Mrs, Dellarambo (Ann Champion) has a moment of regret for having stood up Bernard. Nevertheless, she is determined to know what happens. She discovers a terrible truth.
“I left word at the desk of Bernard’s hotel that I had been called away on business. I said that I was sorry I couldn’t keep our date. Packing my bags for the next flight to Los Angeles, I took a cab to the airport and flew to Hollywood.”
“I had my screen test and they liked me. I agreed to act in a new picture. It was called, ‘Bullets over Budapest.’ Ramón Magnifico was the male lead. I played the part of Melinda Craft, a secret agent who fronted a Jazz band as a cover for my secret identity. The picture was mostly filmed in Paris and I can still see the same sights I saw in my dream. Once Ramon took me to a charming French sidewalk coffee shop. The shop was called La Petite L’Amour and it was so romantic. I had voice coaches, acting coaches and a wardroom staff around me all the time. It was exciting.”
She stopped.
“Dr. Candella, I have never been to Paris. I wonder if there really is a shop like called La Petite L’Amour?”
When Mrs. Dellarambo said that I remembered when I had been to Paris. I had coffee in that very same coffee shop. The parallel reality she entered was next door to this world. Nearly everything would be the same.
“Old Stromberg the director said after my first scene, ‘Miss Champion, you are a natural. You vere vonderbar.’ I signed a contract for five years with the studio. I was promised a starring role in five pictures. I couldn’t believe it. I had three lawyers look at the contract. They all agreed that Hollywood never had a star like me.”
“By June of the next year I was famous all over the world. Everywhere I went they adored me. I had dozens of handsome men, multi-billionaires, royalty and fabulous males, all clambering for a date. When I finally had time from my busy schedule, Ramón Magnifico, the great motion picture star for RKO, took me to Hong Kong for dinner.”
“Oh, it was all so wonderful.
Her expression became one of puzzlement and sadness.
“The powder Ramón asked me to try that night in Hong Kong was so innocent. He was so much fun. I liked him and I trusted him. I put a pinch on my tongue and in a minute I felt like … I can’t express it. I have never felt so good in my whole life. I was empress of the world and I loved Ramón to desperation. At least I loved him that night in the Hong Kong Hilton luxury suite. The second time, a week later, the magic potion he gave me was just as wonderful. I started having some of the powder every time Ramón took me out.”
A strange abstracted look came over Mrs. Champion’s face.
“Then things seemed to just … fall apart.”
“I needed more and more of the magic powder just to say my lines and keep from feeling blue. I thought of Bernard and wondered what he was doing. If I called him would he talk to me after the way I had left him cold? Or maybe now that I was a big Hollywood star would he be too shy to come near me?”
“After a while, when I couldn’t read my lines and I fell down on the set once or twice. All I did most of the time was sniff the powder.”
Mrs. Champion stopped speaking. I waited for two minutes. Finally, she began to speak again. This time her voice was weaker, no longer the young vibrant voice I had heard when I first met her.
“RKO broke my contract for non-compliance or some such foolish reason or other. I didn’t care. Ramón was long gone and I still had some money. All I did was stay in my room and sniff my powder. Later, when my money ran out I found that I had no friends.”
She looked lost.
“The rest is a gray fog. I remember being with some man in a fleabag motel. There was a bottle of cheap wine on the nightstand. He was grabbing at me and I was crying and telling him to leave me alone … then … then I was here, in your laboratory once again, doctor.”
She shut her eyes tightly, her hands to her face. When she opened them and dropped them to her lap her voice was her own once more. She sat up in the chair. Her voice became stronger and she had an impish smile.
“I’m glad to be back. I think I’ll go home. After I feed Bernard some of his favorite pork chops and spaghetti, I’ll have him carry me into the bedroom.”
Next episode: That isn’t the end of this story. Bernard shows up. Not knowing his wife had seen Dr. Candella and the Wish Machine, he enters the Wish Machine.
Gene Paleno is an author and illustrator living in Witter Springs.
