Chancellor v. Chandler

The Chancellor and Chandler find they have something in common: they both appreciate quality craftsmanship.

Buildings! cries the Chandler, arms jetting up. They make 'em tall now, sure - but they've got no spirit! All twisting mirrored glass and metal. What's so good about the world that we need it reflected back at us from a two billion dollar looking glass that rises eighty seven stories high? Nothing, that's what!

The Chandler's a wiry, thin frizzy-haired woman in a flowing hemp dress and denim headband, makes quick gestures to press important points during conversation.

What I attribute this to, confides the Chancellor while idly fingering his monogramed cufflinks, is simple lack of love. Love of that station to which one was born. Let bankers be bankers, peasants peasants, and craftsman craftsman. I find lack of love, or lack of pride to be the one great vice of the New World. Of my kind - and here I make no lie of baring to you that I am one born to serve, as they say in the better clubs of Beacon Hill - I believe I am a shining example. My work, of course, is to leave these hands of mine unsullied by work. Absolutely, I could have squandered my life on crass moneymaking. Yet instead I turned my efforts solely to matters of social importance: I dine and drink with the best sort of people, and in dining and through witty conversation, I provide a crucial model for them: of a man whose life is lived in hope of benefiting all others! Specifically, as chancellor now of my alma mater, that tower you see off in the distance... of grand ivory.

The Chancellor, impassioned, gestures with outstretched hand to the northeast. The Chandler turns and looks. She doesn't see an ivory tower, but she does see Pepple. He's burying the body of Chamberlain. She wrinkles her nose.

The Chancellor apologizes and explains.

Your university doesn't need organic soap, does it? she asks. Because if your students aren't showering with organic, hand-made soap, she points out, they might as well be slaughtering thousands of fish and birds in Micronesia. A sinful industry: bug-eyed chemists and profiteers the whole bunch of them.

The Chancellor's shocked.

Let me put you down for an order of 2,000 bars of my personal brand, Ginny's Ol' Fashioned Spit-Shine. You know, just a test order. Here's a complimentary sample.

The Chancellor takes the same, puts it to his nose. It smells a bit like musty basement, he says.

Well of course it does! How else would you know it's organic?

He nods, convinced, and writes out the check. The Chandler stuffs it down her blouse.

They raise their guns. Their guns go off.