But when it rained while we were registered at some expensive place like the Kittatiny at the Delaware Water Gap, there was need for anxiety, with the actors’ board bill mounting daily and nothing being accomplished. Yes, we had worries. But we were getting encouragement too. The splendid reviews of our pictures in _The Dramatic Mirror_ helped a lot. The way our pictures were going over was a joy. With their first announcement on the screen, what a twitter in the audience! A great old title page Biograph pictures had. Nothing less than our National emblem, our good old American eagle, sponsored them. He certainly looked a fine bird on the screen, his wings benignly spread, godfathering the Biograph’s little movie children. Exhibitors were certainly getting keen about “Biographs”; the public was too. People were becoming anxious about the players as well, and commencing to ask all sorts of questions about them. Stacks of mail were arriving daily imploring the names of players, but of this no hint was given the actor. How surprised I was that time my husband said to me, “You know we are getting as many as twenty-five letters a day about Mary Pickford?” “Why, what do you mean, letters about her?” “Every picture she plays in brings a bunch of mail asking her name and other things about her.” “You’re not kidding?” “Of course not.” “Did you tell her?” “No. I don’t want her asking for a raise in salary.” Biograph found it a difficult job sticking to their policy of secrecy. Letters came from fans asking about their favorites; the pretty girl with the curls--the girl with the sad eyes--the man with the lovely smile--the funny little man--and the policeman. What tears of joy Sennett would have wept had he known! In bunches the postman soon began to leave the “who” letters at 11 East Fourteenth Street. “Who played the tall, thin man in ‘The Tenderfoot’?” “Who played the little girl in the Colonial dress and curls who danced the minuet in the rose garden at midnight in ‘Wilful Peggy’?” “Who was the handsome Indian who did the corn dance on the mountain top in ‘The Indian Runner’s Romance’?” Other picture concerns than Biograph had not as yet made the actor’s name public. But they did give him his mail when addressed with sufficient clarity. Arthur Mackley, the famous _Sheriff_ of Essanay, was receiving, those days, ten letters a day. They came addressed. The Sheriff Essanay Company Chicago Some boy, the Sheriff, getting ten letters a day!