Modern Screen (Jan-Dec 1960)

Dare She Wear White? (Continued from page 23) We now present for you this strange and miraculous story . . . It is a story that begins in the attic of a small house on a small Texas farm, back in 1945, when Debbie Reynolds — then Mary Frances Reynolds — was twelve years old. She had been visiting her grandmother for the past two weeks. And now it was nearly time to leave. And her grandmother, who had promised her a very special present when she left, had taken her up to the attic to show her the present. "What is it, Gram'?" Debbie had asked, excitedly, all the way up the stairs. "What is it?" "It's no thin' that'll overjoy you now, Mary Frances," the old woman said as they entered the room, nicking on the light, " — not a two-wheeler bike or a new ketcher's mitt or whatever it is a tomboy your age craves. In fact, it's not even something I'm goin' to let you take away with you now. It's too precious to be trusted on one of those busses all the way to California, with all that dust and grease and everything. Come the time, though, and I'll send it to you by Santa Fe. That's the only way I'd trust that — " "But what is it, Gram'?" Debbie interrupted. The old woman led her across the crowded room, to a box, a huge cardboard box which sat alone on the top of an ancient bureau, a somewhat tattered box, but shining-free from dust, as if, from time to time, it had been wiped clean — tenderly, lovingly, specially. "Go ahead," the old woman said then, "take the lid off and have a look for yourself . . . Go ahead." Debbie began to remove the top of the box. "Phew!" she said, crinkling her nose, when the top was halfway off. Her grandmother nodded. "That's just what the moths say when they git that close — phew!" she said. "Now come on, keep liftin' and take your look and then let's be off with you." When the top was removed, finally, a few moments later, the old woman stepped back a bit and squinted her eyes and watched her granddaughter's expression. She was pleased to see the girl smile as she looked inside the box. She was pleased to see her reach and lift out the white dress that lay there. She was pleased to see her stare at the dress for a little while and then to hear her say, "Gee, Gram', this is pretty." "It's my weddin' dress," the old woman explained, simply. "The dress I wore when I got married, and that your own Ma wore when she did." She pointed back into the box. "And see," she said, "there's the veil that comes with it — and it's the veil and the dress I'd like for you to wear when you get married." The smile disappeared from Debbie's face. "But I'm not going to get married, Gram'," she said. "I know, I know," said the old woman. "I was twelve years old once myself, Mary Frances. And just like you, believe it or not — a little hellion of a gal who loved to play with boys but who thought to herself, 'Me, I'm never going to marry one of 'em!' . . . Well, child, someday you're goin' to be a young lady. And you're goin' to meet a fellow. And instead of roughhousin' together, you're goin' to find yourself wantin' to be together. And then | 68 you're goin' to find yourself wantin' to marry together. And that's where this dress is goin' to come in. . . ." She took the dress from Debbie and she held it herself now and looked down at it, as she continued talking. "It was that way with me and your Grandpa, lots and lots of years ago, you know . . . We fell in love with each other. And we decided to get married. And first thing I thought of was, 'Well, I've got to have me a real nice dress the day I get married. Real nice.' And so, even though I didn't have much money to my name, I wrote to New York City and sent for this material — this lace and this satin and that veil stuff and those little hand-made lilies of the valley on the veil — and I didn't flinch a mite even when I saw the bill. For thirty-eight dollars it was; a lot of money in those days. But I just sat down and made my dress and came the weddin' and I wore it." She paused for a moment. Then she looked back up at her granddaughter. "You know, Mary Frances, truthful, at the time," she said, "I didn't know why I needed so special a dress — not really, I didn't know. I even thought to myself from time to time, as I was sittin' there sewin' it together, I thought, 'Miss, you sure are a vain and selfish young lady spendin' all this money on something you're only goin' to wear for one short day in your life.' "But later on, pass time, I began to realize why I'd really wanted it, my dress, my white long fancy dress on my weddin' day. "And that reason was, pure and simple, that I got to realize that my weddin' day was the most important and beautiful day in my whole life ... A day I was on my way to bein' a wife . . . And, eventually, a mother . . . And, then, a woman, a real, grown, bona-fide woman. . . . "And that for that one day that I was so special, it was right for me to want to go lookin' so special." She winked. "And child," she said, "there's practical reasons behind it all, too. Like the walkin'-down-the-aisle-of-the-church part, I remember that. And that fellow, your Grandpa, standin' there lookin' at me like I was something special. I remember that. And I think he remembered it, too, pass time. So that as we lived together and got into the little tiffs, sometimes the big tiffs, all married folk get into, I'm sure there were times he stopped a bit in his bickerin' and remembered me not as an agin' lady with hands red from hot water and field work and wrinkles formin' near my eyes and my body slowly gettin' different-shaped, but as that girl he saw that one day, that special day, all young and dressed up in her pretty white dress and — " She stopped. And cleared her throat. "Am I talkin' too much, Mary Frances?" she asked. Her granddaughter shook her head. "Well," the old woman said, "I guess I am, really. But I'm near through now. And all I want to say before I finish is that I feel somewhere in my bones that this dress brought me and your Grandpa a lot of luck in our married life. And your Ma, she wore it, and it's brought her a good lot of years with your Daddy. And someday, Mary Frances, I want you to wear it, for luck in your marriage. And maybe if you ever have a daughter — " She stopped again. "Now I am talkin' too much, too far ahead, eh?" she said. "—Oh, what a terrible gabby old lady I'm gettin' to be." She turned now, and placed the dress back into the box. "There," she said, when the lid was on the box again. "Now let's go back downstairs so you can get ready to get your bus." She began to walk towards the door. "Are you comin', child?" she called out to her granddaughter, who hadn't moved from the spot where she'd been standing. Debbie nodded. "Yes, Gram'," she said, "except I just want to say two things before I do come and go away — two things." "What might they be?" the grandmother asked. "First," said Debbie, "you're not a gabby old lady, like you said." "I'm not?" the old woman asked, softly. "No," said Debbie. "No . . . And second, I'm not saying I ever will — but if I ever do, find a fellow someday and get married to him, well, I just want you to know that I'll be honored to wear your dress at my wedding, Gram'. Just like you did. And my Ma did." "That's nice of you to teU me that," said the old woman. And then, reaching for a handkerchief, she said, "Now here. Take this and dry your eyes . . . Come on . . . Come on, child." Suddenly, Debbie ran across the room and into her grandmother's arms. "My, my," the old woman said, holding her close, trying to laugh, trying to push back her own tears. "What kind of hellion are you, anyway? Gettin' so mushed-up over an old weddin' dress? And cryin' like this — as if you were forgettin' you got good strong Texas blood in you. . . ." The fate of the wedding dress To this day, no one knows exactly how the fire started. Some people say there was a short circuit in the electricity, and that started it. Others will tell you that the Texas sun was so hot that summer of 1947 that it acted like a match to some of the old wooden farmhouses down in the southern part of the state and actually burned them up. At any rate, there was a fire. And it spread very quickly through the little house, burning to ashes everything as it went. Burning, up in the attic, amid everything else, a long white wedding dress, a dress that had been worn twice, and that would never be worn again. Debbie Reynolds had forgotten about that dress by the time her own wedding day came around, some eight years later. It was, in fact, too hectic a wedding to think of anything but getting it done with. Debbie was an actress by this time, one of the brightest young stars in Hollywood, and she'd been going these past couple of years with Eddie Fisher, one of the most promising young singers in the country. They'd been engaged for a while now. Theirs had been one of the most up-anddown, on-again off-again engagements in show business history. So that, finally, when the wedding did take place, it was put together as quickly and frantically as a Saturday lunch for unexpected visitors. The site for the wedding was a resort in the decidedly un-mountainous Catskill Mountains, about forty miles from New York. The atmosphere surrounding the entire affair can best be described as circus-like. Guests at the resort peeked through the windows of the makeshift chapel, some with autograph books in their hands, ready to corner the bride and groom on their way out. Photographers, refused admittance to the actual ceremony, drowned out the wedding march with their hollering. Reporters, pencils and