[Illustration: The beginning of the Griffith régime at 4500 Sunset Boulevard. A tense moment in comedy. From left to right: D. W. Griffith, Teddy Lampson, Mae Marsh, Donald Crisp, W. E. Lawrence and Dorothy Gish. (_See p. 248_) ] The gay life of Dorothy and Gertrude was short-lived. Their first night of revelry on Los Angeles’ Gay White Way was their last. Up in their room, the night of arrival, they had planned their evening: dinner in the grill, the movies afterward, the grill again as a finish. They put up their hair, they slipped their skirts to the hip, the jacket just covering the lowered waistline, and the lengthened skirt the legs. So they sallied forth. Their program was well-nigh fulfilled; they finished with two-thirds of it. As they were leaving Clune’s big movie palace they were apprehended by two men, David Griffith and Dell Henderson, who, having been out scouting for the youngsters all evening, were just beginning to get seriously worried over their disappearance. Mr. Griffith had made Mr. and Mrs. Henderson responsible for the girls, and at his suggestion they had already found an apartment for them, not only in the same house with themselves but on the same floor, and--adjoining. All the fun was gone out of life. This arrangement would be worse than boarding school. But it got worse still. Sister Lillian, at Mary Pickford’s suggestion, decided she’d return to the movies, and so she and mother came on to Los Angeles. That meant Dorothy and Gertrude would be transferred to Mother Gish’s care, where their bubbling spirits and love of noisy innocent fun would be frowned upon by the non-approving eyes of the more sober elder sister. Things became more complicated when Marshall Neilan began paying ardent attentions to little Gertrude. Marshall had fallen in love with Gertrude from seeing her on the screen, and he told Allan Dwan with whom he had worked at the American Film Company in Santa Barbara that he was going to marry the cute little kid. * * * * *