Star-dust in Hollywood (1930)

Star-dust in Hollywood itself is at the moment tuned down to the change. I could philosophically look forward to a future mostly recumbent, scribbling away with a pad on my knees, driving out like an invalid in our old car with Jo at the wheel, and basking as an interesting relic under the vine pergola of some sunlit garden in the South of France. All of which proves that I was more ill than I imagined myself to be. The real shock came on to poor Jo, who, imagining that her husband was suffering from a rather severe attack of asthma, suddenly found that his life was in some danger. She was not at all in a placid condition that could cheerfully envisage the second half of a lifetime spent lying on the back. The other person most troubled by my illness was perhaps the house-owner. We were there as willy-nilly lodgers in rather peculiar circumstances. The villa was in reality empty and set about with real estate signboards announcing " Attractive Mansion for Sale." Now and then, if Jo happened to be absent, parties of house-hunters would suddenly enter my room with a careless nonchalance, to find themselves confronted by a man in bed. Naturally, the idea that worried the house-owner must have been : " What kind of people are these camping out in my house, and how can I ever get rid of them in the end ? " " I should let him do the worrying if I were you," said his son-in-law, the doctor, after having ascertained that the congestion was making no headway. " I should let him do the worrying. My motto is : when you find a soft thing stick to it. After all, you are living here rent-free, and he can't very well turn you out until I tell him he can." Which was the exact situation that the house-owner was afraid of. He saw us as eternal lodgers, Old Men of the Sea on that house's back. My unexpected presence in bed added no sales-value to that empty house ; in fact, I prevented prospective purchasers from lounging at the bedroom window [to]