David Wallace - Broom of the System

“Jesus knew the sex was great!” squawked Vlad the Impaler.

“A pleasure to meet you, and a sincere expression of the profoundest gratitude for allowing us into your home and into the presence of an animal of vital theological importance,” Sykes was saying to Lenore, ignoring Lang’s outstretched hand. “Our friend Mrs. Tilsit has told me all about you and your profound relationship with your profound pet.”

“Tissaw,” said Candy Mandible.

“Tissaw.” Sykes smiled. “A bird through which the voice of the Lord has been personally heard by me to cry out for exposure to the American people, through the medium of, again, to my profound and humble honor, me.”

“Hmmm,” Lenore said.

“Lenore, Lenore,” twittered Vlad the Impaler. “Make me come. I need space, as a person. Let’s get rid of this disgusting unprofessional mirror. You will be a star in the electronic firmament of American evangelical theology! Like Charlotte’s Web!”

“Boy, he’s gotten even worse,” Lenore said to Candy.

“Worse?” cried Hart Lee Sykes. “Worse? The lady jests with us all, friends. Miss surely you are aware that your feathered companion has been touched by the hand of the Lord Himself.”

“Probably bit it, then,” muttered Lenore.

“Mmm-hmmm,” the crowd of technicians was rumbling at Sykes.

“… that he represents a theological development of the very highest order, a manifestation of the earthly intervention and influence of the Almighty comparable in significance to the weeping fir tree of Yrzc, Poland, and the cruciform tar-pit formations of Sierra Leone! Worse, she jests!”

The crowd of technicians laughed.

“Hart Lee, sweetheart,” crooned Vlad the Impaler.

“You live here too?” Lang whispered to Candy.

“Sshh,” Candy hissed. Lang grinned and put his finger to his lips, nodding.

“Mrs. Tissaw told you to put Vlad the Impaler on religious television?” Lenore was saying to Reverend Sykes. Vlad the Impaler was going to the bathroom on his little director’s chair.

“My little friend, the directive to afford this creature exposure to an American populace crying out for divine direction and reaffir mation came from a source far, far higher than Mrs. Tyson, or you, or I!” cried Sykes, standing on tiptoe in his pointed boots.

Lenore stared at Sykes. “Not my father.”

“Exactly, young Miss. The Father of us all!” Sykes looked around him. “I am the recipient of the mandate which all true humble servants of the Lord pray for, all their miserable lives. Thank you. Thank you.” Sykes made motions toward trying to kiss Lenore’s hand.

“It’s Tissaw,” Candy said wearily. Sykes gave her the fish-eye.

“Andrew Sealander Lang, here, padre,” Lang said to Sykes, taking the Reverend’s pudgy hand from Lenore’s and shaking it. “One of Ms. Beadsman’s closest friends and a deep admirer of her bird, and of your show, sir.”

The Reverend shook Lang’s hand without looking at him. He stared into Lenore’s eyes. Lenore could smell his breath. “Miss Beadsman, you are in a position to aid us in delivering to the American people and to the world the Lord’s true contemporary message, through His chosen feathered vehicle.”

“Look, I’m afraid I just don’t understand what you’re talking about,” said Lenore. “There’s a pretty troubling explanation for Vlad’s talking, I’m afraid, that shouldn‘t—”

“The only even remotely problematic problem is that the Lord is moving in such very mysterious ways through your pet that the miraculous little thing isn’t saying quite what requires to be said, quite as quickly as he might, given the extreme expense involved in delivering the message of the Lord these days,”said the Reverend. “The bird in its secular aspect seems to be so understandably caught up in the ecstasy of the Lord’s verbal presence within him that he goes far beyond what actually needs and is proper to be said, given the import of the mission.”

“Little fucker sounds pretty healthy to me,” said Vlad the Impaler, crunching a sunflower seed.

“A case in point,” the Reverend said solemnly to Lenore. “What you find yourself in a position to do is to help the bird deliver the message intended and required. His next line in the relevant initial message is, ‘All contributing subscriptions are tax-deductible.’ ” The Reverend’s smile reached almost to his ears. “If you could simply use your privileged position to reemphasize to the bird the vital importance of his mission, and prompt him to deliver the lines he’s directed by our Father through me to deliver, and also perhaps get him to stop biting the makeup-man…” Sykes gestured toward a pale man with a bandaged hand.

“I still don’t get it,” said Lenore.

“May I, Reverend?” Candy said, trying to ignore something Lang was whispering into her ear.

“By all means.” Sykes folded his arms and tapped a pointed boot on the floor. The director looked at his watch.

“What apparently happened was that Mrs. Tissaw was in here dusting,” Candy said, “two days ago, the day you went right from the switchboard to Clarice’s and then I guess to Rick‘s, ’cause you sure weren’t around, and I was out too, because Nick Allied and I finally…”

“Ahem,” said the Reverend.

“Anyway,” Candy said, “Mrs. Tissaw was in here, and she heard the little… the bird, and he I guess was saying religious stuff…”

“Of the profoundest importance,” Sykes added.

“… and she just had a complete spasm, from excitement, and she called ‘Real People,’ to try to get them to come have a look at him, because he’d supposedly been squawking something about ‘Real People’…”

“Well Candy you know how come he was saying that,” Lenore said.

“We all know tonight,” said Sykes, nodding solemnly. Affirmation-noise swelled from the cigarette smoke above the technicians’ heads.

Candy rolled her eyes. “And I guess ‘Real People’ figured he wasn’t their cup of tea, weird-mixture-of-Biblical-and-obscene-stuff-wise, but the guy in charge told the guy on the phone to tell her to call CBN…”

“Which is of course me,” Sykes said.

“And she did, and they flew somebody out here from the Reverend’s office,” Candy said. “And this was yesterday, when you were obviously totally out of town, and your Dad’s office said your brother didn’t have a phone, and that you were unreachable.”

“LaVache and his stupid lymph node,” muttered Lenore.

“But anyway the guy came and had a look, and I guess Vlad was just in incredible form, that day.”

“As was of course meant from the beginning to be,” said the Reverend.

“And but anyway the guy from ‘Partners With God Club’ saw him, and I guess just did a spiritual back-flip, and spasmed his way over to the phone, with Mrs. Tissaw like wringing her hands for joy beside him…”

“No need to embellish, Cindy,” said Sykes, looking with annoyance over at Wang-Dang Lang, who was at the cage, poking at Vlad the Impaler through the bars with a section of Styrofoam cup, while Vlad eyed him beadily.

“And first the guy tried to call me, at work, to get me to try to call you, at Mrs. Tissaw’s surprisingly considerate suggestion, but I guess they never could get through, because the phone-situation at F and V is still really biting the big wazoo…”

“Ahem,” said Sykes.

“But obviously if you were phoneless I wouldn’t have been able to reach you anyway, but anyway they tried, and then the guy of course called ‘Partners With God Club’ headquarters, and more or less told Father Sykes the story, and I guess they all decided old Vlad was much hotter stuff than just for ’Real Religious People’ or whatever, and the Reverend hightailed it up here from Atlanta… ”