Task: Story Composition
Input (English): Fact1: Defense lawyer Stephen Ashe defends Wilfong despite knowledge of Ace 's other illegal activities, Fact2: upper-class family disowned him and daughter due to Stephen 's alcoholism and Jan 's free spirited willfulness, Fact3: Stephen continues to slip deeper into alcoholism, Fact4: Ace police that was over gambling debt to protect Jan 's reputation, Fact5: Jan brings him to Dwight 's trial
Output (English): Defense lawyer Stephen Ashe Lionel Barrymore successfully defends known gangster Ace Wilfong Clark Gable from a murder charge, despite his knowledge of Aces other illegal activities. His upperclass family has all but disowned him and his daughter Jan Norma Shearer, due to Stephens alcoholism and Jans free spirited willfulness. Jan is engaged to cleancut Dwight Winthrop Leslie Howard, but their relationship is threatened when she meets Ace and becomes enamored with him and his exciting life. As Stephen continues to slip deeper into alcoholism, Jan breaks her engagement with Dwight and begins a clandestine affair with Ace, which grows into love. This comes to a head when Ace asks a drunken Stephen if he can marry Jan; Stephen, offended by the request, angrily refuses, and when he discovers Jan in Aces boudoir, takes her home. They have an argument over their respective vices, and Jan proposes a deal: she will never see Ace again if Stephen will give up drinking. Despite knowing he cannot keep his promise, Stephen agrees, and the two of them leave for a cleansing camping holiday, along with Stephens fiercely loyal assistant Eddie James Gleason. After three months of sobriety, Stephen buys a bottle of liquor and boards a train for an unknown destination. Jan returns home to find her family has cut her off; feeling despondent, she visits Ace. He reacts angrily and possessively to her return and informs her that they will be married the next day. Jan slowly realizes what sort of man he really is, and sneaks away. Ace follows her to her apartment and, after a brief confrontation involving Eddie and Dwight, threatens Jan that she cannot get out of marrying him, and that if she marries Dwight he Ace will make sure Dwight is killed. Dwight goes to Aces gambling club and kills him, then turns himself in for the murder. He tells the police that it was over a gambling debt, to protect Jans reputation even though it will mean his own execution. Jan finds Stephen in a flophouse, seriously ill from his drinking binge, and brings him to Dwights trial. Over the objections of both Dwight and the prosecuting attorney, Stephen puts Jan on the witness stand and brings out the full details of her relationship with Ace, and the true reason Dwight killed him. In an emotional appeal to the jury, Stephen takes the blame for everything that happened, explaining that his alcoholism meant that he had failed to be a proper father to Jan until it was too late. He then collapses to the ground, dead. Dwight is acquitted and, as Jan prepares to leave for a new life in New York, promises to follow her.