"There'll be strings attached?"
"I said no strings attached, although of course there will be strings. Your father specializes in string. You're practically out-of-towners, and they just don't take ten million from every Tom, Dick, and Harry who wants to give it."
"Couldn't you persuade them to take it?"
"I think I could do that. And then there's no guarantee."
"There's a good guarantee?"
"There is no guarantee," Yossarian corrected again. "You and your father seem to have the same selective hearing impairment, don't you?"
"Collective hearing impairment?"
"Yes. And it will have to be wasteful."
"Tasteful?"
"Yes. Wasteful. It will have to be lavish and crude enough to get into the newspapers and high-fashion magazines."
"I think it's what they want."
"There might just be an opening they don't know about yet," Yossarian finally judged. "The wedding I mentioned will be in the bus terminal."
M2 reacted with a start, just as Yossarian had expected. "What's good about that?" he wanted to know.
"Innovation, Milo," Yossarian answered. "The museum isn't good enough for some people anymore. The bus terminal is just right for the Maxons."
"The Maxons?"
"Olivia and Christopher."
"The big industrialist?"
"Who never set foot in a factory and never laid eyes on a product any company of his ever manufactured, except maybe his Cuban cigars. I'm helping Maxon out with the logistics," he embroidered nonchalantly. "All the media will cover it, naturally. Will you take the bus terminal if we can't get the museum?"
"I'll have to ask my mother. Offhand--"
"If it's good enough for the Maxons," tempted Yossarian, "with the mayor, the cardinal, maybe even the White House ..."
"That might make a difference."
"Of course, you could not be the first."
"We could be first?"
"You could not be first, unless your sister marries the Maxon girl or you want to make it a double wedding. I can talk to the Maxons for you, if your mother wants me to."
"What would you do," M2 asked, with a gaze that seemed circumspect, "with the whores at the bus terminal?"
The white light in M2's gray eyes as he said the word whores invested him instantaneously with the face of a ravenous man blistering with acquisitive desire.
Yossarian gave the answer he thought most fit.
"Use them or lose them," he answered carelessly. "As much as you want. The police will oblige. The opportunities are boundless. I'm being realistic about the museum. Your father sells things, Milo, and that's not elegant."
"My mother hates him for that."
"And she lives in Cleveland. When is your sister getting married?"