Gentlemen Prefer Blondes - Anita Loos (reading well .TXT) 📗

he asked me if he could make me a present of a diamond tiara. So it seemed as if his wife must have heard about it, and it really seemed as if she must have come clear over from London about it. So there was a very very loud knock at the door so we asked her to come in. So Lady Francis Beekman came in and she is a quite large size lady who seems to resemble Bill Hart quite a lot. I mean Dorothy thinks that Lady Francis Beeckman resembles Bill Hart quite a lot, only she really thinks she looks more like Bill Hart’s horse. So it seems that she said that if I did not give her back the diamond tiara right away, she would make quite a fuss and she would ruin my reputation. Because she said that something really must be wrong about the whole thing. Because it seems that Sir Francis Beekman and she have been married for 35 years and the last present he gave to her was a wedding ring. So Dorothy spoke up and she said “Lady you could no more ruin my girl friends reputation than you could sink the Jewish fleet.” I mean I was quite proud of Dorothy the way she stood up for my reputation. Because I really think that there is nothing so wonderful as two girls when they stand up for each other and help each other a lot. Because no matter how vigarous Lady Francis Beekman seems to be, she had to realize that she could not sink a whole fleet full of ships. So she had to stop talking against my reputation.

So then she said she would drag it into the court and she would say that it was undue influence. So I said to her, “If you wear that hat into a court, we will see if the judge thinks it took an undue influence to make Sir Francis Beekman look at a girl.” So then Dorothy spoke up and Dorothy said “My girl friend is right, Lady. You have got to be the Queen of England to get away with a hat like that.” So Lady Francis Beekman seemed to get quite angry. So then she said she would send for Sir Francis Beekman where he suddenly went to Scotland, to go hunting when he found out that Lady Francis Beekman had found out. So Dorothy said “Do you mean that you have left Sir Francis Beekman loose with all those spendthrifts down in Scotland?” So Dorothy said she would better look out or he would get together with the boys some night and simply massacre a haypenny. I mean I always encouradge Dorothy to talk quite a lot when we are talking to unrefined people like Lady Francis Beekman, because Dorothy speaks their own languadge to unrefined people better than a refined girl like I. So Dorothy said, “You had better not send for Sir Francis Beekman because if my girl friend really wanted to turn loose on Sir Francis Beekman, all he would have left would be his title.” So then I spoke right up and said Yes that I was an American girl and we American girls do not care about a title because we American girls always say that what is good enough for Washington is good enough for us. So Lady Francis Beekman really seemed to get more angry and more angry all of the time.

So then she said that if it was necessary, she would tell the judge that Sir Francis Beekman went out of his mind when he gave it to me. So Dorothy said “Lady, if you go into a court and if the judge gets a good look at you, he will think that Sir Francis Beekman was out of his mind 35 years ago.” So then Lady Francis Beekman said she knew what kind of a person she had to deal with and she would not deal with any such a person because she said it hurt her dignity. So Dorothy said “Lady, if we hurt your dignity like you hurt our eyesight I hope for your sake, you are a Christian science.” So that seemed to make Lady Francis Beekman angry. So she said she would turn it all over to her soliciter. So when she went out she tripped over quite a long train which she had on her skirt and she nearly fell down. So Dorothy leaned out of the door and Dorothy called down the hall and said, “Take a tuck in that skirt Isabel, its 1925.” So I really felt quite depressed because I felt as if our whole morning was really very unrefined just because we had to mix with such an unrefined lady as Lady Francis Beekman.