“I think it’s an advantage, not being some naive little beauty contest winner,” she said, trying to convince herself as much as me. “Let those little tramps try to sleep their way to the top. I have something they’ll never have.”

“Talent,” I said, nodding, going along with her.

“Well of course talent, but I was talking about connections. Your connections. My late uncle’s connections. Ben’s connections.”

It was the first time Ben Siegel had been referred to since we’d tied the knot.

“Ben’s connections,” I echoed numbly.

She shrugged a single shoulder, as if the bombshell she’d just dropped was the tiniest firecracker. “Ben owes us. He owes you and he owes me. He has more Hollywood friends than Hedda Hopper.”

“I’d rather not bring Ben back into our lives, in any fashion. Okay?”

She raised her hands in gentle surrender. “All right, bad suggestion-but your partner Fred has a black book filled with movie colony bigwigs. Isn’t that why you threw in with him-the movie studios and stars he works for, and with? It would be easy for him to line up some interviews, some auditions for me.”

“You’ve really been thinking about this, haven’t you?”

“Yes. Yes, I have.”

“And I’d just move out here, and what? Let Lou Sapperstein run the Chicago office?”

“Sure, and you can fly back and forth some. We could maintain two residences. We can afford it.”

I knew when Peg got up a full head of steam like this, there was no stopping her-and, frankly, I didn’t see the harm. She did have a little talent-a little-and, yes, she had the looks. She was pretty with a nice shape, and with all the Technicolor pictures they were making these days, those violet eyes would show up nice.