''I don't need to purge,'' he said. ''Except heavies being used tactically.
I have nothing against them if they use them right even if they kill you.
But for ground support give me a man like Pete Quesada.
There is a man who will boot them in.''
''Please.''
''If you ever want to quit a beat-up character like me that guy could give you ground support.''
''You are not beat-up, whatever that is, and I love you.''
''Please give me two tablets from that bottle and pour the glass of Valpolicella that you neglected to pour, and I will tell you some of the rest of it.''
''You don't have to.
You don't have to tell me and I know now it is not good for you.
Especially not the Valhalla Express day.
I am not an inquisitor; or whatever the female of inquisitor is.
Let us just lie quietly and look out of the window, and watch and see what happens on our Grand Canal.''
''Maybe we better.
Who gives a damn about the war anyway?''
''You and me, maybe,'' she said and stroked his head. ''Here are the two things from the square bottle.
Here is the glass of decanted vino.
I'll send you better from our own estates.
Please let us sleep a little while.
Please be a good boy and we just lie together and love each other.
Please put your hand here.''
''My good or my bad?''
''Your bad,'' the girl said. ''The one I love and must think about all week.
I cannot keep it like you keep the stones.''
''They're in the safe,'' the Colonel said. ''In your name,'' he added.
''Let's just sleep and not talk about any material things nor any sorrows.''
''The hell with sorrows,'' the Colonel said with his eyes closed and his head resting lightly on the black sweater that was his fatherland.
You have to have some damned fatherland, he thought. Here is mine.
''Why aren't you President?'' the girl asked. ''You could be an excellent president.''
''Me President?
I served in the Montana National Guard when I was sixteen.
But I never wore a bow tie in my life and I am not, nor ever have been, an unsuccessful haberdasher.
I have none of the qualifications for the Presidency.
I couldn't even head the opposition even though I don't have to sit on telephone books to have my picture taken.
Nor am a no-fight general.
Hell, I never even was at SHAEF.
I couldn't even be an elder statesman.
I'm not old enough.
Now we are governed in some way, by the dregs.
We are governed by what you find in the bottom of dead beer glasses that whores have dunked their cigarettes in.
The place has not even been swept out yet and they have an amateur pianist beating on the box.''
''I don't understand it because my American is so incomplete.
But it sounds awful.
But don't be angry about it.
Let me be angry for you.''
''Do you know what an unsuccessful haberdasher is?''
''No.''
''It is not discreditable.
There are many of them in our country.
There is at least one in every town.