PEGGY IN HOLLYWOOD

Wairarapa Times-Age, 21 March 1939, Page 10

PEGGY IN HOLLYWOOD

PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT. COPYRIGHT.

BY

MRS PATRICK MACGILL.

CHAPTER XX. (Continued;. “I am not so mad on acting that I cannot give up the stage, darling,' Douglas told her, as he pleaded lor himself. “I am only learning to act so that one day I shall be able to write. ( And I have enough money to make a, year or so of travelling possible before we need to settle down. I would take you to see the world, Peggy, Paris, Rome, Venice, Switzerland in winter with ice carnivals and sleighing, Norway in the summer —where the darkness never falls, the tropics Where the stars hang like lighted lamps in the sky, and the South Seas where the flowers and the natives will make you realise what a gorgeous, colourful thing life can .be.” The young actor-dramatist was not ranting or letting his imagination run riot in order to impress Peggy. She could feel that; he really would do all these things for her, and, provided she could banish David from her life and thoughts for the rest of her life, it would be more than probable that she would enjoy herself exactly as Douglas was saying. She put forth a white, tender little hand and lightly touched Douglas’s knee. “Don’t talk to me about things that hurt . . . just yet,” she asked, quietly. “I’m a brute and ought to know better. But all men are brutes in love,” the young actor tbld Peggy, with perfect truth. “But I am going to take advantage of your offer to accompany you to New York. I was on my way there . . . had been seen off on the Sante Fe from Hollywood with orchids and chocolates all complete,” said Peggy, a thin wraith of a smile curving her lips. “Then Mr ’Lewisohn dragged me off at San Felipe te come up here and do this picture,’ she added. Douglas laughed. “He certainly gets what he wants, that old boy! But he’s as straight as a sword and as keen,” he added enthusiastically. “I’d better leave a' note for him in his cabin. It won’t take me long to get ready. I only unpacked a few things from the New York trunk,” sajd Peggy, in spite of herself, beginning to feel the urge, the interest that comes with the promise of a new adventure. The note to the film -director was brief, but more pain and pathos, more bewilderment lay behind the message than a long elaborate letter' could have conveyed to anybody, on the inside of Peggy’s Hollywood adventure. “Dear Mr Lewisohn, “I am going to-finish the journey to New York that was interrupted at San Felipe. I cannot think very clearly at present, but after the terrible experiences that Hollywood has held for David and me, I do not wish to see it again. Undoubtedly Miss Orth has used some means to force David’s hand in regard to this marriage, but I think it best to let matters rest there. No good can come from torturing interviews. I am ever so sorry not to have done better in “Success,” but hope that you will not lose too heavily over it. 1 am returning to the stage, not believing in myself sufficiently to make motion pictures my career. You were so good to give me a chance. Thank you again and again. I shall never forget you. “Your sincere friend, "Peggy Rooney.” Having sealed’ the envelope, Peggy slipped over to the director’s cabin and placed in it the middle of the table propped up against the lamp, so that he would be bound to see it when he came in from the studio. When she got back, the car that Douglas had hired in Los Angeles for his stay in Idyllwild was waiting at her cabin door, and in shouldering Peggy’s heavy trunk without help, the young actor proved that he was something more than a matinei idol. “Come on, Peggy! Climb up. Bundle in,” he bade her breezily. He stowed her small baggage in the rumble seat and saw that she was settled comfortably in the place beside the wheel. The whole company had gone to the moonlight picnic; as they'drove by the inn the singing of the Idyllwild Brethren —unaccompanied for a few seconds owing to the organ breaking on Aunt Louella as usual—was wafted to them through the quiet night; somehow Peggy was glad. “I would far rather remember Idyllwild than Hollywood,” she told Douglas, with more meaning than he knew or could ever have guessed.

His hand left the wheel for a split second to seek and find Peggy’s. “Hollywood is a gilded airball, a dragon spewing spite and misery to those who will not let her swallow them whole,” he said, with so much lively emphasis that Peggy wondered what his secret experiences had been to cause him to voice his opinion in such a way. “New York is not so cruel, because she does not promise so much and perform — precisely nothing.” he told Peggy with perfect truth. As they sped along ii/ the direction of Riverside, Peggy forced herself to take an interest in the various aspects of the journey as pointed out by Douglas. Th high powered car fairly ate up the roads, and it was half an hour past midnight when they reached the aerodrome at Los Angeles. As soon as Douglas made his appearance in the sheds, Peggy was startled by a little old woman dressed in cheap black, emerging from behind a post where she must have been watching vfor the actor's arrival. “How do you do, Mr. Gillmorc? He’s worse, Jack is. and I've spent more of the money you gave me on taking part of the journey by aeroplane. They told me at the office your name was down as one of tonight’s passengers.- I’ve never been in a flying machine an’ I thought you might let me come in along of you. I won’t disturb you any.”i This with a significant look at Peggy. For a moment Douglas looked blank and appeared rather at a loss. Then he recovered his sunny, easy good nature and seemed to be making up his mind to some inevitable circumstances. “Miss Rooney—Mrs Ralston,” he said waving an introductory hand between the two strangely contrasted women. “Mrs Ralston’s youngest boy was in our New York company and what must the fool do but get drunk and fall out of his hotel window,” Douglas told Peggy when they were comfortably seated in the back of the aeroplane, with Mrs Ralston holding fearfully to her seat beside the company stewardess. “And you are paying her fare to New York to see him, I suppose” said Peggy, supplying the rest of the story.

They had two hours to wait at Chicago and Douglas proposed the Exhibition. There was only time for the most casual glance .around the' mighty show, but it look Mrs Ralston’s mind completely off her sick boy and Douglas hoped that it would divert Peggy’s mind from her troubles. Whenever her attention seemed perfunctory or her blue eyes grew wistful, he would propose some childish, ridiculous pleasure —a ride on the Helter Skelter or a shot at Aunt Sally. "Oh, Pegs, don’t let life down you! You’ll learn to forget, and then my turn will come. Meantime, little old New York for both of us —eh?” And that was the only allusion ever made to Peggy’s jilting. CHAPTER XXI. If Oscar Lewisohn and Jon had not decided to have their breakfast brought to the studio where they had been all night at work, instead of going over to the cabin for it, they would have received Peggy’s letter, and all would have been well. It was a little two-headed boy of five for whom Lewisohn was forever making paper boats that was chosen for a small but important part in PeggyRooney's Hollywood drama. Trotting into the cabin for his usual pre-break-fast chat with his idol, he dropped his little mouth with disappointment when he saw the room empty. But a paper boat was on the table! Near the cabin was a pretty, picturesque creek. Billy loved sailing boats in the creek. Peggy’s letter, torn and shaped just as Lewisohn tore and shaped his old letters for Billy, made an excellent boat. “Any idea where Peggy is, Mr Lewisohn? This came for her early this’ morning, but she didn’t sleep in the cabin last night.” Vi held a telegram in her hand. Lewisohn lotted up with the blank, haggard stare of the man who has been up all night, who does not care if the world falls to pieces so long as he can get a few hours uninterrupted sleep. “Where is she then?” he asked drowsily. “I thought sh.e might be still working on that retake with Douglas when she wasn’t in bed at twelve o’clock, the time we all came back from the picnic,” said Vi. her eyes sparkling at the prospect of a juicy morsel of scandal to carry back to the others. Some of Lewisohn’s drowsiness fled. “Give me that telegram, Vi, and keep your mouth shut or ‘Success’ will be the last picture you’ll ever act in for me,” he told her, surlily. “All right, boss. Don’t lose your spirit,” was Vi’s satisfactory reception of both the instruction and the threat. Lewisohn opened the telegram directly Vi had gone. As he surmised, it was from David, and read, “Take no notice fake report in Press practical joke writing all my love dearest David.” Yesterday, when Peggy’s scene had still failed to satisfy his critical eye and ear. he had only regarded Peggy’s grief as an avenue to the accomplishment of an artistic end; the human side had to wait until the other was satisfied. But, the scene having not only fulfilled but triumphantly surpassed every hope that he had cherished, he was now ready to give his undivided attention to the human side of Peggy’s trouble with her lover. “I felt there was something like this behind it—mock marriages amongst film actresses are a favourite party trick. It was because I wanted to get the latest dope on Finklesteen that I instructed him to go io the rotten I party!” groaned Lewisohn. “Douglas has gone to New York.” observed Jon, slily. He gave a swift side glance to his friend’s face to see if the thought that had crept unbidden into his mind had also visited Lewisohn’s.

It had not. But the tired, kindly old face brightened. “Ah, she has gone to the boy! She has gone to the boy! She has gone to find out for herself like a so sensible little girl. She would be discreet and not let on to any of Finklesteen’s lot that she was in Hollywood. To-night, or maybe tomorrow, we’ll see her back. Go to sleep,'Jon. I’m all in. and so are you. We are not so youns and we was, boy. but we are not so old that Hollywood can lick us —eh?”

The two friends laughed like schoolbovs and let down the shades to shut out as much as they could of the eternal sunlight. Lewisohn was asleen in two seconds; it was Jon who, still awake, answered the knock of the hotel messenger. “Gentleman from Hollywood on the telephone for Miss Rooney. Miss de Frece sent me over to you,” said the boy. (To be Continued).