Bunny would go away, and find himself haunted by a figure in a scanty one-piece bathing suit a figure youthful, sinewy but graceful, vivid, swift. It was evident that she liked him, and Bunny would wake up from his dreams and realize he liked her. He would think about her when he ought to be studying; and his thinking summed itself up in one question, “Why not?” Echo, in the form of Dad and Mr. Roscoe and Annabelle Ames and their friends, appeared to be answering, “Why not?” The one person who would have answered otherwise was Henrietta Ashleigh, and Henrietta, alas, was now hardly even a memory. Bunny was not visiting the blue lagoon, nor saying prayers out of the little black and gold books. Bunny would call Vee Tracy on the telephone, at the studio or at her bungalow, and she was always ready for a lark. They would go to one of the restaurants where the screen folk dined, and then to one of the theatres where the same folk were pictured, and she would tell him about the private lives of these people—stories even stranger than the ones made up for them. Very soon the screen world was putting one and one together in its gossip. Vee Tracy had picked up a millionaire, an oil prince—oh, millions and millions! And it was romantic, too, he was said to be a Bolshevik! The glances and tones of voice that Bunny encountered gave new echoes of the haunting question—“Why not?” IV Sitting on the beach, half dug into the sand, and staring out over the blue water, Vee told him something about her life. “I’m no spring chicken, Bunny, don’t imagine it. When I came into this game, I had my own way to make, and I paid the price, like every other girl. You’ll hear them lie about it, but don’t be fooled; there are no women producers, and no saints among the men.” Bunny thought it over. “Can’t they be satisfied with finding a good actress?” “She can be a good actress in the day-time, and a good mistress at night; the man can have both, and he takes them.” “It sounds rather ghastly,” said the other. “I’ll tell you how it is, there’s such fierce competition in this game, if you’re going to get ahead, nothing else matters, nothing else is real. I know it was that way with me; I hung round the doors of the studios—I was only fifteen—and I starved and yearned, till I’d have slept with the devil to get inside.” She sat, staring before her, and Bunny, watching her out of the corner of his eye, saw that her face was grim.