THE OXFORD CITY LIBERAL ASSOCIATION DANCE AT THE TOWN HALL

THE OXFORD CITY LIBERAL ASSOCIATION DANCE AT THE TOWN HALL. Tickets are being sold at the door for 1s. 6d. Upstairs there is a table with jugs of lemonade and plates of plum cake. In the main hall a band is playing and the younger liberals are dancing. One of the waitresses from the Crown sits by the door fanning her face with a handkerchief. Ernest, with a radiant smile, is slowly walking round the room offering plum cake to the couples sitting about. Some giggle and take it; some giggle and refuse; some refuse and look exceedingly haughty. Adam leans against the side of the door watching him. Close up; Adam bears on his face the same expression of blind misery that he wore in the taxi the night before.
LE VIN TRISTE. Ernest has asked the waitress from the Crown to dance with him. It is an ungainly performance; still sublimely contented he collides with several couples, misses his footing and, but for his partner, would have fallen. An M.C. in evening dress asks Adam to take him away. Broad stone steps. Several motors are drawn up outside the Town Hall. Ernest climbs into the first of them—a decrepit Ford—and starts the engine. Adam attempts to stop him. A policeman hurries up. There is a wrenching of gears and the car starts. The policeman blows his whistle. Halfway down St. Aldates the car runs into the kerb, mounts the pavement and runs into a shop window. The inhabitants of St. Aldates converge from all sides; heads appear at every window; policemen assemble. There is a movement in the crowd to make way for something being carried out. Adam turns and wanders aimlessly towards Carfax. St. Mary’s clock strikes twelve. It is raining again. Adam is alone.
HALF AN HOUR LATER. AN HOTEL BEDROOM. Adam is lying on his face across the bed, fully clothed. He turns over and sits up. Again the vision of the native village; the savage has dragged himself very near to the edge of the jungle. His back glistens in the evening sun with his last exertion. He raises himself to his feet, and with quick unsteady steps reaches the first bushes; soon he is lost to view. Adam steadies himself at the foot of the bed and walks to the dressing table; he leans for a long time looking at himself in the glass. He walks to the window and looks out into the rain. Finally he takes the blue bottle from his pocket, uncorks it, smells it, and then without more ado drinks its contents. He makes a wry face at its bitterness and stands for a minute uncertain. Then moved by some odd instinct he turns out the light and curls himself up under the coverlet. At the foot of a low banyan tree the savage lies very still. A large fly settles on his shoulder; two birds of prey perch on the branch above him, waiting. The tropical sun begins to set, and in the brief twilight animals begin to prowl upon their obscene questings. Soon it is quite dark. A photograph of H.M. the King in naval uniform flashes out into the night.
GOD SAVE THE KING. The cinema quickly empties. The young man from Cambridge goes his way to drink a glass of Pilsen at Odenino’s. Ada and Gladys pass out through ranks of liveried attendants. For perhaps the fiftieth time in the course of the evening Gladys says, “Well, I do call it a soft film.” “Fancy ’er not coming in again.” There is quite a crowd outside, all waiting to go to Earls Court. Ada and Gladys fight manfully and secure places on the top of the bus. “Ere, ’oo are yer pushing? Mind out, can’t yer?” When they arrive home they will no doubt have some cocoa before going to bed, and perhaps some bread and bloater paste. It has been rather a disappointing evening on the whole. Still, as Ada says, with the pictures you has to take the bad with the good. Next week there may be something really funny. Larry Semon or Buster Keaton—who knows?