The Memoir of Johnny Devine (19 page)

Thursday night, Eliza sat at her typewriter,
stroking the cat with her feet, picturing Papa’s broad shoulders
and Mama’s gentle smile. And her dark-blue, almond-shaped eyes,
which Eliza had inherited.

Spies
?

Mama and Papa had been such quiet people.
Though they had never spoken of their lives before Betty and Eliza
were born, there had been no pretense with them. They were genuine;
the same people every minute of every day. If they truly did have
some kind of secret involvement or ties with communism, they would
have had a very good reason for it.

But she still had too many questions that
needed answers. Perhaps, by some miracle, she would find those
answers before Agent Robinson did.

Because of John’s out of town trip, Eliza
had four days off in a row, and it felt strange. She already missed
the story and the dictation, the discussions.

On Friday, she spent most of the day on the
telephone, hunting for numbers to establishments that might offer
some information about her parents’ immigration. She needed to find
a lead on their background or a clue about them—a ship’s log, a
hospital record, a person who knew them, anything. The trouble was,
she was searching in the dark and didn’t even know what for.

Saturday began with a drizzle that turned to
steady rain, so a matinee was out. She was trapped in her tiny
apartment. And alone, since Mr. Darcy hadn’t come around for his
morning milk. He’d been coming to see her so faithfully, even
staying inside a few nights. What could be important enough to a
tomcat to interrupt his homey, new routine? But then, he’d probably
been a stray for a long time and wasn’t accustomed to being a
cherished pet.

She worked on editing an article on women’s
equality, but the Bible story about the woman and Jesus kept
creeping into her thoughts. Perhaps Pastor Ted was telling the rest
of it in tomorrow’s service. Eliza certainly wouldn’t be going. She
would probably be welcome, but she wasn’t about to go there on her
own. She didn’t belong.

But she
did
have a Bible, and it
wasn’t as if she couldn’t read the story for herself.

Eliza took the Bible from the bookcase,
belly-flopped down on her bed, stocking feet crossed in the air,
and leafed through the Gospel of John—a name hard to forget.

She read several chapters,
stopping to look up unfamiliar words in the dictionary the way her
parents had taught her. She went on until she found the story of
the adulterous woman. She read it carefully, touched again by
Christ’s compassion and by his words,
“Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.”
But after Jesus rescued the woman, there was
nothing more said of her. The story went on to Jesus teaching
judgmental men about Himself and about truth.

Another line stood out:
“
And ye shall know the truth, and the
truth shall make you free.”

So how was it that the sinful woman had been
set free, but the so-called righteous men still clung to their
binding way of thinking?

As far as Eliza could tell, Christ came to
change people and liberate them from man-made rules that only
changed how a person appeared outwardly. The men in the story, on
the other hand, wanted this woman ridiculed and made to conform to
their rules. They had no interest in helping her truly change.

Eliza read the next chapter as well, but
there was no further mention of the woman. Had she changed?

Was true change even possible?

If you let Me, I will make you new.

Eliza stilled. It was as
if she felt the words rather than heard them. They were just
there
, like the memory
of a familiar voice.

Mr. Darcy howled at the glass door. Eliza
hurried to open it before he changed his mind.

Would John know more about the woman in the
story? Perhaps she could ask him the next time she saw him.

Which wouldn’t be for another dreadfully
long day.

Monday arrived with
a stiff breeze that caught the hem of Eliza’s
skirt and sent a mild chill up her legs. The sight of John’s house
and of Millie waiting for her at the door was a relief.

Millie tut-tutted, ushering Eliza inside
like a mother hen. “That wind gonna blow winter right in on top of
us, Miz Eliza. You best bundle up from now on. Catch your death if
you don’t.”

Eliza removed her scarf, smiling. Millie had
been polishing with lemon wax again. This house always smelled
wonderful and so right. Like home ought to smell.

Millie tilted her head up and narrowed a
gaze at Eliza. “You done somethin’ different with your hair?”

“
No, same
hair.”

The sound of John’s cane approaching gave
her a huge case of the jitters. As he came near, he looked tense,
but even so, it did her heart good to see him. She couldn’t contain
her broad smile.

The tension on his face
gave way to surprise. His eyes searched hers, questioning. Then
just as quickly, his hard expression resumed. “I hope you had a
good weekend. You’ve been working hard and certainly
deserved
a
break.”

“
Thank you. I visited my
sister. How was your benefit event?”

“
Long. And a bit of a
shock, to be honest. I haven’t been to L.A. in more than a decade.
Brought back more memories than I’d bargained for. But it was for a
good cause. Oscar cooked up this event to help a group of his
long-time clients. He thought my name would lend some draw
power.”

“
And did it?”

“
The turnout wasn’t bad,
especially for a first-time event.”

She smiled again, pleased for his success.
“So, you’re glad you went?”

His gaze shifted away from her and toward
the library, as if he would rather be in there. “I’m grateful for
any chance I can help Oscar.” He gestured toward the other
room.

Millie left them and Eliza went to her desk,
but John didn’t join her in the library after all. Odd. Shaking off
her disappointment, she reviewed the last few pages of his
manuscript, then glanced at John’s table for new pages. She didn’t
see any. Perhaps he had gone to get them.

Millie brought a tray with two cups of
coffee and offered one to Eliza, then looked around the room with a
frown. “This room feel chilly to you? I’ll have Duncan lay a
fire.”

“
I’m fine, Millie, but I
don’t mind if you think a fire is needed.”

Still frowning, Millie set the other cup of
coffee on John’s table. Duncan entered, mail in hand. Millie
stopped him and asked about a fire. With a sigh, Duncan dropped the
mail on Eliza’s desk and trudged out.

John was still nowhere in sight. Maybe he’d
left pages or his notebook and she just hadn’t seen them.

Eliza went to his table and searched more
closely, but found nothing. Strange—no pages and no John. She
returned to her desk and looked again, finding nothing there
either. Her eye caught something pink peeking out of the stack of
mail.

A small, square, stationery-style
envelope.

Checking around to make sure no one was
watching, she leaned closer.

The corner with the return address poked
out, but not enough to see who it was from.

Knowing full well that she shouldn’t, she
reached over and tugged the envelope out a little more.

The return address read “D.M.” with an
address in San Diego. In a feminine hand.

Something in the center of her chest turned
to ice.

A sound in the hallway made her jump, and
she returned to her seat, heart thumping. She was no gumshoe, but
wasn’t it obvious? John was receiving regular mail from a woman
with the initials D.M.

It’s none of your business, Eliza.

She inserted a clean sheet of paper into her
typewriter. Betty would also tell her it was none of her business.
Even Mama would say it. But as Eliza waited, heart still pounding,
Deborah Marlow’s beautiful face flooded her mind like a movie
screen. Glamorous, alluring, confident.

Though tabloids had paired Johnny Devine and
Deborah Marlow romantically in the past, he had never talked about
her.

Not yet, anyway.

Appalled at the childish direction her
emotions were headed, Eliza straightened the stack of manuscript
pages, then glanced at the stack of mail. It was rather odd that he
never talked about Deborah when he had been candid about other
women. Perhaps John had been more in love with this woman than
anyone else. Which wasn’t hard to imagine. Perhaps he still carried
deep feelings for her—why else would he be so secretive about their
relationship?

John’s cane tapped as he approached.

Foolish girl. You’re an employee. This is a
job. A temporary job that will end soon.

It was just that her lungs wouldn’t work,
and her heart fluttered like a caged bird.

What’s wrong with you? Stop acting like a
child.

Eliza put on the most composed look she
could, hating the fact that she was forced to hide behind a mask
yet again.

But she had no choice.
Allowing John to see that she had fallen in love
with him was out of the question.

Vacancy demands to be
filled.
It’s basic physics. Only a pure
fool would ignore or try to deny it.

~
The Devine Truth: A Memoir

Eliza looked up at the sound of John’s
cane.

“
So sorry to
keep you waiting,” John said.

Duncan came in from the kitchen carrying a
long-handled basket of wood, which he hauled to the fireplace with
shuffling steps.

John eyed him. “Expecting a freeze,
Duncan?”

The old man set the basket down. “Millie
wants a fire.”

“
Seems warm enough to me,
but if Millie wants it, I won’t argue.”

Duncan placed wood in the fireplace,
muttering about what Millie wanted.

John took his seat and set his cane beside
him. “Where did we leave off, Mrs. Saunderson?”

Eliza took the last page of manuscript from
the stack and held it up to read. Her pulse still hadn’t returned
to normal. “It was 1941, and you suspected that your looks and
popularity were the real reason you were cast in so many films.”
She peeked at him. Oh, yes. He still had the looks. She dropped her
gaze and readied her pencil.

“
Yes. I figured the only
thing the director expected from me was to show up. It didn’t even
matter if I could act. And I did want to act. I wanted to do a good
job, or at least I did at one time. I suppose by then, however, I
had lost my love for the art. I was convinced that all they wanted
was to put me in a film and showcase me with all their staging
wizardry. I told Oscar that producers chose specific roles to bring
out my … bankable charms.” He sighed. “Sex appeal is like gold in
Hollywood. Never mind my desire to act and connect with the
audience. Which was what I really wanted. I never felt close to
anyone after my family died. Losing them, and losing the connection
with the audience left me feeling detached. No matter how many …
people I spent time with.”

Eliza’s shoulders stiffened as she prepared
to hear something she would rather not. But hadn’t she told Oscar
how important it was for John to tell his story, in its entirety?
These things needed to be said.

“
I want people to
understand there was a deep, aggravating void in my life. I hope
readers will recognize such a feeling, no matter their specific
circumstances.”

She finished jotting the last lines. “I am
sure many people know the feeling. And I think your readers will be
eager to read on and see if you ever found a … a lasting way to
fill that void.”

“
I hope so.”

He went on with stories of friends who felt
the same way about being cast simply for their sex appeal or screen
image and then drowned their disillusionment in drink. “Jonesy took
it much harder than the rest of us did.”

Eliza paused her writing. “Who is that?”

“
Gina Jones, but we all
called her Jonesy. She could drink like a whale and slip right into
character like nobody’s business. I don’t know how she did it. But
the drinking took a deadly toll on her health. She died in a
hospital, broke and diseased.”

Eliza remembered the actress all too well.
Just before Ralph went into the army, when he spent most of his
time out with friends, Eliza would slip out for an occasional
Saturday matinee, more for the newsreels than the picture. She’d
heard about the actress’s death. By that time, Eliza knew full well
who the woman was because Ralph kept a life-sized pin-up poster of
her in the hall closet. Gina Jones: every red-blooded American
man’s dream.