The Waterbury Democrat., 1945-02-22

quarrel with their judgment. Born in Prague, Wechsberg studied at the Vienna Conservatory
 of Music and the Sorbonne, and at
 18 made the first of his trips around
 the world as violinist in a ships
 orchestra. Hiss fellow musicians were
 of all nationalitieS, shapes, sizes,
 dispositions and degrees of tempera-
 ment. For instance, there was
 Franzi, the bank clerk, whose pas sion was finance He collected ticker tape and Manhattan telephone direc- tories, and Wall Street to him was seventh heaven. Or Sebastiano, the ever-sleepy piano player, who was so clever at switching from one pasr senger's temporarily empty state room to another for a Snooze that each concert was delayed by the frantic search for him. And, when located, he could be awakened only by pouring ice water down his throat.
 THE SOULFUL VALET
 There was Nam, the Indo- Chinese boy of ariStocratic family who stole aboard to be the musicians valet, largely because he loved "Humor- esque.' And the High Voltage Lady, passenger who insisted on singing the aria from "Tosco," but was crossed up when the pianist inten tionally played his accompaniment, a key too high.
 Adventure follows on the heels of misadventure; Wechsberg's vio- lin collapsed because of the high humidity of the Red Sea, and there was the matter of piano that went overheard. Nor was all the fun at sea; the authors "reminiscences of his days as claquer at the opera provide some of the best stories in this altogether enjoyable book.
 
 THEODORE PRATT. who dem- onstrated literary kinship with Joseph WechSberg in his recently published "Perils in Provence"- they share a love for the incongru- ous, and unlikely but real engag- ing people-is back again this time with the novel: Miss billy Says No" (DuelI, Sloan & Pearce: S2.5O).
 It's the light engaging tale of a fortyish-but-fair secretary to a Hollywood film producer, who in- Sthead of a hope chest has a trunk filled with film scripts, rejections over period of 25 years. Miss Dillys illustration extends in another direc- tion, too. Apparently never to come is that raise from $375O a week to $4000, and until she decides to write | her book, all she has to look for ward to is the annual visit of MT. | Horatin, the beaded, shy member of the film company's Bard of Di- rectors.
 Her book, a diary of her ex- periences inside a motion picture studio, is snapped up by the first publisher to see it. Miss billy is suddenly filthy rich, and the fun begins when her employer and every-other film producer in Holly good start bidding for the film rights of her book.
 Miss billy says, "No.' She refuses to sell. The stratagemS, the lures, the begging, the threats, the sheer desperation of the film executives particularly her own bosses, pro- vide high comedy. But all this is of secondary importance to Miss billy. So is her raise to forty bucks. MT Horatio is back, and comes love. Romance is briefly hlighted, but all comes out as it should. If the author should get Miss Dilly's opportunity, there's the fascinating question of it might be case of MT. Pratt Says No.'
 OF A BOY
 In Poor Child" (Harper: $2.5O Anne Parrish's first novel since 1941, we meet 12-year-old Martin Doyle, 3 tragic child who is hard to put out of mind. Victim of a horror which takes from him his mother and little sister and makes page one of the New York tabloids, Martin s taken in by the wealthy, half- world, dreamy Mrs. de Rendon. Her country home is magnificent to the Irish lad, she is gentle and wins his