Chapter 203: Such a Low-Cost...
Chapter 203: Such a Low-Cost...
Hearing Eric Williams’s reply, Elizabeth lightly glared at him.
“You... really have no sense of grace.”
“What does this have to do with grace?” Eric opened a can of beer and sat down on the sofa. “Was I supposed to follow along with what you said, claim that I like this book too, then enthusiastically discuss the life philosophy conveyed within it with you until we hit it off perfectly and regretted not meeting sooner?”
“Isn’t that how things usually go?” Elizabeth tilted her chin upward and asked as though it were only natural.
Eric smiled slightly.
“When you were at school, you probably encountered situations like that all the time, right?”
Elizabeth honestly nodded.
Julia, who had been somewhat restrainedly holding her juice, could not help letting out a soft laugh.
She had entered society right after graduating high school. Although she lacked Elizabeth’s high IQ and impressive academic background, her understanding of interpersonal interactions was far greater than Elizabeth’s, who had been carefully protected since childhood. After thinking about it slightly, she immediately understood what Eric meant.
Eric also laughed. Facing Elizabeth’s puzzled gaze, he explained:
“With your identity as the second daughter of the News Corporation family, material things definitely won’t work if men want to approach you. So they can only start from the spiritual level. That’s why, silly girl, most of the time when you encounter this sort of thing, it’s because men are trying to hit on you.”
It was the first time someone had directly pointed this out to Elizabeth.
Thinking about how she really had felt her heart flutter because of such situations before, she could not help parting her lips slightly, looking utterly dumbfounded in an adorable way.
Eric took a sip of beer and leaned against the sofa with a nostalgic expression.
“Speaking of which, I used this kind of low-cost pickup tactic all the time in my previous life too.”
“Ah... pfft!” Even though Elizabeth understood that what Eric said was probably true, she still unwillingly spat toward him. “You think all men are as filthy as you?”
“For most men, becoming the Murdoch family’s son-in-law means saving themselves thirty years of struggle. So what if they’re a little shameless?”
Elizabeth stubbornly retorted:
“T-Those are just your guesses.”
“Whether they’re guesses or not, you know it yourself.” Eric had no intention of continuing to bicker with her. “By the way, why did you come looking for me so late at night?”
Hearing this question, Julia unconsciously straightened her waist slightly. Whenever she got nervous, she always made that movement.
Elizabeth, however, answered openly:
“Since you came to Venice, let’s go sightseeing together. How about tomorrow?”
Eric thought about his schedule for a moment before nodding.
“No problem. I just happen to be free tomorrow.”
Elizabeth originally thought inviting Eric would require quite a bit of persuasion, but she did not expect him to agree so easily.
Since it was already late at night in Venice, it would also be inappropriate for two women to stay too long in a grown man’s room. After chatting for a little while, she left with Julia, who still had barely spoken.
The next morning, after learning that Eric had arrived, the chairman of this year’s jury panel, Andrei Smirnov, invited Eric to breakfast bright and early.
Although the two needed a translator to communicate, they still chatted very happily together. They remained talking in the boutique hotel restaurant until past nine o’clock before Andrei Smirnov reluctantly left because of work matters.
By the time Eric brought Allen to the agreed-upon dock, he discovered that Julia and Elizabeth had already been waiting for quite a while.
The moment Eric appeared, Elizabeth immediately began complaining unhappily.
“Hey, Eric, you really have no sense of punctuality. You actually made two girls wait this long?”
“I had things to deal with too, okay? It’s not like I’m as idle as you two rich young ladies,” Eric explained before sending Allen off to rent a boat. They planned to visit Venice’s main island today.
After finding a speedboat, Elizabeth pulled Julia aboard. Claiming that she could also speak Italian, she chased away Allen, who had originally been acting as translator.
After riding the speedboat to the main island, the three of them switched to a gondola and leisurely drifted along the Grand Canal.
The morning sunlight warmly shone over them.
Dressed in casual clothes, Eric leaned against the seat inside the gondola, thoroughly enjoying the surrounding architectural scenery. From time to time, he lifted the camera hanging around his neck and snapped several photographs.
Meanwhile, Elizabeth, seated on the other side, loudly chatted in Italian with the fifty-something gondolier standing at the bow, whose name was Loviso. The two of them occasionally burst into hearty laughter together.
“Hey, Julia, why haven’t you been saying anything? Are you feeling unwell?”
Only after pressing the shutter several times toward an arched bridge did Eric realize that the woman sitting beside him had remained unusually quiet.
This gondola only had a single seat, so all three of them were squeezed together. Eric sat on the right, Elizabeth occupied the left side, while Julia had been arranged in the middle.
Both women were slender, and Eric himself was not fat either, so even though three people were sitting in what was originally a two-person seat, it did not feel overly crowded.
Julia raised her head. Facing Eric’s concerned gaze, she quickly replied:
“N-No, I’m not.”
“Oh.” Eric thought for a moment but did not know what to say. Just as he was about to raise his camera again, Julia spoke first in a low voice.
“Eric, when are you going back to Los Angeles?”
“September 5th. The day after tomorrow.”
Julia raised her head and exchanged a glance with Eric before curiously asking:
“Why so soon? Aren’t you going to stay in Venice for a few more days?”
Eric lifted his camera and casually captured the silhouette of a seabird skimming across the water before explaining casually:
“I’d like to rest longer too, but over the next two months, I still need to shoot two movies. Time’s very tight.”
Julia nodded gently and lowered her head again.
“Right, Julia, when are you planning to go back?”
Julia hesitated briefly before replying:
“Originally, Liz said she wanted to take me to Australia to look around. Their family has a lot of ranches there, but I don’t plan on going anymore.”
“You should head back anyway. Steel Magnolias is scheduled for release in November, so you’ll probably need to cooperate with the promotion campaign soon. Besides, you should also start selecting scripts for next year’s movies.”
Julia looked at Eric with a complicated expression. After a long pause, she finally uttered a single word:
“You...”
Eric lowered his head and removed the finished film roll from his camera before replacing it with a new one. After glancing at Julia’s expression, he quickly understood what she was thinking and smiled.
“I won’t interfere with your movie choices next year anymore. You can try choosing for yourself. Of course, it’s still best if you listen to Kapur’s opinions more too.”
This year, Eric had already pushed Julia to a new peak in a very short time by assigning her two blockbuster films.
Although Eric could continue maintaining that peak for her, judging by Julia’s still somewhat immature personality, he felt it would be better for her to experience some ups and downs instead.
Moreover, next year he no longer planned to film movies as frantically as he had this year.
If he kept crazily shooting movies nonstop while every single one became a massive hit, it was not impossible that the major powers losing too many benefits to him would eventually become unable to endure it and hire someone to assassinate him.
Next year, he intended to devote most of his energy toward an arrangement that would be crucial to his future film career.
When Eric had forcefully interfered with her movie selections before, Julia constantly thought about how to escape his control.
But now, suddenly hearing that Eric would no longer manage her affairs, Julia instead felt a strange sense of emptiness.
“Hey, look over there! That’s the Bridge of Sighs!”
Just as both of them were lost in their own thoughts, Elizabeth suddenly shouted in English from the other side.
Eric looked toward where Elizabeth was pointing.
Within a narrow water alley floated a fully enclosed white stone arch bridge resembling a small attic.
The gondolier, Loviso, smiled as he rowed the gondola into the waterway.
“The Bridge of Sighs... what a beautiful name,” Elizabeth sighed like an artistic young woman before turning toward Julia beside her. “Julia, do you know the legend behind the Bridge of Sighs?”
Julia blankly shook her head.
She genuinely did not know.
After all, this was not an era like ten or twenty years later when information would become extremely accessible, where typing a few words into a webpage could instantly reveal everything.
Seeing Julia shake her head, Elizabeth proudly waved her small hand and explained:
“Look, these kinds of arch bridges connect two buildings. This side used to be the Venetian Doge’s Palace, while the other side was a prison for serious criminals. It’s said that very few prisoners sent from the palace to that prison ever came out alive again. So whenever prisoners crossed this bridge, they would sigh in regret. That’s how the Bridge of Sighs got its name.”
After taking several photos, Eric lowered his camera and smiled.
“Hearing you explain it like that, I actually think calling it the Gate of Hell would suit it more. If this bridge were alive, after being infused over and over again with the sighs of so many serious criminals, it would probably be filled with all sorts of violent emotions. In a movie, it would become the kind of classic supervillain who thinks the whole world wronged him and commits every anti-human, anti-society evil imaginable.”
Elizabeth’s enthusiastic expression froze briefly.
She unexpectedly found Eric’s reasoning rather convincing.
However, the woman quickly rolled her eyes dramatically at him.
“Hey, can you stop ruining the mood all the time?”
“I’m just telling the truth.”
Elizabeth angrily turned her head away, deciding to ignore this hateful guy. Wrapping her arm around Julia’s, she began whispering quietly with her.
The gondola slowly drifted beneath the Bridge of Sighs.
Standing at the stern, the gondolier slightly raised his voice and said something in Italian to the three of them.
Both Eric and Julia looked toward Elizabeth in confusion. With a somewhat smug tilt of her chin, the woman translated:
“Mr. Loviso says that if lovers kiss beneath the Bridge of Sighs, they’ll receive everlasting love.”
Hearing this, Julia secretly glanced sideways at Eric. Yet after only a single glance, she guiltily lowered her eyes again.
Elizabeth, meanwhile, could not help slightly rising to her feet. Her gaze darted back and forth between Eric and Julia, looking eager to try something.
Seeing Elizabeth’s expression, Eric jokingly crossed both arms over his chest protectively and declared righteously:
“Don’t even think about it. I absolutely refuse to kiss you.”
“Get lost. Even if this bridge collapsed, I still wouldn’t kiss you, pervert.”
Elizabeth planted one hand on her waist and fiercely retorted without backing down.
Then her large eyes suddenly shifted mischievously.
Under Eric’s astonished gaze, she abruptly wrapped her arms around the completely defenseless Julia and lowered her head to kiss the woman directly on her red lips.