How are you? How you feeling? SECOND COWBOY: Good! Real good. I feel so good I didn’t have to jack off this morning to get my heart started. “CARISSIMO!” SHE CRIED. “YOU’RE JUST what I’m looking for. A lunch date. The duchess stood me up.” “Black or white?” I said. “White,” she said, reversing my direction on the sidewalk. White is Wallis Windsor, whereas the Black Duchess is what her friends call Perla Apfeldorf, the Brazilian wife of a notoriously racist South African diamond industrialist. As for the lady who also knew the distinction, she was indeed a lady—Lady Ina Coolbirth, an American married to a British chemicals tycoon and a lot of woman in every way. Tall, taller than most men, Ina was a big breezy peppy broad, born and raised on a ranch in Montana. “This is the second time she’s canceled,” Ina Coolbirth continued. “She says she has hives. Or the duke has hives. One or the other. Anyway, I’ve still got a table at Côte Basque. So, shall we? Because I do so need someone to talk to, really.
