“Paula,” the mayor said, “it’s late and I’m tired. God knows you must be too. I think I’ll go back to the Mansion. Perhaps I can stop by tomorrow. I’ll try to bring Frances.”
“Thanks, Frank, for everything.”
“Nonsense. But listen, if there’s anything I can do, anything, just let me know.”
“You’re kind, Frank.”
“Paula, I mean it. Keys to the city, kid. Keys to the city.”
“That’s no campaign promise, kid. He means it,” put in the City Commissioner of Streets, who’d been sucking down the rye.
“She knows I do, Bob,” said Hizzoner.
Which earned Monsieur le Mayor the City Commissioner of Streets’ studied glance for trace irony. None to empty-stomached drunken Druff there seemed to be. Which oddly reassured him, oddly. For hypocrisy’s simply-saked decency of the thing. But, hey, cautioned the remnants of Druff’s sobriety, you’re throwing caution to the winds yourself here. Is there a full-court cabal on or not? It’s your call. If there is, look to your moorings, chuck the footwork. Don’t say chuck. Check, it amended.
Druff wanted his MacGuffin.
How did he know that name? Where was he?
Reassured. Hypocrisy of the thing. Check.
Because it was so. The mayor’s bland response was reassuring. He’d not taken Druff’s bait, he’d honored Marv’s death. He’d humored the room. He’d shown self-control when all about him were losing theirs. Druff thought that all mankind needed to make a better world was a little deniability, enough energy to establish a decent alibi. It showed respect.
The mayor was standing. He’d taken Paula’s hand. He’d leaned down to peck at her cheek, to tell her something.
“Time, gentlemen,” Doug said gaily. “Do you again, sir, before I leave?” He offered more rye. Druff, straining to hear, waved him away.
“Good night all,” the mayor addressed the room. “May we meet again on a happier occasion,” he solemnly said. “Did I have a coat with me, Doug?”
“I don’t think so, Your Honor.”
The son of a bitch, thought sobering Druff. That limo we passed in the driveway. He drove him here! And that other son of a bitch. “Did I have a coat with me, Doug?” That was for Druff’s benefit. Grandstanding bastard. He took back his banquets and bouquets, everything he’d thought that evening about Hizzoner’s circumspection. “Did I have a coat with me, Doug?” Thinks he can play rub-my-nose with me, does he? Druff could hardly believe it. Whatever happened to discretion? Didn’t they know what a dangerous world it was, coming and going, outdoors and in? Did they give no thought at all to appearances? Druff sized up the room, took a deep breath, and only prayed the MacGuffin was within hearshot and sightshot.
He’d considered turning in his resignation Monday morning. He would probably have to spend Sunday not only drafting the letter but typing it up as well. (He was, what he was. He had, he congratulated himself, too much class to drag Mrs. Norman into it.) But why bother? he thought. Why not strike while the iron was hot? Why should he show any more consideration for them than they did for him? Why not run with the flouters and flaunters?
The City Commissioner of Streets stood up. “Saay,” he said, “it is late. I wonder could you fellas give me a ride home?”
Well, he was what he was. Why drag others into it? If he was so considerate of Mrs. Norman, a woman he didn’t particularly like, why should he be less so to Mrs. Macklin’s visitors, people he didn’t even know?
He watched Doug, who looked to the mayor for guidance.
“You’re one of his drivers, aren’t you, Doug?” asked their mayor.
“Oh, on occasion, sir. Yes sir, Your Honor.”
“You’d be in the best position to know then. Tell me, Doug, is it well out of our way?”
“Well, Your Honor, you’ve put your finger on it, sir. The city commissioner lives in the Homan district. Off Overodey, two or three blocks down Page.”
“Why, that’s all the way across town, isn’t it?”
“Near enough, Your Honor.”
“Not only in the opposite direction of the Mansion but close to all that new construction?”
“Well, sir, from where the overflow on Edson feeds into the detour on Valor and Hoe.”
Druff observed the two comedians. Someone should have gone over to the piano and hammered out rim shots for them. If he’d known any more about the piano than he did of the districts, streets and phantom construction sites in the imaginary city they pummeled him with, he might have done so himself. And now he turned his gaze away from the two municipal clowns working Mrs. Macklin’s big room to the audience itself. There were still a number of people in the house, people frozen along the fault lines of their imminent departures—the scufflers and seat shifters he’d detected earlier but who’d been caught by “Hizzoner and Doug” and their surprise, unexpected floor show like a pop quiz.
Although she maintained perfect control, Mrs. Macklin seemed more amused than anyone in the room. She might almost have been a royal dowager witnessing some slightly irreverent Command Performance. Well, it was a distraction, Druff supposed. Marv shoveled into the ground just that afternoon, all the holy, highfalutin goings-on at the funeral chapel, her dark clothes and strained graciousness and this not yet even the first full day of her official mourning. So it was a distraction. Druff could hardly blame her.
Well, he was already standing anyway. Looking back in Doug’s direction, whose shtick about detours and overflow and made-up streets had closed out the routine. He nodded at his erstwhile chauffeur and turned to the city’s chief executive.
“I quit,” he said.
“You quit?”
“That’s right. I’m resigning. I quit.”
“Just like that?”
“Yes.”
“That’s your trouble, Druff. And you call yourself a politician. You quit? You don’t know dust about smoke-filled rooms, do you? You’d just go and give up a plummy job like yours? Snap? Just like that? No quid pro quo? No dealing? No nothing? Well, I never,” said his mayor.
He was right, Druff thought. Everyone did.
Sure, prompted the MacGuffin. You didn’t even get how you know that name out of it.
A lot you’ve got to criticize, scolded wounded Druff. Where were you when I needed you?
Within hearshot, sightshot and soulshot, little buddy. Don’t worry about me.
So what do I do now?
Did I bring you here on an empty stomach? Did I pour rye in your eye? Did I feed you coca leaves all day like there was no tomorrow? The hell, scorned the MacGuffin. You got yourself into this. You just go and get yourself out.
Beat a strategic withdrawal, is that what you’re advising me?
Jesus! contempted old Mac.
Druff tossed a grateful mental wink at his friend.
Jesus Christ Jesus, kibitzed MacGuffin.
While Druff stared down the mayor.
“Gotcha!” he told him. “No, Frank,” Druff said, “I’m not quitting. Don’t you recognize more floor show when you see some?”
“Well, come along then,” the mayor said.
“You’ll take me?”
“Does he need your arm, do you think, Doug?”
“Maybe that and some stretcher-bearers, Mr. Mayor.”
And made a face as he came within breath range of the still-incumbent City Commissioner of Streets. Who, startled, suddenly recalled his performance that afternoon in Doug’s apartment. And willed his imperfectly steady legs into a locked position, conscious of his hip flexion, deliberately straightening his lumbar curve, minding all his orthopedics. In this manner he carefully made his way toward his bereaved hostess. I must look, he thought, like whatsisname, Frankenstein’s monster. Yeah, he thought hopefully, but sober.
“What can I say?” he said.
“You’re kind,” Mrs. Macklin said.
“Me?” he offered. “Nah. Marvin was kind.”
“Kind? Marvin was a hardened banker
.”
Eureka! he exclaimed mentally. And didn’t forget to propitiate his MacGuffin.
Oh boy. His MacGuffin was disgusted.
Thinking as they led him off, It’s the company I keep, the circles I do and don’t travel in. Of course! Marvin Macklin was a hardened banker! What’s a hardened banker?
It was the first question he asked when he got into the limo. (Asking it through a speaking tube which he took off a hook where it lay on the dash. Because the mayor had instructed Druff to sit up front with the driver. “You’re not out of the woods yet,” Hizzoner explained through the tube. “You could be carsick. I’m only human, Druff. Well, I’m queasy. It’s nothing personal. I just can’t stand the sight of blood or the smell of puke.” Druff not too drunk to register that Motor Pool One was not as high-tech as his own electronically bristled limo, that its upholstery was not even leather but some gray cloth stuff he could not name but which wore an odor, not unpleasant, of some at once sweet and sour, luxurious mildew. It was a “machine” he associated with the days of lap rugs and tasseled hand pulls, some golden age of “motoring,” of hampers and running boards, of spares securely buckled inside round metal forms mounted near graceful, elegant fenders. He doubted that the limousine had a radio, let alone a cellular telephone. Or if it did it would be on the AM band, or shortwave perhaps. It would have vacuum tubes. Static would crackle in its felt-lined speakers. Now he was conscious of it, he noticed that this boat was stick-shift, a banker’s car from the days when streets were streets, and that’s what reminded him.) He looked at Doug as he lifted the speaking tube from its hook. “How do I work this thing, do I blow into it first or what?”
“The captain blows into it first. You just talk into it.”
“It’s funny,” Druff managed to fish when they’d traveled a few blocks, “I wouldn’t have called Marv ‘a hardened banker.’ What do you suppose Mrs. Macklin meant by that, Mr. Mayor?”
“Mind your business,” said Mr. Mayor.
“Are you sore at me?” Druff asked. “Don’t be sore at me. I’ve had a rough day. I was only kidding when I spoke of resigning. Those were my nerves resigning, not me. Hey, loyalty is my middle name. You really think I’d quit on you with the streets how they are? I was out in them last night. You wouldn’t believe the traffic. The traffic was terrific. The bankers, the bakers, the candlestick makers. Boy oh boy.”
“Quit, don’t quit,” the mayor boomed at him through the tube while Druff was still speaking. “No one’s indispensable. FDR’s brains blew up on him when he was out on a date with his girlfriend during the War. You think that affected anything? The hell! A few weeks later the Germans surrendered.” (Hmn, Druff thought, not only the same phrase MacGuffin had used, the same inflection, the same tone of voice!) “And what do you mean, ‘the bankers, the bakers?’ Why do you keep carping on that?”
“And what do you mean, ‘FDR’s brains blew up on him when he was out on a date with his girlfriend’?” the City Commissioner of Streets shot back.
“This is a ridiculous conversation,” the mayor said in a normal voice unaided by the speaking tube.
“It is,” Druff replied, too exhausted to trust his voice to an unabetted acoustics, and still speaking into the tube.
“Drop this one off first, Doug,” the mayor commanded.
What did he mean “this one?”
He was so tired. Beyond tired, weary really. He’d been on the go all day. It was amazing to him it was still only Saturday night. As that afternoon it had been amazing to him that it was still only that afternoon, as twilight had astonished him, as even now he was surprised not to be able to perceive just a hint in the darkness of even false dawn, time running in place on him, stuttering, skipping, caught like a phonograph needle in a faulty groove, the day’s long melody making no progress. It was Saturday, the weekend. On any normal Saturday he would have found some occasion to go off by himself in his house, to lie down, at least to put his feet up, to snooze in an easy chair, perchance to dream. It was the failure of privacy which so tired one, thought Druff, pressed and pooped. If he could just lean back in the old-fashioned, comfortable and roomy automobile, big as a bedroom even up front with Doug, sit back, maybe catch forty winks. Druff gazed sleepily out the window. He didn’t quite recognize where they were. There was probably still a ways to go. The mayor had finished speaking. Doug, always a more focused driver than Dick, was concentrating on the road. Druff, lulled by the ride, allowed himself to shut his eyes.
No! Don’t you dare! his MacGuffin startled.
“What’s it to you?” jolted Druff out loud.
The hypnagogic sleep, jerk. You talk too much, remember? It’s already been demonstrated that speaking tube’s for show, not for blow. The acoustics in here are better than Carnegie Hall’s. They’d pick up every word.
But I’m so tired.
Keep walking, don’t sit down. Run a cold shower, drink some black coffee.
Sleepy weepy.
Then talk, I tell you! Keep talking. But stay awake! Don’t let yourself lose consciousness. Stay in control.
My hero, Druff appreciated.
“Mr. Mayor, why haven’t we been better friends?” Druff asked.
That’s the way, MacGuffin encouraged. Good shot there, Druff, you wise old pol, you. Frame the argument, preempt and conquer.
Druff beamed. It was the nicest thing the MacGuffin had ever thought to him, and the City Commissioner of Streets felt ever so slightly more alert.
Though maybe Mr. Mayor was asleep. He didn’t answer him. It could be a trap, but.
Force his hand, prompted MacGuffin. Take a follow-up.
“Because I’ve never understood why we aren’t closer. I feel no animus toward you. I voted for you, as a matter of fact.”
“You voted for him,” Doug said. “You’re in the man’s administration, for heaven’s sake.”
“It’s a secret ballot,” Druff hissed. “We go into that booth, the curtain closes behind us.”
“Oh, please.”
“No ‘Oh, please.’ We could get away with murder if we wanted to.”
“Oh, please.”
“Give the man a break, Doug. He’s warm. He’s very warm. We could get away with murder.”
“I’m sorry, Your Honor. It just makes me angry the way certain prominent officials who serve at your pleasure carry on sometimes.”
“It was a fair question, Doug. The man’s entitled to an answer. The reason I didn’t offer one is I found it hard to believe he didn’t already know. I still do. However—”
“What do you mean ‘drop this one off first’? Where are we? What part of town is this? I don’t recognize it.”
“The City Commissioner of Streets wants to know what part of town this is, Frank. The City Commissioner of Streets doesn’t recognize it. The City Commissioner of Streets is lost.”
“Now now. The man’s responsible for—what is it, Bobbo, a few hundred thousand square acres of streets in your jurisdiction?”
“I’m not out of the woods yet, you said. What kind of crack is that? You can’t stand the sight of blood, you said. What do you mean, I’m warm? What do you mean you could get away with murder?”
And now the City Commissioner of Streets was completely awake.
Doug was giggling. He was laughing out loud. He was snorting and laughing uncontrollably.
“You’re going to wet your pants you don’t watch out,” Druff said. “He can’t stand the sight of blood, he can’t stand the smell of puke. Maybe he’s not too thrilled with the stench of wee-wee.”
“I like the stench of wee-wee,” the mayor said.
Just jump in anytime, Druff addressed the MacGufĭìn.
“Oh hell, Bob. I said you’re entitled to an answer and you are. The reason we’re not better friends is I can’t let go of a grudge. That’s it. That’s the long and short of it.”
“Against me? What kind of grudge can you have against me?”
“Well, to be perfectly honest,
I didn’t approve of your negative campaign tactics that time you opposed me in the primary.”
“That was a thousand years ago. We were both just starting out. We were only running for alderman! Anyway, what negative campaign tactics? No one used television in those days. We didn’t even take out radio spots. Christ, most of my campaign literature was these cheesy, heavily inked fliers, my name on a piece of cardboard up on a stick in someone’s front lawn. Debates were held in high school gymnasiums, VFW halls, the American Legion. Out-of-doors in the park on company picnics. Which negative campaign tactics? What negative campaign tactics?”
“All right. You hired a car! You hired a car with a great big loudspeaker on the roof and rode all over the precinct playing loud music and crying ‘VOTE FOR BOB DRUFF! VOTE FOR BOB DRUFF ON APRIL EIGHTEENTH!’ ”
“You’ve got to be kidding. You’re kidding me. You’re kidding me, aren’t you?”
He is and he isn’t. You’re not out of the woods yet. This one’s got a lot of unresolved menace in him.
“Would I kid you, Druff?”
“Doug’s right, I serve at your pleasure. If you’ve so much against me, how come I’m still working for you?”
“I didn’t appoint you,” the mayor said. “You were appointed by my predecessor. Anyway, that was just politics, that was just campaign promises.”
It was true. The mayor had pledged that if he was elected he’d do away with the spoils system. As part of his campaign to break up the machine, he’d promised to retain everyone who’d been doing their job reasonably well. Druff had come in toward the end of the Golden Age of streets and highways, just before the money Eisenhower had pumped into the interstates had begun to give out. It was a brilliant idea. A lot of his opponent’s hacks in City Hall either actively campaigned for the mayor, or stayed home. Meanwhile, he’d convinced enough of the voters that he was apolitical to win by a landslide.
He’s kidding and he isn’t kidding, the MacGuffin warned again. Where there’s smoke, in other words, there could be fire. A word to the wise old pol was sufficient.
Who then upped the ante, who took the bull by the horns and raised the conversation from bland schmooze and the cult of personality to bottom lines.
The MacGuffin Page 29