It was not the first deal the Abercrombies had struck with the Bruces. The first was in 1920, with Amos T. Bruce, Sr., Randy’s grandfather, from whom, it was generally acknowledged, ol’ Randy had inherited his business acumen. Old Amos, as he was called with varying degrees of affection, immediately saw, with the passage of the XVIIIth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, a chance to turn a dollar.
Old Amos knew the tipplers of America, and maybe especially the tipplers of Mississippi and New Orleans, Louisiana, were not going to happily switch to Coca-Cola or Welch’s grape juice simply because it was now against the law of the land to imbibe anything stronger. And he knew that his still (est. 1805) in a wooded area on the grounds of “Our Tara” was already at maximum production, and he was having a hard time meeting local Baptist and Methodist demand for “Mississippi’s Best” white lightning. Unless Old Amos found an alternate supply of hooch, he was going to miss out on all the money that could be earned supplying the tipplers in New Orleans.
And, although Old Amos personally thought Scotch whisky tasted like horse piss, he knew that there were a lot of people in New Orleans who actually liked it. A lot.
Thus, he knew what he had to do—catch the next steamer from Charleston, South Carolina, to Glasgow, Scotland—and he did it.
Three weeks after landing in Glasgow, and after sampling all the Scots whisky he could lay his hands on, he had found the one that was the least worst. It was called “Old Pheasant” and it came from a distillery in Dungaress. He went there and sought out the chief distiller.
This turned out to be a gaunt six-footer his own age by the odd name of Myelord, who wore a plaid skirt and had a woman’s purse hanging from his belt over his crotch.
Telling himself that he should know that the booze business caused strange bedfellows, Old Amos introduced himself to Myelord as a brother distiller from the New World and offered as proof a taste of Mississippi’s Best. Myelord liked it, and by the time the first Mason jar was empty, Myelord and Old Amos were pals. At that time, Old Amos asked Myelord who owned the Old Pheasant distillery.
“Actually, Amos, my newfound fellow distiller chum, I own it.”
“In that case, Myelord, old buddy, I have a business proposition for you.”
By the time Old Amos and Myelord had emptied a second quart-sized Mason jar of Mississippi’s Best, not only had a deal been struck, but Myelord, after asking if Amos liked to shoot birds, invited him up to the castle for dinner, and to spend the night, and in the morning to have a go at popping a few pheasants.
Amos, never having seen a pheasant before, happily agreed.
The deal struck was that the Old Pheasant distillery would sell to Amos all of its output, relabeled “Famous Pheasant” and packed in wooden cases marked “Scottish Tweed,” and arrange for its shipment by sea to Muddiebay Bay, where it would be offloaded in the dead of night for further shipment to New Orleans’s “speakeasies” and “gentleman’s clubs.”
The change of name was necessary, Amos explained, because the tipplers in New Orleans never having seen a pheasant would be happier with “Famous” than they would be with “Old,” the latter which would suggest to them something like an ancient chicken—in other words, tough, stringy, and smelling like a chicken coop.
Sometime during that night, Amos learned that Myelord was not his new business partner’s real name, and that he was actually Bertram William Louis Oswald Harold James, Earl of Abercrombie, and that the building in which they were emptying yet another Mason jar of Mississippi’s Best was not, as he had first thought, the Scottish National Museum, but rather what ol’ Bertie thought of as Home Sweet Home.
Popping a few pheasants the next morning was equally an eye-opener for Amos. Not only was it almost as much fun as popping duck in the tidewater around the MSB&DDC, Inc., facility back home in Muddiebay, but ol’ Bertie said, “The bloody birds are a real pest. The more of them you shoot, the more of them there are.”
That could not be said about mallards in the Mississippi Flyway.
Amos decided that he’d have to give that some thought. But for the time being he did only what was incumbent upon him as a Southern Gentleman. He invited ol’ Bertie to visit him and pop some mallards over Muddiebay Bay. Bertie didn’t seem enthusiastic until Amos told him Muddiebay was not far from New Orleans and its famed cuisine and gentleman’s clubs.
Thus began their lifelong friendship and business relationship. The latter turned out to be far more successful than Old Amos had ever dreamed it would. Attempting to satisfy the unquenchable thirst of New Orleanians with Famous Pheasant was futile, but on the other hand quite profitable.
In time, Old Amos took Young Amos to Dungaress and introduced him to Scottish country life. And during this period, earning them the lasting gratitude of the Earl of Abercrombie, and later his son, the Earl of Abercrombie, they came up with an idea—actually two ideas—on how to convert the pheasants of Castle Abercrombie from pests into a cash crop.
The first idea was simplicity itself. Old Amos and Young Amos knew very well how many shooters were willing to pay through the nose for the privilege of getting a few shots at mallards, and it followed that they would be willing to pay as much for the privilege of getting a few shots at Scottish pheasants.
Old Amos said that when he floated the idea, he was confident the would-be shooters would line up like politicians at the public trough—that is, drooling and with a wide-eyed look of happy anticipation on their faces.
Ol’ Bertie said that was fine, but they would have to factor in the cost of getting rid of the pheasants once they had been blasted from the Scottish skies, probably by dumping them into a ditch dug for that purpose, which, considering the price of petrol and wear and tear on the tractor that would dig said ditch, et cetera, would cost a pretty penny, indeed.
“Why would you want to bury the pheasants?” Young Amos asked.
“Well, what we have been doing for the past century or so, after shooting the bloody pests, is to send them to the Royal Dungaress Orphans Home, and its sister charity, the Royal Dungaress Home for Unwed Mothers-to-Be. But they can swallow only so many of the buggers—nobody, including orphans and unwed mothers-to-be, can be expected to eat pheasant day after bloody day—and you’re going to cause a great deal more than so many.”
“Let me think about it, Bertie,” Old Amos said.
And he did.
But it was Young Amos who came up with the solution, which everyone agreed was brilliant. He had spent enough of his time in New Orleans, which of course is known for its ambience Français, to learn something of the French mind. He suspected, and was later proven right, that les chefs Français in the five-star restaurants of Paris would like nothing better than to be able to add to their menus “Fresh Scottish Pheasant, flown from Scotland Directly to Our Kitchen,” and be prepared to pay through their nez Français for the privilege.
A deal was struck with TWA, which had two flights a day from Glasgow’s Abbotsinch to Paris’s Charles de Gaulle to do the actual flying, and then the money began to roll in.
The “guest gentleman shooters” would appear at Abercrombie Castle, where they would be welcomed by the Earl and Countess of Abercrombie. The earl—or sometimes Lady Margaret, who was known to her friends as “Maggie”—would then explain the traditions of the hunt and the costs thereof. These were ten dollars per pheasant downed and one dollar for each shot shell provided to accomplish the former.
The earl, who was wearing the kilt of Clan Abercrombie, would further explain that gentleman shooters were expected to make a small gift—twenty dollars was acceptable, but greater generosity would not be rejected—to the “gillies” who would accompany them to the stands from which they would down their game.
The gillies had several functions. The first of these was to point the gentleman shooters away from other gentleman shooters. Next, they would keep careful count of the num
ber of shells they issued to the gentleman shooters, and finally they would keep careful count of how many pheasants “their” gentleman shooter downed at ten dollars per downing.
Gillies, who were paid five dollars a day, plus twenty percent of the amount their shooters paid at ten dollars per bird for each shot down, quickly learned that most gentleman shooters were so thrilled to have the gillie enthusiastically cry, “Jolly good shot, sir!” that they never challenged the call even when they told themselves they “didn’t come within fifty EXPLETIVE DELETED!! feet of the EXPLETIVE DELETED!! bird.”
When all the birds had been driven past the stands by the “beaters”—children from the Royal Dungaress Orphans Home—the gentlemen were taken by their gillies to sort of a picnic lunch, where cucumber sandwiches and other victuals were available at nominal prices.
Meanwhile, assisted by a fifty-strong herd of Labrador retrievers, the more mobile of the expectant ladies at the Royal Dungaress Home for Unwed Mothers-to-Be swept through the killing fields picking up the downed pheasants and moving them to an out-of-sight shed where they were quickly gutted by the less mobile of the ladies-in-waiting, so to speak. Next they were loaded into coolers, covered with ice, and then driven to Abbotsinch for their final flight to Charles de Gaulle and ultimately into the ovens of the Frog chefs.
The system thus devised outlasted both Old Amos and Young Amos, which left ol’ Randy as the last of the Bruce line; and it outlasted the Earl of Abercrombie, which left Captain Charles William George Michael Bertram of Her Majesty’s Own Scottish Light Lancers, who had become, of course, Captain Charles William George Michael Bertram the Earl of Abercrombie on the death of his father, as the last of his line.
The two got along well even after the earl reluctantly hung up his uniform to assume his earl-y responsibilities, which included administration of the Castle Abercrombie estates and the siring of an heir to keep the ball rolling, so to speak.
Randy didn’t even think of this burden upon Bertie until he showed up at the castle one day and found Bertie in the company of a petite, fair-skinned young woman.
“Randy, old boy, this is my Maggie, who has just agreed to become the Countess of Abercrombie.”
“Nice to meet you, Maggie,” Randy had replied, offering the young woman his hand.
“Randy, old boy,” Bertie said, “I hate to appear stuffy, but there are traditions to be upheld, you know. Among them is that commoners like you are required to address my darling Maggie as either ‘My Lady’ or ‘Lady Margaret.’ And commoners do not attempt to touch members of the nobility, such as my Maggie, the Honorable Margaret Patricia Alice McNess, third daughter of the Earl of Ipswich, is.”
“And I will call you ‘Randy,’” Lady Margaret said. “As I not only have a soft spot in my heart for commoners, I have a small favor I—the earl and I—would like to ask of you.”
“I’m at your service, My Lady,” Randy had replied. He had quickly decided that if the price he had to pay to continue shooting at Castle Abercrombie was putting up with all this nobility EXPLETIVE DELETED!! and Bertie’s EXPLETIVE DELETED!! newfound love, then so be it.
“Bertie and I would like you to be Bertie’s Best Man when we are united in Holy Matrimony at the High Kirk of Glasgow, sometimes called Saint Kentigern’s, on Tuesday next. I suppose it’s too much to ask that you have morning clothes?”
Randy had been running around with Bertie long enough to have learned that, in Scotland, morning clothes were different from the mourning clothes—dark suit, black tie, and absolutely no white socks—one wore to a funeral in Mississippi. In Scotland, morning clothes were a pastel version of the long-tailed black “Fish and Soup Monkey Suits” the social elite of Muddiebay wore to Mardi Gras balls. In Scotland, morning clothes were what one wore at a morning social event, such as a wedding at St. Kentigern’s in Glasgow.
“Why me, My Lady?” Randy asked.
“Because having a commoner such as yourself will spare Bertie and myself from the tiring business of having to choose between the thirty or forty members of the nobility who will think they are entitled to that honor.”
So Randy was best man at the nuptials of the Earl and Lady Margaret.
—
As time passed, to his genuine surprise, Randy came to really like Lady Margaret. She was one hell of a shot, for one thing, and when she was not in the family way, she liked a little nip.
One day, when they were having a couple of the latter in the Minor Dining Hall of Castle Abercrombie, the countess said, out of the blue, “Bertie tells me you are acquainted with Philip Williams, the author. Is this so?”
“Actually, I know him rather well. Actually, one might say, My Lady, that I am as close to him as a Southern gentleman, such as myself, ever gets to what we Southern gentlemen think of as EXPLETIVE DELETED!! Yankees. Once a Yankee, we say, always a Yankee.”
“I’d like to meet him,” Lady Margaret said.
“Oh, I don’t think so, Lady Margaret.”
“Randy, I thought I told you Maggie doesn’t care what you think,” Lord Bertie said. “Produce this chap so that my Maggie can meet him!”
—
Getting ol’ Phil to Castle Abercrombie was easier ordered than accomplished. In addition to his usual suspicion of anything Randy proposed, Phil said from what he had heard it was always raining in Scotland, and that the high point of Scottish cuisine was a dish called haggis, which was made of the heart, liver, and lungs of a sheep or lamb stuffed into the stomach of one or the other of said creatures.
And, as a final argument, although he had as a young man known a skirt-wearing Scot who was perfectly normal, sexual preference wise, he was leery of going anywhere skirt-wearing by men was considered normal behavior.
But eventually Randy prevailed, and one day, Bertie having sent it to the airport to meet them, the ducal Rolls-Royce deposited them before the main door to Castle Abercrombie, where the earl and countess awaited them.
Randy said, “For God’s sake, try to forget you’re a EXPLETIVE DELETED!! Yankee and behave,” and got out of the car.
Phil followed him.
“Your Lordship, Lady Margaret, may I present my friend—”
“I’ll be a EXPLETIVE DELETED!!” Phil cried cheerfully. “Tally EXPLETIVE DELETED!! ho, Bertie!”
“Hi-Yo, EXPLETIVE DELETED!! Silver! Away yourself, old chap!” the earl replied.
“Who’s the bimbo, Lone Ranger?” Phil inquired. “That can’t be Tonto! Not with a set of knockers like that.”
They then embraced.
“I gather that you have met?” Randy and Lady Margaret asked, in chorus.
They had, but relating the details of that here would be getting ahead of the story. That sometimes happens to less skilled writers of romance novels. As the astute reader of same may have noticed, the male and female protagonists therein are often depicted in loving, or lascivious, embrace before any justification for their behavior is offered.
Suffice it to say here that ol’ Phil became very close friends of the Earl and Countess of Abercrombie, which had a bearing on how Randy planned to get some time alone with Carol-Anne in Merry England, to wit:
Once everybody got to Dungaress, after they had spent two days in London—or until the ladies had reached their credit card limit, whichever came first—Pancho Gonzales’s beloved niece would fall ill. Her loving Uncle Pancho would charter a private jet with a capacity for no more than five passengers to fly her to the famed doctors whose offices line London’s Harley Street.
Out of the goodness of her heart, Carol-Anne would volunteer to go along, so that Poor Pancho’s Poor Sick Niece would have some female companionship. Randy, who would blame the Poor Sick Niece’s illness on the haggis she had eaten before he had Done His Duty to warn her not to do so, would, stricken by guilt, consider it his duty as a Southern Gentleman to go with them to London.
&nb
sp; They would go directly from Heathrow to Claridge’s Hotel, where Randy had reserved suitable accommodations.
And for the next week, ol’ Phil would take care of the hunters, and Lady Margaret, because ol’ Phil would ask her to, and they were buddies, would take care of the ladies.
Everybody would be happy. Showtime!
—
The only thing that remained to be done was to telephone Pancho, to make sure everything was going as planned with him. Pancho and his niece were critical components of the plot.
He did so immediately after Carol-Anne had hoisted her panty hose up and around what Randy now recognized to be her deteriorating derriere and left so as to be home before her husband came home from the bank.
“Pancho, buddy! How’s every little thing?” he greeted his Miami-Cuban coconspirator.
“I told you I’d meet you in the General’s Club in the Atlanta airport tomorrow. So why are you calling me?”
“Just checking, amigo. I suppose Consuelo’s all excited about going to London?”
“Actually, Randy, Consuelo’s not going.”
“What do mean, Consuelo’s not going?”
“I mean, she ran off with that jai-alai player she was always eyeing, the one they call Pedro the Perfect because of his body.”
“That’s awful.”
“Not to worry. I’m bringing Ginger Gallagher instead.”
“Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t Ginger Gallagher that pale-skinned long-legged blonde, the one whose hair hangs down to her waist? The tall one? The one you were chasing around the American Virgin Islands with your tongue hanging out?”
“You got it, Randy. I have always been attracted to gorgeous twenty-five-year-old blondes whose Daddy left them just over half a billion dollars.”
“Pancho, you dumb EXPLETIVE DELETED!! fried banana eater—which, come to think of it, is what Ginger called you—no one is going to think that Ginger Gallagher is your niece!”
The Hunting Trip Page 11