A Foreign Affair Page #6

That's not the way it works.

Suppose you stop and ask yourself

how come he skidded of the road?

- I'll tell you how. No moral brakes.

- That's it, going too fast.

During the war, he couldn't go fast enough.

"Get on that beachhead, through the

tank traps, across the Rhine. Step on it."

Faster, 100 miles an hour,

through burning towns.

Then one day the war is over.

You expect him to jam on those brakes

and stop like that.

Everybody can't stop like that!

Sometimes you skid, sometimes you go

into a spin...

and smash into a tree...

and bash your fenders and scrape those

fine ideals you brought from home.

It's time such wrecks

were hauled into a garage.

- Anyone who forgets he's American...

- Don't forget he's also human.

What would you know about that?

Von Schlegel, von Schlittenheim...

The loneliness is stored up right down

to his boots and it's driving him crazy.

One day a pair of

open-toed shoes come along.

You want him to ask questions?

Party affiliation? Social Security number?

Yes, I want him to make sure

he's not doing something subversive.

Are you qualified to call the pitch on this?

What's your life, anyway?

Committees and sessions

and adjournments

and budget cuts and appropriations.

What do you do for laughs? What do you

do for tears for that matter?

For tears... for tears I

cry, Captain Pringle.

It may interest you to know

I once cried for a man

- till my eyes were half washed out of my head.

- Not really.

I was on an important subcommittee.

One was a Southern Democrat.

His convictions

were utterly different from mine.

I hated everything he stood for.

I despised his politics.

But I loved him... insanely.

I loved the Southern syrup in his voice.

His mint julep manners.

The way he'd look at me

through his long thick eyelashes

when I was vetoing an amendment.

He'd put his arm around me,

just kind of lazy, like.

Lean his head against my cheek.

His hair had a deep wave in it.

- You know what he was trying to do?

- What?

He was trying to sway my vote.

Once he drove me home

from an all-night meeting,

stopped his car on Earl Street.

For no reason at all, he said,

except he was yearning for my lips.

To tell you the truth, I

was yearning for his.

But it would have meant betraying

my platform and my constituents.

- What did you do?

- I filibustered.

- You what?

- I just kept on talking.

The constitution, the Bill of Rights, poems,

Longfellow, anything I could think of.

Von Schloss, von Schlotzing,

von Schlumann, von Schlrmann,

von...

- No other man since the mint julep guy?

- No.

- No more what you call yearning?

- No.

- Sure?

- None of your business.

I've been doing a little yearning

ever since you stepped off that plane.

Captain Pringle!

- Don't!

- Why not? You're not a Nazi.

Don't tell me it's subversive

to kiss a Republican.

I am a Congresswoman.

Yeah. Now I know how I'll cast

my absentee ballot come re-election.

- I'm here on official business.

- This is official.

Oh! Now, listen.

Listen.

"Listen, my children, and you shall hear

of the midnight ride of Paul Revere

"On the 18th of April in '75,

hardly a man is now alive

"Who remembers that famous day and year

"He said to his friend, 'lf the British

march by land or sea from the town tonight

"'Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch

of the North Church tower as a signal light

"'One if by land and two if by sea

"'And I on the opposite shore shall be

ready to ride and spread the alarm

"'Through every Middlesex village and farm

"'For the country folk

to be up and to arm... '

"Then he said 'Good night! '

and, with muffled oar, silent..." Oh!

Now, Congresswoman,

may I have the floor?

You are entirely out of order.

Objection overruled.

Just, er, checking up on Paul Revere.

Oh, sure.

This is where you live, Congresswoman.

This is your billet.

I said we're here. What's the matter?

- I just want to die.

- You what?

It's awful. It never should have happened.

Listen, you didn't burn down an orphanage.

You got kissed in a file room. That's all.

- I'm a thief.

- Thief?

The lowest kind of a thief,

stealing another woman's man.

Yeah?

The cake I brought. The

girl you left behind.

She sent a love letter and you fell in love

with the postman.

Those things happen, like electrons,

positive and negative.

- One day they get together and wham!

- No!

No wham.

- We've got to get control of ourselves.

- Can we?

It would be wiser

not to see each other again.

- I suppose it would.

- We can't go on with our investigation.

- So we drop it.

- No. No, I'll go on alone.

- I could enlist the help of the general.

- No.

Why not?

Miss Frost, Congresswoman,

Postman, darling,

to know that you're here and around

and I couldn't see you, I'd go crazy.

We've got to be strong.

This business about Dusty, it's not serious.

It's just a college crush.

- I have a dreadful sense of guilt.

- We're not engaged.

I'm not committed in any way.

It would break her heart, the daughter of

the man who swung the 4th Precinct.

No, it won't.

She's a kind of a flighty kid, you know.

She's been engaged to four guys

since I've been gone,

one of them a feed and grain merchant.

Think what a good provider he'd make.

Oh, John...

I don't even know your first name,

Congresswoman darling.

- Phoebe.

- Phoebe.

Isn't that ridiculous?

Not a bit ridiculous.

How about a good-night kiss, Phoebe?

Good night.

Good morning.

Good evening.

Good gracious.

(Man) The problem is how to stop

all this physical human contact...

We just ought to put our foot down

and put it down hard.

- Why, Miss Frost.

- Where have you been?

- We've been worried.

- Won't you join us?

- Miss Frost?

- Miss Frost?

Anything I can do for you?

Not a thing.

- Hans Otto Birgel.

- That's the best we could find, Colonel.

The others without uniform

don't show his face so plainly.

Lovely master race type.

I bet he never tortured anybody.

Not until he made sure

his dachshund had had his dinner.

I want every MP to memorise this puss.

Have 100 copies printed. Send it around

with a detailed description.

Will do.

We've got the trap baited

with the right cheese.

He'll snap at it, sure as shooting.

- I hope.

Come in.

- You wanted to see me, Colonel?

- Yes, Miss Frost.

- That'll be all, Major.

- Yes, sir.

- How is the investigation going?

- The what?

- The investigation.

- Oh, fine.

- Making any progress?

- Slowly. Why?

It seems, in the course of it,

you lost something.

- I have?

- This is yours, isn't it?

Yes, thank you very much.

Well, I guess I'd better get some hatpins.

It is pretty windy in Berlin,

especially at night.

Well, the whole thing

can be easily explained.

But I hardly think you're in a position

to cast a stone, Colonel Plummer.

- I'm very sorry.

- I think you're brazen.

Am I?

- Having that on your desk.

- Having what on my desk?

I know all about that going

but you can't stop like that.

But there is such a thing as discretion.

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