Barney's Version - Mordecai Richler [80]
Morty Herscovitch checked me out last week and was delighted to proclaim, “You’ve shrunk almost half an inch since last year.” Next he blew me a kiss and rammed his gloved finger up my arse.
“You won’t find any truffles there,” I said.
“We’re going to have to get it trimmed one of these days. The sooner the better. Remember Myer Labovitch?”
“No.”
“Sure you do. Room Thirty-nine. Big in the AZA. First guy to come to school wearing a zoot suit. He flew to Zurich yesterday. Kidney transplant. They buy them in Pakistan. Costs a fortune, but what the hell? You know what’s coming soon to your neighbourhood health centre? Heart transplants from pigs. They’re working on it in Houston right now. Now tell me, what will the Lubavitcher Rebbe say to that, eh, Barney?”
I was Morty’s last patient of the day, but even as we retired to his office, shmoozing, a raging Duddy Kravitz whacked open the door and burst in on us, shedding his cashmere topcoat and white silk scarf, revealing a snazzy tux. Dismissing me with a perfunctory nod, he turned on Morty. “I need a disease.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“It’s for my wife. Look, I’m in a terrible hurry and she’s waiting in my car. It’s a Jag. Latest model. You ought to get one, Barney. You pay cash, you can knock them down. She’s in tears.”
“Because she hasn’t got a disease?”
Duddy explained that his millions notwithstanding, never mind his donations to the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, the art museum, the Montreal General Hospital, McGill, and his whopper of an annual cheque to Centraid, he was still unable to crack Westmount society to his wife’s satisfaction. But tonight, en route to the museum’s Strawberry and Champagne Ball, “They usually seat us at a table in the bleachers,” he said, “I had a brain wave. There has to be a disease out there not yet spoken for, something for which I could register a charitable foundation, organize a ball at the Ritz, fly in some bigname ballet dancer or opera singer to perform, who cares the cost, and everybody would have to turn out. But it’s a tough call. Don’t tell me. I know. Multiple sclerosis has already been nabbed. So has cancer. Parkinson’s. Alzheimer’s. Liver and heart diseases. Arthritis. You name it, it’s gone. So what I need is some disease still out there, something sexy I could start a charity for, and appoint the governor general, or some other prick, honorary patron. You know, like Sister Kenny, or was it Mrs. Roosevelt, and the March of Dimes. Polio was terrific. Something kids get tugs at the heartstrings. People are suckers for it.”
“What about AIDS?” I suggested.
“Where have you been living? That’s long gone. Now there’s that thing that women get, you know, they eat like pigs, then stick two fingers down their throat and vomit it out, what’s that called?”
“Bulimia.”
“It’s disgusting, but if Princess Diana has got it, it could have lots of appeal for Westmount types. Goddamn it,” said Duddy, glancing at his watch. “Come on, Morty. I’m running late. Any minute now she starts her blowing-on-the-horn routine. She’s driving me crazy. Hit me with something.”
“Crohn’s disease.”
“Never heard of it. Is it big?”
“Maybe two hundred thousand Canadians suffer from it.”
“Good. Now you’re talking. So tell me about it.”
“It’s also known as ileitis or ulcerative colitis.”
“Explain it to me in laymen’s terms, please.”
“It leads to gas, diarrhoea, rectal bleeding, fever, weight loss. You suffer from it you could have fifteen bowel movements a day.”
“Oh, great! Wonderful! I phone Wayne Gretzky, I say, how would you like to be a patron for a charity for farters? Mr. Trudeau, this is D.K. speaking, and I’ve got just the thing to improve your image. How would you like to join the board of a charity my wife is organizing for people who shit day and night? Hey there, everybody, you are invited to my wife’s annual Diarrhoea Ball. Listen, for my wife it has to have some class. I want you to come up with a winner by nine o’clock tomorrow