.” He looked at Mac curiously. ”What made you think of it?”

”Because I saw it, too, when I was stealing the thunder from you fellows at the Logan lynching. You can see the Serpent mound just south of Peebles, from the train. It was all lit up by moonlight after the storm. I couldn't have put it into words as well as you just did, but that's exactly how that barrow made me feel.”

Charlie smiled uneasily, as if Mac were making a joke at his expense. ”That's impossible, Mac. You couldn't have seen the Great Serpent mound. It's north and east of Peebles, nowhere near the train line.”

By 1915 The Life and Times of W. C. Fields had become a popular and lucrative enough draw to come to the attention of legitimate theater. In that year the plot s.h.i.+fted: The Ziegfeld Follies hired W. C. away from vaudeville. For several years the episodes of his life revolved around escapades in this new venue. Often they centered around conflicts with his new boss, Flo Ziegfeld.

Bill Catlett peered out into the hallway from W. C.'s dressing room.

”Is it all clear?” came a nasal caw behind him. Catlett turned to look at his partner and grinned. Fields was dressed for golfing; or at least golfing as Fields played it. A cap like a collapsed omelette draped the top of W. C.'s head. The cap was so large it shaded but didn't dim what Fields wore beneath: a deep pink bow tie, lavender s.h.i.+rt, yellow and green argyle knit vest, voluminous black and white checkered knickers, short socks and spats. W. C. teetered as he stood: His golfing shoes sported three inch spikes.

Catlett would have considered his colleague the epitome of sartorial disaster if his own wardrobe hadn't been even more dreadful. His caddie's outfit started off with a plaid tam-o-shanter no self-respecting Scotsman would be caught dead wearing, and went to worse from there. Catlett couldn't look down at himself without breaking out of character into laughter.

”No sign of Ziegfeld.” He reported to Fields. ”I can hear them getting ready to change the sets. We'd better get out there.”

”The timing has to be perfect,” Fields growled as he hoisted the main prop, an outsized golf bag, onto his shoulder. ”We must array ourselves as soon as that blasted set is up, before Ziegfeld's dancing beauties prance on stage.”

W. C. had approached Ziegfeld about doing a golfing skit months before. The impresario had initially agreed, then decided that one tiny change must be made. W. C. Fields would have to change the golf act into a fis.h.i.+ng act on a yacht. That way Flo Ziegfeld could slide his ubiquitous showgirls on stage as bathing beauties.

Fields was livid, but Ziegfeld wouldn't budge. He never did when it came to his beloved dancers. But Flo Ziegfeld was about to discover that his comedian was more stubborn than he.

”Now,” muttered W. C. They scuttled their way down the corridor to the wings. Their timing was impeccable. The yacht set was in place behind the curtains. f.a.n.n.y Brice, spotlighted in front, was winding down her routine. In a minute the music would segue into the prologue for their act, curtains would go up on an empty stage and dancing girls would sashay slowly into place. After the lovelies had cut a few fancy figures Catlett and Fields were supposed to walk on with their fis.h.i.+ng equipment.

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