When third-degreed about her dressing-room mate in _The Music Box Revue_--who was thought to have landed her job because her father was warden of Leavenworth Prison, where Nicky Arnstein, husband of Fannie Brice, star of the show, was on the rock pile--Hilda again "knew nothing." She started her own little brownstone-front upstairs speakeasy. The opening was all New York in one place. It was soon the scene of raids and battles. When she went to Europe to duck a judgment she resented, for $270 for ten pairs of specially built shoes, she traveled incognito, with her Rolls-Royce, two maids and 27 trunks. Though she never earned more than $150 a week, Hilda once walked into Texas Guinan's, and bought a bracelet off Tex's arm for $25,000 in big bills, just to "burn up" Kitty Ray, who was sitting a few tables away with "Nucky" Johnson. She was 29 when she died, in New York Hospital, of peritonitis. Many of her friends are still on Broadway. At least one gentleman with whom she was known to be close cracked a bottle of champagne for her daughter. A girl who also succeeded Hilda in the affections of "Nucky" Johnson worked at the same club with her daughter until she left to get married. With a subtle touch of irony, fate had decreed that this girl, Virginia Biddle, should dance next to Yolande Ugarte, Hilda Ferguson's daughter! Hilda, Junior, after sweeping Broadway's most ardent off their feet, eloped with Frank Parker, radio tenor. The marriage, a stormy one, lasted all of two years, after which the pair took their troubles to court. The court decision which severed their ties only brought more squabbles in its wake. For, when Hilda, Junior, became the constant companion of Duncan McMartin, Canadian multi-millionaire, and McMartin's wife inferred she was the cause of their separation, Parker hailed Hilda back into court. He told the judge she was holding him up to so much ridicule he thought alimony payments should be stopped. The judge said Frank was no candidate for a monastery either, and ordered the payments to go on, with an urgent reminder to get the arrears up to date. As these lines were written McMartin settled with his wife, obtained a divorce and married Hilda. d.--_The Good Deed_ When Ruth Hilliard was eight years old, she was scalded by boiling water. One side of her face was terribly disfigured. When she grew up, she would have been beautiful enough, except for that hideous scar. She worked as a cigarette girl in the old Hollywood Restaurant, and envied the chorines who had all the nice things in life. Stars thronged the Hollywood, and so did the millionaires. But none noticed Ruth Hilliard. Or, if they did, it was to look at the scar and momentarily think, "what a shame!" A constant visitor at the Hollywood was Jimmy Ritz, the comedian. Ruth often wished he'd say hello to her. Sometimes, when she had the money, she'd go to Loew's State to see him act, or to Earl Carroll's _Vanities_, in which he later starred.