Карл Хайасен - Squeeze Me

Angie said, “But there’s a guest list.”

“You should see all the characters outside, trying to crash this party. Scammers, posers, pouty-ass billionaires that didn’t get an invite. I feel sorry for the Secret Service tonight.”

“Mr. Tile, I need to know if he’s here. And what about the snakes?”

The old man motioned around the grounds with his cane and said, “This is a damn big slice of habitat. You should get back to work, Angela.”

—

It had turned into the weirdest, most frenetic shift of Jerry Crosby’s law-enforcement career. While most of his officers were working traffic control and perimeter security at the Commander’s Ball, other large though less-exclusive galas were underway all over the island. The police chief was sitting in his SUV in front of Casa Bellicosa and monitoring the dispatch calls when the shit totally demolished the fan, shortly after sunset.

The first big python interrupted the Carpal Tunnel auction at the Alabaster Club. The second snake derailed the Scoliosis raffle at the Founders Club. A third Burmese appeared in a gin fountain at the Pilgrim Club, then another at the Plymouth Club, then the Sailfish Club, then the Marlin Club, then the Snapper Club, then the Bath Club, and finally the Salt Club.

Angie Armstrong was tied up at the Winter White House, so Jerry Crosby went and killed each of the pythons himself. All the event managers begged him not to further disrupt their festivities by using a gun, but Crosby had no experience wrestling lethal reptiles and no time to debate other options. He left the dead snakes lying where he shot them, and was assured more than once that he’d be out of a job the following Monday. After a certain number of threats, he no longer gave a flying fuckeroo.

A text from Agent Paul Ryskamp brought the chief speeding back to Casa Bellicosa, where the Cornbright brothers had been intercepted stepping onto the seawall after arriving on an inflatable outboard. The boat was the tender for their new yacht, the Inheritance, which Chase and Chance had inconveniently anchored near the main channel of the Intracoastal Waterway, for maximum exposure.

The Secret Service had whisked the Cornbrights from the seawall to a secure storage room filled from floor to ceiling with bootlegged Canadian toilet paper. When Crosby walked in, the young men and their wives were loudly griping that they’d been humiliated in front of the other members and guests. The chief informed them that it was he who’d gotten their names on the ticket list, and that everyone else but them understood that Casa Bellicosa was to be accessed only through the front portico, where armed agents were overseeing the ID checkpoints and metal-detectors.

“So what if we came in a boat instead of a car? That’s no reason to treat us like we’re Al-Qaeda!” Chase snapped.

With narrow-eyed reproach, his brother added, “Chief Crosby, what do you think our mother would say about all this?”

“She’d say you’re acting like spoiled little turds.”

The chief led the stewing young men and their spouses to the Grand Ballroom, where the other guests had congregated in anticipation of dinner and POTUS’s arrival. Crosby saw that sequin party masks were being distributed at each table. He overheard a server say they were leftovers from Mardi Gras Night.

A confused Cornbright spouse said: “Is this a costume ball? Nobody told us!”

“What if they re-themed the event?” fretted her counterpart.

The room went dark, and The Collusionists started playing “Hail to the Chief.” Crosby slipped out through the kitchen and headed back to his SUV, so he missed Mastodon’s entrance. Later, he and 18.4 million other Americans would watch the viral YouTube video, almost all of them wondering why the President of the United States was holding a Bakongo tribal fertility mask over his face, how he had come to choose such an unusual artifact, and whether it was a safe alternative for an N95.

In fact, the wooden mask was a replica that for decades had hung between the genuine head of a snow leopard and the genuine horns of a greater kudu on an oak-paneled wall in the club’s Safari Room. Christian himself had volunteered to fetch the mask following the accident, when Mastodon had refused to go to the hospital and bellowed that nothing would stop him from attending the Commander’s Ball.

Days later, on the long flight home to Copenhagen, the newly unemployed tanning-bed technician would rack his brain trying to figure out why the Cabo Royale had malfunctioned yet again. It couldn’t possibly have been sabotage—the machine had been locked down under guard since Christian completed the final tune-up. Had one of the replacement capacitors been faulty? Or one of the new relays? Also, against Christian’s advice, the President had applied to his skin a pungent cream advertised as a miracle bronzing accelerant, and promoted by one of his groveling right-wing radio stooges.

Whatever had gone wrong inside the Cabo, the result was arresting. Mastodon’s complexion was the color of eggplant when he punched his way through the canopy. His goggles were fogged, his signature forelock was spiky and charred, and the Velcro base of his skull cap emitted an audible sizzle. He came out raging.

Christian spent the rest of the night being interrogated by the Secret Service. The next morning, Spalding called to tell him what had happened during the Commander’s Ball. Christian said he was relieved not to have been there, though he would have loved to see Lady Tarzan in that skimpy Versace.

—

“My fellow Americans,” the President began, “thank you so much for coming to show your support. I can’t think of a more beautiful night in a more beautiful place to celebrate the beautiful achievements of my administration. Pause for applause.”

The last sentence wasn’t meant to be read aloud, but Mastodon’s view of the teleprompter cues was narrowed by the tribal mask’s slit-like eye holes. Regardless, there had been no burst of applause because the mask was also blocking the projection of the President’s voice—only a husky, muffled singsong reached the microphone, leaving the audience adrift. Some guests theorized that the President was attempting an authentic African dialect, to match his colorful face piece.

“Before we go any further,” he said, “I’d like to recognize two amazing young men who are here with us tonight, Charles and Chauncey Cornbright. Where are you, fellas? Stand up!”

The Cornbrights, Chase and Chance, didn’t move. They couldn’t make out a word the man was saying.

“Come on, guys, stand!” prodded Mastodon impatiently. He’d once played a round of golf with the brothers but he couldn’t recall what the hell they looked like. Neither of the snots had broken 100— that he remembered.

An aide crept to the podium and asked Mastodon to position the mask a few inches out farther from his face. He did, and it helped.

“As many of you know, not long ago, Chuck and Chandler tragically lost their mother in a horrible, violent crime,” he went on. “Kikey Pew Fitzsimmons was a close personal friend of mine and a founding member of the Potussies, my favorite bunch of badass Palm Beach gals. Where are you ladies? Stand, please.”

Seated at a front table, the Potussies arose shimmying and twirling imaginary lariats—a raucous detonation of red, white, and blue. Each of their gowns was more elaborate and blindingly tasteless than the last. When the women attempted to croon the President’s name, he cringed behind the mask thinking: Th ese broads are already shit-faced.

“I want the Cornbright brothers to know,” he continued, “that we haven’t forgotten, and we’ll never forget, what happened to our precious Kikey Pew”—this time the mispronunciation drew uneasy murmurs—“and it’s my sworn promise to you, Chip and Christopher, that justice will be done, and justice will be harsh! Pause for applause!”