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And now the post script.
I must, of course, end the tale of the Dog Collar Sting, but I need to add a post script. All the players in this tale have died save for Basil, Daisy's boyfriend, who called me as I was heading home after the denouement and said that I could tell no one, particularly not Daisy, what he was about to say, but that the joke was, "incredible, and congratulations1". Daisy, on the other hand, called me every day for the next three weeks ascribing all sorts of pathologies to Guy and I finally was able to penetrate, after trying numerous times, that it was a practical joke on her and that she should accept it. She didn't, she never did. We fell out of touch soon afterwards and she moved to the West Coast. Basil called me when she died--she couldn't have been more than 45. Alas, practical jokers may face some kind of karma or maybe it was that her star was going to shine brightly and then explode. It did, I am sorry to say, because she was intelligent and attractive and filled with energy. She never understood how her jokes could be interpreted as being mean, bordering on cruel and sadistic--not the one she played on me, but on the ones she told me about, some of which I just remember and can't bring myself to tell and many that I don't remember. Oddly, at least to me, she believed that Guy's joke exhibited a weird side to him.
I haven't spoken to Basil in many years although I saw his aunt and uncle at the San Francisco Fall Antiques Show at least ten years ago and asked for his number. I called and we had a great conversation and I sensed that he had not gotten over losing Daisy. When you ride the tiger's tail, you certainly have an exciting ride. My great friend, Guy, died in 1997 as I said and Mindy, as many of you might have read, died earlier this year. One of the two English dealers involved in the plot has died and, alas, so has Shaw Kinsley. They all played their roles to perfection. I have to admit that I still don't like practical jokes and that I feel just a tad guilty in having taken part in the joke on Daisy. Guy's lightness of touch was completely ignored by Daisy--she was very upset. Finally, this is my business, not a game, and I really don't want to be playing jokes on anyone. It won't happen again, but I am pretty certain that there aren't too many more Daisys out there--at least not that I am going to meet.
Story, however, is story. I learned a great deal from Guy who understood story about as well as anyone I have ever met. I enjoyed his novels, but what I really remain a fan of is his desire to keep busy and keep writing and keep thinking--gusto is the right word. Being married to an antiques dealer heightened his sense of the importance of texture in his writing and his thinking. For example, Mindy took Guy's history of his (brand new) house in Bedford (which he wrote in advance of the building) stating that it was actually three houses, one from the fifteenth, one from the sixteenth and one from the seventeenth century and expanded on it with objects. As the supposed family enriched itself the house grew and Guy and Mindy filled it with the appropriate period props. They also scoured England's salvage yards for beams and panelling, but that wasn't all--everything related as near as possible to a long tenancy by a single prospering family that had left their mark over three hundred years. Guy loved that and also loved that he had all the modern conveniences (what the Brits call mod-cons) such as hidden speakers and wet bars for entertaining and lots of space for large parties. He left behind, along with Mindy, quite a legacy.
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