Анита Лус – Gentlemen Prefer Blondes / Джентльмены предпочитают блондинок (страница 3)
Chapter Two
FATE KEEPS ON HAPPENING
Well, Dorothy and I are really on the ship sailing to Europe as anyone could tell by looking at the ocean. I always love the ocean. I mean I always love a ship and I really love the Majestic[29] because you would not know it was a ship because it is just like being at the Ritz, and the steward says the ocean is not so unpleasant this month as it generally is. So Mr. Eisman is going to meet us next month in Paris because he has to be there on business. I mean he always says that there is really no place to see the latest styles in buttons like Paris.
So Dorothy is out taking a walk up and down the deck with a gentleman she met on the steps, but I am not going to waste my time going around with gentlemen because if I did nothing but go around I would not finish my diary or read good books which I am always reading to improve my mind. But Dorothy really does not care about her mind and I always scold her because she does nothing but waste her time by going around with gentlemen who do not have anything, when Eddie Goldmark ofthe Goldmark Films is really quite wealthy and can make a girl delightful presents. But she does nothing but waste her time and yesterday, which was really the day before we sailed, she would not go to luncheon with Mr. Goldmark but she went to luncheon to meet a gentleman called Mr. Mencken from Baltimore who really only prints a green magazine which has not even got any pictures in it.
So Mr. Eisman and Lulu came down to the boat to see me off and Lulu cried quite a lot. I mean I really believe she could not care anymore for me[30] if she was light and not colored. Lulu has had a very sad life because when she was quite young a pullman porter[31] fell madly in love with her. So she believed him and he lured her away from her home. Finally she found out that she had been deceived and she really was broken-hearted and when she tried to go back home she found out that it was too late because her best girl-friend, who she had always trusted, had stolen her husband and he would not take Lulu back. So I have always said to her she could always work for me and she is going to take care of the apartment until I get back, because I would not sublet the apartment because Dorothy sublet her apartment when she went to Europe last year and the gentleman who sublet the apartment allowed girls to pay calls[32] on him who were not nice.
Mr. Eisman has literally filled our room with flowers and the steward has had quite a hard time to find enough vases to put them into. And of course Mr. Eisman has sent me quite a lot of good books as he always does, because he always knows that good books are always welcome. So he has sent me quite a large book of Etiquette as he says there is quite a lot of Etiquette in England and London and it would be a good thing for a girl to learn. So I am going to take it on the deck after luncheon and read it, because I would often like to know what a girl should do when a gentleman she has just met, says something to her in a taxi. Of course I always become quite upset but I always believe in giving a gentleman another chance.
So now the steward tells me it is luncheon time, so I will go upstairs as the gentleman Dorothy met on the steps has invited us to luncheon in the Ritz, which is a special dining room on the ship where you can spend quite a lot of money.
I am going to stay in bed this morning as I am quite upset as I saw a gentleman who quite upset me. I am not really sure it was the gentleman, as I saw him at quite a distance in the bar, but if it really is the gentleman it shows that a girl has a lot of fate in her life. So when I thought I saw this gentleman I was with Dorothy and Major Falcon, who is the gentleman Dorothy met on the steps, and Major Falcon noticed that I became upset, so he wanted me to tell him what was the matter, but it is really so terrible that I would not want to tell anyone. So I said good night to Major Falcon and I left him with Dorothy and I went down to our room and did nothing but cry and send the steward for some champagne to cheer me up. I mean champagne always makes me feel philosophical. So this morning the steward brought me my coffee and quite a large pitcher of ice water so I will stay in bed and not have any more champagne until luncheon time.
Dorothy never has any fate in her life and she does nothing but waste her time and I really wonder if I did right to bring her with me and not Lulu. I mean she really gives gentlemen a bad impression as she talks quite a lot of slang. Because when I went up yesterday to meet her and Major Falcon for luncheon, I overheard her say to Major Falcon that she really liked to become intoxicated once in a while. Only she did not say intoxicated, but she really said a slang word that she really should not say.
Major Falcon is really quite a delightful gentleman for an Englishman. I mean he really spends quite a lot of money and we had quite a delightful luncheon and dinner in the Ritz until I thought I saw the gentleman who upset me and I am so upset I think I will get dressed and go up on the deck and see if it really is the one I think it is. I mean there is nothing else for me to do as I have finished writing in my diary for today and I have decided not to read the book of Etiquette as I looked through it and it does not seem to have anything in it that I would care to know. So I will not waste my time on such a book. But I wish I did not feel so upset about the gentleman I think I saw.
It really is the gentleman I thought I saw. I mean when I found out it was the gentleman my heart really stopped. Because it all brought back things that anybody does not like to remember. So yesterday when I went up on the deck to see if I could see the gentleman and see if it really was him, I met quite a delightful gentleman who I met once at a party called Mr. Ginzberg. Only his name is not Mr. Ginzberg anymore because he changed his name to Mr. Mountginz which he really thinks is more aristocratic. So we walked around the deck and we met the gentleman face to face and I really saw it was him and he really saw it was me. I mean his face became so red it was almost a picture. So I was so upset I said good-bye to Mr. Mountginz and I started to rush right down to my room and cry. But when I was going down the steps, I bumped right into Major Falcon who noticed that I was upset. So Major Falcon made me go to the Ritz and have some champagne and tell him all about it.
So then I told Maj or Falcon about the time in Arkansas when Papa sent me to Little Rock to study how to become a stenographer. I mean Papa and I had quite a little quarrel because Papa did not like a gentleman who used to pay calls on me in the park and Papa thought it would do me good to get away for a while[33]. So I was in the business college in Little Rock for about a week when a gentleman called Mr. Jennings paid a call on the business college because he wanted to have a new stenographer. So he looked over all we college girls and he picked me out. So he told our teacher that he would help me finish my course in his office because he was only a lawyer and I really did not have to know so much. So Mr. Jennings helped me quite a lot and I stayed in his office about a year when I found out that he was not the kind of a gentleman that a young girl is safe with. I mean one evening when I went to pay a call on him at his apartment, I found a girl there who really was famous all over Little Rock for not being nice. So when I found out that girls like that paid calls on Mr. Jennings I had quite a bad case of hysterics and my mind was really a blank and when I came out of it, it seems that I had a revolver in my hand and it seems that the revolver had shot Mr. Jennings.
So this gentleman on the boat was really the District Attorney[34] who was at the trial and he really was quite harsh at the trial and he called me names[35] that I would not even put in my diary. Because everyone at the trial except the District Attorney was really lovely to me and all the gentlemen in the jury all cried when my lawyer pointed at me and told them that they practically all had had either a mother or a sister. So the jury was only out three minutes and then they came back and acquitted me and they were all so lovely that I really had to kiss all of them and when I kissed the judge he had tears in his eyes. I mean it was when Mr. Jennings became shot that I got the idea to go into the cinema, so Judge Hibbard got me a ticket to Hollywood. So it was Judge Hibbard who really gave me my name because he did not like the name I had because he said a girl should have a name that should express her personality. So he said my name should be Lorelei[36] which is the name of a girl who became famous for sitting on a rock in Germany. So I was in Hollywood in the cinema when I met Mr. Eisman and he said that a girl with my brains should not be in the cinema but she should be educated, so he took me out of the cinema so he could educate me.