I chewed the lower lip a bit. I must say I couldn't see why I should go butting in, trying to put a stopper on Eggy's – as far as I could make out – quite praiseworthy amours. Live and let live is my motto. If Eggy wanted to get spliced, let him, was the way I looked at it. Marriage might improve him. It was difficult to think of anything that wouldn't.
'H'm,' I said again.
Old Plimsoll was fiddling with pencil and paper – working out routes and so on, apparently.
'The journey is, as you say, a long one, but perfectly simple. On arriving in New York, you would, I understand, take the train known as the Twentieth Century Limited to Chicago. A very brief wait there –'
I sat up.
'Chicago? You don't go through Chicago, do you?'
'Yes. You change trains at Chicago. And from there to Los Angeles is a mere –'
'But wait a second,' I said. 'This is beginning to look more like a practical proposition. Your mention of Chicago opens up a new line of thought. The fight for the heavyweight championship of the world is coming off in Chicago in a week or so.'
I examined the matter in the light of these new facts. All my life I had wanted to see one of these world's championships, and I had never been able to afford the trip. It now dawned upon me that, having come into the title and trimmings, I could do it on my head. The amazing thing was that I hadn't thought of it before. It always takes you some little time to get used to the idea that you are on Easy Street.
'How far is it from Chicago to Hollywood?'
'Little more than a two days' journey, I believe.'
'Then say no more,' I said. 'It's a go. I don't suppose for a moment that I'll be able to do a thing about old Eggy, but I'll go and see him.'
'Excellent.'
There was a pause. I could see that something else was coming.
And – er – Reginald.'
'Hullo?'
'You will be careful?'
'Careful?'
He coughed, and fiddled with an application for soccage in fief.
'Where you yourself are concerned, I mean. These Hollywood women are, as you were saying a moment ago, of considerable personal attractions...'
I laughed heartily.
'Good Lord!' I said. 'No girl's going to look at me.'
This seemed to jar his reverence for the family. He frowned in a rebuking sort of way.
'You are the Earl of Havershot'
'I know. But even so –'
'And, if I am not mistaken, girls have looked at you in the past.'
I knew what he meant. A couple of years before, while at Cannes, I had got engaged to a girl named Ann Bannister, an American newspaper girl who was spending her holiday there, and as I was the heir apparent at the time this had caused some stir in the elder branches of the family. There was a considerable sense of relief, I believe, when the thing had been broken off.
All the Havershots have been highly susceptible and impulsive. Your hearts rule your heads. So –'
'Oh, right ho. I'll be careful.'
'Then I will say no more. Verbum – ah – sapienti satis. And you will start for Hollywood as soon as possible?'
'Immediately,' I said.
There was a boat leaving on the Wednesday. Hastily throwing together a collar and a toothbrush, I caught it. A brief stay in New York, a couple of days in Chicago, and I was on the train to Los Angeles, bowling along through what I believe is called Illinois.
And it was as I sat outside the observation car on the second morning of the journey, smoking a pipe and thinking of this and that, that April June came into my life.
The general effect was rather as if I had swallowed sixpen-north of dynamite and somebody had touched it off inside me.
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Money for Nothing Page 27
