Thus in the view of Lanny Budd the meaning of “being poor” was that his lovely mother was outclassed in the race for attention. She would never be listed as one of the “ten best-dressed women of Paris.” Fortunately she was of a happy disposition and did not let these hardships mar her life; she learned to make a joke of them, and also a virtue. She would talk about her unwillingness to “pay the price,” a remark which some of her friends might have resented as a reflection upon themselves.
But these were matters beyond Lanny's understanding as yet. He would try to console his mother. “I'm glad you're poor. If you weren't, I wouldn't see even a little of you!”
She would hug him, and tears would come into the lovely blue eyes. “You're the best thing in the whole world, and I'm a foolish woman ever to think about anything else!”
“That's the way I'd like it!” Lanny would grin.
II
The reason why Robbie stayed so long on this trip was that he had another deal on, and Beauty was helping him. That was an aspect of their relationship which Lanny had learned about, and in which he also took part according to his abilities. Customers had to be met “socially,” something far more effective than mere business acquaintanceship. In the latter case they would be thinking only about money, but in the former they would like you; at any rate they would pretend they did, and you would try to make it real. You had to “entertain” them, and for this purpose what could be more helpful than a woman with the charms of Beauty Budd? For this well-recognized part of the selling of munitions Robbie paid generously.
The Russian Minister of War would be planning to visit Paris with his wife. Robbie had scouts who kept him posted, and he would telegraph Beauty, who would at once inquire among her friends and find someone who knew either the minister or his wife, and would invite them down for a few days to warm their old bones. Beauty would meet them and make an engagement for tea, and wire Robbie, who would come in a shiny new car and take the tired old couple motoring, and show them the Corniche road, and maybe let them have a fling in the Casino at Monte Carlo.
Robbie's agents would have provided him with a regular dossier about such guests, including their tastes and their weaknesses. Beauty would have several duchesses and countesses at the tea party, and when the minister took his seat at the gaming table, Robbie would slip him a bundle of thousand-franc notes and tell him laughingly to take a “flier” for him. The old gentleman would do so, and if he lost Robbie would tell him to forget it, and if he won he would forget it without being told. Later, when Robbie would tell him news about the marvelous new sub-machine gun which Budd's were putting on the market, the minister would be deeply interested and would make a date for Robbie to demonstrate it in St. Petersburg.
When Robbie was leaving to keep that date, he would say to Beauty: “I can't motor to St. Petersburg. I'd get stuck like Napoleon in the snow.” Yes, there was snow in Russia, impossible as it might seem in Juan-les-Pins, where everybody lay around on the beach absorbing sunshine. “That old car of yours is beginning to look shabby,” he would add. “You better take mine. But don't let anybody swindle you on the old one; you ought to get five or six thousand francs for it at least.” If Beauty protested that he was too generous, Robbie had a formula: “It goes on the expense account.”
A marvelous phenomenon, the expense account of a munitions salesman, which could be stretched to include both his business and his pleasures. It included the newspaper man who brought the tip, and the detective who prepared the dossier. It included the car, and the chauffeur, and the gambling losses. It included the tea party and, strange to say, it might even include some of the duchesses and countesses — those who were so important that it was an honor for a Russian cabinet minister to meet them, instead of for them to meet a Russian cabinet minister.