Then, having said that very magnificently, the young idealist who was gradually and painfully evolving into a man of the world, went on to point out that as a matter of fact none of the eight would have much chance to bother Verne. His efficient blacklist system would see to it that they didn’t get work in the oil fields; and any organizing they could do would be of a pitiful sort. On the other hand, Verne must realize that if he persisted in trying to railroad these fellows to jail, there was going to be a long trial, and a lot of publicity of a kind the operators might find troublesome. The testimony would have to be “framed”; and Bunny would do everything in his power to expose it, and to see that the public got the facts. What if it should occur to the defendants’ lawyer to subpoena Mr. Vernon Roscoe and ask what he knew about the planting of spies on the Paradise workers?
“Oh, son!” cried Dad, “You wouldn’t do a dirty thing like that!”
Bunny answered, “Of course I wouldn’t. I said the lawyer might do it. Wouldn’t you, if you were in his place?” And Dad, very uncomfortable, said to let the matter ride, and he would see what he could do with Verne.
V
One outcome of these negotiations, Dad appealed to Vee Tracy: couldn’t she possibly do more to keep Bunny out of the hands of these awful reds? Why, he wasn’t thinking about a thing else! Vee said she would try, and she did, and it was a further strain upon their love and affection. For Bunny was beginning to know what he wanted now, and he didn’t want to be kept from it.
Vee was hard at work on The Princess of Patchouli. It was a silly story, she would freely admit; yet her whole being was concentrated upon making it real and vivid. If you asked her why, the answer would be, it was her profession; which meant that she was getting four thousand a week, with the possibility of increasing it to five thousand a week if she made good. But what did she want with the five thousand a week? To buy more applause and attention, as a means of getting more thousands for more weeks? It was a vicious circle—exactly like Dad’s oil wells. The wobblies had a song about it in their jungles: “We go to work to get the cash to buy the food to get the strength to go to work to get the cash to buy the food to get the strength to go to work—” and so on, as long as your breath held out.
Vee wanted to talk about the picture and the problems that arose day by day, and the various personalities and their jealousies and vanities, their loves and hates. Bunny, who loved her, would pretend to be interested, because it would hurt her if he wasn’t. And it was the same with the Hollywood parties; once they had been new and startling, but now they all seemed alike. Everybody was making a new picture, but it would always be like the old pictures. Nobody did anything original, but everybody followed fashions; the public’s taste ran to society pictures, and nobody would look at a war picture—but presently the public would want war pictures, and after that costume pictures, and then sea pictures, and then back to society pictures. Vee’s friends changed their bootleggers, but it was always the same stuff they drank. Also they changed their lovers; a certain man slept with a certain woman, and then presently it was a different woman—but the more it changed, the more it was the same thing.
Bunny and Vee loved each other, just as passionately as ever. At least, they told themselves it was as ever, but all the while the subtle chemistry of change was at work. Men and women are not bodies only, and cannot be satisfied with delights of the body only. Men and women are minds, and have to have harmony of ideas. Can they be bored with each other’s ideas, and still be just as much in love? Men and women are characters, and these characters lead to actions—and what if they lead to different actions? What if the man wants to read a book, while the woman wants to go to a dance?
Vee had been so considerate in the matter of her adoring “Applesauce,” so careful lest Bunny should be jealous; and now Bunny made the irritating discovery that it was his turn to be careful! Vee had two enemies among women—and Bunny persisted in keeping them as his intimates. That Socialist girl at the university—of course he had to see her there, but did he have to make dates to go to Socialist meetings with her? Vee was ready to believe that he wasn’t in love with a common little sweatshop Jewess; but what if Vee wanted to be taken to a world premiere on the evening of the Socialist lecture?
And then—that Ruth Watkins! Of course Bunny wouldn’t be in love with an ignorant country girl, without any education; but all the same, she was setting her snares for him, and Vee had seen
