Photoplay (Jan-Jun 1940)

apologize! Hell forgive you, I'm sure. Tell him from now on you'll be a good girl — or vice versa ... I don't care which." "If you don't care — that's what I'll do. Ill go back to Mr. Gilbert and ask him to take me back." HER heart beat frighteningly, warningly. This was the first serious quarrel she had ever had with Teddy and it did horrible things to her inside. But somehow she knew she could not let him bully her, even in temper. She was silent. "You won't have to ask twice, I assure you," Teddy raised his voice. "I can even tell you what he'll say — 'My dear Miss Russell — of course I want you back, but I don't like your meddlesome husband. He's crazy, selfish, stupid — and doesn't want anybody to do anything for you but himself.' That's what he'll say to you." His too-bright, feverish eyes wavered a little, but came back to meet her gaze. "Unfortunately, Lillian, that's the truth — every word. But I can't help myself, Lillian — that's how I feel about you. I want to write you the greatest operetta of your career. I can do it, if you'll have faith in me ... I'll start it tonight — this very minute — " Her heart melted then. "Come, Teddy — sit beside me." She turned out the lamp and they sat beside the fireplace, with only the glow from the dying embers lighting their faces. "I've been unfair to you, Teddy," she began. "There's something I've kept from you, dear — something I should have told you." Teddy sprung up, his hands clenched. "If it's anything that may come between us, don't tell me now. I'll — I'll never give you up — understand that! Even if you should tell me you loved someone else more — even if you said you did not love me any more. I wouldn't let you go! I — couldn't live without you!" "Listen, Teddy — there is someone else — " Before she could finish his head was in her lap, his hot tears on her hands. "Teddy — a baby. I'm going to have a baby." He caught her hands and crushed them to his lips. "So, you see, dear — it's just as well that I'm out of the show." When he rose and walked across the room, she watched him, puzzled. "Aren't you happy about it?" she asked. His dark head bent, he stalked the room, his face desperate in the fire light. "I was never happier — but never more convinced of my own selfishness." "Why, dear?" Perhaps she would never understand this manchild, who had come to mean so much to her life — even had the power to change its path. Persuade her to come to a strange country — and then dare get her fired from a show and thus throw them both out of work. "Why?" he repeated, his voice husky with emotion. "I've risked your entire career — as if it belonged to me. And it doesn't. Even you have no right to jeopardize it, Lillian." He came over and sat on the couch beside her. "I'll be proud of our child — dear — but if anything should happen to you — because of it — I'd hate myself— forever." "What could happen, Teddy?" "You — you might die. Or, it might change you in so many ways that you'd never really be Lillian Russell again." Tilting his chin up so that he looked straight into her eyes, "Teddy dear, you're horribly morbid; but if I should die, I'd consider it a glorious ending to my career; if I live and my career should die — I'd consider it the lovely beginning of a new life." Smiling into his wet eyes, "Now, dear — take me in your arms. Hold me tight— and don't let me go — 'til the fire burns out."' He gathered her to him, trying to put into his kiss all the things that were in his heart. Later, she tried to argue that she soon would be "perfectly all right" but the sensitive artist that was Teddy Solomon argued against her statements. He underwent, lived through, in his imaginative mind every pain, every anxiety which Lillian was to experience during the following months. While she did everything she knew to calm him, Lillian did a lot of thinking, which she dared not voice. After all, and at best, it would be a year before she could go back on the stage — she knew that. And then what had been her fame — on the other side of the Atlantic, might have faded out, been forgotten by that time. But still there was more of it to be gained in London, where they were. The truth was they had accumulated little money during the bright months. They had put so little aside for happier days — because, why should they, when they were living their happy days! That had been their theory. The trouble was in making it work, even though she determinedly insisted that they were happy. Because they had each other. "Lillian, do you realize that it is expected nowadays that a man be in love with his own wife? Isn't that fitting for me?" Teddy would say. "And some day, some day when you sing my operetta the world will know that I adore you." How he worked over the piano — all night, all day — never stopping. Seldom sleeping, in his feverish haste — his determined anxiety. Lillian saw his pale hands become too long, too transparent. And his face, with its delicate bone structure almost showing through. His eyes were burning flames, keeping alive on his love, his dream, his hope of what he was doing for her. "It will be your greatest success," he would say, day after day. I HE baby — a girl they named Dorothy — was three months old when the London Theater season was getting under way. She was a darling baby — with Lillian's bright gold hair and pink skin and her father's large brown eyes. She was a good baby, too, who responded nicely to the attentions of the French nursemaid Lillian engaged. Lillian had pawned every piece of her jewelry, so they could keep living in the small hotel suite and afford the nursemaid. Time was pressing in on them horribly — but surely she could not find fault with Teddy's effort and application. "Did Mr. Solomon drink his eggnog, Marie?" Lillian asked her maid at frequent intervals each day — asked when the incessant playing on the piano in the next room seemed weaker, more stumbling. As if to indicate the composer was striving against every odd to find the melodies and to set them down. At times it seemed that he was racing against time itself — racing with his own health. That he might finish before this fever became too consuming. "No'm — although I told him it was an English custom never to leave an empty glass," the maid replied. "He doesn't look well. He works too hard." "He's tired — he needs to go away for a holiday." "He says it is to be the greatest role of your career — the one he's working on now. It's just for you." Listening to the music filtering through the cheap thin walls, "I hope so — for his sake." LlLLIAN was dressed in one of the most becoming house dresses she owned. A Lillian Russell blue — satin, with a train, with a flowing, becoming flounce, draped about the neck and falling about her wide shoulders — which accentuated her small, tightlylaced waist. She wore her hair in a high pompadour, with a cluster of curls turned over her left shoulder. Looking at her reflection in the dressing table mirror, she thought of a certain day in New York, when she wore a blue dress — and a wide hat, which blew off and let her hair go wild. His arms had been around her when she reached up and pulled her hair from his eyes — such dark, thoughtful eyes they were . . . and he had said, a little later, "You're very beautiful." "Marie," she called, "you'll stay to let the visitor in tonight. He's to call about eight." "Visitor, Ma'am?" "How could you possibly forget, Marie? The American newspaperman. His name is Mr. Moore," Lillian managed to keep her voice even. "Show him in when he arrives." She had cabled Alexander Moore that she would now give him her story if he could come to London. A FEW minutes before eight, Lillian went into the music room and put her arm about Teddy's bent shoulders. "You look tired, dear," she said. "I am tired, darling — but it's fun getting tired from work you love. When I'm finished and you tell me I've kept my promise and written your greatest role, then I'll rest as long as you wish." "But, you still have so much to do, Teddy — " Then, with sudden determination, "And unless you promise to go away, I'll never tell you I like your operetta — and what's more, I may not even sing it when you do finish it." That made him laugh. It always did. "All right, that settles it — we go away. That is, if you get enough money for your life." "What do you say my hie is worth?" "More than all the papers in the world could pay." "You're sweet," she told him, her lips against his stubby cheek. "So are you," he said, turning back again to the keyboard. "Now run along and sell yourself to the newspaperman — and, Lillian, please don't send Marie in here with any more eggnogs. She always comes when I'm in the midst of a great idea— here she is, pushing an eggnog down my throat." "All right — no more tonight." Lillian couldn't know what seeing her walk into that room did to Alex Moore. He stood as she came toward him, took her outstretched hand, bowed, properly aloof. Through his guard, he was thinking how unkind the years had been to leave his heart, so young in its feeling for her. The sight of her brought back the ache, which was old as forever. He saw her now as the woman, yet he never had lost his picture of her as the girl. Her blue eyes were deeper — life had dug into her heart. Her figure was more mature — but there was something about her graceful, richly-padded body which would never age. Her voice, vibrated through him. And the sensation of being in her presence was almost unbearable at first — a storm inside him while he stood apart and watched — postponing the second when he must appoint his mind to control it. This smiling, gracious woman before him was Lillian Russell, a famous actress, beloved by millions. His paper was eager to pay her homage through its columns. He must see her that way. She was, above everything else a woman who loved another man. She was forever beyond his own reach. The first few sentences they exchanged were not recorded on the memory of either. They did not fasten the thread of conversation for a few seconds, while their eyes and overtones expressed more than the formalities, uttered with mechanical politeness. if IANO music, reached between and about them. While it came from behind a closed door, from another room, and played in spurts, starts and stops it was strangely suited to their moods. Alex extracted a folded letter from the large envelope he balanced on his lap. "This is in letter form, and merely gives our paper the exclusive right to publish your story. You'll have to sign where it says 'accepted.' " Lillian didn't even look at the proffered letter. Her eyes still held to his face. "And this — this is your check." The music sounded insistently loud then. It brought Lillian from her contemplation of Alex. She shook her head, as one coming out from a daydream, smiled. She took the check and letter without looking at either. "You'll sign — sign the letter — " Alex said, leaning toward her. "Why did you break our pact, Mr. Moore?" He did not answer immediately. He was too surprised. Looking at her, he said, his voice well under control. "I didn't think you even remembered me, Miss Russell." "That doesn't answer my question, Mr. Moore." "I don't think I can answer it without quibbling a little. You see, I made my pact with a girl named Helen Leonard, and when I found she was Lillian Russell, I — well — I got scared, I guess." Taking a quick breath, "Does it seem very long ago — I mean, it does seem a long time ago, doesn't it? "I can see it all as if it were yesterday. We had just left Professor Damrosch's and I was so happy because he was going to teach me — and grandma was all a-flutter because she didn't like the Professor at first. Then it happened . . . And you seemed to leap from nowhere and I — I thought you were going to be killed." "I was afraid you were." "And here we are — years later — signing a contract for my life story." Her lips parted in a smile. "It would have been a very short one, if you hadn't been so brave." Alex saw the mist in her eyes as she smiled again. He saw, too, that the acclaim of the world had not erased the simple memories from her heart. "Maybe it wasn't bravery," Alex spoke, forcing lightness into his voice. "Maybe it was just a newspaperman saving a good story. You — you look very well, Miss Russell." "Thank you. You haven't changed much . . . and I haven't seen you since the night Mother was de