For the old man this journey was just peaches and cream all the way; a vicarious jag, with no hangover the next morning. He insisted upon paying all the bills; and he had his secretary along, so everything just happened by magic—train accommodations, hotel suites, taxicabs, flowers, candy, theatre tickets—you had only to hint a wish, and the thing was there. What more could there be to add to mortal bliss? Only that Vee would have liked to eat a square meal now and then; and to have spent the morning in bed, instead of having to keep an appointment to “reduce” at a gymnasium!
They saw the world premiere of Come-Hither Eyes. Possibly you have never been to college in America, and do not understand our lively ways of speech; so let it be explained that sometimes the eyes of co-eds have been observed to possess, whether from natural endowment or by practice acquired, a certain quality suggestive to the male creature of an impulse to proximity. A delicious title, you see; and a delicious picture, transporting tired and bored millions into that very same world of glorious money-spending to which Vee and Bunny had been lifted up. The mechanic who had been screwing up nut number 847 in an automobile factory all day, the housewife who had been washing baby-diapers and buying shoddy goods in a five and ten-cent store—these were placed in the same position as Dad, enjoying a vicarious jag with no hangover the next morning!
The scenes at the New York premiere were the same as in Angel City; the crowds as great, and the cheering as enthusiastic. And Vee and Bunny, sitting up in bed in their silken garments, while black-clad robots silently and mechanically served breakfast on silver trays—Vee and Bunny read the accounts of their triumph, and who had attended and what they had worn. And then, turning over the paper, Bunny read a dispatch from Angel City—ten thousand oil workers had walked out on strike, and the industry was tied up tight. The operators announced that they were no longer willing to recognize the oil board, and issued a new wage-scale that was to be taken or left. Trouble was feared, added the newspapers, because it was known that radical agitators had for some time been active among the men.
VI
Bunny was on a holiday, and must enjoy himself; if he failed to do so, the enjoyment of his two companions would be marred. He must smile and escort them to a theatre, and afterwards send Dad home in a taxi, and go with Vee to a supper-party with some of the screen people, and gossip about their productions and their profits, and see them drink too much, and know that there would be an hour’s talk about prohibition and bootleggers, starting as soon as he and Vee refused to drink. Were they “on the wagon”? Or were they afraid of this liquor? This was something special—the original Koski stuff, or whatever it might be in New York.
Then in the morning the pair would go to the gym, and practice stunts together, making themselves a quite competent pair of gymnasts—Vee said that if ever Dad went broke, and she got “kleig eyes” and had to quit the movies, they could earn several hundred a week on the “big time circuit.” They would have lunch, and then maybe there would be a matinee, or somebody calling, or reporters or special writers; or Vee would go shopping, and absolutely insist upon having her darling Bunny along, because he had such exquisite taste, and why did she dress but to please him? Bunny met other rich young men in his position, and learned that such remarks were preliminary to the man’s ordering the bill sent to him. But there was nothing of the “gold-digger” about Vee—when she gave the invitation, she paid.
What she wanted was her Bunny-rabbit. She adored him, and wanted to be with him every moment, and to show him off to all the world, including the newspapers. They had been together long enough for Bunny to know her thoroughly, and to realize the drawbacks as well as the advantages of the alliance. That she was sensual did not trouble him, for he was young, and his ardors matched hers. The arts that he had learned from Eunice Hoyt were combined with those Vee had learned from many lovers, and they were dizzy with delight; the impulse that drew them together was impossible to resist.
But intellectually they were far from being mated. Vee would listen to anything he wanted to talk about, but how little she really cared about serious things would be comically revealed by her sudden shifting of the conversation. She had her own life, one of speed and excitement and show. She might jeer at the movie world and its works, but nevertheless, she was of that world, and applause and attention were the breath she lived by. She was always on the stage, playing a part—the world’s professional darling; always bright, always fresh, young, beautiful, sprightly. Such a thing as thoughtfulness was suspect, a cloak for dangerous enemies stealing into your mind. “What’s the matter, Bunny-rabbit? I believe you’re thinking about that horrid strike!”
Sitting down and reading a book was a thing quite unknown to this world’s darling. A newspaper, yes, of course, or a magazine—one had them lying
