«You should talk, you gutter person!»
«I also don’t try too much of that Jake’s beer, which for me is a dollar a pitcher!»
«Hey, very good, Sly!» shouted Marlon in his perfectly normal Midwest voice, devoid of slurs and slushes. «Really terrific!»
«Fine retort, mi’boy,» said Telly, as if he were a cultured university professor of English.
«We can do anything,» added Dustin, smoothing his mustache.
«Well, we’d better be damn good down there at Logan Airport, gentlemen,» said The Duke, checking his slightly rouged nose and speaking in a voice properly belonging to a high-ranking corporate executive.
«Hog damn, we’re great!» yelled Sir Larry, in tones reminiscent of the Okefenokee Swamp.
«Good Lord,» exclaimed Sylvester, the mid-Atlantic vowels of a Yale Drama School graduate coming through as he stared at the Vice-President. «You really are him!»
«He, Sly!» Larry corrected again, briefly slipping back into aristocratic British. «At least, I think so.»
«A naturally evolved vernacular legitimatizes its usage,» retaliated Sylvester, still looking at the Vice-President. «We appreciate the use of your aircraft, sir, but how come?»
«Secretary of State Pease thought it would make a nice impression on Boston, and since I wasn’t doing anything—I mean, I do a lot, but I wasn’t doing anything this week—so I said, ‘Sure, why not?’» The heir apparent leaned forward conspiratorially. «I even signed the ‘finding.’»
«The what?» asked Telly, taking his eyes off his face in the mirror.
«The intelligence finding for your operation.»
«We know what it is, young man,» said The Duke, his well-spoken voice reflecting his current role as somebody’s chief executive officer. «But I believe only the President can sign such a document.»
«Well, he was in the bathroom, and I was there, so I said, ‘Sure, why not?’»
«Fellow thespians,» pronounced Telly, returning to his mirror, his vibrato right out of that famed theatrical institution, The Players, in New York’s Gramercy Park. «If we don’t pull it oft, Congress will give this young man a testimonial dinner he’ll never forget.»
«Actually, I’ve made some new friends over there—»
«With him on the spit—spit—spit,» completed Dustin, jerkily revolving his head. «For exactly—exactly—exactly four—four hours, twenty—twenty—twenty minutes and thirty-two—two—two seconds. His ass will be extremely well done.»
«Oh, a roast! I’d like that. It shows they really like you!»
«Are you going to introduce us at the airport press conference?» asked Marlon skeptically, his quiet, warm Midwest accent pronounced.
«Me? No, the mayor will meet you. Actually I’m not supposed to get off the plane for an hour or so, and then without any press whatsoever.»
«Then why get off the plane at all?» said the erudite Yalie who called himself Sylvester. «We’re using air force equipment to take us to—»
«Don’t tell me,» shrieked the Vice-President, cupping his ears with his hands. «I’m not supposed to know anything!»
«Not supposed to know anything?» questioned The Duke. «You signed the finding, sir.»
«Well, sure, why not? But who the heck ever reads those dumb things?»
«Pore Jud is daid, a candle lights his haid,» sang Telly softly from his swivel chair, his bass-baritone perfectly acceptable for the touching Rodgers and Hammerstein song.
«I repeat,» repeated Sylvester. «Why leave the plane?»
«I have to. You see, some son of a butterball stole my wife’s car from back home—her car, not mine—and I have to identify it.»
«You’re kidding!» said Dustin, no eccentricities in his delivery. «It’s here in Boston?»
«I’m told it was driven by some very unsavory characters.»
«What are you going to do?» asked Marlon.
«Kick some fucker’s ass to the eighteenth hole and back, that’s what I’m going to do!»
Once more there was a brief silence as The Duke rose to his full height, surveying his comrades’ quiet attention on the Vice-President, then spoke in the lingo of his namesake. «You may be rancho correcto after all, pilgrim. Maybe we could even help.»
«Well, of course, I never curse, at least hardly ever—»
«Curse, baby,» broke in Telly, reaching into his vest pocket and withdrawing a stringed piece of candy. «Have a lollipop and don’t back off. You just may have made a couple of friends here. I figure you can use ’em.»
«Prepare for our final descent into Boston’s Logan Airport,» came the words over the loudspeaker from Air Force II’s flight deck. «Estimated arrival in eighteen minutes.»
«There’s still time for us to have a drink, sir,» said the soft-spoken Marlon, studying the young, blond-haired politician. «All you have to do is summon your steward.»
«Why the hell not?» The Vice-President of the United States rebelliously pressed the button, and within moments—perhaps too many moments—the air force steward appeared—perhaps not too enthusiastically.
«Wadd’ya want?» asked the corporal, insistently cowing the young Veep.
«What did you say, pilgrim?» shouted The Duke, still standing.
«I beg your pardon …?»
«Do you know who this man is?»
«Yes, sir, of course, sir!»
«Then sit straight in yer saddle and canter, don’t trot!»
In far fewer minutes than his arrival might have indicated, the corporal and a second crewman returned with drinks for everyone. And everyone smiled as they raised their glasses.
«To you, sir,» toasted Dustin in his clear, precise voice.
«I’ll second that,» said Telly. «And forget the lollipop, my friend.»
«Third …!»
«Fourth …!»
«Fifth …!»
«Sixth!» finalized The Duke, nodding his head in the best tradition of corporate acknowledgment.
«Gosh, you guys are really great fellows!»
«It’s our convenient and ubiquitous privilege to befriend the Vice-President of the United States,» said the gentle Marlon, glancing at the others as he drank.
«Gee, I don’t know what to say. I feel like I’m one of you!»
«You are, pilgrim, you are,» said The Duke, raising his glass for a second time. «You’ve been crapped upon, too.»
Jennifer Redwing, with the enthusiastic assistance of Erin Lafferty, as well as the sous-chef labors of Desis One and Two, created a multinational barbecue on the redwood porch. Since the steel-constructed pit contained four broiling areas, each regulated by a separate dial, the tastes of everyone could be served. Paddy Lafferty’s wife called the kosher boys in Marblehead and had them deliver the finest salmon and the freshest chickens, then she reached the boyos in Lynn to send up the best porterhouses they had in stock.
«I don’t know what I can do about you, you outrageously beautiful lass,» cried Erin, looking wide-eyed at Jennifer in the kitchen. «Should I try to get some buffalo meat?»
«No, dear Erin,» replied Jenny, laughing as she peeled the large Idaho potatoes they had found in the subcellar. «I’ll broil a few slices of the salmon.»
«Oh, like yer Indian fishes in them rushin’-like-hell rivers?»
«No again, Erin. Like those less-in-cholesterol meals we’re all supposed to eat.»