Cy leaned across and patted her knee. “Thanks to the wonders of modern movie makeup artists you’ll look as young and gorgeous as he does. I promise. Cross my heart.”

Mummy looked at me again, then shrugged. “What can I say? It’s certainly better than spending six weeks in a Reno motel.”

Chapter 7

ON THE BERENGARIA

STILL JULY 13

Rather rough but I don’t feel seasick yet. Mummy is going to be a film star. As if she needed any more adoration.

So it seemed that we were going to Hollywood. I must say I was rather excited. I mean, one hears so much about the glamour of that place, and it would be fun to watch my mother turn into a film star. Cy had sworn us to secrecy for now, until he could organize the big press announcement back in Hollywood by which time Mummy’s proxy would be spending her days in a Reno motel. I warned them that Tubby Halliday was on board and not to say anything within his hearing.

“Oh, so that’s his game, is it?” Goldman said. “I saw him hanging around the bar last night and I thought he was taking too much interest in other people’s business.”

“He was trying to get out of me why my mother was going to America,” I said. “Luckily I didn’t tell him.”

“I suppose you might hint to him that your mom was going to Hollywood,” Cy Goldman said. “That will throw him off the scent of your real purpose.”

“Brilliant,” Mummy said. “Yes, if he asks more questions, Georgie, say that I’m accompanying my old friend Stella Brightwell to Hollywood and leave it at that.”

BY THE END of the day we had sailed through the squall, the sea had calmed, and the evening was bright and clear. It seemed there was to be a costume ball on our third night at sea and the talk around the ship was on what everyone was going to wear. There was even a costume hire set up in one of the onboard shops.

“What do you think, Georgie? What should we go as?”

I shrugged. “It seems rather silly to go when we’ve nobody to dance with.”

“Don’t be such a fuddy-duddy,” she said. “Really, your great-grandmother comes out in you too often. It’s fun to dress up and I’m sure someone will ask you to dance.”

“Do you plan to hire a costume or invent something then?” I asked. “I haven’t brought anything suitable with me, unless we wrap our sheets around us and go as vestal virgins.”