PEGGY IN HOLLYWOOD

Wairarapa Times-Age, 22 March 1939, Page 10

PEGGY IN HOLLYWOOD

PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT. COPYRIGHT.

BY

MRS PATRICK MACGILL.

CHAPTER XXL (Continued). “I'll come right over,” said Jon, making up his mind even as he spoke. He was a little stronger physically than his friend Oscar, and his brain was not quite so fogged with the long night’s work. He had enough knowledge of David to know that if he became aware that Peggy had fled from Idyllwild—al the bottom of his heart he suspected that she had gone off with Douglas Gillmore, cut to the quick because she believed the picture she had seen in the paper—no power on earth would stop him from following and, in all probability he would give the whole, story to the newspapers, and the secret of

“Success” would be out —he and Oscar would lose the little bit of money they had been able to borrow!

“Is that you, darling?” David’s voice at the othei’ end of the.line agitated, tender, urgent. “No, Mr Whitley, it is Jon speaking. Miss Rooney' is doing retakes with Oscar and will not be free till a long time.". Jon prayed to be forgiven the lie, but where there was a choice between his friend and this stranger who came to Hollywood and got into such messes —well, what would anybody do? “I say, Jon, Peggy didn’t get mad over that damn fool picture in the paper, did she? I mean, she got my telegram, and she knows it was one of those fake party stunts I was pushed into —Miss Orth was drunk when she insisted on it, and I had to keep her quiet. Tell Peggy that, will you? As soon as you see her?” “Oh, sure, sure, Mr Whitley.” The slow, Swedish voice was very emphatic. “And tell her that I’m sneaking off to Arizona for a few days to get some material for the new play. If she’s through before three o’clock, could you ask her to ring me up?” “Oh, sure, sure, Mr. Whitley.” “That's a good egg. ’Bye!” The Swede was sweating as he hung up. There was no sleep for him for the rest of the day. Wan-eyed-, wretchedly tired, he waited for Oscar to open his eyes. Then he told him.

“Thank God he’ll be away for a few days,” was Lewisohn’s pious accept? ance of the news. “The premiere must be announced ,for Saturday and he must not know that Peggy has gone until it is too late for him to ruin the picture. That is what the fool would do.” Lewisohn’s voice was sombre with the weight of a hundred cares. -“We must find her. You may be right, Jon, about Douglas taking her with him to New York. Go down to the inn and dictate a telegram over their telephone. And charge it collect,” he added, remembering the emancipated state of his pocket book. Within an hour the return reply came from Gillmore’s manager. “Know nothing of the girl. Gillmore went direct from aeroplane to bedside sick father Missouri. —Martin.” CHAPTER XXII.

Hollywood had been on its hind legs with expectation for three days. It was Saturday. The excitement had been working up to fever pitch since Wednesday. The most absurd of all the travesties in the Kingdom of Glitter — the entertainment known as a premiere is the one taken most seriously. Hollywood is then on parade; not that it is ever off, but on premiere nights it dresses with malice aforethough! The Los Angeles papers had carried whole page advertisements. Every film notability, every studio executive ol any consequence, English celebrities an Indian Prince and Princess, the Governor of the State and his lady al! were advertised to appear with theii telegrams of acceptance reproduced along with their names in the advertisements.

“The greatest film of all with a cast that will fade the Hollywood stars out of the cinema sky! This is Oscar Lewisohn’s opus. The Secret Film with a Secret Cast! A Prologue such as Hollywood has never before seen is to be staged! Come early!" The advertisements were followed by columns of interviews in all ol which the excitement and suspense were worked up until eventually numbers of quite sensible, normal people rang up the box office, to be informed that the house was sold out. • Hundreds of searchlights tearing through the sky ... a dozen powerful arc lamps to illumine the path ol the human "stars” as they arrived in their up-to-the-minute limousines, a man with a microphone in the forecourt of the theatre introducing notable arrivals to the radio public; light and more light, blare and yet more brazen trumpeting. . . oh, here comes Oscar Lewisohn the director of the Secret Film, himself! “Step this way, Mr Lewisohn, won’t you? Just a word or two about the picture, please!"

Oscar and Jon, silk-hatted, lemon gloved, gardenia in buttonhole, just the right size in pearl sluds —stepped obediently to the microphone and said, "How do you do, folk? This is Oscai' and Jon . . . still together . . . . Remember when we gave you ‘Sidewalk Idols?’ Oh yes, you do! Mother, you might have been a bit younger then, but you are a lot prettier now! Well, folks, you are going to like this picture a whole lot better than ‘Sidewalk Idols.’ I won't tell you any more about it. Come and see it. Good-bye!"

Their expansively smiling faces, their self-confident swagger down the red carpeted aisle, stopped at every step by outstretched hands, to seats in the third row immediately behind Sam Finklesteen and the “Success" Company. Beside Finklesteen was Opal Orth, in white satin and ermine, with the now famous pigeon blood rubies as her only touch of colour. David had telegraphed that he could not possibly be in Hollywood till the following morning; material for the finest play he would ever write had just turned up. He would ring up as soon as he arrived in Los Angeles. Directly Lewisohn took his seal, Finklesteen and Opal turned round with the most effusive greetings and congratulations that the evening had ■ so far held.

"I am so glad. Oscar, f said to Opal here —we were going to have the final re-take of ‘Success’ to-night—‘We will put off everything to go and support my old friend Oscar in his new picture.’ I said that, didn't I, Opal?” turning to his companion for confirmation of his words.

“You sure did, Sam,” she corroborated. with a much more American accent than any native. “Thanks, Sam,” said Oscar, drily. “And you too. Miss Orth, 11 he added,

with non-committal politeness. I Beckoning Oscar and leaning ovex’ I the back of the seat until his mouth was on a line with his ear, Finklesteen | inquired in a hoarse whisper, “Any [ letting your old pal in on the name of the picture, and who’s in it?” Oscai’ was saved from replying by the urgent glance pt the assistant stage j manager, who seemed agitated about j something. “Could I speak to you a minute, Mr Lewisohn?” he asked, beckoning him into the aisle. “There’s . a bus with a bunch of hicks outside I asking for you, saying they’ve come ' from Idyllwild to put on a programme here tonight. Something about an organ, they said. I’d be glad if you'd come and se what it’s all about, Mr. Lewisohn. They are in the manager’s office.” “That’s all right, son. I'll come right along." Lewisohn went out with the stage manager, giving a meaning look to six particularly brawny young men in’ a

row who had seats just across the aisle from Finklesteen. “Mr Lewisohn, what does this mean? There’s a bunch of folks from the back woods telling me that you asked them to come here tonight with an old organ contraption and give a turn. They don’t seem drunk or daft, either!” The manager himself was waitingoutside the door, the handle in his hand. Lewisohn was never more in earnest in his life: than when he replied, “Those people. Jack, are going on first as they are, organ and all, to give a representation of a meeting of the Idyllwild Brethren. They want a new organ. They'll get enough for a dozen organs if I am not mistaken.” “You are crazy, man. This is Hollywood, remember.” “I am remembering," was Lewisohn’s unperturbed reply. CHAPTER XXIII. The hush that preceded the raising of

the curtain was more charged with suspense than usual. Every eye was glued to the darkened stage, every ear was strained in the silence. Not a single person in the audience, with the exception of Jon, knew the secret of the night’s entertainment. Even the company had been forbiddeivto attend and had to content'themselves with hearing the premiere broadcast over the radio. There was a ripple of human movement, but no othei- sound as the curtain slowly, rose on the strangest sight that the stage of the fashionable theatre had ever known. The setting was exactly like the room at the inn where the accustomed meetings were held, even to the sanded floor and the crayon portraits of John Everton’s father and mother over the fireplace. The identical organ that always bucked on Aunt Louella was in the middle of the stage, with Aunt Louella herself at the keyboard and Miss Fanny May in her freshly-starched lawn, close by. There were Gran’pa and Gran’ma Willoughby, Mrs. Everton, the grave, fresh-faced boy and his pretty girlfriend, all exactly the same as if they were in their mountain home. Those at the side could sec Oscar Lewisohn in the wings, only the hard set of his lips betraying the tumult of the spirit within. Before the amazed comments of the audience could be given voice, he strode on to-the stage, walked down to the footlight and addressed those who were presently to see and judge his picture. He dispensed with the usual “Ladies and gentlemen,” getting straight into the core of their hearts —“Folks, most of you know me, I guess.” A storm of clapping made it impossible for him to go on. The smile that had many a time “put over" a deal,, broke over the life-seamed face, and Lewisohn held up a hand in pleading to be allowed to go on. “There’s not one of you who would be sitting there except you had a father and mother.” The sincerity of the face and voice that held the stage froze the titter on the lips of the few who saw fit to take the remark as a joke. “When I took my company up to Idyllwild in the San Jacinto Mountains to make this picture, John Everton, the man who is to conduct this prologue, and who keeps the inn, did not know me from a hole in the ground. But I told him about my picture and only having barely enough to hire the camera and buy the film, and he told me to go ahead and use his lot for the studio, and to put my boys and girls in the little cottages that he rents for his living in the summer. These folks that

you see here,” Lewisohn made a swift dramatic sweep of his arm towards the group, “are the real foundation of all life, prtending to be nothing but what they are. They’ve been trying to save up enough dimes and cents to buy themselves a new organ to play at the meetings. How much you got. Aunt Louella?” turning to the red-faced, embarrassed treasurer of the organ fund. “Twenty-four dollars and twenty-five cents, Mr Lewisohn,” was the bash-fully-spoken reply.

“Hear that. folks? Twenty-four bucks and two bits! Now. I want you all —every mother’s son and daughter of you —to forget your frills and finery and that you are in Hollywood, and try to imagine yourselves two hundred miles up amongst the pines and firs and cedar trees with squirrels and lizards and chipmunks and bluebirds for company. It shouldn’t be so hard. Some of you have come from just such a place.'” Lewisohn reminded them gently. "Right away, folks." turning to the group around John Everton. "Just carry on the meeting as if you were at home in Idyllwild.” To the accompaniment of storms of applause, Oscar Lewisohn bowed and retired to his place in the wings. ‘The quietness with which the crowd settled down io listen was a tangible thing. John Everton read the undying story of the Prodigal Son just as quietly, sincerely and movingly as Lewisohn had heard him read it on the night when he had attended the meeting. There was scarcely a dry eye in the house. In lhe middle of a verse which the Brethren were singing in concert, the organ bucked cm Aunt Louella and she gave a snort of exasperation so loud that the singers stopped, nonplussed. It was the psychological moment, the moment for which Lewisohn had been hoping and waiting. While Aunt Louella was struggling frantically to adjust stops and fix pedals, he darted on to the stage for the second time. (To be Continued).