Radio Mirror: The Magazine of Radio Romances (Jan-June 1943)

&£**•* '%£ f opened the door — and there he stood, grinning. I was too amazed to speak. At last I managed, "Why Tom Trumblel" Jackie's whole world crumbled about her. She tried to believe that this terrible thing that had happened to her was only something she'd dreamed in the night THE STORY I WAS a very small part of the busy, exciting city that was Washington in the months just before Pearl Harbor, but for the first time in my humdrum life I had the intoxicating sensation of really living. For within one day I had met two men — one romantic and famous, the other naive and oddly appealing. And both of them told me they loved me. Dean Hunter was one — the famous Dean Hunter whose voice and personality are such an important part of radio and movies. Tom Trumble was the other — an ordinary private in Uncle Sam's Army, whose untrained but sincere style of singing had attracted the attention of my boss, Lieutenant Colonel Wilson. It was Col. Wilson's job to produce the weekly broadcast called Hiya, Soldier for the entertainment of the boys in training camps all over the country, and as fate would have it, Dean Hunter and Tom Trumble came to Washington to be on the same program I was one of Col. Wilson's assistants, which was why I met both Dean and Tom. Dean laid violent siege to my heart almost from the very first, and of course I couldn't help responding, he was so handsome, so sure of himself, so charming. Tom was different — more humble and a little pitiful I couldn't take him very seriously On the broadcast, Tom made a terrible blunder. The excitement of being on a nationwide program affected him so much that he broke down in the middle of his song, and the broadcast was saved only by Dean's quick action in stepping to the microphone and finishing for him. It was typical of the two men that Tom's honest emotion caused a catastrophe, and Dean's cool poise saved the situation. But I forgot Tom and his mistake after the broadcast, for Dean whisked me away on a thrilling midnight ride— a ride which ended in our marriage that very night. It was the kind of adventure every girl dreams of, something straight out of a story book. Reality didn't return until the next day when we went back to Washington' Dean asked me to keep the marriage a secret for a while, and I agreed At Col. Wilson's office Tom 1 rumble was waiting for me, to say good-bye before he caught his train back to camp. There was only an hour left before the train was „ t0 leKave' but in that hour he tel h^mhe/°Vedme I ^nted to tell him ,t was hopeless, but he wouldn't let me. And so he went away, not Know stayin*0^!1101!1 Where Dean was away" zn^V^* Called be seeing ml In6'"1138^^ SOMETHING very unexpected has happened." ., Partly, I was hurt— paw angry. And fear was there, too. m husband of a day— oh, less than day— had hurried out of Washington and back to New York. And n had left me with no explanatw but the little note which said soro thing unexpected had happened. .^ Oh, I knew then how gre»l • streak of cruelty Dean Hunter n> have. Cruelty— or thoughtless^ And, as my anger died away, ing a strange feeling of emp ..mo **** "^^M behind it, I tried to assure myself mat it was thoughtlessness, and nothing more. Nothing more than Ofwg in a hurry, than having a wh*f)deal on his mind' than— than ™nat? it wouldn't do. There was w!,r,e to U than that. Perhaps — D '• Perhaps the "something unex And th WaS named Diana Stuart. then that was something more wh^°rry about> to frighten me— m"° was Diana Stuart and how husband? ^ reaUy ™elm t0 my Just don't believe it when I hear ****. 1943 women say that they aren't jealous. If you're not a little jealous, you just don't really care, I think. And jealousy was a nasty little devil with a little pitchfork— pricking annoyingly at my mind and hurting my heart. But there wasn't anything I could do about it for the moment. I could only go through the motions of being a busy little Washington secretary, of working very hard today and trying to lose myself in my work. Of course, Dean's neat, frightening little note had asked me to write him where he could reach me. Write him? Well, what on earth do you say, I asked myself, to the man who has shared his love with you and then gone away? And I must somehow keep from crying. If I cried, traces of the tears would show, and give my secret away. And what good does it do to cry, anyway, I kept asking myself fiercely. I put my chin up, tried to shake away the fear which sat so heavily on my shoulders. First of all, I decided, I needed a friend to (Continued on page 85) 47