Henderson Daily Dispatch

Wanted-Love!
The Story of an Unemployed Girl

Lillian Abbott, daughter of a wealthy New England family, decides she is tired of the social whirl and wants a career. She decides on the movies and after an exchange of correspondence with the head of one movie studio, Stanley Thomas, by name, she leaves home and accompanies him to New York from Salem, taking with her her savings. After registering at a New York hotel, Allen leaves her, taking with him her money and a diamond ring. He had repulsed his advances.

(NOW GO ON WITH THE STORY)

CHAPTER II

WHAT DOES Lillian do in New York without money? Lillian wondered, a little bewildered. And although she realized she did not have as much as one dollar—

Lillian did not sense the significance of the situation.

"I can charge anything I like," she reasoned. "I can sign checks for food and as long as I have luggage here there won't be any worry on the part of the hotel—"

She gave her little white hat another tilt, took up her gloves and decided to go through with her former plan to dine alone in the hotel dining room.

The merry tune of the radio still filled the room. And as worry was almost foreign to the naturally gay Lillian, the problem of being without money failed to take a hold on her then.

She was free.

She was on her own.

She could go down into the dining room, where an orchestra was playing, and she could order a dinner to her own liking.

There would be no one there to remind her to eat salad or not to eat two desserts!

There was something positively joyous in locking her room door and pushing the key down into the cuff of her glove.

And as she stepped into the elevator she was elated. She actually wished she might run into Blaine in the hotel lobby... hoped she might see him sitting in one of the large upholstered chairs.

She smiled as she thought of what she would say: "Thanks awfully for having me come to New York.

I never would have just come on alone.

You really did me a favor, tricking me into coming."

He would look surprised. Rise and perhaps sputter.

Then she would smile and add:

"You've probably tricked other girls, too.

But I bet they weren't as grateful as I am."

But of course, he wouldn't be there. He wouldn't be anywhere she might see him. He had stolen her money. He had her diamond ring, too.

Lillian had always been able to get as much money as she needed. She always had been able to charge anything in the way of clothes, theater tickets, flowers.

Her father's name was as good as cash in any of the stores in Boston.

Her mother had accounts everywhere and Lillian always had used them freely.

Money being tied to the movies and Blaine having tricked her out of her ring did not make much of a dent. Her consciousness.

She could hear the jazz orchestra in the dining room playing. She stepped from the elevator and followed in the direction of the gay tune.

She tripped down several red carpeted steps into the dining room, which was softly lighted, and which was centered with a small dance floor.

A large sign in bright blue letters called the wonderful room a "GRILL."

A smiling waiter approached, his eyes questioning.

"Are you joining a party, madame?" he asked politely.

"No," answered Lillian. "I'm alone."

He bowed and smiled as if he had known that from the time she entered. "A small table by the orchestra, perhaps?"

That suited Lillian exactly. And as he pulled out the chair for Lillian, who felt very happy and New Yorkish, the sleek-haired little man leading the orchestra looked over at her.

His expression was one of pleasure, as if he were greeting Lillian. She might have been an old acquaintance.

She returned his glad look. Her heart beat a little faster. Her eyes sparkled. This was New York!

Everybody is always happy in New York!

The orchestra turned its tune into one of Lillian's favorites: And one of the saxophone players put aside his brass instrument and lifted a megaphone.

He began to sing. His voice was croony. He faced Lillian, and his croony words reached across. It was funny, really, she thought how the words of his song seemed to fit the situation... almost:

"... I got the ritz from the one I love...

Oh, I got the big go-by..."

Well, thought Lillian, "Blaine certainly did give me the green light. The big go-by!"

But it seemed amusing, the whole thing. She scanned the menu which the waiter held before her.

She never once looked at the prices listed in small figures on the right side of the green and blue bordered cardboard. She never had allowed prices to influence her ordering. Certainly they had nothing to do with her appetite.

Through a fresh fruit cocktail, which she relished with bits of Melba toast and sweet butter, Lillian gave her entire attention to the orchestra.

She applauded its tunes. And once she told the waiter to ask the boys to play "All the King's Horses" for her.

She was a little pleased though, when the tune turned into something else. She realized that the other had reminded her somehow of Blaine— and she did not want to be reminded of him.

When the golden brown squab was placed before her and the delicious aroma kindled her appetite she thought of Cyrus Abbott.

It was the first time she had thought about him since that afternoon when she discussed him with Blaine.

Squab was his favorite dish. And this one was browned beautifully.

Lillian Abbott usually thought of her parents because of things. Things they did, things they ate, things they said. She seldom thought of them because of their affection for her.

They never had shown it enough to make her conscious that they had any great love for her.

The only time she ever hugged her father or mother was when they gave her a present. And even when she went away to school, or returned, they never kissed her. They patted her and touched their cheeks against hers. She never had cried when she left them. She never had felt particularly joyous on returning.

"So, they won't mind so much, because I've left home—really," she thought. "Father will be furious and do a scene in the library... with mother watching him."

"They'll think it's only a prank— and that I'll come back in a day or two," she imagined.

Lillian skipped salad. She had never liked it anyway. And she ordered pastry and ice cream, both.

She concluded her meal with a bit of tasty, biting cheese and toasted crackers and demi-tasse coffee.

She nibbled the cheese and crackers slowly. And allowed the waiter to fill the tiny cup with coffee three times.

It meant staying longer in the softly-lighted, merry-tuned room.

It meant not facing her problem... loneliness, solitude of her hotel room.

Now several couples danced on the tiny square of a dance floor. She watched them whirl about. And she was almost envious of a girl in a trailing black dress, all tulle and sheenless crepe. Lillian felt a little pang, purely feminine, because she was not in evening clothes, and did not have a handsome escort, one who danced as wonderfully as the tall blonde fellow with the girl in the black dress.

Her attention was taken from the whirling couple by the waiter who pushed a check for her dinner under the saucer of her empty coffee cup.

Unconsciously she felt in her lap for her handbag.

But, how silly, she thought.

She had no handbag.

No money!

Why, she couldn't even leave a dollar tip for the solicitous fellow.

She looked at the check to hide her embarrassment.

The scrawly writing of the waiter and the amount stamped on by some machine blurred and whirled.

"Oh. I'll just sign this," she said, with an aim at nonchalance.

"A pencil, please."

She wrote her name—then she grew panicky.

She couldn't put her real name there.

She didn't know how she was registered in the hotel. Blaine had attended to that and he'd forgotten to explain.

(TO BE CONTINUED)