Modern Screen (Jan-Dec 1960)

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They've got Scotland Yard, watching them every minute. They've got Bee — she's agreed to stay longer than she'd planned, hasn't she? She's even stopped looking around for another girl for the time being, hasn't she? Just so you'll feel better . . . Why, the children, they've got — " "I don't care what you say they've got, Eddie," Liz said, cutting in, her voice still soft. "We're not going. And I want," she said, "I want for us to tell the children that we're not, first thing at breakfast. If they've had any worries of their own about this, if they know anything about this, I want their minds put at rest, too . . . Michael, especially — he's old enough to hear things, to know what's going on — " "And what are we supposed to tell him, in case he does know?" Eddie asked. "That his Mama and Eddie are afraid?" "Yes," Liz said, "if that's the right word." "But it's a terrible word," Eddie said. "I don't care what kind of word it is," Liz said. "We're going to tell them." Eddie shook his head. "Honey," he started to say, "listen, I know how you feel — " Liz jumped up from the bed suddenly. Suddenly her voice rose. "Don't say that," she said, " — not that. How could you know how I feel? I'm their mother. I have my own set of feelings for them. I'm their mother. "And you — " she started to say. She brought her hand up to her mouth and she bit it. "And me," Eddie said, loudly now., too, "I'm their father ... I am their father, Liz. They may not be of my flesh, or of my blood. But they happen to be the children I'm with every day. They happen to be my wife's children. I happen to love them . . . And I'm concerned about them, too, as much as anybody else on this earth. Anybody!" He paused. AND THEN, HIS VOICE SOFT once more, he said, "Look . . . Liz. When I was a boy— I haven't thought of this for years, but it comes back to me now — when I was a boy, there was this kid in our neighborhood. He was a normal enough kid, when he started out in life, I guess. But he had two very abnormal parents. They were afraid for him, afraid that he'd ever, once in his life, get hurt. And so, if he was out playing with us, a gang of boys, and a fight started, the way it often did, his mother would come streaking out of their house and grab her boy away from us. 'Stay away from that lousy mob,' she used to say, 'or you'll get hurt!' . . . And in school, if this kid himself did something out of line and the teacher said something nasty to him, his father would come up and holler at the teacher and ask her how she dared to criticize their son . . . For their son must not be hurt! "I remember," Eddie went on, "we went to the same junior high school together, the same high school. And I remember how just after Korea the two of us were called into the Army, the same day. I'd talked to him the night before. We'd meet, we decided, on a certain corner that next morning and report in together. "Well. ' Eddie said, "that next morning, I got there, to the corner. I waited. I waited half-an-hour more than I should have, and this kid, he didn't show. I couldn't figure why. I didn't learn why, in fact, till about a week after I went away. That's when I got this letter from my mother. She told me it was terrible about this kid. A few minutes before he was supposed to leave the house to meet me, she said, he began to bawl and weep and scream and kick. He was afraid to go into the Army. Every guy on earth, when the time comes, is a little afraid. But this kid, he was this afraid. He carried on so bad that morning that his own parents couldn't quiet him down, and they had to come from the hospital eventually and take him. "He stayed in that hospital a few years, Liz. Now he's out. He's my age, exactly, and he sits home all day now with his mother and his father. He's a young man. He's a broken vegetable, really. He doesn't work. He doesn't go out. He just sits home. "He's ruined, Liz — " "It's a different thing you're talking about," she said. "But it isn't," Eddie said. "It's the story of a boy and his parents and fear. It's the story of a legacy. He was taught this fear, this kid I knew . . . They gave him a lesson. And he learned it well. . . ." Liz began to walk towards a closet, on the other side of the room. "Where are you going?" Eddie asked. "To take a walk," Liz said, reaching for a coat, putting it on. "To get lost, maybe, in the fog." "Why are you going?" Eddie asked. "Because I don't want any more talk," Liz said. "YOU'VE MADE UP YOUR MIND about this whole thing?" Eddie asked. "Yes," Liz said, picking up her handbag. "And you want me to have a talk with the children tomorrow — with Michael and I Christopher?" "Yes." "And you want me to give them their first lesson in fear?" "Yes," Liz said. She shouted it now. The tears came to her eyes and she shouted it. Sobbing, she ran from the room. She ran down the hallway. "Mrs. Fisher," a voice called out. It was Bee Smith, the nurse, looking out of the door of her room. "Elizabeth!" Liz ran past her, ignoring her, ignoring everything. When, finally, she got to the door, she put her hand on the knob, and she started to turn it. "Fear" — the word came to her mind, suddenly. "Is that what we want for them? "A legacy of fear?" After a while — a long, a very long, while — Liz turned, and she began to walk back up the hallway, back towards the bedroom. "Eddie," she whispered, when she got to the door. He was sitting on a chair, his hands clasped tightly together. He rose from the chair and he waited as she came to him. "Eddie," she said . . . "Eddie" ... as she fell into his arms, as she began to cry again, as he began to kiss her hair, and to soothe her. . . . BACK IN HER LITTLE ROOM, meanwhile, Bee Smith smiled. She'd seen Liz walk back to her husband from that door. And this made her happy. She guessed, from what she'd seen and heard just now, that it would be all right for her to start interviewing girls for her job again. But tomorrow — she thought — tomorrow was probably going to be such a lovely day. And, she wondered, if maybe instead, it wouldn't be more pleasant to go walking with her "grandchildren", and take them to see that enormous building downtown with the big clock on it, and that pretty river called the Thames. Well, she thought, as she sat back in her chair, she'd see about all that in the morning. The fog was lifting now. Everything was going to be lovely again. . . . END Eddie and Liz both star in Butterfield 8. MGM; Liz stars in Two For The Seesaw, United Artists, Cleopatra, for 20th-Fox. NU-NAILS ARTIFICIAL FINGERNAILS Cover short, broken, thin nails with nu-nails. Applied in a jiffy with our amazing new quick-drying glue. Can be worn any length . ..polished any shade. Help overcome nail-biting habit. Set often1 29c. At dime, drug & dept. stores. NU-NAILS CO., Dept. -S 5251 W. Harrison, Chicago 44 Also Hollywood Fingernails — Permanent Dubonett, Rose Color. No polish required ... 39c set. PHOTO SPECIALS Greatest Values Ever Offered!! ENLARGED FROM ANY SNAPSHOT, PHOTO 01 NEGATIVE. 10 POST CARD SIZE EACH GROUP 4 5x7 ENLARGEMENTS ONLY 1 COLORED IN OIL > + _ or 2 8x10 ENLARGEMENTS 1 COLORED IN OIL ^> J 98 nil oiilcr. We Pay Color Cipth«s. fill STATE PHOTO SERVICE, Dept. D 1180 Broadway. New York I. N. Y. KILL THE HAIR ROOT / Deilioy unwonted hoir PEBMANENTLY. U>e coi Uft/lken ton M«io«"wo°Wd Li FOREVEb'' I Xs^vfMONEY.eACK GUARANTEE (Oui 7oih Y.o.) ■ MAHLER'S. INC.. Dept. 360T PROVIDENCE 15. !our postmaster suggests: Avoid the avalanche of last minute holiday mailings! To assure prompt delivery of all Christmas parcels and greeting cards before the holiday — MAIL EARLY! FOR DISTANT OUT-OFTOWN POINTS, MAIL BY DECEMBER 10, 1960 FOR DELIVERY IN YOUR LOCAL AREA, MAIL BEFORE DECEMBER 16, 1960