Stories Without Pictures, Chapter 2: A Hilly Comes A-Calling

Here's the second in the installment of Stories Without Pictures. It's a transcript of a recent telephone-call I had...

A HILLY COMES A-CALLING

I was sitting at home in my palatial, oak-paneled library at Palmerwood, sipping Auld MacBlechantochuan, and lingering over the naughtier passages in the "Decameron," when Cubbings approached with the phone.

"Mrs. Clinton, sir," he murmured.

"Oh, good God's urge, tell 'er I'm out. Or dead," I snarled. But Cubbings was adamant.

"She says it's urgent, sir," he said firmly.

"Damn it to heck," I muttered, grabbing the phone. "Remind me to flog you later, Cubbings."

"I live to serve, sir," Cubbings said, and withdrew soundlessly.

I took the phone, and, wincing preemptively, groaned, "Hello?"

Having already braced himself, I was glad I did.

"JIMMEEEEEE!" squawked the phone in tones redolent of something between a foghorn and a crow. "How are you? Did you vote for me? How are your lovely children? Sylvia, Lenny, Maxie, and, uh, Lorax? And your lovely wife, The Armenian?"

I wasn't sure whether I was more repelled by the voice or more nauseated by the blatant insincerity of her inquiries about my family.

"Oh, we're well, Hilly, thanks for asking," I said weakly, casting desperately around for a reason to end the conversation. "How've you been? I know the last few weeks have been rough."

"Oh, you know," blared the phone, "yeah, that was rough. But Huma and I were able to get down to Myrtle Beach for a little R and R."

"Myrtle Beach? Classy. You and Huma?"

"No, Bill."

"You said Huma."

"No I didn't."

"What can I do for you, Hilly?" I asked, gesturing furiously at Cubbings for more Scotch. I had the sinking feeling that this isn't going to be a quick call.

"Well, I'm glad you asked!" the phone cawed. "You and I are old friends, right, Jimmy? I mean, we go way back, don't we?"

"Look, Hilly," I said slowly and cautiously. I know enough to know when I'm about to get shook down, "I was glad to be able to kill Vince FOster for you--I always thought he was a zombie--and of course, I love partying with Marc Rich, but..."

"Good!" she brayed, and then her voice dropped to a conspiratorial rasp. "I knew I could count on you, Jimmy. You're my rock. Now listen, James, I need a favor...."

I gritted my teeth, waiting for Hillary to ask for her "favor."

"JP, Mrs. Clinton rasped, trying to whisper and failing pretty badly, "I'm in need of a swashbuckling, debonair, international daredevil who knows Russia inside and out and who has all kinds of highly-placed connections to perform a top-secret mission for me."

"You've got to be kidding me," I said. "Top secret mission? Hilly, you don't have any official capacity. You're not an elected official anymore. You don't hold any appointed positions. You're unemployed. Go knit something. Or take up gardening. Or ballroom dancing. Just retire already."

"But I'm a Clinton!" she barked. "That's official enough! Just being a Clinton is enough to get anyone to do anything I want! It's like being a Bush! Or a Kennedy! JUST DO THE DAMNED MISSION!"

"Well, it does sound right up my alley," I mused, half-tempted. It had been a while since I'd performed any high-stakes international espionage derring-do, and I was worried about getting rusty. Also, I was getting a little low on my favorite vodka, "Ol' One-Eyed Bolshevik Ivan's Blood of the Imperialist Capitalist Exploiters," and I was wondering if I called my old pal Vlad ahead of time, he couldn't have a couple of cases ready for me at Sheremetevo Airport.

"I'm listening, Hilly," I said. "Precisely what kind of unofficial top-secret mission for me do you have in mind?"

I must admit to being a little surprised when Hillary made her request.

"JP," Mrs. Clinton whispers, "I need you to sneak into Russia and bring back definitive proof that the Russians hacked the election for Trump."

There followed quite a long pause, which I ended by saying, "But there isn't any."

"Sure there is!" she bellowed. "Haven't you been watching the news?"

"Yeah, I've been watching the news," I snapped, grabbing a small marble statuette of Atticus Aristide Palmer, his great-great-great uncle off its pedestal and throwing it at Cubbings. "It's all just a long string of, 'Unnamed Sources Have Strong Reason to Believe,' and 'Intelligence Sources Now Think,' but there's zero proof. It's all just partisan hypothesis and conjecturing and grandstanding, and not one goddamn piece of solid evidence has yet been brought forward. Zero. There's just a bunch of phony outrage in the press. And from you."

"WHAT ABOUT THE CIA??!?" she roared.

"The CIA?" I snickered. "That bunch of geniuses with all their 'definitive proof of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq'? That bunch of twits who took eleven years to find Bin Laden? Honestly, Google Earth can show me chicks nude-tanning on the roof in Amsterdam, but the CIA can't find a six-foot, five inch Arab on dialysis whose face just happens to be on every milk-carton and hummus-container from Manhattan to Malaysia? Those Keystone Kops? Don't make me laugh. Come on, there are seventeen different intelligence agencies, and not even all of them agree on this. The CIA finds what the president tells them to find. You know it. I know it."

"How do you know about the Google Earth images of naked women sunbathing in Amsterdam?" Hillary asked.

"So I'm told," I said hurriedly, furiously gesturing to Cubbings to clear his search history. I began to sense the conversation going off the rails, so I tried to refocus Hillary.

"So let's recap, Hilly," I sighed. "You want the American people to believe that the Russians wrote a special, secret line of hacking-code that only the Russians or their stooges can use."

"Yes," she brayed.

"And they gave this super-secret code to Guccifer 2.0, a Romanian, and he used it to hack the DNC's servers, your personal email server, and John Podesta's and Colin Powell's personal email accounts."

"That's right," she cawed.

"And then Guccifer 2.0 turns all those juicy emails over to Wikileaks and DC Leaks, so that Julian Assange, another Russian patsy, who just happens to be under house arrest in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, can make it public."

"Yes," she squawked.

"And Julian Assange does this all at the behest of the shadowy, sinister Vladimir Putin, who, sitting spider-like in his lair at the Kremlin, directs all that is secret and skullduggerous across the planet with well-nigh Godlike omnipotence--all so his BFF Donald Trump can get elected."

"That's right," she honked.

"And that's how the Russians 'hacked' the American election, right?" I groaned. I suddenly had a pain in my lower back and felt a headache coming on. "That and some fake stories on Twitter, right?"

"Bingo," she screeched dulcetly. "And can you also find some proof that James Comey at the FBI is working for the Russians, too? And also Mitch McConnell? And Rex Tillerson, too?"

"Hilly," I said, "you do realize that that is some tinfoil hat-level conspiracy theory, don't you?"

"JUST FIND THE PROOF!!!" she bellowed.

"Good God's urge, Rodham," I snarled, "THERE ISN'T ANY. IT DIDN'T HAPPEN. Listen, do you want to know the real reason you lost? Seriously? Class, race, Russians, coal-miners, James Comey, Pussygate, blah blah blah. You really want to know why you lost the election?"

I took a deep breath, an even deeper gulp of Old MacBlechantochuan, lit another Cohiba, and barreled ahead.

"You really want to know why you lost the election, Hilly?" I said again. "Simple. NOBODY LIKES YOU."

"What are you talking about?" she bleated. "Obama said I was likable enough!"

"Well, he lied," I said flatly. "Look, American politics is a popularity contest. It;s unfortunate, but there it is. It just is. Americans don't really care about policy positions, or personal political philosophy, or character, or qualifications."

"But I went to Yale Law Schoo.."

"Doesn't matter. Americans vote for whom they like. Reagan--brains of a peacock, but he was folksy, avuncular, good with a quip. Mondale, unquestionably smarter and more honest, was as grim as a tombstone. Your husband is likable. Bob Dole came across as the crabby old man trying to send back his meatloaf at the early-bird special at Applebee's because it's too salty."

"But I was Secretary of...."

"Doesn't matter. Dubya couldn't find his ass with both hands, but he presented as the kinda guy you could have a beer with. Gore, unquestionably brighter and more qualified, campaigned like a fresh corpse. Nobody liked him. Even after Dubya got us into two completely pointless wars under false pretenses, he STILL beat John Kerry, who had the face of a horse and the personality of an unlikable horse, in spite of the fact that he was a smarter, better, and far more competent guy."

"But I..."

"DOESN'T MATTER, I keep telling you. Obama had the deck stacked against him--black AND liberal?--but McCain came across as crabby as Dole, only with hemorrhoids. Nobody liked him. Mitt Romney--who doesn't want to punch that smug prick in the kisser? So Obama won again, because he's funny, and cool under fire, and classy."

"But I..."

"And Trump was entertaining as hell. 'Little Marco,' 'Yeah, 'cause you'd be in jail,' 'WRAAAWWWWNNNG,' like it or not, the guy had some great TV moments. That stuff plays in America the Dumb. You just came across as elitist, hectoring, secretive, shrill, and artificial. All your one-liners sounded scripted--most likely by that putz Borowitz--and rehearsed. He sounded off the cuff and genuine. Would you have been the better president? Hell yes. Is he a trainwreck in a suit? No question. But Hilly... NOBODY LIKES YOU. It's just that simple."

I waited, bated breath, for Hillary to respond.

"So you don't think the Russians hacked my campaign?" she finally rasped.

"Nope," I said. "Matter of fact, the only campaign that got sabotaged in 2016 was the Democratic primary, when you screwed Bernie."

Hillary was silent for a long moment. It was one of the sweetest moments of my life.

"So you're not going to sneak into Russia and bring back definitive proof that the Russians hacked my campaign?" she growled.

"I am not," I trilled. "I might go anyhow--it's been a while since I hung out with the Rotenberg brothers at their dacha in Odessa, and that's always a party, but nope, I'm not accepting your mission."

Hillary chewed on this for another long minute.

"So I'm probably not gonna be president?" she gritted.

"Probably not, no," I said.

"Well, can I have a couple million for my Foundation?" she finally got around to asking.

"Will it get you off the phone with me?" I grumbled. It's a small price to pay.

"As soon as you like!"

"I'll have Cubbings drop off the check in the morning," I said wearily. And then I hung up. 

Stories Without Pictures, Chapter 1: The Distress-Call

Drawrin' pictures is hard work, and every so often, I post a Stupid Status Update Serialized Adventure (TM) on the Intersocial Medianet-Webs that doesn't have any illustrations.

There have been a bunch of them, but here's the first. Even without pictures, I still think it's pretty funny.

"THE DISTRESS-CALL"

I had a bad feeling about the distress signal that my pilot received as my luxurious private G-6 winged its way over Central Asia.

This is how irritating adventures generally begin.

Nevertheless, it would be caddish to ignore a cry for help, so I reluctantly gave the order to alter course and see who the hell was in trouble this time.

One makes sacrifices in order to be a Selfless Defender of the Republic.

My pilot informed me that the distress call was coming from Uighur-Abad in Kyrgyzstan.

Uighur-Abad? For some reason, that rang a bell. I hurriedly flipped through the card-file in my Mind-Palace. A wave of the most ominous, shadowy dread washed over my soul. I couldn't remember any halfway decent hotel-bars, restaurants, or tailors in that part of the world.

On the other hand, I thought, there may very well be a hidden stash of my favorite vodka, "Ol' One-Eyed Ivan's Blood of the Imperialist Capitalist Exploiters." They stopped making it in '93, and worldwide stocks are dwindling. But you never know. There might be a case or seven hidden in one of those old Soviet outposts. The trip may not be a total loss.

My luxurious G-6 private plane touched down at Osh Airport in a howling blizzard. I checked my very sophisticated GPS distance satellite-map thingies, and my eagle-eyes narrowed as I looked at all the blinky-blinky lights.

It was ten miles from Osh to Uighurabad, from whence the distress signal emanates.

"Ten miles in this part of the world could take a day or more," I mused to myself, as I lit a hand-rolled Cuban Cohiba with my grandfather's antique sliver lighter, "and that's in optimal driving conditions. I wonder how long it would take me by... another form of transportation."

Having been fortunate enough to make the acquaintance of a Kyrgyz fur-trader over a few glasses of "Uncle Genghis's Top-Notch Koumiss" in the airport bar, I was now properly insulated against the Central Asian blizzards. I'd bartered my way into a smashing ensemble: a floor-length coat of snow-leopard fur with matching shapka* and gloves.

"No reason why we can't look good--and, dare I say it, damned good--while answering a distress signal in the wilds of Central Asia," I thought to myself, catching sight of my own reflection in a shop-window, and preening just a tad.

Checking my GPS satellite blinky thing, I clambered atop a Bactrian camel and took a quick mental inventory. "Ten miles to Uighurabad on a camel in a blizzard, three Cohibas, a hip-flask of 'Auld Blechaintoshan,' scotch, a slight buzz from that koumiss, an Amex platinum card, a fully-loaded .44 Magnum Desert Eagle, and I'm wearing sunglasses," I thought. Not optimal, but I've been in worse situations. "Avanti."

But it wasn't long before I found myself in a tight spot.

The raging blizzard through which I was struggling on my way from Osh to Uighurabad suddenly took a turn for the worse. Howling winds whipped the skirts of my newly-acquired floor-length snow-leopard coat... ice and snow rent my flesh like knives.

Tragically, I was forced to go full "Han Solo and the Taun-Taun" on my Bactrian camel, gut the thing, and crawl inside its rib-cage.

Morosely, I fired up a Cohiba, took a swig of "Auld MacBlechaintochan 18-year," peered out from his makeshift dead camel shelter, and wondered, for the thousandth time, who's been sending that distress signal from Uighurabad.

The blizzard blew itself out, and, slightly footsore and smelling vaguely of camel-innards, but still looking absolutely smashing, I sidled into the town of Uighurabad in the former Soviet Republic of Kyrgyzstan, from whence the distress signal came.

It's a mighty depressing place. There are a few Soviet-era concrete monstrosities still clawing the Central Asian sky... a few tired-looking and poorly-stocked shops... a run-down mosque... a few old men huddled around the statue of Josef Stalin shaking hands with Manas, the legendary Kyrgyz national hero, in the town square.

I checked my GPS beepy blinky thing. The distress signal, whoever was sending it, appeared to be coming from behind a low ridge of hills just west of town.

"Off we go," I muttered to myself. "In the service of God, country, and my fellow-man, forward the battalions."

My crack security/extraction-team--an accessory no self-respecting international gentleman of fortune and intrigue should ever be without--seemed unavoidably delayed, so bravely on I forged.

I tracked the distress signal on my beepy blinky GPS thingy out of Uighurabad, over the low ridge of rocky escarpment west of Uighurabad to a jagged crack in the stones. It appeared to lead to a cave.

Cautiously, I stuck my head into the cave. A thick, musty odor of rot and decay filled my nostrils... a sound like muffled weeping tickled his ears. Who--or what--could possibly be inside???

Squinting into the darkness of the cave, I saw a huge, shaggy form curled into the fetal position on the rough stone floor. Its body trembled, racked with sobs. The stench was well-nigh overpowering--my eyes began to water.

Suddenly, the thing, sensing my presence, leapt to its feet and spun around, and I saw its horrible visage:

A hulking, brutish, simian form; a broad, flat face; a feral, snarling mouth; tiny, beady eyes, glittering with tears, under a heavy, jutting brow; a thick coat of shaggy, filthy, matted orange fur.

"Donald?" I said, recognizing my fellow filthy-rich plutocrat. "Good God's urge, this is the first time I've ever been disappointed that it WASN'T a yeti. What in the name of common sense are you doing here?"

I recoiled bit as the Trump-beast lumbered toward me. Don't laugh, you would too. The stench of unwashed Trump could give the average burning landfill a run for its money.

"Donald, what are you doing here?" I repeated, holding my lilac-scented, monogrammed linen handkerchief to my aristocratic nostrils as Trump, sobbing, embraced me. "Aren't you supposed to be blowharding your way through a Republican debate tonight?"

"Yeah, that's why I've been hiding out in a cave in Kyrgyzstan!" the Trump-thing wailed. "I've been hiding out here wishing the whole thing would just... go away! JP, I don't want to be President! I never did! I'm a complete buffoon, and I know it! But it's outta my control now. You gotta help me, man! You gotta figure some way to get me OUT of this thing!"

I reluctantly handed the shaggy, stinking Trump my last Cohiba and my hip-flask. I detest the man, but there's solidarity among One Percenters.

"It started as a gag," Trump muttered. "I was drinking with Barry Diller and David Geffen at the last Palmerwood hunting-party and I got lit up and they dared me to run for President. What the hell, I said. Sounds like a gas.

"But God help me... I started WINNING. JP, I've done everything to get out of it. I've said I'm gonna keep Mexicans out with a giant wall. I said Megyn Kelly was mean to me because she was on her period. I made fun of a handicapped reporter. I made fun of John McCain. I got Sarah Palin to endorse me, for Chryssakes. THAT should have been the kiss of death right there."

He turned to me, desperation in his piggy little eyes.

"But NOTHING WORKS," he moaned. "I keep rising in the polls! America the Stupid just eats up all my kooky with a spoon! The loonier I act, the more of a jerkoff I am, the bigger the total assclown I act like, this stupid country can't get enough of me! Hell, I even said I could shoot somebody and not lose supporters, AND I GOT A FIVE PERCENT BUMP IN IOWA!!!! What the HELL do I have to do to get out of this race, fellate ISIS on 'America's Got Talent'?! I'll do it if you think it'll work. Don't think I won't."

I couldn't help but feel a sneaking sympathy for The Donald.

"I get it," I commiserated. "Good God's urge, the outrageous, offensive stuff I post on Facebook about politics, Ann Coulter, religion, football, you--great zounds, I tick myself off, and I think I've been unfriended twice. And a lot of my friends are from Indiana. Some of them are in the clergy. Many of them are deeply conservative. Trust me, I get it."

"Yeah, good for you," the matted, reeking Trump-beast growled. "But what am I supposed to do?"

I didn't answer. Instead, I pulled out my mobile, opened up the CNN app, and the two of us anxiously watched the results of the Iowa Caucus now coming in.

"So what's happening?" Donald rasped. "What's going on?!?"

"Well, good news and bad news," JP says. "Good news is Bernie's closing the gap on Slick Hilly."

"Did I ever tell you about the threeway I had with Hilly and Donna Shalala?" the Trump beasts mused. "Boy, you talk about feeling like a third wheel. It was almost like they wished I wasn't there. What's the bad news?"

"Bad news is it looks like you might win," JP says. "But I think I have a plan anyhow."

I mulled it over. "You know what..." I said, "Yes.... yes, I think... you know, it's so crazy that it just... might... WORK."

I turned my attention back to the results of the Iowa Caucus coming on my mobile and snorted scornfully as I read the morning's headlines.

"What? What now?" Trump grunted from underneath the layer of crusted grime coating his shaggy bulk. "Did I win?"

"Nope, you came in second to Ted Crazed," I said. "I'm just laughing about this headline: 'Hillary Breathes "Huge Sigh of Relief" After Tie in Iowa.'"

"What's she got to be relieved about?" Trump wondered, scratching his chest absently and dislodging a chunk of calcified filth.

"Presumably, she's relieved at being able to leave Iowa untarred, unfeathered, and not on a rail," I answered. "But hold on.... I'm just about to put my idea into motion."

I tapped on my mobile, hit "send," and smiled up at Trump, who glared back at me.

"What are you doing on that stupid phone, Palmer?" he grunted, and scratched his rump, dislodging the few shreds of his trousers which remained there. "I came in second in Iowa, but I'm still in the race, and Huckabee, Santorum, and Rand Paul all dropped out today! You're supposed to be getting me OUT of this thing, not playing Angry Birds or looking at FoxNewsGirlsGoneWild.com or whatever it is you're doing!"

"Calm yourself, Donald," I replied, in my soothing baritone voice. God, is it soothing, that voice of mine. Feels like someone pouring warm syrup on your bare flesh. Next to me, Barry White sounds like Fran Drescher with emphysema. "Taken care of. You'll be toast in no time."

"What?" Trump bellowed, jumping up and down in a manner oddly redolent of an orangutan having a seizure. "What? How? What did you do???"

"I just nominated you for the Nobel Peace Prize," I grinned, folding my arms in satisfaction. "Texted a few friends in Sweden, called in some favors. It's in. You've been nominated. Heck, you might even win. If Henry Kissinger can win it after wiping Cambodia off the map, you've got a real shot at it."

Trump, dumfounded, suddenly burst out laughing, "You're KIDDING!" he bellows. "It.. it's GENIUS!"

I hate to look immodest, but I had to agree. In a political party whose entire foreign policy boils down to "bomb everything until it stops moving," winning the Nobel Peace Prize could have been the kiss of death for the Donald's campaign.

I checked my beepy-blinky satellite GPS thingy, which had suddenly begun going off like a string of firecrackers. Well, what do you know. My crack security-team had finally shaken off their hangovers, and decided to come looking for me, after a week or so. I resolved to have a stern chat with Mssrs. Dailey and Miller. Once I'd had a few drinks himself. It gets thirsty in Central Asia.

"Coming, Trump-Brute?" I asked. "I'm going to call for my plane and then continue on to Switzerland, which is where I was going when I got your distress signal. I need to drop some watches off at La Chaux-de-Fonds to get serviced. Come on, we'll stop in Monaco, get you cleaned up, pop into Le Saint-Benoit and grab a steak, what do you say? You've been living on raw cave-rats for two weeks now."

"Nah, you go on," the Trump-beast said. "I'm gonna wait until my poll-numbers drop some more. Also I'm gonna sue Cruz for screwing me in Iowa. No way I lost to that jagoff."

My eyes shot open in bewilderment, but I decided not to press the issue. I had done what I could to get Trump out of the race. The rest... was up to fate.