Part 42 (1/2)

THIRTY YEARS.

1925.

1.

Johnny walked through the crowded room looking for Dulcie. She had been with him a moment ago, but suddenly she had disappeared. He wondered where she had gone.

A small, thin-faced woman called him. ”Johnny dear,” she said in a thin high-pitched voice that was not unpleasant to the ear, ”come here a minute and talk to me. We have so little time to chat with each other, I'm beginning to forget how sweet you are.”

Johnny turned and looked at her, then he smiled slowly and walked toward her. n.o.body dared to ignore Marian Andrews. She was small and nervously intense and wrote a column that was syndicated in almost every newspaper in the country and throughout the world. Her subject was Hollywood, and Hollywood was her subject. Her words were known to make or break people. She knew how important she was and hesitated but little in using her power when she so willed. But the power was cleverly concealed beneath an overfriendly, gus.h.i.+ng, inquisitive manner that carried somehow into her column and gave the reader a feeling that he or she had just heard the news over the back fence that separated his own home from his neighbor's.

”Marian,” Johnny said pleasantly, taking her hand, ”I didn't see you.”

She looked at him a moment, an eyebrow lifted archly. ”For a second,” she said lightly. ”I thought you didn't want to see me.”

”How could you imagine such a thing?” He laughed easily. ”I just had something on my mind, that's all.”

She looked at him shrewdly. ”Such as where is your lovely wife?”

He looked at her in surprise. ”That's one of them,” he admitted.

She laughed, happy at her guess. ”You don't have to worry about her, dear boy, she just went outside for a bit of fresh air. Her cousin Warren is with her and you can sit down here beside me and we can have a talk.” She patted the seat beside her.

He looked down at her and smiled again. ”You see everything, Marian, don't you?”

A glint of pride came into her eyes. ”That's my job,” she replied. ”Don't forget I'm a reporter. Now come on, do sit down.”

He dropped into the chair beside her. Reporter was what she liked to think of herself as being; town gossip was more like it, he thought.

She turned to him. ”Isn't it a lovely party that Peter is giving for her cousin? He's so pleased that Warren's first picture is to be made by him and you must be so happy that Dulcie is playing opposite Warren.”

”Yes,” he said slowly. ”We're all very happy over it. Warren Craig is one of the biggest names in the theater and it means a great deal to us that he consented to do this picture.” He looked at her directly. ”It means a great deal to the whole industry too. We've been after him for years.”

”I heard somewhere that's how you met Dulcie,” she gushed. ”When you went backstage to his dressing room.” She laughed gaily. ”It must seem all too wonderful to you. You go backstage to sign one of America's greatest actors for the movies and meet his cousin, fall in love with her, and come away with a wife and not the actor you were after. And then two years later he finally agrees to make a picture, and your charming wife, now one of the most important stars in pictures, is to play opposite him. It's just like the movies.” She looked up at him smiling. ”It's a wonderful story. May I print it? I think everybody would love to know about it.”

He returned her smile. ”Go ahead,” he said easily. ”You would use it even if I said no,” he thought. He took out a cigarette and lit it.

”You must be very proud of Dulcie,” she continued. ”It's not every girl that becomes a star in her first picture and then proves it wasn't just an accident by making two others in which she is even better than in the first. I hear her pictures are the biggest grossing pictures you have.”

He wished she didn't have the habit of probing in two directions at once. It made it rather difficult for you to decide which one to follow first. He drew on his cigarette. ”I am proud of her,” he answered. ”She always dreamed of being a great actress and I knew it was in her, but I don't think any of us realized just how great a success she would be. You know she only made that first picture to pa.s.s the time while I was busy at the studio.”

”And then she was so good you couldn't keep her from the screen,” Marian said.

He grinned wryly. ”That's about it. She was too good.”

She looked at him sharply. ”Would you have wanted her to stay off the screen after that first picture?”

He looked at her openly. ”Off the record, Marian?” he asked.

”Off the record,” she a.s.sured him.

”Frankly, I would have, but after I saw that picture I knew I didn't stand a chance,” he said, hoping she would keep her word.

”That's what I thought,” she said, nodding her head, satisfied with herself. ”It must be very unhappy being married to one of the most beautiful and admired women in the country and living three thousand miles away from her.”

”It's not as bad as that,” he said quickly. ”We both understand that our work keeps us apart and we get together as often as we can. I come out here four times a year and she comes to New York almost as much.”

She leaned forward and patted his cheek. ”Johnny, you're such a dear understanding boy. Sometimes I must feel sorry for you.”

He looked at her inquisitively. What did she mean by that? Sometimes during the last few visits to the studio he had got the impression that people were feeling sorry for him. Why should she come out and say it? ”Don't be,” he said dryly. ”We're actually very happy and, in spite of the distance between us, very close to each other.”

”Of course, Johnny, of course,” she said quickly-almost too quickly. She glanced across the room. ”Oh, there's Doug and Mary. I must talk to them, will you excuse me?”

He smiled tolerantly at her. Having exhausted him as a source of gossip, she was now looking for another. ”Sure,” he said getting to his feet with her. ”Go right ahead.”

She hesitated for a moment. Her face was serious as she looked at him. ”I like you, Johnny,” she said unexpectedly. ”You're a very decent guy.”

He was surprised by her statement and the sudden undercurrent of earnestness in her tones. ”Thank you, Marian,” he said simply. ”But why-?”

She interrupted his question. ”This is a very funny business, Johnny,” she said, putting a hand on his arm. ”We live in a sort of goldfish bowl out here. I know, because in some ways I helped to make it so. And I know, too, that many things are said about the people out here that aren't true and that these things sometimes make a lot of trouble and hurt other people.”

He looked at her strangely. ”I know, Marian,” he said gently.

An expression of relief crossed her face. She took her hand from his arm. ”I'm glad you understand, Johnny,” she said. ”Because I wouldn't want to see you hurt unnecessarily. Take everything you read and hear with a grain of salt. Don't believe anything unless you see it for yourself. There are many small and vicious people who are envious of your happiness and wouldn't hesitate to destroy it.” And then with typical birdlike quickness she left him.

He watched her cross the room with her small hurried steps. Strange turn the conversation had taken. He wondered what she meant. He didn't know of anyone who wanted to hurt him. He looked across the room. Dulcie and Warren were just entering the room from the veranda. A sudden light of comprehension came into his eyes.

So that's what Marian was trying to warn him about. Dulcie was laughing and her face looked young and happy and excited. She had risen so quickly that there must be people envious of her success. Marian was trying to tell him that these people wouldn't hesitate to hurt them if they could get at Dulcie that way. He smiled to himself confidently as he made his way toward them. Let them try. He knew better than to believe any of them or anybody. Even Marian Andrews.

2.

Peter held the door open and let them enter the room before him. Then he followed them into the room and closed the door. The little study was quiet after the sound of the party outside. There was a small fire glowing in the fireplace and it cast a cheery reddish light across their faces.

He turned the key in the door and straightened up. ”That's so we won't be disturbed,” he said smiling. ”These big parties make me nervous. All day my stomach is upset thinking about it.”

”I know how you feel,” Willie Borden said. ”That's why I'm glad I'm moving back to New York. This ain't the kind of life I like. I like making pictures, but I don't like the things you got to do to keep up with the crowd out here. Sometimes I think we're slaves to our publicity men's ideas of how to run our business.”

”That's how you guys might feel,” Sam Sharpe injected. ”But from my point of view you can't do without it. Outside in that room there you got maybe twenty people whose business it is to tell the whole world about what happens here. In Marian Andrews's column tomorrow ten million people will read that everybody in Hollywood turned out for Peter Kessler's party in honor of Warren Craig, who, incidentally, is appearing in a picture with Dulcie Warren for the Magnum studios. And that's just one column. Like I said, there are twenty of them. It's money in the bank for you guys, and you complain.”