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

in the Army; he may be sent away any time. He can't help her, and how's she going to take care of it herself, with no training except for waiting— and she won't be able to do that much longer? Where will she keep it, even if she can support it, in a town like this, where there isn't enough room for the people who are already here? She'll have to leave town, for sure, and that alone costs money. And what if she gets sick, or if the kid gets sick, who's she going to turn to?" I looked around the table at the faces of the others. They were evidently in complete agreement with Stella, or, if they were not so forthrightly disapproving as she, their faces were at least grave and concerned. "In a case like that," Stella was saying, "there's only one thing to do—" ¥ LEFT the table hastily, feeling sud*■ denly sick and defeated, and ran up to my room, where I sat down on the bed to stare unseeingly at the sunlit world outside. I should have known, I thought, that there would be something wrong with my having a baby. Everything else had gone wrong since I had left Allensport; even a normal and wonderful event like having a child couldn't be right under the present circumstances. I realized that my case was exactly like Rose's, except that Rose at least knew how to do some sort of job. "Eric," I told myself desperately, "will think of something. He'll know what to do." But even as I tried to reassure myself, I could not help but feel, underneath, that Eric might not be able to help. I had seen enough of him here at camp to realize that actually he no longer belonged to me, nor to his home, nor to any part of his civilian life, but to the Army, and that his first thought and first duty must be for the Army. While there was a war to be won, I did not, could not count, although I also knew that in a larger sense Eric and all the millions of men in the Army were fighting for me and for other women like me. By the time five o'clock came, by the time the bus left me at the camp, I was afraid to face my husband, afraid to tell him. In a shaky voice I asked the guard for Private Aldren. A few minutes later Eric came hurrying down the gravel path, the westering sun on his face, a straight, fine figure of a man — of a soldier — looking, somehow, a little glorious. He caught me to him with rough, hungry arms, not speaking for a moment, and I fancied that his greeting was more Continued from page 52 intense than was usual for those dismal, formal visits at the camp. "Lisa, beloved," he murmured into my hair, "I could hardly wait for you to come. At a time like this — " At that moment I thought that he knew. He was a sensitive man, and intuitive, and I thought that perhaps he had noticed changes in me that I myself had not realized. "You know?" I tipped back my head to look at him. "Eric, you know, and you're glad? Thank God, I've wanted our baby so much — " His arms dropped from my shoulders, and he stepped back and away from me, not only in a physical sense, but as if the ground at our feet had parted, separating us and leaving a yawning chasm between. And I shall never so long as I live forget the look on his face at that moment, utterly aghast, a look of horror and of hopelessness. "A baby!" he choked. "Are we — " I turned and ran. I raced blindly down the path to the circle where the bus was turning, loaded with soldiers on their way to town. The driver saw me waving and stopped impatiently, and as I climbed on and as we drove off. I saw Eric racing after me, heard him crying hoarsely, "Lisa, wait!" Wait! I could not. I could not bear to face more of his disappointment and dismay, could not bear to see him pull himself together for my sake. I knew one thing— that I couldn't be separated from Eric. I would do anything in the world, anything, in order to stay with him, or to keep my chance of staying with him. Of the bus ride I remember absolutely nothing. It was as if I'd been put in a tube such as those in which change is sometimes returned in stores, and shot through a vacuum back to town without thought, without feeling, without emotion. At the boardinghouse I went directly to Stella's room. Mrs. Nelson stopped me on my way upstairs to tell me that Eric had called and had left a message saying that he would call again in a few minutes. I paid her no attention. I did not want to talk to him, not while that terrible look on his face was still with me. I must have been a little light-headed by then. I remember standing in the doorway of Stella's room, saying with elaborate politeness, as if I had just dropped in for a cup of tea, "I beg your pardon, Stella. I'm very glad to find you at home. Do you remember what you were talking about at the breakfast table this morning?" I must have looked strange, too. Stella's eyes were sharp and guarded — <Cg &ay/teuc 7c CONNIE HAINES, so tiny that she has to stand on a platform to sing into the microphone, is living proof of the old saying that "good things come in small packages". Connie is the featured songstress on NBC's Abbott and Costello program. Her real name is Yvonne Marie Ja Mais, and she started her career, tutored by her mother who was a singing instructor, at the age of four in her home town, Savannah, Georgia. When Connie was fourteen she tried her luck at New York, and shortly thereafter joined Harry James' band, and later Tommy Dorsey's, as vocalist. Last year she went to Hollywood as a Blue Network staff artist. Connie's hobbies are swimming and golf — the miniature variety — and she collects animal miniatures as well. Her repertoire of tunes numbers around four thousand. 54 as she said, "Sure, I remember." "What did you mean when you said there was only one thing to do in a case like that?" She shrugged. "What else is there to do but — but lose it," she said. "Do you know how, Stella? Or where?" The look in her eyes changed, and she became immediately the friendly person I'd first known. "You?" she exclaimed. "You poor kid!" That was all there was to it. Stella made a telephone call to Butte, made an appointment for me with a doctor there. She interrupted her conversation with him to place her hand over the mouthpiece and to ask me, "He can see you Monday afternoon, or tonight, if you want to leave right now." "Tonight," I said, quickly. I know now how criminals feel when they are about to commit their first crime. Once the decision was made, I was seized by a kind of hysterical determination to get it done, done quickly and over with, before anyone could stop me. Anything in the world was right if it would keep Eric from looking at me as he had looked when I'd told him about our baby. lVf Y criminal courage began to slip, J-" and sanity began to return when I saw the doctor's office in Butte. It was a dingy office in a dingy building, three flights up. I waited because I had not the courage to leave. I wanted most of all to flee the place, to run and hide in Eric's arms, but the recollection of that terrible look on his face stopped me. I knew that what I was about to do was wrong, so terribly wrong. The door to the inner office opened, and I caught a glimpse of the doctor, a little man with flat, dull eyes. The receptionist showed another woman in, and glanced sharply at me as she went back to her desk. "Want some water?" she asked. I shook my head weakly, feeling cold and sick. She shrugged, and then, as if inspired, began to fiddle with the radio on her desk. I heard Eric's voice as she spun the dial, and I cried out for her to turn back to his station, and in a second his voice was coming into the room, full and strong over the airwaves. " — again interrupting our program at the request of Private Ernest Allen, who wishes us to find his wife, Lisa, missing since this afternoon. Lisa Allen is to call this station at once." His tone was intense, desperate, breaking over my name. Of course, there was no Private Ernest Allen — it was Eric broadcasting for me, reaching out with his strength and his love to pull me back to sanity. I got to my feet, and the receptionist, alarmed, hurried toward me. I heard a voice that must have been my voice, but detached from me and far away. "Call that station!" I cried. "Oh, please, call that station." I don't know how much later it was that I felt myself fighting my way up out of cold and smothering mists, struggling for breath, for strength, reaching finally a place of light and peace — the blessed security of Eric's arms around me. He was murmuring broken bits of phrases in my ear, carrying me out of the doctor's office and down the stairs to the, taxi he'd kept waiting. I tried to speak, and he said, "Don't talk now,! Continued on page 57 RADIO MIRROR