Under The Net - Iris Murdoch [88]
is odd here. It doesn't follow that I would regard it as less of a waste of time to translate better stuff.' I got up and went to look out of the window. I could hear Madge following me across the thick carpet. 'Jake,' she said close behind my ear, 'stop this. You've got the chance of a lifetime. Maybe at first you wouldn't have much to do, but later it would be different. And you must drop this nonsense about Jean Pierre.' 'You wouldn't understand,' I said. We turned to face each other. 'Your girl friend's gone to Hollywood,' said Madge after a moment's silence. I took hold of Madge's limp and unresponsive hand. 'It's not that,' I said. 'Incidentally,' I said, 'I wish you wouldn't refer to Anna as my girl friend. We haven't met for years, except for one time last week.' Madge said, 'Oh!' rather sceptically. 'Anyway,' I added, 'she hasn't gone to Hollywood.' It wasn't till that moment that I felt absolutely certain of it. You don't know that she has, do you?' I asked Madge. 'Well, not exactly,' said Madge, 'but I'm told she has. And everyone goes to Hollywood if they can.' I made a gesture expressive of contempt of a world in which this was so. But I had already displayed too much emotion and I wanted to change the subject. 'How will this company of yours relate to Bounty Belfounder?' I asked. 'Relate to it?' said Madge. 'Wipe it off the face of the earth.' She spoke with cruel satisfaction. I shrugged my shoulders. 'And don't pretend,' said Madge, that that matters tuppence to you. In fact, you'll be doing a great service to your friend Belfounder. There's nothing he wants so much as to lose all his money.' This startled me. Madge had evidently been moving in circles where Hugo's character was discussed. 'He can do it without my help,' I said, turning away. I felt a sort of confused lassitude. I was being offered a great deal of money; and it was not at all clear to me why I was refusing it: if what I was doing was refusing it. What was more important, I was being offered the key to the world in which money comes easily, and where the same amount of effort can produce enormously richer results: as when one removes a weight from one element to another. As for my conscience, I could catch up with that in a few months. In time I could earn my keep in that world as well as the next man. All I had to do was to shut my eyes and walk in. Why did the way in seem so hard? I was in anguish. I seemed to be throwing away the substance for the shadow. What I was preferring was an emptiness of which I could give no intelligible account whatever. Madge watched me with increasing distress. Madge,' I said, just for something to say, 'what will happen about the Nightingale?' 'Oh, that'll be all right,' said Madge. 'Someone from Sadie did approach Jean Pierre about it, but he put them off. And now our company has got the film rights of all his books.' This was cool. I smiled at Madge, and saw her smiling too with relief. 'So Sadie and Sammy have had it,' I said. 'They've had it,' said Madge. I began remembering how sorry I'd felt for Madge, and then it occurred to me that Madge had probably started double-crossing Sammy even before she knew that Sammy was double-crossing her. It takes time to make the Hotel Prince de Cl�s. This was so funny that I began to laugh, and the more I thought of it the more I laughed until I had to sit down on the floor. At first Madge laughed with me, but then she stopped and said sharply, 'Jake!' I recovered. 'So Sammy will have to make animal pictures after all,' I said. 'As for that,' said Madge, 'Sammy's been sold a pup there too. Or rather he hasn't been sold a pup.' 'What do you mean?' I asked. 'Phantasifilms cheated Sammy,' said Madge. 'Do you know how old Mister Mars is?' A sad finger touched my heart. 'I don't know,' I said. 'How old?' 'Fourteen,' said Madge. 'He's on his last legs. He could hardly get through the last film he made. Phantasifilms were going to retire him anyway. Then Sammy got interested in him, and they sold him without telling his age. Sammy ought to have looked in his mouth.' 'You can't