“Impatience,” May Berriman said in her most theatrical voice, “is for amateurs waiting in the wings ten minutes before their cue. My best advice to you is to relax—until it’s time to go on. There’s no way to hurry the action.”
Of course, May was right. There was no way to hurry the action. On the other hand, Peggy, Amy, and Greta found that there was also no easy way to relax. The next two days dragged by only as days can drag when you want nothing more than for them to come to an end.
Rehearsals, school, studying, all took up many hours, but for the first time since Come Closer had started casting, Peggy seemed to have extra hours in the day. And each of those extra hours seemed like a day in itself.
As she went through the now-familiar routine of crowded days and nights, she could not rid her mind of the thought of Paula Andrews and of—somewhere—Paula’s parents, wondering where she was. And as Paula began to bloom from her new, nourishing diet, Peggy seemed to fade with her preoccupations.
But nothing lasts forever, and soon the two long days were at an end.
The girls put in their phone call at noon, knowing that it was only nine in Los Angeles and that Dot would surely be asleep at that hour after a late arrival the night before. It seemed a pity to wake her, but it was better than waiting and taking a chance of missing her entirely.
“What? Who? Where?” Dot’s voice, fogged with sleep and confusion, came over the three thousand miles of telephone wire as clearly as if she had been next door.
“It’s me, Dot! Peggy Lane. In New York!”
“Why?” Dot demanded, this time a little less foggy. “It’s wonderful to hear your nice, friendly, wide-awake, noontime New York voice,” she said in her normal peppery manner, “but not when I was in the middle of a dream about landing a movie lead that was going to get me an Oscar!”
“I’m sorry to wake you, Dot,” Peggy said, “but this is important, and I didn’t want to find that you’d gone out. We want you to do a favor for us.”