Kitabı oxu: «Gentlemen Prefer Blondes / Джентльмены предпочитают блондинок»

© Шитова Л. Ф., адаптация, сокращение, словарь, 2023

© ООО «ИД «Антология», 2023

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Chapter One
GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES

March 16th:

A gentleman friend and I were dining at the Ritz¹ 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. But I think it would really make an encyclopedia. I mean I seem to be thinking practically all of the time. Sometimes I sit for hours and do not do anything else but think. So this gentleman said a girl with brains should do something else with them besides think. And he said he knew brains when he saw them², and this morning he sent me a book. So when my maid brought it to me, I said to her, “Well, Lulu, here is another book and we have not read half the ones we have got yet.” But when I opened it and saw that it was all a blank I remembered what my gentleman friend said, and so then I understood that it was a diary. So here I am writing a book instead of reading one.

But now it is the 16th of March and of course it is too late to begin with January, but it does not matter as my gentleman friend, Mr. Eisman, was in town practically all of January and February, and when he is in town one day seems to be practically the same as the next day.

I mean Mr. Eisman is in the wholesale button profession and he is the gentleman who is known practically all over Chicago as Gus Eisman the Button King. And he is the gentleman who is interested in educating me, so of course he is always coming down to New York to see how my brains have improved since the last time. But when Mr. Eisman is in New York we always seem to do the same thing. I mean we always have dinner at the Colony³ and see a show and go to the Trocadero⁴ and then Mr. Eisman shows me to my apartment. So of course when a gentleman is interested in educating a girl, he likes to stay and talk about the day until quite late, so I am quite tired the next day and I do not really get up until it is time to dress for dinner at the Colony.

It would be strange if I turned out to be a writer. I mean at my home near Little Rock, Arkansas⁵, my family all wanted me to do something about my music. Because all of my friends said I had talent and they all kept after me about practicing. But I never seemed to care so much about practicing. I mean I simply could not sit for hours practicing just for the sake of a career. So one day I got quite temperamental and threw the old mandolin across the room and I have really never touched it since. But writing is different because you do not have to learn or practice. So now I really almost have to smile because I have just noticed that I have written two pages, so this will do⁶ for today and tomorrow. And it just shows how temperamental I am when I get started.

March 19th:

Well, last evening Dorothy called up and said she has met a gentleman who introduced himself to her in the lobby of the Ritz. So then they went to luncheon and tea and dinner and then they went to a show and then they went to the Trocadero. So Dorothy said his name was Lord Cooksleigh but what she really calls him is Coocoo. So Dorothy said why don’t you and I and Coocoo go to the Follies⁷ tonight and bring Gus along if he is in town? So then Dorothy and I had quite a little quarrel because every time she mentions Mr. Eisman she calls him by his first name, and she does not seem to understand 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 respect to call him 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 this morning Coocoo called up and he wanted me to luncheon at the Ritz. I mean these foreigners really are bold. Just because Coocoo is an Englishman and a Lord he thinks a girl can waste hours on him just for a luncheon at the Ritz, when all he does is talk about some expedition to a place called Tibet. So I will be quite glad to see Mr. Eisman when he comes because he always has something quite interesting to talk about, as for instance the last time he was here he presented me with quite a beautiful emerald bracelet. So next week is my birthday and he always has some delightful surprise on holidays.

So the reason I thought I would take luncheon at the Ritz was because Mr. Chaplin is at the Ritz and I always like to renew old acquaintances, because I met Mr. Chaplin once when we were both working on the same lot in Hollywood and I am sure he would remember me. Gentlemen always seem to remember blondes. I mean the only career I would like to be besides a writer is a cinema star and I was doing quite well in the cinema when Mr. Eisman made me give it all up. Because of course when a gentleman takes such a friendly interest in educating a girl as Mr. Eisman does, you like to show that you appreciate it, and he is against a girl being in the cinema.

March 20th:

Mr. Eisman comes here tomorrow in time for my birthday. So I thought it would really be great to have at least one good time before Mr. Eisman came, so last evening I had some literary gentlemen in the apartment because Mr. Eisman always likes me to have such people in and out. He is quite anxious for a girl to improve her mind and his greatest interest in me is because I always seem to want to improve my mind and not waste any time. So I invited all of the brainy gentlemen I could think up. So I thought up a gentleman who is the professor of all of the economics up at Columbia College, and another gentleman who is a famous playwright who writes very, very famous plays that are all about Life. I mean anybody would recognize his name but it always slips my memory⁸ because all of us real friends of his only call him Sam. So Sam asked if he could bring a gentleman who writes novels from England, so I said yes, so he brought him. And then we all got together and I called up Dorothy and the gentlemen brought their own liquor. So of course the place was a wreck this morning and Lulu and I worked like dogs to get it cleaned up, but Heaven knows how long it will take to get the chandelier fixed.

March 22nd:

Well, my birthday has come and gone but it was really quite depressing. I mean it seems to me a gentleman who has a friendly interest in educating a girl like Gus Eisman, would want her to have the biggest diamond in New York. I mean I must say I was quite disappointed when he came to the apartment with a little thing you could hardly see. So I told him I thought it was quite cute, but I had quite a headache and I told him I would see him the next day, perhaps. Because even Lulu thought it was quite small. But he came in at dinner time with really a very very beautiful bracelet of diamonds so I was quite cheered up. So then we had dinner at the Colony and we went to a show and supper at the Trocadero as usual whenever he is in town. He kept talking about how bad business in the button profession was full of bolshevicks who make nothing but trouble. Because Mr. Eisman feels that the country is really on the verge of the bolshevicks and I become quite worried. I mean if the bolshevicks do come in, there is only one gentleman who could handle them and that is Mr. D. W. Griffith⁹. Because I will never forget when Mr. Griffith was directing Intolerance. I mean it was my last cinema just before Mr. Eisman made me give up my career and I was playing one of the girls that fainted at the battle when all of the gentlemen fell off the tower. And when I saw how Mr. Griffith handled all of those mobs in Intolerance I understood that he could do anything, and I really think that the government of America should tell Mr. Griffith to get all ready if the bolshevicks start to do it.

Well, I forgot to mention that the English gentleman who writes novels has taken quite an interest in me, as soon as he found out that I was literary. I mean he has called up every day and I went to tea twice with him. So he has sent me a whole complete set of books for my birthday. They all seem to be about ocean travel although I have not had time to more than look through them. I have always liked novels about ocean travel ever since I posed for the front cover of a novel about ocean travel because I always say that a girl never really looks as well as she does on board a steamship, or even a yacht.

So the English gentleman’s name is Mr. Gerald Lamson as those who have read his novels would know. And he also sent me some of his own novels and they all seem to be about middle-age English gentlemen who live in the country and ride bicycles. So I told Mr. Lamson how I write down all of my thoughts and he said he knew I had something to me from the first minute he saw me and when we become better acquainted I am going to let him read my diary. I mean I even told Mr. Eisman about him and he is quite pleased. Because of course Mr. Lamson is quite famous and it seems Mr. Eisman has read all of his novels going there and back on the trains. But of course I did not tell Mr. Eisman that I am really getting quite a little crush on¹⁰ Mr. Lamson, which I really believe I am, but Mr. Eisman thinks my interest in him is more literary.

March 30th:

At last Mr. Eisman has left and I must say I am quite tired and a little rest will be quite welcome. I mean I do not mind staying out late every night if I dance, but Mr. Eisman is really not such a good dancer so most of the time we just sit and drink some champagne or have a bite to eat and of course I do not dance with anyone else when I am out with Mr. Eisman. But Mr. Eisman and Gerry, as Mr. Lamson wants me to call him, became quite good friends and we had several evenings, all three together. So now that Mr. Eisman is out of town at last, Gerry and I are going out together this evening and Gerry said not to dress up, because Gerry seems to like me more for my soul. Gerry does not like a girl to be nothing else but a doll, but he likes her to bring in her husband’s slippers every evening.

But before Mr. Eisman went to Chicago he told me that he is going to Paris this summer on professional business and I think he is going to present me with a trip to Paris as he says there is nothing so educational as traveling. I mean it did worlds of good¹¹ to Dorothy when she went abroad last spring and I never get tired of hearing her telling how the merry-go-rounds in Paris have pigs instead of horses. But I really do not know whether to be excited or not because, of course, if I go to Paris I will have to leave Gerry and both Gerry and I have made up our minds¹² not to be separated from one another from now on¹³.

March 31st:

Last night Gerry and I had dinner at a place where we had roast beef and baked potato. I mean he always wants me to have food which is what he calls “nourishing.” So then we took a cab and drove for hours around the park because Gerry said the air would be good for me. It is really very sweet to have someone think of all those things that gentlemen hardly ever seem to think about.

So then we talked quite a lot. I mean Gerry knows how to draw a girl out and I told him things that I really would not even put in my diary. So when he heard all about my life he became quite depressed and we both had tears in our eyes. Because he said he never dreamed a girl could go through so much as I, and stay so sweet and not made bitter¹⁴ by it all. I mean Gerry thinks that most gentlemen are brutes and hardly ever think about a girl’s soul.

So it seems that Gerry has had quite a lot of trouble himself and he cannot even get married because of his wife. He and she have never been in love with each other but she was a suffragette¹⁵ and asked him to marry her, so what could he do? So we rode all around the park until quite late talking and philosophizing quite a lot. So Gerry calls me his little thinker and I really would not be surprised if all of my thoughts will give him quite a few ideas for his novels. Because Gerry says he has never seen a girl of my personal appearance with so many brains. And he had almost given up looking for his ideal when our paths crossed¹⁶ each other and I told him I really thought a thing like that was nearly always the result of fate.

So Gerry says that I remind him quite a lot of Helen of Troy¹⁷, who was of Greek origin. But the only Greek I know is a Greek gentleman by the name of Mr. Georgopolis who is really quite wealthy and he is what Dorothy and I call a “Shopper” because you can always call him up at any hour and ask him to go shopping and he never seems to care how much anything costs. I mean Mr. Georgopolis is also quite cultured, as I know quite a few gentlemen who can speak to a waiter in French but Mr. Georgopolis can also speak to a waiter in Greek which very few gentlemen seem to be able to do.

April 1st:

From now on I am taking writing in my diary seriously as I am really writing it for Gerry. I mean he and I are going to read it together some evening in front of the fireplace. But Gerry leaves this evening for Boston as he has to lecture about all of his works at Boston, but he will come right back as soon as possible. So I am going to spend all of my time improving myself while he is gone. And this afternoon we are both going to a museum on 5th Avenue, because Gerry wants to show me a very very beautiful cup made by an antique jeweler called Mr. Cellini¹⁸ and he wants me to read Mr. Cellini’s life which is a very very fine book and not dull while he is in Boston.

So the famous playwright friend of mine who is called Sam called up this morning and he wanted me to go to a literary party tonight that he and some other literary gentlemen are giving in Harlem but Gerry does not want me to go with Sam as Sam always insists on telling risky stories. But personally I am quite broad-minded and I always say that I do not mind a risky story as long as it is really funny. I mean I have a great sense of humor. So I am going to stay home and read the book by Mr. Cellini instead, because, after all, the only thing I am really interested in, is improving my mind. So I am going to do nothing else but improve my mind while Gerry is in Boston.

April 2nd:

I seem to be quite depressed this morning as I always am when there is nothing to put my mind to. Because I decided not to read the book by Mr. Cellini. I mean it was quite amusing in spots¹⁹ because it was really quite risky but the spots were not so close together and I never seem to like to always be hunting clear through a book for the spots I am looking for, especially when there are really not so many spots that seem to be so amusing after all.

Well, I just got a telegram from Gerry that he will not be back until tomorrow. And it is quite depressing to stay at home and do nothing but read, unless you really have a book that is worth bothering about.

April 3rd:

I am really so depressed this morning that I was even glad to get a letter from Mr. Eisman. Last night I felt so lonesome with nothing to do that I made a telephone call for Boston to talk to Gerry but it never went through²⁰. So today I think I had better go over²¹ to Madame Frances and order some new evening dresses to cheer me up.

Well, Lulu just brought me a telegram from Gerry that he will come this afternoon, but I must not meet him at the station because of all of the reporters who always meet him at the station wherever he comes from. But he says he will come right up to see me as he has something to talk about.

April 4th:

What an evening we had last evening. I mean it seems that Gerry is madly in love with me. Because all of the time he was in Boston lecturing to the women’s clubs he said, as he looked over the faces of all those club women in Boston, he never understood I was so beautiful. And he said that there was only one in all the world and that was me. But it seems that Gerry thinks that Mr. Eisman is terrible and that no good can come of our friendship. I mean I was quite surprised, as they both seemed to get along²² quite well together, but it seems that Gerry never wants me to see Mr. Eisman again. And he wants me to give up everything and study French and he will get a divorce and we will be married. Because Gerry does not seem to like the kind of life all of us lead in New York and he wants me to go home to papa in Arkansas and he will send me books to read so that I will not get lonesome there. And he gave me our engagement ring, but some way I still seem to be depressed. I mean I could not sleep all night thinking of the terrible things Gerry said about New York and about Mr. Eisman. Of course I can understand Gerry being jealous of any gentleman friend of mine and of course I never really thought that Mr. Eisman was Rudolph Valentino²³, but Gerry said he couldn’t think of a sweet girl like I having a friendship with Mr. Eisman. So it really made me feel quite depressed. I mean Gerry likes to talk quite a lot and I always think a lot of talk is depressing and worries your brains. But so long as Gerry does not mind me going out with other gentlemen when they have something to give you mentally, I am going to luncheon with Eddie Goldmark of the Goldmark Films who is always wanting me to sign a contract to go into the cinema and who is madly in love with Dorothy.

April 6th:

Well, I finally wrote Mr. Eisman that I was going to get married and it seems that he is coming on at once as he would probably like to give me his advice. Getting married is really quite serious and Gerry talks to me for hours and hours about it. I mean he never seems to get tired of talking and he does not seem to even want to go to shows or dance or do anything else but talk, and if I don’t really have something to put my mind on soon I will scream.

April 7th:

Well, Mr. Eisman arrived this morning and he and I had quite a long talk, and after all, I think he is right. Because here is the first real opportunity I have ever really had. I mean to go to Paris and broaden out and improve my writing, and why should I give it up to marry an author, where he is the whole thing and all I would be would be the wife of Gerald Lamson? 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 ofthe ropes²⁴ and she can get along in Paris just as though she knew French²⁵ and besides she knows a French gentleman who was born and raised there²⁶, who 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. So it is quite lucky that Mr. Lamson is out lecturing in Cincinnati²⁷ and he will not be back until Wednesday and I can send him a letter and tell him that I have to go to Europe now but I will see him later perhaps. So anyway I will not be listening to any more of his depressing conversation. So Mr. Eisman gave me quite a nice string of pearls²⁸ and he gave Dorothy a diamond pin and we all went to the Colony for dinner and we all went to a show and supper at the Trocadero and we all spent quite a pleasant evening.

Chapter Two
FATE KEEPS ON HAPPENING

April 11th:

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 Majestic²⁹ 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 me³⁰ if she was light and not colored. Lulu has had a very sad life because when she was quite young a pullman porter³¹ 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 calls³² 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.

April 12th:

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.

April 13th:

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 while³³. 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 Attorney³⁴ who was at the trial and he really was quite harsh at the trial and he called me names³⁵ 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 Lorelei³⁶ 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.

So Major Falcon was really quite interested in everything I talked about, because he said it was quite a coincidence because this District Attorney, who is called Mr. Bartlett, is now working for the government of America and he is on his way to a place called Vienna on some business for Uncle Sam³⁷ that is quite a great secret and Mr. Falcon would like very much to know what the secret is, because the Government in London sent him to America especially to find out what it was. Only of course Mr. Bartlett does not know who Major Falcon is, because it is such a great secret, but Major Falcon can tell me, because he knows who he can trust. So Major Falcon says he thinks a girl like I should forgive and forget what Mr. Bartlett called me and he wants to bring us together and he says he thinks Mr. Bartlett would talk to me quite a lot when he really gets to know me and I forgive him for that time in Little Rock. Because it would be quite romantic for Mr. Bartlett and I to become friendly, and gentlemen who work for Uncle Sam generally like to become romantic with girls. So he is going to bring us together on the deck after dinner tonight and I am going to forgive him and talk with him quite a lot, because why should a girl hold a grudge³⁸ against a gentleman who had to do it. So Major Falcon brought me quite a large bottle of perfume and I mean Major Falcon really knows how to cheer a girl up quite a lot and so tonight I am going to make it all up³⁹ with Mr. Bartlett.