Twelve Days and Twelfth Night

Chapter 1

one

On the first day of Christmas my true love sent to me . . . a partridge in a pear tree.

San Diego, California

Soft sunshine, a sea breeze, and a shining new opportunity. Maggie Oliver paused to savor the Italian Renaissance facade of San Diego’s USO-Army-Navy YMCA building. Then she climbed granite steps and swung open the door.

A senior hostess sat at the front desk, her cherubic face crowned by silver hair.

“Good morning.” Maggie mirrored her bright smile. “I’m Margaret Oliver, and I’m—”

“Late.” All resemblance to a cherub disappeared in a great pinching of features.

A clock above the woman’s head indicated Maggie was five minutes early, but she knew better than to argue. “I do apologize. The trolley—you understand.”

The woman rose, barely taller standing than sitting. “Miss Perkins, please watch the front desk.”

“Yes, Mrs. Laverne.” A young brunette scampered over.

Mrs. Laverne marched across the red-tiled lobby under a wood-beamed ceiling. “I serve as one of the directors of this USO club. I’ll show you to your office, Mrs. Oliver.”

“Miss Oliver.”

“Miss?” She cranked her gaze back to Maggie and almost stumbled. “When will USO-Camp Shows learn their lesson and stop placing responsibility in the hands of single young ladies? After the unfortunate situation with Miss Holmes . . .”

Unfortunate? Bernard Anderson, the Camp Shows regional director, had hired Maggie after Miss Holmes married.

Mrs. Laverne huffed and resumed her march.

Maggie trotted after the club director. Perhaps kind words would help. “Mr. Anderson told me about the important work you do at this club. He said you have over five hundred beds for servicemen on leave and offer lots of services and recreation.”

“We do. We’ve had five million visitors since January. Do you see this tile floor? It was supposed to last ten years, but we had to replace it after only one year.”

“Oh my.”

Mrs. Laverne passed through an arched doorway and waved toward a gymnasium. “You can imagine what an imposition it is to sacrifice space for Camp Shows, but sacrifice we must.”

Maggie lifted an eyebrow as she followed the woman up a staircase. Mrs. Laverne wasn’t her supervisor, but she was opening precious space to a separate branch of the USO. “Thank you for making room for us.”

On the second floor, Mrs. Laverne gestured to an open door. “Here’s your office. Your assistant arrived fifteen minutes ago. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

“Thank you.” But Maggie’s smile landed on the club director’s retreating back.

Inside the office, a middle-aged woman strode up to Maggie, and her dark eyes pierced like an obsidian knife. “Come on. No time to waste. Let’s get to work.”

Well, that was an unusual way to be welcomed, but Maggie found a smile. “Good morning. I’m Miss Oliver—”

“San Diego’s new Camp Shows director.” The woman spread manila folders on the larger of the two desks.

Gray streaked her neatly rolled black hair.

“The Navy wants a Christmas show, but Miss Holmes waited too long. The Camp Shows troupes are already booked, so you’ll have to start from scratch.

Only two months till Christmas, and we’ve got nothing. ”

Maggie’s head spun, so she removed her hat and straightened the jacket of her dark blue suit, the one Grandpa said made her eyes look as blue as Grandma’s.

Sweet Grandpa. He was so proud of her, but this job was on a trial basis. If she couldn’t pull a show together, she’d lose this job. And he’d lose his home.

“I’ve organized this for you.” Miss Nameless slapped her hand on a folder. “Let’s go.”

So, Maggie had a hardworking assistant, and she joined her at the desk. “Your name is . . . ?”

“Ria Fernandez.” She held out a folder, and a golden band sparkled on her ring finger.

Maggie set her hat and purse on the desk and took the folder. “Ria? That’s pretty.”

“Ria is short and fast.” She flicked the folder. “The show, Miss Oliver.”

Maggie settled into the wooden chair, and Mrs. Fernandez pulled over a chair beside the desk.

Putting on a show would be a thrilling challenge, and Maggie could do it. After over ten years dancing in Hollywood, she’d danced with USO-Camp Shows, then choreographed, then directed. This was the next step.

She opened the folder. “What do we have, Mrs. Fernandez?”

“Call me Ria. Save a lot of syllables.”

“Is that so? Call me Maggie and save a few more.”

Ria snapped up her gaze, and a smile burst out. “I like you.”

Maggie laughed. “What do we have?”

“Nothing.” Ria pointed to the folder in Maggie’s hand. “List of venues, contacts, phone numbers. An X means they aren’t available.”

Maggie whistled. “That’s most of them.”

“You have appointments this afternoon at the three best options.” Ria handed Maggie a neatly typed list. “Your schedule, your contacts, where to meet them, the trolley route.”

“Oh my.” Very efficient.

Ria slid over another folder. “Mr. Anderson gave me a list of Hollywood stars, but we’d better book them fast.”

Halfway down the list, Maggie gasped. “Prescott Duke? He’s my favorite star.

I danced in three of his movies. Not with him, of course.

Just in the ensemble. With his dark good looks, they always paired him with blondes, not brunettes like me.

But, oh my. He’s so handsome and such a gentleman, and that voice. It’s like midnight blue velvet.”

Ria cleared her throat, and the obsidian returned to her gaze.

Maggie gave her an apologetic smile. “Too many syllables?”

She tapped the list. “See the X? You don’t want Mr. Duke. He was burned in an accident. Really bad scars.”

“I—I’d heard.” Prescott Duke’s story had been the talk of the town.

He’d been one of the first stars to enlist after Pearl Harbor, but his bus to the training camp had crashed and burst into flames.

Mr. Duke had escaped but then returned to the inferno to save other men.

He’d been discharged from the Army due to his injuries, and he hadn’t made a film since.

The man was a hero, and Maggie slid her finger over the X. “I want him in my show. Scars and all.”

Yeoman Third Class Frank Sebastian led Maggie toward the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego’s Balboa Park. Modeled after the Globe Theatre in London from Shakespearean times, the circular building had half-timbering near the roof and Old English lettering.

With all her visits to the park, why had Maggie never been inside the theater? “I love it. I absolutely love it.”

“We’re mighty fond of it.” The square collar of the sailor’s navy-blue tunic fluttered in the wind. “It was built for the California Pacific International Exposition in ’35. It was supposed to be torn down afterward, but the city rallied, raised money, and had it built to code.”

The squawk of seagulls, the rustle of palm trees, and the scent of eucalyptus trees added a California layer to the charm. “Now the Navy runs it.”

“Yes, ma’am. After Pearl Harbor, we took over most of the buildings in Balboa Park to expand the naval hospital. We use the theater for lectures and entertainment. We use the Museum of Man over yonder for a hospital ward.”

Holding back her hair, Maggie turned in a circle. To the left of the theater, the Spanish-inspired museum raised an ornate stucco tower and a colorful tiled dome to the blue sky. “It’s perfect.”

“Don’t get too excited, ma’am. The theater only seats about five hundred. You’d need multiple showings for all the sailors in San Diego, and the theater will rarely be available for rehearsals.”

She followed the handsome blond sailor toward the theater. Frank Sebastian . . . the name was familiar, but the face wasn’t. Since he was from the South and easily ten years her junior, she couldn’t imagine where she might have met him.

He opened the door and led her through the lobby and into the theater.

Maggie strolled down the aisle. The stage was small, but she liked how the wall encircled the floor seating and how balconies stacked up that wall like bunk beds.

She could practically see actors in Elizabethan garb calling out lines. “Too bad Shakespeare wouldn’t fit for a Christmas show. I can’t see our boys sitting through a play in Ye Olde English anyway.”

“That’s what they thought for the Exposition too, so the Globe Players performed short versions of Shakespeare plays. They were a big hit. The scripts are in the office. Want to see?”

“Why, yes.” Maggie followed the yeoman up the aisle. “Short versions?”

“Yes, ma’am. About an hour.”

“An hour . . .” The men might sit through that, especially if it were a comedy, especially if supplemented by song-and-dance numbers and plenty of pretty girls.

Frank Sebastian entered an office off the lobby, shoved boxes aside, and opened a file cabinet. “Here we go. The Taming of the Shrew, Hamlet, Twelfth Night, Macbeth—”

“Twelfth Night? May I see?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Maggie took the thin script. “I played Olivia in this play in high school. I loved it. Full of comedy and mistaken identities. And . . . and Shakespeare wrote it for Christmas.”

“Huh.” The sailor screwed up one eye. “The fellows always like a good laugh.”

Maggie clutched the script to her chest, and a plan danced in her head like a Busby Berkeley spectacular—the venue, the program. All she needed was a star.

Los Angeles, California

Prescott Duke sat in a leather armchair in front of Melvin Underwood’s shiny desk, and his foot jiggled. “Anything for me? Anything at all?”

Melvin rested his big hands on his big belly. “You know the answer, Press.”

Prescott tugged at his shirt collar. “I know I’m done in movies. I know that. I mean, I’ll do anything. A charity gig, a—”

“What are you worried about?” Melvin’s thick gray eyebrows fused. “You have a fancy house, a fancy car, and enough money for life if you manage it well. And you do.”

“It’s not the money. It never was. I’d work for free.”

“Never say that to your agent.”

Prescott cracked a smile, then sobered. “I mean it, Mel. I’m going stir-crazy. It’s been almost two years since the accident. I’m tired of doing nothing all day.”

“What’re you going to do? Get a job?”