Previously on The West Wing…
President Bartlet is censured by Congress for lying about his MS. C.J. is lying about her true feelings for the newly-returned Danny, who thinks that everyone is lying about the disappearance of the Qumari defense minister. And Josh is lying low to avoid Donna who thinks he should be dating Joey Lucas….
Previously in The Maltese Sparrow…
Who knows? I was watching The West Wing.
And now, The Maltese Sparrow: Part 4 – Citizens on Patrol…
Of all the places I expected to be taken, the Dirksen Senate Office Building was probably the last. Well, to be fair, the last place I expected to be taken was EuroDisney because no one ever goes there, but this place was pretty high on the list. Ms. Bouvier didn’t seem surprised so I decided to take it all in stride.
We breezed through some stuffy front office past a state flag I didn’t recognize and into the anteroom outside a Senator’s office. Tommy gave me another jab with his gun and said menacingly, “Just remember, Mr. Marlowe, that I’ll be right here, so no funny business.”
“Hang on a second,” I said, “How did you get a gun into a federal building? There are metal detectors all over the place in here.”
Slowly realization dawned on him and a look of terror spread across his face. With a scream he plunged into a gaping plot hole, leaving myself and Ms. Bouvier to contemplate our upcoming meeting in peace. “Very impressive, Sam,” she said admiringly. I looked at her stoically as I produced my pipe from my pocket and blew a few bubbles.
“I wouldn’t get too excited, sweetheart, as I just eliminated the possibility I could ever pull my revolver as well – or I might meet the same fate. So why don’t we cut to the chase, baby – what is it you’re supposed to be hiding from these creeps?”
She stepped back and looked at me with a hurt expression. “Don’t you believe me, Sam?”
I looked at her for a moment and then said, “Whether I believe you or not ain’t the issue. You knew what Tommy was talking about, even if you haven’t got whatever it is, now kindly explain what whatever it is is.” She looked at me for a moment and then we spent the next five minutes diagramming that sentence out. Finally, she understood and hesitantly explained.
“It’s a statue, a small sparrow carved in stone. Very rare and extremely valuable. There’s not a collector in the world who wouldn’t pay $5 million for it.”
I let out a whistle. “Five mill? That’s a lot of dough. No wonder everyone’s so excited about it.”
“Sam, the Maltese Sparrow is one of the most valuable statues in the world. People would kill for it. Please, you’ve got to make them believe I don’t have it.” She looked up at me with desperation in her eye. I handed her my handkerchief so she could get it out. “I’m sorry,” she said, “It’s Desperation by Calvin Klein- it keeps getting in there and irritating my eyes.”
“The Maltese Sparrow, eh? I didn’t know that the natives of Malta were all that clever in the statuary game.”
She then explained that it was not from Malta, but was in fact made in Cleveland where, shortly after being completed, a large chocolate malt was spilled on it and it has proved remarkably difficult to clean. Either way, now we know what the mysterious Ms. Bouvier knows and I was looking at all the cards on the table. Or so I thought….
The door to the Senator’s office opened and out stepped a distinguished looking man in his late 50’s. He waved away some bubbles in the air with his hand and said sharply, “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize I’d walked into a taping of the Lawrence Welk show out here.”
“Very amusing, Senator, but you’re a day late and a dollar short since Lawrence Welk has been dead for fifty years. Now why don’t we dispense with the chit-chat and get down to business.”
He looked at me questioningly for a moment. “I think you’ll find that Lawrence Welk died in ’92, actually.”
“Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t. But that was the past and this is the present and who knows what tomorrow may bring except that it’s a safe bet it will be a lot like today but not as much like yesterday as today was although yesterday may be as similar to today as tomorrow in different ways which it’s hard to quantify.”
“Yes,” he said slowly before turing to Penny. He looked at her for a moment before holding out his arms and saying, “And what about you? No hug for your father, dear?”
I was hoping he was her priest, but the look in her eye told me he probably wasn’t. And that she was also probably Jewish. Don’t ask me how, it just did.
To Be Continued…