A Woman Laughs (1914)
Clara is an attractive coquette, seemingly wholesome, but really a most designing person. Some facts of her past have become known to a grave and studious gentleman, David. He is seriously ill but during his convalescence he observes her assiduous attentions to his friend, Louis, with growing alarm. He warns his friend against the woman, but Louis misconstrues his advice and persists in his affair with Clara. This love, however, soon curdles to hate. He associates David with his misfortune and writes a note to Clara that he is "through with them both forever." In the loneliness of his room, he tears up the photograph of the heartless woman, and then goes to the sideboard to mix himself a libation. Just as he places his hand on the electric water-kettle, an accident at the distant power-house sends extra heavy voltage over the wire, and he catches the full current, which kills him. David happens in to see Louis and finds him dead in the room with the fragments of the photograph, the note and other signs of broken hopes scattered about him. In a wild rage, believing that Clara's conduct had inspired his friend to suicide, David rushes for her, drags her back to the chamber of death, and tells her that she must remain there until the police come. She looks coldly at the dead man at her feet; she has no regrets; her interests are centered in herself alone. As she sees the officers coming, she clasps David by the arm, scornfully exclaiming, "Let them come in. They will find us both here." David is seized with a great fear, as the epistle left by the dead man would involve himself as well as the woman, so he allows her to go out on her wicked way, and she passes through the door with sibilant laughter as he is left alone with his friend. The officers come, examine the premises; they see the burned handle of the kettle and observe that the hand of the deceased is similarly burned. This dissipates the theory of suicide, showing that Louis was really electrocuted. David seeking forgetfulness, goes west and plunges into out-of-door business, improving big real estate holdings, and busying himself to dull the aching grief caused by the ruined life of his friend. Much to David's surprise and regret, his trusted young engineer, Scott, comes one day upon the scene accompanied by his sister and a dashing woman whom he introduces as his fiancée. All at once the specter of the past rises, vicious and impertinent in the person of the bold and resourceful Clara, whose eyes challenge him to interfere with her affairs by revealing the past. The coquette mischievously busy as of old, soon has an alliance with a fashionable young idler, George, with whom she travels about the country, while Scott is busy in the affairs of his profession. David is only too glad to have her out of his sight, and is not surprised when he discovers her in the arms of the ardent George, whom she has chained to her chariot wheel. Not to be too precipitant, David gives Scott an inkling of the affairs, and the latter starts investigating on his own account and soon sees things for himself. He confronts Clara in indignation, but she is cool and defiant, and taking off her engagement ring flings it at his feet. He is too deeply humiliated to remain. He rushes away, and then in desperation, draws his revolver intent upon self-destruction. Happily, David arrives at this moment, wrests the weapon from him and finally calms the desperate man. He tells him how Clara's laughter has echoed through the sorrowing years, a trail of misery and despair. Scott is for making away with her at once, but David cautions him, "Let her live, and make her pay." That night as she is packing up, about to leave, she gets a note signed by "George," asking her for a tryst at the old meeting place just once more. She secretly leaves the house, and upon reaching the hill, instead of finding George, she comes face to face with Scott. She feels that he is about to kill her. She turns from the scene and flees back into the dark, the embodiment of fear. When the morning comes David meets Scott, but the latter has triumphed over himself. He remarks, "She is a woman. I cannot avenge the wrong she put upon me." So the siren fades out of the story, her palsied lips forgetting forever again to frame a laugh.
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GenresDrama
Short
IMDbPro
See more details at IMDbPro
| Filmmakers | Role |
|---|---|
| Norval MacGregor | Director |
| William E. Wing | Writer |
| William Nicholas Selig | Producer |
| Cast | Role |
|---|---|
| Kathlyn Williams | |
| Edwin Wallock | |
| Charles Clary | |
| Harry Lonsdale |
