Modern Screen (Feb-Dec 1959)

ever, knew anything about his alleged revolutionary activities, nor do I have any connection whatever with the internal affairs of Panama or any other country." It wasn't much but the newspapers gobbled it up. It admitted at least a connection between Wayne and the revolutionary, who, at that time, was being hotly pursued through central Panama jungles. On the third day the topic got really lively. One eastern paper exploded the information that it had proof that John Wayne had collected an arsenal: that he had a barn in Encino loaded to the rafters with firearms and that he had admitted that they were to be used in a rebellion. Until he explained it, the world was sure that Wayne had political ambitions. The explanation didn't do justice to the hot story. Wayne was preparing a picture called The Alamo, the story of the rebellion of Texas against Mexico in 1830, so the guns were indeed intended to be used in a revolt. They proved, however, to be vintage rifles that would be as useful as sling shots in modern combat. But the rumors had added fat to the already crackling fire. When Pilar Wayne saw the headlines that evening she was thrown into a new turmoil of concern. They were black with veiled intimations and colorfully illustrated with stills from John Wayne movies, depicting the star in fighting poses. Pilar, a native Latin American herself, saw nothing but immediate disaster. Wayne paced his living room and pondered his situation. "I think I'll go to Panama," he said finally, "and settle this thing down there." Pilar's reaction was the same as if he had announced that he was going to jump off the Empire State Building. "Are you crazy?" she demanded. "If you go down there they will lock you up." "What for?" asked Wayne. "I haven't done anything." "We know that," said Pilar, "but maybe they don't." "I've got to do something," said Wayne. "Then go to bed — like ordinary people." Report from Panama Wayne walked to the phone and placed a call to the Panama Ambassador in Washington. When the Ambassador got on the line Wayne explained who he was and his predicament. The Ambassador assured him that his government was thoroughly convinced that Wayne knew nothing of the revolt and had at no time considered him involved in any way except as an innocent bystander — and he told Wayne there would be no need for him to go to Panama to explain anything. Wayne offered his books and himself for confirmation of this any time he was called upon. And the matter, as far as official circles were concerned, was settled. That night, very late, John Wayne awakened to find his wife wide-awake beside him. "Why can't you sleep?" he asked. "I'm afraid," she said, "that the phone might ring." Pilar Wayne had reason to be concerned about the possibility of further adventure — and danger. Once she believed that the adventures of even an action star were confined to sound stages and the back lots of movie studios. Her first disillusionment came shortly before their marriage. It was in Hawaii, on the main island, where her fiance was engaged in making a film about the exploits of a brokendown freighter during World War II. She had come to the islands to prepare for her marriage, which was scheduled to take place when the filming was over. Every morning a studio limousine picked up her husband-to-be at the small house he occupied and drove him to a dock near the village of Kona. There he boarded the lumbering freighter purchased for the movie and set out to sea for the day's shooting. She was not invited along because the crew, actors, movie workmen and the heavy equipment added so much weight to the already creaking vessel that not an extra pound could be placed aboard. Pilar, of course, didn't know this. The ship would sail off in the early morning and painfully pull in alongside the dock about five o'clock in the afternoon. And Pilar was always there to greet her man. One evening she stood on the pier gazing out to sea. The horizon was gloomy and foreboding against a silhouette of fishing boats, and there was no familiar streak of black smoke rising from the sea, the signal that the freighter was heading for port. Dusk fell rapidly and Pilar watched but all she saw were angry clouds that shifted about menacingly and the white caps of the towering waves. And when night fell, with the freighter three hours overdue, the sea moved in on the shore, snapping viciously at the rocks and sending spiral sprays of fierce white water thirty feet into the air and shaking the dock with shuddering impacts that made it almost impossible to keep a footing. Rain fell in driving sheets now, a warm rain that somehow chilled Pilar for it was so ominous. She was joined by anxious fisherfolk, helplessly but intently staring into the black at what they presumed to be the position of their boats. One broke loose and charged like a terror-borne, living thing into the rocks and piled itself high on the giant lava coals, looking like a toy broken and discarded by a disinterested small boy. The fishermen left to climb atop the lava to attempt some salvage. Pilar stood alone on the dock trembling from the night wind and the dread she fought to dispel. Then there were lights. Small at first and later larger, outlining, possibly, the below-deck portholes of a ship. They disappeared, sometimes it seemed for minutes, below the maddened sea, but each time Pilar saw them they were closer — and she knew her fiance and his company were at least afloat. There was little cheer in Pilar's heart as the ship, visible now in the reflection of lights from the village, drew closer to the dock. The monster of iron and wood was lifted high on a perch of prongs of licking water and then slammed back into the hard gut of ocean. It shuddered with pain at each assault and it skittered sidewise, out of control, at times, but its approach to the pier was firm. Soon there were bells and the shouts of seamen getting and acknowledging orders. The fishermen forgot their small craft and ran to the pier to lend a hand in the landing. And then the ship was at the dock, rising and falling like a giant elevator as the whim of the swell had its final way. The lines were thrown and looped loosely on the dock stanchions and one-by-one the wet and tired movie men skidded down a buckling gangplank to safety. Pilar ran to her fiance. He grinned and hugged her. "You keep off that boat," she said. "What for?" he asked, purring with innocence. "I've been standing here for hours," she said, "and you've been out there in the dark probably drowning. That ship is not safe." A crewman joined them. 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