by Max Shulman
“Very amusing,” he said. “Come on, let’s get back to marriage.”
Boo laughed. “Oh, Virgil, you’re too perfect. All you need is a butternut uniform, a sash, and a sword.… Southern ladies, suh, are for marryin’, suh, not dallyin’. For that there’s places in Memphis.… Right, cousin?”
“All right, so I’m a little old-fashioned.”
“Try obsolete.”
“Well now, look who’s talking! Come out from behind that Spanish moss, Miss Melanie, and answer me a question: this beach house of yours—have you ever invited anyone who might really go?”
“Well—”
“Well, no! Next question: in the last eighteen years have you ever once seriously considered a proposal of marriage? Never mind mine. I mean all the others you’ve had.”
“All right, Virgil, I’ll admit it. I’m obsolete too.”
“Maybe extinct,” he said. “And it’s got me worried.”
“That’s very kind of you, but I’ll be just fine, thanks.”
Virgil shook his head gravely. “I’m not so sure. I’ve been reading this article on prolonged sexual continence. Do you know it’s one hundred percent fatal?”
“Oh, dear me!” exclaimed William Ransom Owens, first cousin to Boo and third cousin to Virgil, who had just walked up behind them.
William Ransom was plump, smooth, pink, trusting, thirty-two years old, and a virgin. Some uncharitable people said he was a homosexual, but he was not. Perhaps he would have been, only he had never heard of it. He stood now in a costume he had carefully selected for this woodsy weekend of roughing it—a suede Lincoln-green jacket that was almost a doublet, narrow Lincoln-green trousers that were almost hose, and ankle-high, laceless Lincoln-green boots of glove-soft leather. He had toyed with the idea of adding a deep-throated blouse with ruffled pleats but abandoned the notion out of an accurate fear that Uncle Jefferson Tatum would seize him by the ruffles and flang him down the mountain.
William Ransom, like the other Owens men, was a kind of executive of the Tatum Cigarette Company. He had an imposing title, a Bigelow on the floor, and a total lack of authority. William Ransom was listed on the corporate roster as Director of Education and Morale, which meant he chose the country-and-western music that was piped through the factory by Muzak all day.
“You’re just funning, aren’t you, Cousin Virgil?” said William Ransom nervously. “I mean about the article you were discussing? About prolonged sexual continence will kill you?”
“Yes, William Ransom,” Virgil assured him. “A little joke is all.”
“Whew!” said William Ransom, vastly relieved. “Course, I’m not really worried. I mean I’ll surely find a girl soon.… Won’t I?” he added doubtfully.
“No question about it,” Virgil answered firmly.
William Ransom beamed. “Cousin Boo,” he said, “what say we sing some good old songs of the thirties?”
“By all means, Cousin William Ransom,” she said. “But would you mind gathering the others? It’s so much nicer when we start together.”
“Why, sure, Cousin Boo,” said William Ransom and scurried around the room and collected his various kinfolk, all of them officers of the Tatum Cigarette Company, all holding executive positions equal in responsibility to William Ransom’s.
William Ransom next proceeded to round up guests who were not members of the family, for no more Owenses remained to be tapped. There had been one more Owens present, but only briefly. This was Gabriel Owens Fuller—Boo’s boy—who had dropped everyone off at the lodge and then flown the helicopter back home to Owens Mill so he could finish work on a digital computer he was building. Aeronautics and physics held no riddles for eighteen-year-old Gabriel. Only the ultimate mystery baffled him: girls.
“Hurry, William Ransom,” called Boo from the piano bench, for the singers had assembled and were clamoring for a downbeat.
“Yes, Cousin Boo,” cried William Ransom and hastened to gather the remaining voices. He spied a grotesquely large neck hunched over the bar and laid a timid finger on it. “Mr. Meyers, sir,” he said, essaying a tentative smile, “would you care to go over to the piano and sing?”
“Sing my ass,” replied Nineteen Meyers, glowering so fiercely that William Ransom went almost Lincoln-green.
“Just thought I’d ask,” stammered William Ransom and backed rapidly away.
Nineteen, muttering, returned to his bottle—no glass; just a bottle. He hated his weekends at the hunting lodge; and the fact is, everybody hated having him there. All the same, a deal was a deal, and Nineteen was not about to give up one single speck of one single thing that was coming to him.
Nineteen’s contract clearly called for free board and room at the Tatum hunting lodge on every weekend outside the football season. It was the least of the benefits in Nineteen’s agreement with Acanthus College. He had the huge marble house on campus, the one with the stained-glass windows, rent-free and staffed with three Negro servants. He had an annual salary of $40,000 as head coach, plus two new Cadillacs every year—a red sedan and a red convertible.
For all of this Jefferson Tatum footed the bill without complaint. He was content with his coach. Year after year Nineteen disappeared into the canebrake and emerged with an awesome bag of huge, infrangible, mouth-breathing young men who loved bodily contact better than anything you could name. Sometimes Jefferson suspected that Nineteen could not simply be finding such people; he had to be breeding them in some secret place—a hollow mountain, most likely. But Jefferson never inquired; all he cared to know was that the Owens Mill Municipal Stadium was jammed with 55,000 ecstatic fans at each game. Jefferson was aware, as others in comparable positions have been aware before him, that to rule a city you must provide circuses as well as bread.
“Gentlemen, gentlemen!” cried William Ransom, detecting the final two guests skulking in the pantry. “Why, I do believe you’re hiding!”
They shuffled their feet guiltily, for hiding is precisely what they had been doing. They were dressed in blue suits, vests, starched collars, dark ties, and rimless glasses, and they had not come to the lodge to make wassail. In fact, they were guests only in a manner of speaking. Both were officers of the Tatum Cigarette Company, but neither was an Owens, and consequently they were answerable for their conduct. T. T. Wilcox, an accountant aged sixty-six years, was vice-president of the firm, and Noah Fenster, a chemist aged fifty-nine years, was Director of Research. Jefferson Tatum had summoned them this weekend—summoned, not invited—to justify the company’s last fiscal statement, and if there was one thing in the world they did not feel like, it was singing.
But William Ransom would brook no objections. “Pishtush!” he said blithely as they tried to tell him they could not carry a tune, and besides they had laryngitis, and moreover they were tone deaf, and in any case, the only song they knew was “Trees.”
“I found the rascals, Cousin Boo!” crowed William Ransom as he hauled them, kicking feebly, to the piano.
Boo smiled approval, ran an arpeggio, and the songs of the 1930’s commenced.
First came “The Music Goes Round and Round” as a kind of flexer for the chorale. Next came “The Hut-Sut Song” in case the first flexer had not quite flexed everybody. Then, confident they were flexed, Boo trusted them with “Small Hotel” and “Funny Valentine.” Then came “Isle of Capri,” during which a nostalgic shimmer appeared behind T. T. Wilcox’s spectacles and he actually hummed two and a half bars before he was silenced by a glare from Noah Fenster. Then Boo, shifting moods, swung into the rousing rhythms of “Strike Up the Band” and “Louisiana Hayride.”
Then the bedroom door opened and Jefferson Tatum appeared and looked upon the revels as Charlton Heston had looked upon the children of Israel when he surprised them doing a hora around the Golden Calf.
“STOP THE MUSIC!” roared Jefferson in a voice so loud that William Ransom jumped squealing into the arms of Nineteen Meyers.
The other Owenses fell into a timor
ous silence, except for Boo. She was the only Owens not frightened of Jefferson. In fact, she was quite fond of the old pirate. Jefferson liked Boo too and would have been delighted to have her as a daughter-in-law. Failing that, he would have thoroughly enjoyed jumping on her elegant bones.
But he had no eyes for Boo as he advanced, dark as a thundercloud, into the room. “If you got to sing,” he snarled at the huddled carolers, “how about ‘Nearer My God to Thee’? That’s customary, ain’t it, when the ship is sinking?”
“What ship, Uncle Jefferson?” asked William Ransom.
“The Tatum Cigarette Company, that’s what ship, you ninny!” shouted Jefferson. “We’re going under like an anvil!”
Virgil concealed a grin. For a man facing a watery death, he thought, old Jefferson was sure a sound sleeper. He had napped through three hours of merrymaking just outside his door, not to speak of the landing and takeoff of a two-rotored helicopter. But Virgil discreetly kept his thoughts to himself.
“You’ve all read the last financial statement,” Jefferson went on. “That so-called Surgeon General is ruining us, and you stand here and sing! Ain’t nobody, for Chrisake, got no ideas?”
“I have, Uncle Jefferson,” said Robert E. Lee Owens. Lee, at twenty-nine the youngest of the Owenses, was also the most serious. His title was Director of Public Image; what’s more, he believed it. He was all the time consulting motivational researchers, writing memos, drawing graphs, and carrying a briefcase.
“I have some ideas,” said Lee, unzipping his briefcase.
“You have oatmeal for brains, is what you have,” said Jefferson. He turned to T. T. Wilcox. “You—you’re supposed to be the vice-president. What the hell have you been doing?”
“Everything I can, sir,” said Mr. Wilcox, licking his dry lips. “We’ve dropped all our crime shows on television and switched entirely to wholesome family comedies. And, if I may say so, sir, it seems to be effective. Tatums are still the No. 1 cigarette in the country.… Of course I know sales were down last year, but all cigarettes fell off.”
“And a good thing,” rumbled Nineteen Meyers, looking up from his bottle. “Them lousy cigarettes play hell with your wind. Brother, I catch any of my athletes smoking, it’s two hundred laps around the track!”
Jefferson clenched his hands tightly. If he did not need this cretin, he would have fired him long ago. But he did need him, so he squinched down his temper and forced a smile. “Nineteen, old buddy,” he said winsomely, “how would you like to go outside and dig a few stumps?”
“Later maybe,” said Nineteen. “I got some whisky to finish.”
“You do that,” said Jefferson. “It’s good for you. Not like cigarettes.”
“Sir,” said Noah Fenster, Director of Research, “I’ll be glad to dig some stumps.”
“You stay right here,” said Jefferson, grabbing Mr. Fenster by the necktie. “What the hell’s been going on in that lab of yours? Where’s the new filter you said you’re developing, the one that’s so all-fired effective?”
“Well, I did develop it, sir,” answered Mr. Fenster, perspiring, “and it is remarkably effective. Trouble is, you can’t get any smoke through it.”
Jefferson released Mr. Fenster’s necktie and heaved a long, racking sigh. “So we’re licked, is that it? We just lay back and wait for the so-called Surgeon General to put us out of business.”
“Uncle Jefferson,” said Lee Owens, “I have made a survey of our problem—a study in depth, you might call it.”
“Shut up,” said Jefferson.
“I won’t shut up!” declared Lee with a rush of determination. “You just listen to me, Uncle Jefferson. I have talked to dozens of experts in psychology and motivational research, and I have gathered all the findings of the Tobacco Industry Research Council, and you are going to listen to me!”
The Owenses looked up with trembling as Jefferson’s color rose.
“Listen to him, Pa,” said Virgil quietly.
The old man’s color subsided. “All right, sonny,” he said to Lee. “Go ahead.”
Lee reached into his briefcase and removed a sheaf of papers. “First of all, let’s take the work of the Tobacco Industry Research Council, to which we all belong. The Council, as you know, provides generous grants, with no strings attached, to any reputable, independent research organization, public or private, that wishes to make studies of smoking. So far we have spent eight million dollars through the Tobacco Industry Research Council, not to mention the ten-million-dollar grant we just gave the American Medical Association to make a four-year study of the effects of tobacco.”
“By all means, sonny, let’s don’t mention the ten-million-dollar grant to the AMA,” said Jefferson. “That’s a simple horse-trade, like you’ll find in any political back room in the country. I’m only guessing, of course, but it seems to me you don’t need to be a genius to figure that one out. We hand the AMA ten million to play with for four years; what they get back is a pledge from all the tobacco state Senators and Congressmen to keep Medicare bottled up in committee for four years. Looks to me like an ordinary, everyday piece of logrolling.… No, sonny, forget AMA and get back to the deal with no strings—the eight million dollars we’ve handed the Tobacco Industry Research Council. What have we got to show for it?”
“I am glad you asked that question, Uncle Jefferson,” said Lee, opening a folder. “I have here reports from nearly one hundred unimpeachable scientists which completely exonerate cigarettes.”
“Exonerate!” shouted Jefferson. “Unimpeachable! Eight million dollars we give away, and for this we get exonerate!
“But that’s the word—exonerate. Nobody at Johns Hopkins or Sloan-Kettering or anywhere else has yet found a carcinogen in tobacco.”
“Carcinogen!” mumbled Jefferson. “Dandy!”
“And here is the Berkson report,” Lee continued, waving a paper. “Dr. Joseph Berkson, no less—the chief of biometry at Mayo Clinic!”
“Biometry,” said Jefferson. “Very nice … Yes, sonny, let’s talk about Dr. Berkson’s report. Happens I know it real good. He said a casual significance had been erroneously assigned to a statistical association. He said—and I quote—‘It is a notorious example of what Alfred North Whitehead has called the fallacy of misplaced concreteness.’… Sonny, I got to admit it: there now is one hell of a battle cry!”
“But, sir—”
Jefferson, livid, was pacing back and forth, waving his arms wildly, and Virgil whispered to Boo, “Here comes the black hat.”
“The what?” said Boo, mystified.
“Listen,” whispered Virgil.
“For God’s love!” cried Jefferson. “Why are we talking about Alfred North Whitehead when we ought to be out looking for a black hat?”
“Who ought to?” asked William Ransom Owens.
“We!” answered Jefferson. “The cigarette industry. We got to find a black hat.”
“I see,” said William Ransom, who did not.
“You all been to the cowboy movies,” said Jefferson. “When the bad guy comes in, what’s he got on his head? A black hat! You know right away he’s the bad guy, and you’re properly scared.”
“Why, that’s true!” exclaimed William Ransom. “Like in Shane and High Noon and like that.”
“Thank you,” said Jefferson with a tight smile at William Ransom. “A black hat means bad, means dangerous, means death! And that’s what the so-called Surgeon General got going for him—a black hat: cigarettes. Coffin nails, gaspers—a black hat if ever there was one. Is it any wonder people are scared of cigarettes?”
“Damn well ought to be,” muttered Nineteen Meyers. “Terrible for your wind.”
But Jefferson was too wound up to notice. “A black hat!” he cried. “That’s what we got to find. We’re in a war to the finish with this so-called Surgeon General, and we ain’t going to win it with ten-dollar words. That guy is trading in fear, and fear is something you can only fight with fear, not with Alfred North W
hitehead.… Say, who the hell is he anyhow?”
“A famous Western badman,” said Virgil.
“Oh, clever,” said Jefferson balefully. “We’ll have many a chuckle about that after the bankruptcy hearing.”
“Uncle Jefferson,” said Lee, “I quite understand what you mean by the black hat. There is no doubt that the Surgeon General has fear on his side. For instance, I have here a report—” he produced another folder—“which was done for me by a prominent motivational research organization. This report proves conclusively—now mark this well!—that 96 percent of all Americans associate cigarette smoking with sin!”
Jefferson accepted the intelligence calmly. “How much did this report cost you?” he asked. “I mean cost me?”
“Fifteen thousand dollars,” answered Lee. “Or was it fifty thousand? I could look it up.”
“Why, you twelve-thumbed idiot!” roared Jefferson. “I could have told you for free that people think cigarettes are the road to perdition. Ain’t you never heard one of them Bible-thumpers?… Naw, I guess you’re too young.… Well, I heard plenty of ’em—old-time bull-voiced hellfire-shouters. Cigarettes, they said, are the instruments of the devil.… And make no mistake, sonny, people believed it. Course they didn’t stop smoking, no more than they stopped drinking or humping, but every time they took a puff, there was a little pinch of guilt—the same kind of sinful feeling they felt the first time they snuck a smoke behind the barn. Down deep in their gut they knew the Lord would call for a reckoning someday.… Well, sonny, this makes pretty easy pickings for the new breed of hellfire-shouters. Oh, it’s a new breed, all right. They ain’t Christ-bitten country boys this time, not backwoods bumpkins with hay in their hair. Now they’re all nice, smooth-talking fellows with white smocks and medical degrees. And they ain’t threatening damnation on that far-off Judgment Day. They got it for you right here and now. I mean lung cancer.”
“I do wish you’d read my memos, Uncle Jefferson,” said Lee with an edge of exasperation. “I covered all this months ago. We’re up against a scare campaign; I know that. But the other side has all the scare techniques; we have none. So let’s stop looking for a black hat. Let’s instead try a brand-new approach to the smoking public—a campaign of moderation. Let’s go part way with the Surgeon General’s committee. Let’s concede that too much smoking might hurt you.”
