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the Whitneys, the Vanderbilts. She was the great social catch of the year.

I took her to her first football game--and she got a thousand dollars for writing about it! It was a hilarious story. It ran in Cosmopolitan, I believe.

Then Gertrude embarked upon a lecture tour. In every city she visited she was front-page news. A clever reporter in Detroit treated his interview with her like a prize fight. “She came out weaving and dodging,” he began, “and then she retreated into her corner of the ring.” The story was extremely funny, but Gertrude didn't happen to think so. By the time she went home to Paris, she had earned over ten thousand dollars here.

When you visited Paris subsequently, would you stop in and say “hello” to her or see her?

Of course! Her studio was filled with paintings she had gotten virtually for nothing. Now they'd be worth millions--early Picassos, and the like.

The last time I saw Gertrude, I guess, was shortly before World War Two. I was staying with Jo Davidson, the sculptor. Gertrude invited both of us down to her chateau in Belignin in the south of France for a week-end. Jo Davidson had turned down many of her previous invitations. He said, “I can't spend a whole week-end with these two crazy women. They're wonderful fun--I love them--but for a whole week-end--not on your life!”