Seven Oaks Magazine.

Scene: The staccato flashes of the press corps bulbs hiss and slow before halting altogether, a murmur running through the assemblage on the White House lawn as the two smiling Anglo-Saxons gift a parting wave to reporters before turning their backs to the din and moving inside for tea.

George: Chuckie, how are you, friend? Been a helluva week out here, boy. One hell of a week. You know any English lawyers might want a seat on the Supreme Court? Maybe some fellas what really know their way around perjury law?

Charles: You’re looking for barristers?

George: Shit no, Charlie, I won’t go near the things. Damn near lost my manhood sliding down the barrister at Camp David. From now on I take the stairs.

George: Oh, and thanks again for that package you sent over. Christopher’s doing great – he debated George Galloway a few weeks ago. We just love the old souse to death, don’t we, Laura? Come here, Chuck. Let me get a good look at you. Jesus.

Charles: Is there something wrong, my dear man?

George: Oh, nothing. Just thinking how lucky we are here Stateside is all, Chuck. The Social Register is enormous, from generation to generation, we can rotate Rockefellers, Gettys, DuPonts – no first-cousin marriages for my twins, no sir.

Charles: Excellent. It’s a damn good thing. Growing up, my siblings were so cross-eyed, we had to play chess in different rooms.

George: Hell of a thing, hell of a thing. How was the trip?

Charles: Excellent. As always, it was difficult to hold my nose for the whole of the breadth of Ireland, but I managed.

George: Well let me say ‘Welcome to America.’

Charles: I don’t have to tell you it’s a quite a lovely country. The kind of place where the talentless, uncharismatic scions of ruthless families with pro-Nazi skeletons in the closet can rise to powerful stations by dint of the accident of birth. I feel quite at home here.

George: You, us, and the Kennedys make three, friend.

Charles: Very Good.

George: Chuckster, I’m hoping maybe you’ll let me get something off my chest – With all this Hurricane Katrina business, I’m in no mood for a lecture on global warm-up.

George: I mean I am up to my eyeballs in this nonsense – you can’t win in this country: You don’t count the ballots cast by black voters, and they call you racist. So you drown the black voters, and they still call you racist!

Charles: Terrible thing, that.

George: I mean, do you know what a pain it is to get yourself re-elected?

Charles: I’m afraid I don’t.

George: Sounds about right, Charlie. Jeez, you’re a stand-up kind of guy, aren’t you Chas? A real prince.

Charles: Why thank you, George.

George: With so damn much in common, I often wonder how it is our two countries ever got into it so fiercely way back.

Charles: It’s fairly simple, chap. Back then a mad king named George fought in vain to keep an illegitimate hold on far-flung, overseas possessions, finally turning tail in a humiliating defeat, leaving behind a country in which violent, armed groups and puritanical religiosity were left firmly in charge.

George: We’ve come a long way, haven’t we, Chuckie?

Charles: In many ways we have. What’s that horrific sound, old chap?

Dick Cheney [from off-stage]: These orphans are medium-rare! I said I wanted well-done! You can expect to find your husband in a trunk for this, mother!

George: Chip, will you excuse me? I don’t need to tell you that a king can be a royal pain in the ass.