“Rigged her myself,” Ernie repeated. “Just three-four lengths of pipe and a punch. Works great on a closed car.” And he yanked at the long wooden pole which opened the water-valve against the ceiling. That which Ernie had indicated so pridefully was a rectangle of two-inch pipe, hung in such position that it was just above the roof of the car. When the valve was opened, from this pipe through numberless orifices descended a veritable water-curtain composed of many tiny streams. The water struck upon the top of the car and flowed down over front and rear and sides in sheets. “Wets her and rinses her all at once,” Ernie pointed out to me. “Saves a lot of time, and does a sight better job. I rigged her.” He was, as I have said, immensely proud--proud as a child. The idea was undoubtedly ingenious, and I told him so. “I got a lot of ideas,” he assured me. “I’m figuring on them.” I nodded. “How’d you like the movies?” I asked. “Great!” he said. “Say, I want to tell you--” But I was already overdue at the office, and I made my excuses to the old man. Another time, I said, would do. He agreed, as he always agreed, and I left him at work upon the car. Forgan, at the door, winked in his direction as I passed, and asked, “Do you make him?” “Why?” I inquired. “What do you mean?” “You watch the old coot,” Forgan admonished me. “He’s a new man.” III I heard from Ernie, and in fragmentary snatches, the story of his moving-picture experience. There was a studio in one of the more remote suburbs, the plant of a fly-by-night company of none too good repute. The director of this company it was who had enticed Ernie away. “They wanted me,” he told me seriously one day, “because I looked so much like Tom Edison. Didn’t you ever notice that?” I did not smile, for Ernie was perfectly sober. But that this washer of automobiles was even remotely like the great inventor seemed to me a ridiculous suggestion. It was true that Ernie had white hair, had a round and placid face; but there was in his countenance none of that strength which is so evident in the other’s. I told myself that it was possible the picture-people were wiser than I, that under the lights and with a touch of makeup here and there-- “A war-film, it was,” Ernie assured me. “I was the big man in it.” “So?” I prompted. “Yeah. Inventor. Working on a new torpedo thing. Spies after it, trying to get it from me. They had me working in a shop with barred windows and a steel door and a guard outside. Had a bed there. Slept there. In the picture, you understand. Ate there and everything. People’d come to see me, and I’d show ’em how the thing worked. I was the big man in that picture, I’ll tell you.” “That must have been an interesting experience,” I suggested. He nodded, started to speak, but an expression curiously and almost ludicrously secretive crossed his countenance. He held his tongue, turned back to his task in a manner almost curt.