her with her bags up the steep front steps. She didn’t know then how
unusual it was for a cab driver to help with luggage. He was being
really gallant.
“Good luck,” he said, on leaving. “You’ll need it. It’s not an easy town
to get started in, but young girls like you come here every day to try,
and most of them make it somehow. Just don’t let it scare you. It’s big,
but it’s not unfriendly. And there’s no place else in this world that
I’d rather live!” With a wave of farewell, he climbed into his cab and
rode off around the corner.
Peggy took a deep breath, patted her hair, and rang the bell of her new
home.
VI
_Cast of Characters_
The door was opened, not by Mrs. Berriman, but by a small, dark-haired
girl with huge, black eyes and a gamin grin, who greeted her with a
decided French accent.
“Allo, allo!” she said brightly. “Come een! Are you Amee or Peggee?”
“I—I’m Peggy,” Peggy said, somewhat taken aback.
“Good!” the French girl cried. “You don’t look like an Amee! I’m Gaby,
wheech ees short for Gabrielle. I leeve ’ere. Maman Berriman she ees out
shopping, mais les autres girls sont ici. Pardon. I meex too much French
een with my talk. Parlez-vous Français?”
“Un peu,” Peggy said. “A very little peu, I’m afraid. But I understood
you. You said the other girls are here, right?”
“Parfait!” Gaby grinned. “Maybee I can teach you how to speak, if you
would like that?”
“I would,” Peggy agreed enthusiastically, but added quickly, “not
starting right now, though!”
“Okay,” Gaby shrugged. “Come on! I first introduce you.”
Four girls waited in the large, comfortable living room, all looking
expectantly at the door. As Peggy entered, a pert-faced redhead bounced
out of her chair to say hello.
“I’m Dot,” she announced. “Are you Peggy or Amy?”
“Peggee, of course!” Gaby cut in, before Peggy could answer. “Does she
look like an Amee to you?”
“No, I guess she doesn’t,” Dot said reflectively. “Well, welcome!”
“Thank you,” Peggy said. “Now will somebody tell me who Amy is?”
“Let me introduce you first,” Dot answered, taking Peggy by the arm.
“This is Irene, our household beauty queen,” she said. Irene, a tall,
startlingly beautiful brunette, languidly waved a gesture of welcome
with long, perfectly manicured fingers. Smiling, she said, “Don’t mind
her jealous tones, Peggy. They say that beauty is in the eye of the
beholder, and that means that she must love me, or she’d think I was
ugly.”
A pretty, round-faced girl with almost white blond hair done in a long
single braid came over to Peggy.
“They sound very catty,” she said with a gentle smile, “but we think
they wouldn’t know what to do without each other. Now, no fighting
tonight,” she said to Dot and Irene. “We want to give Peggy a chance to
get used to us first.” Then, turning back to Peggy, she said, “My name
is Greta. Your room is right next door to mine. And this is Maggie.”
Maggie, all freckles, brown bangs, and bright China-blue eyes, was
sitting cross-legged on the floor. Without uncrossing her legs, she rose
effortlessly, offered a wiry handshake and a warm grin, and sank back to
her former position in one fluid movement.
“She’s not showing off,” Dot said, noticing Peggy’s startled look. “She
does that sort of thing all the time without even thinking about it.
She’s a dancer, and she makes the rest of us seem like a herd of
elephants by comparison.”
“Not elephants,” Maggie said. “Not since I’ve been teaching you all how
to move and walk. Maybe buffalo, but not elephants!”
“Do you know ’ow to move and walk?” Gaby asked.
“I always thought so, but now I’m beginning to have my doubts,” Peggy
replied.
“Walk to the door and then back,” Maggie said.
Peggy did so, trying to be as graceful as she could, without seeming in
any way affected. She had never really considered her walking ability
before, and now that she was doing so, under the close scrutiny of the
five girls, she suddenly felt that she had never walked before. Coming
back to Maggie, she waited hopefully for her judgment. “Elephant?” she
asked.
“Nope,” Maggie said, as if trying to find just the right kind of beast.
“Buffalo?”
“A little better than buffalo, I think. Maybe a well-bred cart horse.
But don’t feel bad about it. You haven’t had lessons yet. Now, we can
start by—”
“We can start by sitting down and getting to know each other first,”
Greta interrupted. “Come on, Peggy. You must be really confused by all
this.”
“A little,” Peggy admitted. “It seems that everyone wants to teach me
something. I was hardly in the house when Gaby was offering French
lessons! What do you teach?”
“I try to teach good manners to my crazy friends here,” Greta said with
a laugh, “but I don’t seem to be very good at it!”
When Peggy was established in a comfortable chair, with the other girls
around her, the first thing she asked was, “Now, who is Amy?”
“Amy Shelby Preston is all we know about her,” Dot said, “just as Peggy
Lane is all we know about you. That, and the fact that you were both due
to get here tonight.”
“Good!” Peggy said. “Then I won’t be the only new girl in the place!
That ought to make it a little easier on me, and on all of you.”
“Oh, you’re not a new girl any more!” Irene laughed. “You’re only new
around here for the first five minutes, and you’ve been here nearly ten
by now! If Amy Shelby Preston takes another half hour to get here,
you’ll be an old-timer by then!”
“Oui, that ees so!” Gaby put in. “Everybodee here ees so open—they tell
you everytheeng about themselves so très vite—that means veree fast—that
you know them so like old friends in no time, yes?”
Peggy thought that this was a fine idea, and she said so. Then, in
accordance with what she now knew to be the household custom, she told
the five girls as much about herself as she felt would be interesting to
them: where she was from, why she was in New York—a five-minute
autobiography.
“... so, you see,” she finished, “I wanted to study acting and I felt
that this was the only place to go, so here I am.”
“It’s pretty much the same with us,” Dot said. “None of us is from New
York either, and we all came to be in the theater or some part of it.
I’m a comedienne and eccentric dancer, and I sing a little, too. I’m not
going to any school but I still work with a voice coach and a drama
coaching group. I’m from California originally. I was in a few movies,
but not in any good roles. I’m not a movie type. I came here when I got
a chance to do a television series that originated live from New York,
and when the series ended, I stuck around. I’m in a Broadway musical
now, lost in the chorus. It’s not much, but it pays the rent.”
“She’s too modest,” Greta said. “She’s not just in the chorus. She has a
dance specialty and a few lines, and she’s understudying the lead
comedienne. And she’s good at it, too.”
Dot blushed and said roughly, “For goodness’ sake, don’t be nice to me!
It makes me feel I have to be nice to you, and that’s not my character!”
Greta answered promptly, “All right, then, let’s talk about me! Anyone
who doesn’t want stage center isn’t going to get it!” She stood up,
walked to the center of the room and made a small pirouette, her thick
braid whirling around her. “I am Greta Larsen and I come from Boston,”
she recited in a little-girl voice. “I know I have a face like a Swedish
dumpling, and everybody thinks I should have come from there or at least
from Wisconsin like you. If you come from Boston, you’re supposed to be
Irish. I’m an ingénue and I’ve been in four off-Broadway plays and one
Broadway play, and all of them were flops. Right now I’m working as a
script editor for a TV producer, and trying to make him realize that I’m
an actress. So far he hardly realizes I’m a script editor. He thinks I’m
a hey-you.” With a comic bow like a mechanical doll, she sat down to a
round of laughter and applause.
“Who’s next?” Peggy said, still laughing. “I haven’t had such fun in
ages!”
Gaby, who stood up next, threw the girls into gales of laughter by
announcing first that she was French. Then she went on to tell Peggy
that her full name was Gabrielle Odette Francine DuChamps Goulet, but
that she only used the name Gaby Odette. Her mother was dead and her
father worked for the UN in New York, but spent most of his time
traveling about the world, only returning for a few weeks at a time.
Gaby had studied acting in France, and had even attracted some critical
attention and good personal reviews in her one acting part in Paris, but
when her father came to America, she decided to come with him and make a
new start here. Since her arrival about a year ago, she had been
devoting all of her energy to studying English, and hoped that in
another six months or so she would be good enough to start looking for
parts.
“I guess I’m next,” Irene said, stretching her long, well-shaped legs
and leaning back in her chair. “I’m Irene Marshall, and I’m—” But just
then the doorbell rang, interrupting her.
“That must be Amy,” she said. “Now I don’t have to tell my history
twice.”
She strode to the door to let the new arrival in, and in a few seconds
ushered her into the living room.
“This is Amy Preston,” she announced, “and this,” she continued, waving
a hand at the five girls in the living room, “is a room full of girls.
Come on in and meet them.”
Peggy thought that Amy Preston was just about the prettiest girl she had
ever seen, and as she watched her gracefully shaking hands and saying
hello, she felt sure that they would be friends. Amy’s honey-blond hair
framed a small oval face, large brown eyes and a smiling, self-possessed
expression. When she spoke, it was with a soft, pleasant Southern accent
and a low voice. Irene introduced Amy to Peggy last of all, and Peggy
said, “I’m really glad to have you here. I’m new too. I just came in
about a half hour ago, and I was so relieved to know that I wasn’t going
to be the only new girl.”
“It makes me feel heaps better too,” Amy said. “In fact, as much as I’ve
been looking forward to New York, I’ve been half dreading this first
meeting. I may not look it, but I’m really quite shy.”
“And I was just thinking how well you handled yourself during all these
introductions!” Peggy said.
“Oh, you have to do that if you’re shy,” Amy said. “That way, people
never know about it. It’s the same thing as going on the stage, I guess.
They say that the best actresses and actors are always just nearly
paralyzed with stage fright. In fact, I think that’s what adds the extra
excitement to their presence. At least I hope so!”
“Did you come to New York to act, too?” Peggy asked.
“I hope to, if I’m lucky,” Amy replied. “But first off, I came to
study.”
“So did I,” Peggy said. “Where are you studying?”
“The New York Academy,” Amy answered, with a faintly perceptible touch
of pride.
“Why, so am I!” Peggy cried with delight.
The two of them quickly fell into an animated discussion of the Academy
and of Mr. Macaulay. They were just comparing notes on their interviews
with him when Dot gently but firmly interrupted.
“You girls will have a lot of time for all that, but now it’s time to do
all the introductions. Amy, you tell us about you, and then we’ll go on
about us. Gaby and Greta and Peggy and I have told about us already, so
we won’t repeat it now. We’ll catch you tomorrow. So there’s only you
and Irene and Maggie to go.”
Then she explained about the household method of introduction, which Amy
agreed was a fine idea.
Amy’s speech was short and direct. “I’m Amy Preston, and I come from
Pine Hollow, North Carolina, which nobody ever heard of except the
people who live there. I went to college for a year and acted in four
plays, and then I persuaded my parents to let me come to New York to
act. There’s nothing else to tell about me, except that I think I’m the
luckiest girl I ever knew to find a place like this to live in and a
place like the Academy to study at. I know I’m going to like you all,
and I hope you’re going to like me, too.” Blushing slightly, she sat
down, and Peggy noticed that her hands were trembling a little. She
hadn’t been fooling about the shyness and stage fright then, Peggy
thought, but she was certainly able to keep it from showing, unless you
looked very closely. Peggy was sure that Amy would prove to be a good
actress.
The rest of the introductory speeches went swiftly. Irene, it turned
out, was from Cleveland. Her real name was Irma Matysko, but she
thought, and everybody agreed, that Irene Marshall sounded a lot better
for a would-be actress. She had acted in several television dramas in
minor parts, and was supporting herself mostly as a fashion model.
Maggie, the dancer, spoke next. “I’m Maggie Delahanty,” she began, “and
I was actually born in Ireland, only my parents brought me here when I
was two, so I don’t remember anything about it. I was raised in
Philadelphia, where my father is a bus driver, and I’ve been dancing
since I was three. I’ve worked in musicals on Broadway and on the road,
and I’ve worked in night clubs, which I hate. Right now I’m studying
singing with a fine coach, so that I can get some good work, because
there’s nothing much for a dancer who can’t sing. I just got back last
week from a summer tour with a music circus, in which I danced my way
through ten states in as many weeks. Right now, I don’t know what I’m
going to do, except sit down as much as I can.”
With another one of her uncanny, fluid movements, she sat down.
The general introductions done, Peggy and Amy went back to their
conversation about Mr. Macaulay and the Academy. Amy’s experience in her
interview had been much the same as Peggy’s. She too had prepared
material to read and, like Peggy, had thought at first that she was
rejected when Mr. Macaulay wouldn’t let her read it. Now she could
hardly wait to get started.
Irene, who had heard all about Mr. Macaulay and his brusque approach
before she had tried to get into the Academy a year ago, said that she
knew she hadn’t made the grade the minute he had started being kind to
her.
“Why did he reject you?” Peggy asked.
“He said that a girl as pretty as me didn’t need acting lessons,” Irene
said with a laugh. “He said that even if I learned to be a good actress,
I would never have a chance to prove it, because I would be given the
kind of parts that just need looks. I told him that I wanted to be a
good actress as well as a pretty one and he told me that it would be a
tragic mistake, because there aren’t any parts written for people like
that!” She laughed again, then in a more sober tone, added, “I think he
was just being kind to me and trying to make me feel good. And you know
what? He succeeded!”
As the conversation turned to plays and roles and types of actresses,
the other girls joined in. They had just gotten to a spirited and
somewhat noisy discussion of the ability of a well-known actress, when
May Berriman came in.
“Well, Amy and Peggy!” she said. “I see you’ve met everybody and you’re
right at home! Good! Now let me make you feel even more at home by
acting like a mother. Do you girls know that it’s very late? And do you
know that I’ve been busy making hot chocolate for you? And that it’s
waiting in the kitchen right now, getting cool? Well, now you know, so
get moving!”
The seven girls and May Berriman trooped downstairs to the big, homey
kitchen that Peggy had noticed on her first visit. Full of friendly
people and the smell of hot chocolate and homemade cookies, the kitchen
seemed to Peggy the nicest place she had ever been. Seated in antique
painted chairs around the long sawbuck table with May Berriman at its
head, they passed around cookies and chocolate and continued the
discussion of the prominent actress, carefully taking her apart, gesture
by gesture, until it seemed a wonder that she had ever gotten so much as
a walk-on role.
“It’s all very easy to criticize your elders and betters,” May Berriman
finally said, “but it’s quite another thing to stand up on the stage
with them and act on their level! That’s not to say that I disapprove of
discussions like this. I think they’re good, because they do develop
your critical abilities, but I think they can be carried too far.” With
a glance at the clock, she added, “And I think this one has gone far
enough into the night. Now all of you, get up to bed. Peggy and Amy
haven’t even unpacked yet!”
VII
_The Biggest Stage_
There were no meals served at May Berriman’s Gramercy Arms, but the big
kitchen was considered common property, and anyone who wanted to was
allowed to prepare breakfast and dinner there. Lunches were eaten at
restaurants and counters.
Each of the girls had a wire basket labeled and filled with her own food
in the giant hotel-size refrigerator, and each was given shelf space for
other things. Since Peggy and Amy had not stocked up the night before,
the other girls invited them to share breakfast with them.
“We have a system,” Dot said. “Each of us cooks for all the others in
turn, but that’s only for breakfast. At dinnertime, you shift for
yourself. The dishes are done for us, thank Heaven, by Aniko, the
housemaid. We each contribute to a dishwashing fund every week to keep
Aniko happy. Since you’re both new, we’ll put you at the end of the
list, which gives you about a week to get used to us in the morning,
before having to cook for us.”
“She’s being optimistic,” Maggie called over her shoulder from her
position at the range. “It’s impossible to get used to us in the
morning. How do you like your eggs?”
They settled on scrambled, which was diplomatic, since they noticed that
Maggie was whipping up a bowl of them for the others. In short order,
they were seated around the long table, eagerly eating the eggs, bacon,
toast and fresh sliced tomatoes, and washing it down with good, hot
coffee.
Irene and Greta huddled together, looking over a copy of _Variety_ and
writing in small notebooks. Catching Peggy’s inquiring glance, Irene
explained, “It’s _Variety_, the bible of show business. We’re looking at
the casting notes. Every time a producer has a play and wants to see new
actors, he puts a notice in the casting call page. The notices tell you
what kind of people he’s looking for and when he’ll see them. We’re
looking—along with a thousand other actors—to see if there’s something
for us. I’ve got two that sound interesting, and Greta’s got one.”
“And do you just go up and say, ‘Here I am’?” Amy asked.
“That’s about all I do,” Irene admitted with a laugh, “because I just
answer the ads for Showgirl types and beautiful ingénue roles. I just
stand there and hope they like my face and figure.”
“I don’t see how they couldn’t,” Peggy said.
“Oh, it’s easy! I’m too tall for some, and too fashionable-looking for
others, or I should be blond, or they wanted an outdoor type, or I’m
just what they’re looking for, but so are twelve other girls who all
have more acting credits. It’s not easy.”
“It’s no easier for me,” Greta put in mournfully. “I’m an even more
definite physical type than Irene is, and to make matters worse, I have
to act for them. Most of the time, my round, red face and my blond
braids eliminate me at the start. If they don’t, I then have to go
through an audition reading. I’m just waiting for a casting notice that
asks for a new actress with a face like a Campbell’s Soup kid, and I’ll
rush right up and get the part!”
“If I ever meet any playwrights, I’ll put in a word for a part like
that,” Peggy said. “But by then, you’ll be famous, and the ‘new actress’
part would disqualify you.”
When breakfast was over, the girls scraped the dishes, put them in the
sink for Aniko, and went their separate ways.
Gaby was off first, for an early English class at a language school,
which would be followed by a full day at Columbia University studying
English literature, American history, economics, and a special course
called Literature of the Theater. With a small “_au revoir_,” which was
all she had said since her first quiet “_bon jour_,” she slipped out.
“Gaby’s a night person,” Dot explained. “You can hardly get a word out
of her until sunset. Then you’re lucky if you can keep her quiet for
five minutes!”
“How about you?” Peggy asked. “Are you a night person, or a morning
person?”
“I think I must be a twenty-four-hour person.” Dot laughed. “I work on
stage until eleven-fifteen, but it doesn’t keep me from getting up as if
I were on a farm. I have to, though. I have a busy day. We rehearse
three days a week, just to keep the chorus work tight, and I have
special rehearsals for my understudy part. It keeps me going nearly
every day from nine in the morning until after midnight, but I seem to
thrive on it.”
Greta left for her office, to put in a day of script editing (whatever
that is, Peggy thought), Irene went upstairs to “put herself together”
for a photo shooting to take place later in the morning, and Maggie went
off to a rehearsal studio to practice her stretches and scales. Amy and
Peggy sat alone in the kitchen.
“What shall we do?” Peggy asked. “I feel so useless having no program,
and we sure can’t spend the day sitting here in the kitchen.”
“Why don’t we go out for a walk, and learn something about the
neighborhood?” Amy suggested.
“Good! In fact, why don’t we find a sight-seeing bus and take a ride
around the city? My father said—”
“So did mine!” Amy interrupted.
“We get more alike every minute!” Peggy said, grinning. “Let’s go up,
put our things away, and go out to learn all about New York.”
Later that afternoon, sipping her first cup of Automat coffee, Peggy
slipped her shoes off under the table and sighed, “I certainly had a lot
to learn when I said we’d go out and learn all about New York! My feet
are killing me, and we haven’t even begun to see the city!”
“We saw a lot, though,” Amy replied thoughtfully. “We saw Chinatown and
Greenwich Village and the Lower East Side and Riverside Drive and Park
Avenue and Central Park and Sutton Place and....”
“And neither of us could find our way back to any one of them unless we
took a sight-seeing bus again!” Peggy said. “Why, we’ve hardly begun!
I’ve been checking off where we’ve been on my city map and guidebook,
and we haven’t seen anything but the sights the guides think are
picturesque! I saw loads of places that we just shot by that I’d love to
go back and explore when we have time; and the guidebook lists hundreds
of things that we didn’t even come near! Did you know that there are
Italian street festivals, and an Indian mosque, and a Spanish museum,
and shops that sell nothing but cheeses from every country in the world,
and an Armenian district, and a Greek one, and Russian restaurants, and
Japanese, and French and German and Turkish and Mexican and....” She ran
out of breath and stopped, eyes shining with excitement.
“My goodness!” Amy said. “You make it sound like a World’s Fair!”
“It is. It’s the biggest permanent World’s Fair anywhere, and we have a
chance to see it without anything to take our minds off it from now
until school starts!”
“Your energy just scares me,” Amy said in a make-believe little-girl
voice, accentuating her Southern drawl. “Ah’m afraid you’ll just have to
carry li’l ol’ me.”
“I’m afraid you’ll have to do the carrying,” Peggy retorted, “unless I
can get these shoes back on! I think all the walking we’ve done has made
my feet three sizes larger!”
Sensibly, they finished the day’s excursion with a Fifth Avenue bus ride
downtown.
The next few days until the Academy opened were a round of sight-seeing,
eating exotic foods in the restaurants of many lands that Peggy had only
started to enumerate, and shopping in the famous stores.
The shopping expeditions were among the most exciting things that Peggy
and Amy did. The huge stores, crammed with merchandise from all over the
world, were like nothing that they had ever seen before. Even the
afternoon that Peggy had spent window-shopping with her mother had
failed to prepare her for the size and complexity of these shops.
Everywhere were rows on rows of dresses, coats, skirts, blouses, robes,
and gowns. Counters and showcases displayed incredible arrays of
lingerie, purses, shoes, gloves, scarves, and other accessories. And
everywhere, at every time of day, the crowds of shoppers clustered as
thick as bees around a hive.