Anita Loos

“ But all the time I am going back to New York, I will have to try to make up my mind one way or another. Because we girls really can not help it, if we have ideals, and sometimes my mind seems to get to running on things that are romantic, and I seem to think that maybe there is some place in the world where there is a gentleman who knows how to look and act like Count Salm and who has got money besides. And when a girls mind gets to thinking about such a romantic thing, a girls mind really does not seem to know whether to marry Henry or not. ”

“ Because when a gentleman has a business, he has an office and he has to be there, but when a gentlemans business is only looking into other peoples business, a gentleman is always on the verge of coming in and out of the house. And a girl could not really say that her time was her own. And when Henry was not in and out of the house, his mother would always be in and out of the house because she seems to think that I am so full of nothing but sunshine. ”

“ And so I am very happy myself because, after all, the greatest thing in life is to always be making everybody else happy. And so, while everybody is so happy, I really think it is a good time to finish my diary because after all, I am to busy going over my senarios with Mr. Montrose, to keep up any other kind of literary work. And I am so busy bringing sunshine into the life of Henry that I really think, with everything else I seem to acomplish, it is all a girl had ought to try to do. ”

“ Spoffard run around all day. So then I tell Mr. Spoffard that I really do not care to go to all of the places that you go to at night, but I will go to bed and get ready for tomorrow instead. So then Dorothy and I go to dinner with Mr. Eisman and then we go to a show, and we stay up quite late at a cabaret called the Chapeau Rouge and I am able to keep it all up with the aid of champagne. So if we keep our eye out for Mr. Spoffard and do not all bump into one another when he is out looking at things that we Americans really should not look at, it will all work out for the best. ”

“ So I really feel as if yesterday was a turning point in my life, because at last I have met a gentleman who is not only an artist but who has got brains besides. I mean he is the kind of a gentleman that a girl could sit at his feet and listen to for days and days and nearly always learn something or other. Because, after all, there is nothing that gives a girl more of a thrill than brains in a gentleman, especially after a girl has been spending the week end with Henry. So Mr. Montrose talked and talked all of the way to New [199] York and I sat there and did nothing else but listen. ”

“ Spoffard and I and Dorothy are on the train again and we are all going to Vienna. I mean Mr. Spoffard and I spent one whole day going through all of the museums in Munchen, but I am really not even going to think about it. Because when something terrible happens to me, I always try to be a Christian science and I simply do not even think about it, but I deny that it ever happened even if my feet do seem to hurt quite a lot. So even Dorothy had quite a hard day in Munchen because her German gentleman friend, who is called Rudolf, came for her at 11 oclock to take her to breakfast. ”

“ But Henry says that all his objections cannot last much longer because he is nearly 90 years of age after all, and Nature must take its course sooner or later.
So Dorothy says what a fool I am to waste my time on Henry, when I might manage to meet Henry's father and the whole thing would be over in a few months and I would practically own the state of Pennsylvania. But I do not think I ought to take Dorothy's advise because Henry's father is watched like a hawk and Henry himself is his Power of Attorney, so no good could really come of it after all. ”

“ March 16th:
A gentleman friend and I were dining at the Ritz last evening and he said that if I took a pencil and a paper and put down all of my thoughts it would make a book. This almost made me smile as what it would really make would be a whole row of encyclopediacs. ”

“ So I decided that the thing that discouradges gentlemen more than anything else is shopping. Because even Mr. Eisman, who was practically born for we girls to shop on, and who knows just what to expect, often gets quite discouradged over all of my shopping. So I decided I would get to New York and I would go to Cartiers and run up quite a large size bill on Henry's credit, because after all our engagement has been announced in all of the newspapers, and Henry's credit is really my credit. ”

“ So when we got back to the Ritz, Dorothy told me why they whispered to her. So it seems when Louie whispered to Dorothy, Louie told Dorothy that if she would steal the diamond tiara from me and give it to him and not let his papa know, he would give her 1000 franks. Because it seems that Lady Francis Beekman has got her heart set on it and she will pay quite a lot for it because she is quite angry and when she really gets as angry as she is, she is only a woman with one idea. So if Louie could get it and his papa would not find it out, he could keep all the money for himself. ”

“ Montrose said that the Bulgarian Ambassadore did not seem to think that Dolly Madison had so much about her that was pertinent to present day Bulgaria, but Mr. Montrose explained to him that that was because he knew practically nothing about dramatic construction. Because Mr. Montrose said he could fix his senario so that Dolly Madison would have one lover who was a Bulgarian, who wanted to marry her. So then Dolly Madison would get to wondering what her great, great grandchildren would be like if she married a Bulgarian, and then she could sit down and have a vision of Bulgaria in 1925. ”

“ So while Dorothy and I were in the Cafe de Paris powdering our nose in the lady’s dressing room we met an American girl who Dorothy knew in the Follies, but now she is living in London. So she told us all about London. So it seems the gentlemen in London have quite a quaint custom of not giving a girl many presents. I mean the English girls really seem to be satisfied with a gold cigaret holder or else what they call a ‘bangle’ which means a bracelet in English which is only gold and does not have any stones in it which American girls would really give to their maid. ”

“ I mean a girl has to look out in Paris, or she would have such a good time in Paris that she would not get anywheres. So I really think that American gentlemen are the best after all, because kissing your hand may make you feel very very good but a diamond and safire bracelet lasts forever. Besides, I do not think that I ought to go out with any gentlemen in Paris because Mr. Eisman will be here next week and he told me that the only kind of gentlemen he wants me to go out with are intelectual gentlemen who are good for a girls brains. ”

“ I mean it is quite an easy thing to pretend not to see one gentleman, but it is a quite hard thing to pretend not to see two gentlemen. So something has really got to happen soon, or I will have to admit that things seem to be happening that are not for the best.
So this afternoon Dorothy and I had an engagement to meet Count Salm for tea at four o’clock, only you do not call it tea at Vienna but you seem to call it “yowzer” and you do not drink tea at Vienna but you drink coffee instead. ”

“ So now I must telephone Mrs. Weeks and say I will bring Sir Francis Beekman to tea tomorrow and I hope it all comes out all right. But I really wish Piggie would not tell so many storys. I mean I do not mind a gentleman when he tells a great many storys if they are new, but a gentleman who tells a great many storys and they are all the same storys is quite enervating. I mean London is really so uneducational that all I seem to be learning is some of Piggies storys and I even want to forget them. So I am really becoming jolly well fed up with London. ”

“ Because even if it is unusual for an American to see a French gentleman always kissing his father, I really think it is refreshing and I think that we Americans would be better off if we American fathers and sons would love one another more like Louie and Robber. ”

“ Eisman really sent me to London to get educated and I would hate to tell him that London is a failure because we know more in New York.
So Dorothy and I came to the Ritz and it is delightfully full of Americans. I mean you would really think it was New York because I always think that the most delightful thing about traveling is to always be running into Americans and to always feel at home. ”

“ Eisman she calls Mr. Eisman by his first name, and she does not seem to realize that when a gentleman who is as important as Mr. Eisman, spends quite a lot of money educating a girl, it really does not show reverance to call a gentleman by his first name. I mean I never even think of calling Mr. Eisman by his first name, but if I want to call him anything at all, I call him “Daddy” and I do not even call him “Daddy” if a place seems to be public. So I told Dorothy that Mr. Eisman would not be in town until day after tomorrow. So then Dorothy and Coocoo came up and we went to the Follies. ”

“ So I thought it would be quite unusual for a girl like I to have a friendship with a gentleman like Mr. Spoffard, who really does not even look at a girl unless she at least looks like a Prespyterian. And I mean our family in Little Rock were really not so Prespyterians.
So I thought I would sit at his table. So then I had to ask him about all of the money because all of the money they use in the Central of Europe has not even got so much sense to it as the kind of franks they use in Paris. ”

“ So then Dorothy and Gerald came in and I told them all about what a wonderful gentleman Piggie turned out to be and I told them when a gentleman sent a girl one dozen orchids every day he really reminded me of a prince. So Piggie blushed quite a lot and he was really very very pleased and he did not say any more that it was not him. So then I started to make a fuss over him and I told him he would have to look out because he was really so good looking and I was so full of impulses that I might even lose my mind some time and give him a kiss. ”

“ Eisman said that opportunities come to seldom in a girls life for me to give up the first one I have really ever had. So I am sailing for France and London on Tuesday and taking Dorothy with me and Mr. Eisman says that he will see us there later. So Dorothy knows all of the ropes and she can get along in Paris just as though she knew French and besides she knows a French gentleman who was born and raised there, who [35] speaks it like a native and knows Paris like a book. And Dorothy says that when we get to London nearly everybody speaks English anyway. ”

“ But all of the time I was listening, I was thinking about Dorothy and I was worrying for fear Dorothy would go to far, and tell Henry something that would not be so good for me afterwards. So finally even Mr. Montrose seemed to notice it, and he said “What’s the matter little woman, a penny for your thoughts.”
So then I told him everything. So he seemed to think quite a lot and finally he said to me “It is really to bad that you feel as [206] if the social life of Mr. Spoffard bored you, because Mr. Spoffard would be ideal to finance my senario.” ”