“They’ve all missed you, Nita. They asked me to tell you so,” her husband said. “They love you, which is more than they do me.”
“They were so good to me, saw that I got here,” she said.
“I know,” he sighed. “While I was too drunk to do anything but stand by and weep.”
Touched, she said, “That was enough.”
He released her and retrieved the roses. “I’ve brought you some flowers.”
She smelled them. “They’re lovely! You oughtn’t to have wasted the money.”
“Not anything to what I’ve thrown away on booze,” he said grimly. “Can you forgive me?”
Her answer was a joyous kiss. “I’ve wanted to see you so badly,” she said.
“And I wanted to be here,” he told her. “But I didn’t have any way. The show kept moving on. And I didn’t know what to write, or whether you’d bother reading any letter I sent.”
“It’s all right,” she said gently.
“I’ve put you through hell,” he said contritely. “And you lost the child.”
“My own doing,” she sighed. “I should have known better. I ought to have told Kress about the pains. He would have sent on Madame Irma.”
“You did it for us,” he said. “For me! To try and make sure I’d have a job to come back to.”
Nita said, “I did what I thought was best. I was wrong, but I suppose I’d do the same thing again in the same circumstances.”
He said, “When can you leave?”
“In a day or two. But I won’t be able to dance again for months.”
Marty smiled. “There’s no need for you to do anything but play the lady and rest. You’re married to Marty Nolan, one of the best single acts in the business!”
“That’s true!” she said.
“I’ll ask at the desk when I can come for you.”
“What about the show?”
“I left last night. We’re not going back. Kress wired and another act is coming to join them on Monday.”
Nita felt a great sadness. The troupe had become a haven for her. It was where all her new friends were. She’d be lost without them. She said, “I wish I could have seen them again just once!”
“You will,” he assured her. “In show business you’re always running into people again. It’s a small world, really. And a warm one.”
“I’ve come to know that,” she agreed. “But what are we to do?”
“I have a job,” he said proudly. “And an advance of salary to pay our bills and get us to it!”
“Glory be!” she cried happily. “Tell me about it.”
“Billy Bowers!”
“From Hollywood?”
“Yes,” Marty said. “He’s been after me to go out there. He thinks I might be the new Wallace Reid. And there’ll be work for you as well.”
“When do we leave?”
“As soon as you’re out of here,” her husband said. “A friend of Billy’s is opening a circuit of vaudeville theatres in and around San Francisco. He’s hired me, on Billy’s word, to head the bill. He sent me the money. And when we play the circuit of eight weeks there I’ll buy me a little car and we’ll drive on down to Hollywood. How does that sound?”
“Grand!” she cried. “Just grand!”
He took her in his arms again and said tenderly, “I’ll make it up to you, I swear I will. And we’ll have another kid.”
She knew it was not the time to tell him the chances of that were slim. It could wait until later. With a small smile, she said, “Time for that after we’ve made our way to Hollywood!”
“I’ve treated you badly,” he said. “I know it. And I promise from now on it will be different.”
“Just so long as you keep away from the booze,” she said. “It’s the booze that changes you.”
“I know,” he said sadly. “It’s held me back. But I’m making a fresh start and nothing will stop me this time.”
Nita left the hospital three days later and they stayed in a lodging house for another few days until she was stronger. Marty proved a loving and considerate husband in every way. Then the morning came for them to board the train on their first lap of the journey to San Francisco.
It was second-class cars again becuaause they had to make their money go as far as possible. Nita had brought along pillows to sit on and spare her mending body from the worst of the jolting. She slept a lot as the days and miles went by. She could see that Marty was restless but he remained close to her and was on his best behavior.
San Francisco was all that she’d hoped for. The weather was good and they had pleasant lodgings in a vine-covered brick house. Marty’s report on the vaudeville circuit was excellent but they agreed that she should remain at the house while he played the eight weeks. Then they would drive down to Hollywood together.
She did not even give him a last warning about his drinking. He seemed a completely different person. She rested and explored the fascinating city and the time passed quickly.
One morning Marty appeared in front of the old house with a car. It was a beauty and she couldn’t imagine how he could have afforded it.
“It’s grand,” she said, staring at the tan touring car with its handsome lines, “but how did you pay for it?”
“Won it in a poker game,” said the irrepressible Marty. “The owner of one of the theatres bought it and ruined the engine in a month. It has a broken head and it heats up when you don’t expect it. But it’ll get us to Hollywood in style, and maybe when we get there I can somehow buy a new motor for her!”
“A Cole Aero-Eight!” she said in wonder, not knowing what the journey ahead would bring.
The Cole Aero-Eight proved their undoing. The deceptively attractive car was in even worse shape than Marty had admitted. It broke down continually and their journey from San Francisco to Los Angeles took twice as long as it otherwise would have. Still Marty enjoyed being at the wheel of the luxurous car (when it was moving) and refused to consider parting with it.
As they drove on down along the coast road, he promised her, “When we get to Hollywood I’ll have Billy find me a garage and get this baby in good shape!”
Nita gave him a distressed glance. “I think it’s hopeless!”
“This car is almost new!” he protested. “It can’t be that bad!”
Nita didn’t want to argue with him. It was enough that they were together again and he was easing up on his drinking. She hoped that when they reached Hollywood they would both be able to find work. She’d not forgotten that Sherman Kress, not given to empty compliments, had vowed she was an excellent type for the movies. If Billy Bowers could get Marty work in some of his comedies it would be a beginning for them.
Despite their faltering car Nita was enjoying the drive south. The lovely blue skies, the sweet flower-scented air and the multitude of gardens in perpetual bloom made it seem an enchanted place. As they came to a smart suburb adjoining Hollywood she had a glimpse of a succession of great mansions behind iron gates and fences, many with shaggy royal palms decorating their grounds.
The traffic grew heavy as they came into Hollywood and Nita was at once excited by the sight of buildings she had read about but never seen before; Grauman’s Chinese Theatre, the Brown Derby Restaurant and the famed bungalow court, The Garden of Allah, owned by the famous actress, Nazimova. She was so caught up in the sights and the people strolling along the sidewalks of this gaudy, almost tacky place that she paid no attention to Marty at the wheel.
All at once her attention was riveted by a groan from him as he cried, “The brakes have failed!”
She turned to him in dismay and saw his frightened, pale face as he reached for the emergency brake. She realized they were going ahead at much too fast a rate for a city street and coming to an intersection where traffic was streaming in from every direction.
“Stop it somehow!” she exclaimed.
“I can’t!” he cried as he swerved quickly around a slow-moving car ahead.
But in avoiding that collision he placed them in new danger. Nita saw it almost too late to warn him as they reached the intersection.
“The truck!” she cried. “On your side!”
She saw his dismay at the approach of the heavy truck and his frantic effort to avoid being hit side-on by spurting ahead, since he couldn’t brake the car to a halt. What he hadn’t noticed was another truck coming out of another street at an equally fast pace. Nita screamed as she realized they were directly in the path of this second monster! She was aware of a jarring impact and a sensation of being hurled up out of the car. Then all was silence and darkness.
Much later on, it was the pain which wakened her, pain in her right arm and in her head. Nita opened her eyes slowly and saw that she was back in a hospital room again. It took her a moment or two to remember the events which had preceded her being there. And when the frightening replay of the accident came to memory she sobbed aloud.
A young nurse came hurrying into the room and over to her bedside. The girl peered down at her sympathetically. “You must not be afraid. You’re quite safe here. You’re going to recover fully!”
She stared up at the nurse. “How long have I been here?”
“Four days,” the young woman said. “We’ve been waiting for you to come around.”
Nita rolled her head on the pillow and gazed about the nondescript little room. Her eyes sought the nurse’s face again as she put her second question. “What about my husband?”
“Your husband?” the girl said vaguely.
“Yes,” he was driving our car at the time of the accident.”
The young nurse looked uneasy. “You mustn’t talk too much,” she warned her. “I’ll send Dr. Watters in to see you. He is in charge of your case.”
“What about my husband?” Nita asked again, frightened now.
The nurse was already on the way to the hall doorway. She looked back over her shoulder, calling, “I’ll get the doctor!”
Nita moved a little in the bed and felt a surge of pain in her left forearm and the surging throb in her head once more. In addition to this it was as if she’d been pounded over every inch of her body so that she was a mass of tortured flesh.
Then figures appeared in the doorway again and she concentrated her attention on them. The nice young nurse had returned with a tall man in a white coat, a stethoscope slung about his neck. Nita knew he must be her doctor.
He came close and bent down to smile at her. “Well, Mrs. Nolan!”
“You know my name?” she said in wonder.
“We’ve had you here the better part of a week,” he told her. He was brown-haired and had a tanned, rather broad face, a snub nose and a friendly smile.
She gazed up at him, still not completely clear-thinking. She said slowly, “The truck! I saw it coming — too late!”
“Most unfortunate,” he agreed. “Happily you have nothing more than a concussion and a simple fracture of the lower arm. It was the concussion which was worrying us. And now you’ve come around.”
“My husband,” she said, returning to that most urgent theme.
The doctor’s smile faded. He said, “Of course, you do not know.”
“Know what?”
He hesitated. “I think you should rest now and I’ll tell you all about the accident and your husband later. You’re taxing yourself too greatly.”
Nita’s eyes filled with tears. She said in a taut whisper, “He was badly hurt?”
The young doctor nodded. “I’m afraid so.”
“How badly?”
There was a second of silence and Watters took her good hand in his and said in a sad tone, “You must be brave, Mrs. Nolan. Your husband was killed.”
“No!” she moaned.
“It was instantaneous, he didn’t know what happened,” the doctor assured her, still holding her hand. “You must try to bear it.” He turned to the nurse and gave her some instructions.
Nita continued to sob. “He can’t be dead!”
“You have a good friend who has been here every day and is looking after everything for you,” the doctor went on. “Billy Bowers, the well known comedy star.”
Nita had closed her eyes and was crying silently now. She felt her head lifted slightly and a tiny glass applied to her lips. She swallowed some sweet-tasting liquid and then was gently settled back on her pillow. The action of the liquid was almost immediate. First the pain lessened, and she had a sensation of being a distance from it, outside her injured body, floating in a kind of cloudlike atmosphere. Her mental anguish also succumbed to the magic of the liquid. She was only conscious of a faint sensation of sorrow. Then she knew nothing at all for another long while.
When she came out of her drugged state the first thing she saw was a familiar face gazing down at her. She thought for a moment she was seeing the boyish face of Billy Bowers on a movie screen. Then she realized it was real, that he was here in her hospital room studying her with deep compassion.
He said, “I’m Billy Bowers.”
“I know,” she replied in a small voice. “I recognized you.”
The comedian looked like a sober business man in his dark blue suit and sedate tie. He said, “I’m terribly sorry for what happened. I feel partly responsible since I encouraged Marty to come out here.”
“You couldn’t have guessed there’d be an accident,” Nita reminded him.
Billy said. “You’re just as lovely as Marty described you. I’ll try to make up to you for what happened.”
“Where — is he?”
“He was buried yesterday,” said Billy. “I’ve bought a plot for him in Hollywood Memorial Cemetery. All the important motion picture people are buried there.”
Nita managed a rueful smile. “Marty would like that. He always wanted to make the big time!”
“And he would have.”
“He admired you,” she said. “Your letters gave him the courage to go on.”
“Marty was my friend,” Billy said quietly. “We played the vaudeville circuit together before I came to Hollywood.”
An anxious look crossed Nita’s face. “Did he have a priest to bury him?”
“He did,” said Billy. “Rest assured, everything was done as you would have wished it. Now we must look to the future. As soon as you are well enough to leave the hospital I’m going to have you come to stay with me.”
“I couldn’t,” Nita protested.
“You must,” he said. “I have a big house with a swimming pool and more than enough servants to look after it. You can have the entire guest wing to yourself.
“I want to find a job in pictures,” she said. “Marty intended us to make something of ourselves out here.”