OCR Text |
Show carelessly done, but handsome; the wind curling it darkly over his forehead O CONTEST WINNING STORY REPRINTED The Bingham Bulletin in this issue contains a ropy of the prize-winning prize-winning Gleam-Scribbler contest Mmy, "Spot liuli t", by David Reed Lyon, featured in the spring issue of "The Pen", University of Utah literary magarinp. A son of Bishop Bish-op and Mrs. David C. Lyon. Mr. Lyon received a buchelor of arts degree with n ninior in english from the school of arts and sciences sci-ences nt commencement Exercises Exer-cises at the university Tuesday, June 10. SPOTLIGHT By DAVID REED LYON Gleam-Scribbler Prize Winner He made sure Kito had left for the garage before he turned to the mirror and began combing his hair. Two years had not been sufficient suf-ficient to overcome the feeling of effeminacy that came with using us-ing plaster on his hair, cosmetics, cosmet-ics, padded suits and lifts in his shoes. He dabbed at his face with tissues and tome cream from a welled up within him. In a burst of temper he flung the hand mirror mir-ror at a curtain hanging beside the window. The curtain thudded thud-ded with the impact satisfactorily, satisfactori-ly, the mirror dropped to the carpet unbroken. He stood up. "God! Just like some doll! Pretty damn soon I won't even think like a man This lousy business!" But even as he said it, he was admiring the agile strength and handsomeness of his figure as he paced up and down. The full-length full-length mirror never suffered from neglect. Quickly, his anger subsided. He stopped directly in front of the glass and stared silently si-lently for a moment. Keeping his eyes on the reflected image, he turned sidewards, opening his mouth and lifting his eyebrows quizzically, as though he were being spoken to. He followed this with more violent gesticulation, flailing his arms and expressing surprise, pleasure, fear, anger, chagrin, using his face and whole body as a kaleidoscope. Tiring of the exertion and feeling the childishness child-ishness of such emotional calisthenics, calis-thenics, he moved a step nearer, locked his jaw muscles and al- . . i i j I I ; ed it into strips, tried to staunch the flow of blood Nearly an hour later, after the ambulance had gone and the police po-lice had finished their routine questioning, he faced the newspapermen news-papermen and the photographers. photograph-ers. "I just happened to be passing, that's all, and I tried to bandage: her up with my shirt" "The doc said you probably saved her life." "Well, I" Studied innocence. Don't be too modest. Don't act too much at ease. Don't get stagey. If they thought this was a put-up job, a publicity stunt Careful. Don't be too patronizing. patroniz-ing. Don't even suggest that this is a real break, the kind that makes front page, the kind you can't buy the tie-ups can come later; Early Boy Scout Training Proves Invaluable; Quick Action by Star Saves Life on Highway too bad I didn't get a good look at that license plate 'Come on, how about some pictures? pic-tures? Over here by the car, fella. More to the right, that's better." Be reluctant just a little. Pictures Pic-tures all over the country tomorrow. to-morrow. The studio would kiss him for that. Kiss him hell he'd get double the salary when his option came up. Look as though you've been a hero, dope. No toothpaste ad stuff. Don't frown at the flashes. "Now one over here in front" Aw please. Just a couple more." "Look this way. Gotcha!" He ran his fingers through his hair on one side of the part. Care-lessly. Care-lessly. He knew it would look Latins go bald? Filipino's aren't Latins. Anyway, hair looks strong, straight, thick. Little though. Five one. He left the house and crossed the lawn to the driveway. The walk was a good three yards from where he always crossed to the car. Dumb architect. Or contractor. con-tractor. He opened the door and got in, enjoying the shiny color of the paint, the dazzle of the chromium, the smell and feel of the leather upholstery. Nice to have money. Happiness dies of starvation without money. The car roared powerfully, then purred purr-ed with a bubbling thunder as it rolled out on the highway. Some day get a big place with a long driveway and porch over it. Porte cochere. Road too noisy right 'in the front yard. He pushed the throttle down a fraction. The vibrant thunder of the exhaust rose in pitch and became a steady roar. The car and open roadster, was long, low, powerful, and foreign. Too many gadgets, he thought.. Bounced like a buggy on bumps. Why didn't did-n't he buy a Buick or a Ford: they handled better. He ran the window up and down, twisting in the seat to turn the handle. Awkward. Awk-ward. Like everything else. Expensive Ex-pensive and awkward. The road wound along the shore line, curving out to the edge of escarpments where the road rimmed a cliff, veering back from fhe water's edge when only the beach was a barrier between the hard, grey band of concrete and the surf. "The sun poked through the low clouds in "brilliant "bril-liant splotches, bathing the sand and rocks with color, highlighting the sequin glare of the sea. Like a bank of kliegs, he noted with removed amusement. Reflection from the hood like a "baby" shooting into your face. He put the elaborate eyeshade down into position: the road curved slyly sly-ly and he blinked with the return re-turn of the dazzling light. He adjusted ad-justed the eyeshade. A series of mischevious wiggles in the road resulted in the abandonment of such transient protection. He sat up straighter, then slumped down in the seat, trying to escape the hood. A car loomed ahead. As he rapidly drew up behind it, another an-other approached from the opposite op-posite 'direction. Blocked temporarily tempor-arily and unable to pass in time, he slowed the car, braking easily. easi-ly. The car ahead of him swerved swerv-ed a foot inward, returned to its own lane a second later. About midway of that quick second, the oncoming car left the highway and smashed through a telegraph pole, overturned, and slid almost to the next pole.. It hesitated, rocking precariously, then leaned lean-ed at last against the pole in resignation. re-signation. The dust settled back into place. A deadly, waiting quiet held the wreckage for an instant, punctured by the tinkle of falling glass and the ticking, aimless, slowing spin of a wheel left in the air. The screech of tortured tor-tured rubber intruded from a dis- ternately flexed and released them, noting the shadows that moved from hollow to hollow as ho did so. Tracy did a lot of that stuff. Supposed to show controlled controll-ed emotion under great stress. Overdid it in "Boys Town," but when you're up there you can do anything and it's art. He posed turning his head around as far as his eye could follow, examining the change in contour and line from the hairline across the forehead, fore-head, from the eyebrow and hollow, hol-low, over the cheekbone and nose to the jaw and chin. A sound straightened him abruptly like a puppet on string. It was Kito coming back indoors. He took two quick steps away from the mirror and slowed to a casual walk a second before the door' opened. "The car is ready, sir. Nuts. Almost like an orderly. Never out of place. Always just what has to be said. No more. No accent, ac-cent, either. Wish he'd swipe something hose green cufflinksso cuff-linksso I could can him. No. He won't. "All right. That'll be all for this afternoon." He picked up the trenchcoat and scarf from the foot of the bed and started for the door. "At what time would you care to dine this evening?" "Uh I don't know late, probably, about seven." He had been momentarily startled; his voice left the low, resonant pitch for a word and a half, then returned. He was irritated. irri-tated. Dammim! If I don't tell him, he'll ask how many for dinner. din-ner. Now see? "Will there be any guests?" "No." Suppose he has to know. Nui- , sance. Brown face and black hair. Sleek and shiny and black. Probably Pro-bably never go bald. Why don't jar labeled SKIN REJUVENATOR prepared exclusively by MARVEL STUDIOS for the exclusive use of its Masculine Stars Automatically he noticed that "exclusively" could have been inserted in-serted before "prepared." He had a moment of disdain, fathered by the skepticism that those two years had made habitual; he was damn sure this was the same stuff selling for a dime in the five-and-ton downtown. He visualized a pert figure in white, busily engaged en-gaged in washing off one label and replacing it with the distinguished, dis-tinguished, artistic, classic damn! That "exclusively" was cropping up every third word or so. Wiping off the last of the cream, he studied the wry, sardonic sar-donic half-smile playing about his lips. He watched that smile in the mirror, devoted his attention to the face that wore it. It was an extremely handsome face, possessing, as his agent put it, "a rugged strength of character charac-ter without sacrificing beauty." He had blushed at "beauty" when Manny first showed the line to him. Now it seemed well, natural, natu-ral, right. Looking at the eyes, he was reminded of those agonizing agoniz-ing weeks of eyebrow plucking and hairline adjusting. The memory mem-ory was so pairiful he imagined he felt his scalp wince. Leaning forward for a better look, he picked up the hand mirror and, moving it back and forth, regarded regard-ed the crown of hs head with critical attention. He bent even nearer the large glass to see better, bet-ter, being careful not to wrinkle his forehead in concentrating. Yes, he could still see the outlines out-lines of the spot, but there was certainly more hair now; the hours of massage were paying dividends. Disgust and anger tante as the actor's car slid to a stop off the highway onto the gravel. Bumping the door as he burst out, he stood for a moment looking at the wreckage, then after af-ter the car disappearing over the next rise. He leaped over the barrow pit, ran frantically a-round a-round the car, shouting and tugging tug-ging in an attempt to right it. Someone called out from the inside in-side of the car, weakly and unintelligibly. unin-telligibly. He halted, then leaped leap-ed to assist the figure that crawled crawl-ed out through a broken window, bleeding and disheveled. "Wife hurt" Without a word the actor scrambled up and helped him to raise the woman over the edge, then lower her carefully to the ground. He tore off his shirt, ripp- |