MASH 08 MASH Goes to Hollywood Read online

  The waiter reappeared with two fresh martinis on his silver tray.

  “I trust these will be satisfactory, gentlemen,” he said. “Perhaps you would care to taste them?”

  Both Dr. Pierce and Dr. McIntyre reached toward the tray, picked up a martini glass, drained it, and set it back on the tray.

  Dr. McIntyre smacked his lips and cocked his head to one side. He nodded his approval. Dr. Pierce pursed his lips and closed his eyes. Then he too nodded his head.

  “Very good, James,” he said. “Bring us two more just like those.”

  “Now that you know how we like them,” Trapper added.

  “Very good, gentlemen,” the waiter said.

  They watched him march back across the thickly carpeted floor.

  “Virtue is obviously its own reward,” Hawkeye said.

  “When the waiter comes back, I’ll borrow his pencil and write that down,” Trapper said. “A gem of wisdom like that should not be lost to humanity.”

  “Cast bread upon the waters,” Hawkeye said.

  “I suspect that you’re leading up to something.”

  “I was simply thinking where we would be had it not occurred to us to petition the Framingham Foundation for a medical scholarship for State Trooper Harris, alias Dr. Smith.”

  “How right you are,” Trapper John said, with feeling.

  “At this very moment, Doctor, we would be in the gymnasium of the Mamie Luckenbill Junior High School, drinking lukewarm Kool-Aid and about to dine on baked beans and mostly meat hot dogs en casserole.”

  “I wouldn’t want this to get around, Doctor, of course,” Trapper John said, “but would it shock you to learn that I don’t really care for the eighth grade school of art, even if the artist is one of your offspring and the teacher is my beloved bride?”

  “Ah, here you are,” Hawkeye said to the waiter. “How nice! I always think a martini is just the thing before dining on beef Wellington.”

  “Especially a beef Wellington preceded by oysters Bienville,” Trapper John said. “Has it ever occurred to you, Doctor, how fortunate we are that our partners down life’s long path are, shall we say, queer for mostly meat hot dogs and baked beans?”

  “Gentlemen,” the waiter said, “Mr. Framingham sends his apologies and asks me to tell you that he will join you just as soon as he solves a little problem with Miss Bazoom.”

  “Mr. Framingham is having trouble with Miss Bazoom?” Hawkeye asked, brightening.

  “It wouldn’t be a problem requiring the attention of duly licensed physicians and all-around healers, by any chance?” Trapper inquired, helpfully.

  “I don’t believe so, sir,” the waiter said. “I believe the problem is logistic.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Miss Bazoom’s pigeons were delivered earlier today, sir, the ones she uses in her dance?”

  “And?”

  “I fear the chef made a little error, sir. The pigeons were served with a nice little sauce piquante at luncheon. Rather well received, too, I might add.”

  “I see,” Hawkeye said. “Well, I can see how something like that could happen.”

  “Miss Bazoom is rather distraught, sir. It appears the pigeons were trained.”

  “Trained?”

  “Yes, sir. Apparently, when given the command, they picked portions of Miss Bazoom’s costume in their beaks and flew away with it.”

  “Well, I can understand why she’s annoyed,” Trapper John said. “But I’m sure that Mr. Framingham can handle the situation.”

  “Indeed,” Hawkeye said. “He is, after all, the great- grandson of our beloved founder.”

  “Quite so, sir,” the waiter said. “Mr. Framingham asks the privilege of sending you a drink while you wait. Another martini, gentlemen?”

  “That would make four,” Hawkeye said. “I never drink four martinis at a sitting.”

  “So you’d better bring us two more,” Trapper John said. “That will make a total of five.”

  “Which, of course, is perfectly all right.”

  The waiter made a little bow and left them.

  Thirty minutes later, Mr. Matthew Q. Framingham VI appeared. Mr. Framingham was not only the great-grandson of the founder of the Framingham Foundation but also its executive secretary and general manager.

  “Hello, there, Matthew my boy,” Hawkeye greeted him cheerfully. “I trust the problem with Miss Bazoom has been satisfactorily resolved?”

  “Resolved,” Matthew said, sitting down and beckoning for the waiter. “Have you any idea how difficult one finds it to purchase trained pigeons?”

  “I’ve never really given it much thought,” Trapper John confessed.

  “But you don’t want to hear my problems,” Matthew Q. Framingham VI said. “How, gentlemen, may I be of service?”

  “We need to launder some money,” Trapper said.

  “What Dr. McIntyre means to say, Matthew,” Hawkeye said, quickly, “is that we wish to pass some money through the foundation. The money will be used to provide a scholarship for a deserving young man. We wish the source of the funds to remain anonymous.”

  “A deserving young man, you say?” Framingham inquired. He was a very large young man, the sixth male of his name to be graduated from Harvard. He had, consequently, a rather odd, somewhat nasal manner of speech.

  “That’s right. We want to send him to medical school.”

  “I’m sure it can be arranged,” Matthew said. “Just last week, Judge Kegley posed a rather similar problem to us. We arranged a full-scholarship, tuition, plus living expenses, for a protégée of his. A Miss Tootsie MacNamara. She will matriculate next week at the South Boston College of Cosmetology and Hairdressing.”

  “I know what you’re thinking, Matthew,” Trapper John said, “and you’re about to get a knuckle sandwich.”

  “My dear doctor,” Matthew said, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “We have been thinking of Harvard Medical School,” Hawkeye said.

  “Which brings us to problem two,” Trapper said.

  “Which is?”

  “Who do we know who can get him into Harvard Medical School?”

  “That does pose a problem,” Framingham said.

  “You mean to tell me we don’t have any Framingham Fellows on the faculty?”

  “I believe that twenty percent of the faculty are privileged to be Framingham Fellows,” Matthew said.

  “Well, then, if a fellow can’t do a fellow a favor, where are we?” Hawkeye said.

  “You’re acquainted with C. Calumet Hennesy, M.D., F.A.C.S., of course?”

  “Is C. C. the man to see?”

  “And Clancy C. Hennesy, his son, the distinguished radiologist?”

  “Ol’ Clancy owes me a couple of favors,” Hawkeye said. “Are we then home free, Matthew?”

  “Last week, Clancy Calumet Hennesy III, who last year graduated summa cum laude from Harvard College with honors in biochemistry, was informed that Harvard Medical School regretted there was no place for him.”

  “But his old man is professor of radiology!” Hawkeye said.

  “And Grandpa, old C. C., is professor of chest-cutting emeritus!” Trapper said.

  “As you can see, there are problems,” Matthew said. “His name is Jasper T. Whaley.”

  “Who is he?”

  “The director of admissions,” Framingham said.

  “And what’s his problem?”

  “He was denied fellowship, for the third time, in the Framingham Foundation.”

  “Why?”

  “He’s henpecked, and his old lady has both nutty ideas and a big mouth,” Matthew said, lapsing momentarily from his customary manner of speech.

  “She does?”

  “Mrs. Eloise Whaley was reliably reported to have announced, at the Back Bay Petunia and Dahlia Society, that once her Jasper got into the Framingham Foundation, he would see to it that the doors were opened to the other sex.”

  “My God!
No wonder he was blackballed!” Trapper replied.

  “Heresy, that’s what it is, heresy!” Hawkeye said.

  “The membership committee vote the last time was eleven black, no white,” Matthew reported.

  “So he’s retaliating by not letting anyone in who has a Framingham Foundation connection?”

  “You could phrase it that way,” Framingham replied.

  “He’s retaliating by not letting anyone in who has a Framingham Foundation connection,” Trapper John dutifully phrased it that way. “So where does that leave us?”

  “Gentlemen,” Matthew said, “at the risk of disloyalty, of being asked for my resignation from the Harvard Club, there are, you know, other medical schools.”

  “Yes, we know,” Trapper John said. “But we’ve already been turned down by the good ones.”

  “Harvard,” Hawkeye said, “was sort of a substandard substitute. Under the circumstances, we were prepared to put up with it, ruinous as that was liable to be to his medical education, if that was the only way we could get Gargantua into medical school in the fall.”

  “Now what?” Trapper John said.

  “Did you say Gargantua? What an odd name!” Matthew said. “Spanish, perhaps?”

  “Now what?” Trapper John said, again. “Is anyone listening to me?”

  “I think we better have another martini and think this over,” Hawkeye said. “Although it seems right now if we can’t get him in Harvard, we can’t get him in anywhere next fall.” He looked around for the waiter. He was nowhere in sight.

  “Look at the bright side,” Trapper John said. “A year from now, we can get him into our alma mater.”

  “One thing I can’t stand is a professional optimist,” Hawkeye said. “Where the hell is the master of the wet martinis?”

  The waiter appeared at that moment, obviously distraught, and headed right for their table.

  “Three more of the same, my good man,” Hawkeye said.

  “Excuse me, sir,” the waiter said to Matthew Q. Framingham VI. “There is, I fear, a bit of a problem.”

  “You can say that again,” Trapper John said.

  “There is, I fear, a bit of a problem.”

  “Can’t it wait?” Matthew Q. Framingham said. “I told Miss Bazoom I was having pigeons flown in from Brooklyn.”

  “It concerns a member, sir,” the waiter said. “At least I think he’s a member. He says he’s a member.”

  “Get some black coffee into him and try to get him to bed,” Dr. Pierce prescribed.

  “The important thing is not to send him home in his present condition,” Dr. McIntyre said. “His wife might get the right idea of what goes on around here.”

  “The gentleman is not trying to leave, sir,” the waiter replied. “He’s trying to get in.”

  “Well, then, what’s the problem?”

  “He doesn’t have a key,” the waiter said.

  “You know the rules, Kegley,” Matthew Q. Framingham VI said. “He signs the lost key card. You compare the signature with the card file. He pays the fine for having lost his key, and he is then given admission. We’ve been doing that for fifty years.”

  “The gentleman refuses to sign the lost key card, sir,” the waiter said. “He says he’s traveling incognito, and if he signs the card he will, ipso facto, become cognito.”

  “The rules are quite clear, Kegley,” Matthew Q. Framingham VI said. “Paragraph 31, section C, paragraph a1, I believe. Under those circumstances, the gentleman seeking entrance will be asked to leave. If he fails to leave, the assistant sergeant at arms will see that he does leave, forcibly if necessary.”

  “Who is the assistant sergeant at arms now, Matthew?” Hawkeye asked.

  “Man Mountain Mulligan,” Framingham replied. “Colonel de la Chevaux recommended him. There was some trouble with the American Football League. He apparently tore the arms off a rival football player, was suspended, and needed suitable employment.”

  “In that case, Kegley,” Hawkeye said, “ask Assistant Sergeant at Arms Mulligan to be gentle with the gentleman. He may have his reasons for being incognito, and neither Dr. McIntyre nor myself really want to put the arms back on someone just now. Awfully messy, you know.”

  “Sir,” Kegley said, “when I denied the gentleman entrance, he threatened to rip the bars from the door and come in anyway. At that point, I took the liberty of bringing Assistant Sergeant at Arms Mulligan into the matter.”

  “And Mulligan’s really torn him up? Pulled his arms off?”

  “Not quite, sir. The gentleman, at the moment, is holding Assistant Sergeant at Arms Mulligan upside down with his left hand while he’s working on the bars with his right. It was at that point that I decided I had best bring the incident to Mr. Framingham’s attention.”

  “Good thinking, Kegley,” Framingham replied. “If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, I’ll tend to this little problem.”

  Trapper John stood up.

  “I can handle this by myself, Dr. McIntyre,” Framingham said. “Thank you just the same.”

  “I wouldn’t miss it for the world, Matthew,” Trapper said. “I’m with you.”

  With Matthew Q. Framingham VI in the van and Kegley in the rear, the four of them marched out of the sitting room and across the wide lobby to the front door.

  Everything was as Kegley had reported. Man Mountain Mulligan, all six-feet-two and 230 pounds of him, was suspended, upside down, by his ankles, which were held in the left hand of an even larger human being. The right hand of the even larger human being was twisting the wrought-iron bars protecting the foyer of the Framingham Foundation out of the way.

  The bar-twister was neatly dressed. He wore a camel’s hair, double-breasted overcoat and a pearl-gray fedora, one side of the brim curled upward, the other down. The fingers of the hand with which he was slowly, but inexorably, twisting the wrought-iron bars out of the way were beringed. The pinky held an eight-carat, square-cut diamond, and the index finger a ninety-four-carat emerald.

  The face was somewhat unfamiliar, but the fedora with the sloping brim, the camel’s hair overcoat, and the two rings were unmistakable. The ninety-four-carat emerald had once adorned the index finger of Sheikh Abdullah ben Abzug, absolute ruler of the sheikhdom of Abzug. The eight-carat diamond had once been the property of Colonel Jean-Pierre de la Chevaux. He had lost it in a small game of chance.

  “Put the nice man down, Boris!” Hawkeye said.

  “What happened to your beard, fatso?” Trapper John asked.

  “You’re not supposed to recognize me,” Boris Alexandrovich Korsky-Rimsakov said, disappointment in every syllable, flipping Assistant Sergeant at Arms Mulligan around and setting him back on his feet. “I’m traveling incognito.”

  “It was the rings,* Boris,” Hawkeye said.

  “Of course,” Boris said. “I could not, of course, under the circumstances, be expected to think of every lousy little detail. Now please tell that simpering simpleton with you to open the bloody door.”

  “He’s talking about you, Matthew,” Trapper John said, helpfully.

  “Maestro,” Matthew Q. Framingham VI said, “you should have identified yourself!”

  “If I identified myself, you idiot, how could I be incognito?” He put his arms around Trapper John and Hawkeye. “Let’s have a little drink,” he said. “It’s been a long and dusty ride from the airport.”

  (* In addition to its intrinsic worth, the ninety-four-carat emerald, known to jewelers as the Star of Abzug, had a diplo-political significance. It had been presented to Mr. Korsky-Rimsakov by Sheikh Abdullah ben Abzug on the occasion of Mr. Korsky-Rimsakov’s ennoblement. When the fortunes of fate threw the sheikh and Mr. Korsky-Rimsakov together for a two- week period (the details of which, for students of Arab-American relationships, may be found in M*A*S*H GOES TO MOROCCO (Pocket Books, New York, 1975) the sheikh had been so impressed with the singer’s relationships with the gentle sex that he created him Sheikh El Noil Sniol (roughly. Lion Loins) o
f Abzug, Privy Counsel to the Throne. Subsequently, the singer was named Ambassador Plenipotentiary and Extraordinary, which position entitled him to a Royal Abzugian diplomatic passport, thus sparing him the boredom of having customs officials paw curiously through his luggage and granting him diplomatic immunity against prosecution for violating the laws of whatever country in which he found himself in the pursuit of his diplomatic duties.

  Chapter Seven

  “I have some good news for you,” Boris Alexandrovich Korsky-Rimsakov, His Islamic Majesty’s Ambassador Plenipotentiary and Extraordinary to the World, announced the moment they had taken seats in the sitting room and called for strong drink. “I will be spending some time with you. Incognito, of course.”

  “I’ll bet that has something to do with your bare cheeks and chin,” Trapper John replied.

  “How perceptive you are, Doctor,” Boris replied. “Where the hell is the booze? I wonder why I come here. The service is really lousy.”

  “Patience, Boris,” Hawkeye said. “This may come as a shock to you, but many people regard membership in the Framingham Foundation as a great privilege.”

  “You’re kidding . . .”

  “Especially since the rules have been bent only twice to let in bachelors,” Hawkeye went on.

  “The other bachelor, I have been informed, is Framingham Number Six. Is that correct?”

  “Correct.”

  “Well, his great-grandfather, or whatever, founded it,” Boris said. “That explains special privilege for him. And odd that this should come up in idle conversation, I am, after all, the world’s greatest opera singer.”

  “Why is it odd that it should come up in idle conversation?” Trapper John asked, innocently. “It seems to me that whenever you and I have a little chat, Boris, it somehow manages to slip into the conversation.”

  The waiter appeared. He set martinis before Drs. Pierce and McIntyre, and a busboy set up a wine cooler holding a jeroboam of Chateau Rothschild ’36. The sommelier, with a nice little bit of showmanship, popped the cork and then stood waiting impatiently for the singer to sip the wine.

  “It will do,” Boris said, grandly. “Put another bottle on ice.”