Read Online Black Is the Fashion for Dying by Jonathan Latimer - Free Book Online Page B

cot, his usually ruddy face a fish-belly white. He looked around for Lisa and, not seeing her, turned towards the pool set.
    He saw the bearers were scrambling up the embankment by the pool, accompanied by the panning camera. With just the right amount of clumsy haste they lifted the litter, dog-trotted down the trail with it. But Caresse, he saw, even though hampered by having to pretend she was unconscious, wasn’t giving them the scene. She allowed one arm, on the camera side, of course, to slide off the litter, dangle helplessly. The shrewd ham, he thought. Exactly what the audience would see and remember.
    Josh Gordon, astride the camera crane, called, “Cut! And thank you.”
    People began to hurry towards the camp, trampling power cables, connection boxes, sound cords, ropes, camera blocks and other debris that lay between the sets. Overhead, ghostly voices called, “Hook up Number 4!” and “For Chrisake, Charley, this way!” Gordon, too, was shouting. “Litter bearers!”
    â€œYes, sir.”
    â€œRemember. Don’t put Miss Garnet down. We’re going right into the next scene.”
    Cranked back to earth, Gordon jumped from the crane, started down the embankment. At the same time Herbie’s voice came over the loudspeaker: “ Miss Carson and Mr. Graves! Places, please! ”
    Somebody yelled, “They’re all set,” and somebody else yelled, “Where’re the guys with that stuffed tiger?” A voice from above called, agonized, “Charley, for Chrisake! To your right!”
    Gordon halted by Blake, eyeing the camp and speaking at the same time. “How’d it go?”
    â€œAt least it doesn’t scan this time.”
    Gordon nodded and called, “Billings!”
    Bililngs, peering through Camera C, turned his head
    â€œIs that camera clear?”
    Jenkins, on the TV platform, answered, “Yes, sir. Doesn’t show in the monitors.”
    â€œBrother!” Gordon said. “If TV’s wrong, this is going to be the greatest shambles since Queen Kelly. ”
    Blake followed him over to the platform, peered with him into the monitors. Jenkins was right. No cameras were visible. Each screen showed only the camp, three interlocking segments from three points of view. In one he could see the hunters’ tent, from which Ashton Graves would presently emerge, and the tent into which Caresse would be carried. In the second monitor, almost a reverse angle, was the camp-fire with the cooks working around it, and in the third was the opening in the jungle made by the trail. Neat, he was forced to admit. If it worked. And it probably would, with Fabro’s luck. All that had to be done, once the scene was filmed, was some moderately expert cutting.
    Gordon had checked sound and lights and was calling for Herbie. Somebody said, “He’s gone to get Basil Trabert.” And Gordon said, “I’m going to make a eunuch of that squirt some day,” and added, “if he isn’t one already.”
    Blake asked, “How’d the close-up of Caresse go?”
    â€œShe really gave,” Gordon said. “First orgasm ever produced by gunpowder.”
    Silence began to descend on the sound stage of its own accord. It was the first time Blake had ever seen it happen. Usually it took a series of profane threats on the loudspeaker system to bring even a semi-hush, but he supposed this strange voluntary quiet was due to curiosity over the new technique. Then, thinking about it, he abruptly realized it would mean no jobs, or at best only part-time jobs for half the men on the set if the speed-up worked. No wonder they were curious.
    Gordon, squinting into the middle monitor, suddenly gave a cry of anguish.
    â€œWhat’s the matter?”
    â€œThat bloody Alf!” Gordon swung from the monitor. “No Webley in the bloody holster!”
    There wasn’t. The holster, hanging from the pole in front of