Chaplin was furious. Then he learned they had only signed her to a day-player agreement, and she was free to take any other job she wished today. It only took four phone calls to learn she had been hired, again, by Pickford. Who was very sorry to say that she was unable to explain when Zasu would again be available. It could be months.

December 14 Did Not Shoot. Talked Story. Orchestra. New set: museum and angels. New camera.

December 17 Did Not Shoot. Mr. Chaplin rehearsed. Orchestra. Enlarged set again: museum, angels, horses, cows. New camera, new dolly mechanism. Crane tested.

December 18 Did Not Shoot. Orchestra. Enlarged set again: museum, angels, horses, cows, history of the world in art, etc. Captive balloons tested.

December 19 !!!

Which is where the logbooks for the production of Sunnyside ended for 1918. The kingpins of the industry, having taken the measure of the situation, finally brought their plans to fruition, with the result of stopping the already wobbling Charlie Chaplin dead in his tracks.

32

This was the Russian dance: Allied forces advanced along the Vaga River, and when their forward positions became untenable, they retreated along the same frozen banks. Then orders would come to advance, and the process would start all over again. The force was known as the Vaga Column, which caused many chuckles, for it implied that their position was as straight and sturdy as Doric marble.

About two hundred men bivouacked in Solnechny Strana, which was friendly to them, townspeople tearfully saying goodbye as if they were their own children every time they left, and greeting them hello, without irony, on each return.

Pfc. Hugo Black was trying to make the best of things. He was even experimenting with getting along. He started by being pleasant to children—nodding at them, for instance—and then worked his way to his fellow soldiers. He had pumped his hand in the air and cried, “My reward is to kill,” when it seemed appropriate, and when he caught his reflection in a windowpane, rather than burst into tears, he elected to turn the corners of his mouth up into a meatless-Friday smile.

Hugo had a week of sentry duty in front of a former schoolhouse, now the “A” Sector billet in which thirty of his fellow men were resting or playing cards. Before him was the width of Solnechny Strana, easily the cleanest and best-constructed village he’d seen in his whole tour. The towns people who walked by, waving and inquiring in broken English about his health, wore plush coats made from animals that were neither cat nor dog. Inspired, Hugo had purchased a new hat from a man with a table on the sidewalk. The man had said “sable,” but it had only been a dollar U.S., and after he’d bought it, Hugo realized it was distressingly tabby-colored.