Achille Augustain Nadeau peered hawkishly over the leading edge over the eight-hundred and fifty third issue of ‘Aesthetica’, fingers feathering the manuscript’s leading edge with a distain so palpable that you could scent it in Java.
“Bothering the hired help, again? How unremarkably elitist.” Nadeau noted nonchalantly, feet clawed against the wickerwork pedestal of his foot rest, glossfied paper turning in his hands, waving indeterminately in the artifice of a breeze.
“But quite brusquely now, Roberto, do you not concede that your collusion in the general moral degradation of our fraternity remains bombastically prominent, hm? Your public representation as a menial, craven bully is indicative of some of the worst, most plebeian excesses of the Council debarkle, mon Dieu, man…” The Burgundian breaks, hand proffering a grape with the poise that’d frustrate Caligula, bowl to mouth, as if flown by wire, ferally rapid.
“…You, Robert, are not a Communist of either denomination; you are too serpentinely scrawny for a blockhead Bolshevik, too memorable for a Menshevik, and considerably too slovenly to make a fine Trotskyist. In a phrase; the Coalition is not for you – quit frittering your dialogue on social inferiors. If you truly require a sparring partner to test your rhetorical edge upon, then please ami, bid me the courteousy of utilising the obvious – that is to say, myself, for the purpose. One does not grind a knife upon a blunted bolder, lest your weapon of wit degrades to all the elegance of a common bludgeon. You’re not an equalist, Autoine, so do desist with suckling on an inferior peen. One does wish to maintain one’s glass… comparatively… uncontaminated with proletarian mastication juices, do you not?’
‘It is a pity, Robert; In all the years I have known you for you have been merely masquerading as a decent man. Now; your true colours are revealed for the pink, fleshy, unhealthily pasty Dadaist nightmare that you bear manifest as – a mere, common, misguided whiny egalitarian, daring consort with servile orders.’
‘Honestly, Autoine; what would your brother think? Perhaps he'd have you shot. I would.'’
THE SYNDIC LEAGUES
(A co-operative of Rheinland's Shipping Unions, retired from a life of piracy.)