“Do I remember.”
“He taught me a lesson. I mean, I figured that if he could do that to me and Joe Baby, it was time for me to quit and to find something better to do than hustling some whores. Shit, I read that seven out of ten women aren’t satisfied anyway. Have never achieved an orgasm. The odds are better in the junk bond business, and if you have somebody giving you tips, you win all the time. You have a head on your shoulders, Nance, yet you’re into some nickel-and-dime gypsy cab operation. You let those guys take your confidence. You let them get you down. You’re not living up to your full potential. You are all beaten down because you weren’t able to find Snow Man. I think the guy probably took the fifty K that Joe Baby and I gave him and left town. You shouldn’t blame yourself. By the way, how is Virginia doing?”
“We finally got a divorce. She’s dating a young economist.” Big Meat thought that this was hilarious. They turned the corner at Fifth Avenue. Xmas crowds were out, and the trees in Central Park were lit. Big Meat wished Nance a Merry Xmas and Happy New Year. He strutted into the Pierre Hotel where he was going to get a manicure. The doorman smiled at him.
6
Kingsley Scabb of the Newport Scabbs sat across from his wife. He was wearing a black blazer, white slacks with sharp creases, blue shirt, open at the collar, brown moccasins and dark blue sunglasses. One of his moles had told him of the meeting Reverend Jones had with President Hatch, and the concern they were all having about the consequences if Operation Two Birds were publicly aired. Scabb was the only one who would gain from such a scandal. Nobody could tie it to him, since he wasn’t inside the loop. The inner circle. Why he was just about as much in the dark about the plan Operation Two Birds, which had become known as the Terrible Twos in the popular imagination, as Dean Clift was. The next election would be his chance. He knew from some of his White House spies that Hatch might be indicted because of an ancient land deal. Jones would like to run, but Jones knew that they would dig up some of those ancient sermons which sounded strange. His obsession about the satanic code in the dollar bill or something. Power had shifted to the Sunbelt where everything was new and crude. Dean Clift was from New York, and he had failed. So now it was time for Scabb. Whenever the country was in trouble it would call on the sons of New England. The sons of New England would have to take control again if the United States were to survive. Scabb was ready. If Hatch and Jones were indicted, because of that harebrained operation, the Terrible Twos, the party would call upon him to lead. Dean Clift had jumped from two to ten percent in the polls, but this was no problem, and the idea of the D’Roaches presenting some sort of challenge was laughable. The American people were not that stupid. With Nola Payne casting the deciding vote on the side of the New Christian judges, there was no chance that Clift’s law suit questioning the legality of his removal from the office would be heard.
“Dear?” Scabb’s wife asked, peering at him over the pages of the Washington Sun, one eye shut. “What do you make of these rumors about Reverend Jones talking to himself in the Oval Office? I mean, not exactly to himself but to ghosts.” She gazed at him out of her watery blue eyes, as he finished his poached egg. She knew more about what was going on inside the White House than he did. She was hooked into a grapevine of domestic servants, who passed on information to their mistresses, who in turn shared the intelligence in beauty salons, and over lunch. “Just gossip, dearest. Reverend Jones is a very spiritual man, perhaps he was praying.” Their eyes collided for a moment before careening into their private souls. All they could hear was the scraping of shovels against the concrete as the help cleared the snow that lay before the Veep’s garage.
“Kingsley, don’t give me that shit. I’ve heard that he’s crazier than Dean was. I also hear that Jesse Hatch is about to be indicted for some kind of land deal. That leaves you.” She put down her coffee and squinted at him. She was always running up bills. Always having cosmetic surgery. Her weight was always expanding and contracting. He held the newspaper to one side, for a moment. “What leaves me, hon?”
“Look, Kingsley, don’t be coy with me. We’ve been married for thirty years. I’ve seen that ambitious look in your eyes for the last three months. Something’s cooking, and you know it.” John, who worked in the Clift White House, entered the dining room of the Vice Presidential mansion built by Nelson Rockefeller, the butcher of Attica; it was said to be haunted by prisoners and guards wearing convict’s clothes and ski masks, and carrying broomsticks.
“Good morning, John. How was your Thanksgiving?”
“Fine, Mr. Vice President, and yours?” John said, pouring more coffee from a silver container.
“Delightful. Nothing like New Hampshire during the Thanksgiving holidays. We all reflect upon that little band of Puritans who—”
“John. Have all of the arrangements for the Xmas party been finalized?” Scabb’s wife said, interrupting him. One of her ancestors had been hanged as a witch.
“Yes, Ms. Scabb.”
“Good. I’ll go over the details with you after breakfast.”
“That’ll be fine, Ms. Scabb.” John had finished pouring the orange juice. He left the dining room. Outside he noticed that nobody was around. He cupped his ear and pinned it to the door of the dining room.
“I never feel comfortable around him. I keep thinking he’s comparing me unfavorably with Dean Clift’s wife — Kingsley.”
“Yes, honey.”
“How are we going to be a team when you won’t let me know what’s going on all of the time? This Operation Two Birds, for example. People all over town are talking about that Haitian woman’s letter. The one written by Admiral Matthews. They’re saying that Dean Clift was right. That there was a conspiracy to nuke the cities with huge surplus populations, blame it on Nigeria, and then nuke Nigeria. I don’t see why they had to be so sloppy. Why couldn’t they have just used ethnic chemicals like crack or heroin or round them all up? I mean that’s what this AIDS thing was all about, wasn’t it? To get rid of some unpopular groups like faggots and blacks. People who have outlived their usefulness. You could have dumped more crack and heroin into the ghettos. But no, they had to listen to those religious nuts. It was Krantz’s idea. He’s almost as weird as that Jones. First he was sucking up to Jones, and then Admiral Matthews. Then this Terrible Twos scheme got loose and it’s threatening everybody. Can’t you get the C.I.A. to do anything right, Kingsley? The stupidest scheme I’ve ever heard of. If this all gets out, Dean Clift will return to Washington and people will start believing in Santa Claus. You don’t know anything about this, do you, Kingsley? It would ruin your career to be involved in such a scandal.”
“Who, me? Of course not, dear. President Hatch never tells me anything.”
“You’d better not be. Wasn’t enough that I caught you at Cardinal Spellman’s party with those chorus boys.” She began to cry. He had been seen at one of the parties Cardinal Spellman used to throw after the opening of Broadway musicals, but that had been years before. She always managed to bring it up.
John stole away from the door and toward the kitchen, carrying a pitcher of orange juice. He could hear Mrs. Scabb, sobbing in the dining room. The government fired him, as soon as Jesse Hatch and his wife moved into the White House. But when John threatened to write a book about what he’d seen in the White House over the years, they gave him the job of managing the Vice President’s household. Esther and Jane still worked at the White House, and they kept him howling as they described the shenanigans going on in the Oval Office since Reverend Jones had taken up residence there. Mrs. Scabb ran past the open door of the kitchen, bawling as she ran to her bedroom. She slammed the door.