Word: vag
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Weaving through the Holyoke Street blast, Vag clutched the paper in his pocket, and, reassured, kept on up the street. He remembered when the long, heavy envelope had arrived. He'd looked at it suspiciously, noticing the return address. Dimly, in the background, he'd heard martial music playing as he extracted, in order, a small card, a large, many-itemed form, and a snide little scrap of yellow paper. It was to this last that he'd addressed wary attention; it was closely printed with a series of crisp pronunciamentos, studded with "you will," "do not fail...
...Vag tried not to resent the whole thing, like a good soldier. After all, he thought, what could you expect with a military man running the whole set-up? It was probably the efficient method. And perhaps this was the way to handle veterans; hit 'em with a crisp military tone and they'll comply before the daze wears off. "You can't treat these guys too soft," he could imagine one Harvard Medical Officer sneering. "They're used to the rough stuff...
Well-disciplined and thoroughly cowed, Vag turned into the eave at 15 Holyoke Street, holding the paper in his left hand, leaving the right free for saluting. Painstakingly, he followed signs to a nice lady and for her read the color-blind numbers, but declined when she asked him to do it again. Upstairs there was some difficulty in the laboratory; Vag bridled a little at the fourth sign in a row saying "Have you forgotten to put your came on the bottle-cap?" and he was annoyed when he reached the doctor's office. The questions started--exactly...
Well, it was here and it was good. Buttoning up his shirt, Vag glanced into the other room and saw that the two guys were dressed with definitely blue neckties peering out of their jackets. Nodding his head deliberately, he shuffled through the mass of stripes and polka-dots hanging behind his closet door, came up with a knitted crimson affair, and carefully knotted it between button-down collars. "Mustn't forget the other thing either," he said to no one in particular, and reaching tenderly into the towel and sheet drawer, he came up triumphantly with a pint...
...blue ties were ready too, and the three of them went out quickly into the street to find orange juice and coffee and call for three size 12 brunettes. Vag sensed the excitement in the air; the crimson flags were already up along Mt. Auburn Street, cars lined the curbs bumper to bumper, and, for once, no one seemed to be carrying any books. The Vagabond began to whistle, stopped once self-consciously, but with a "what the hell," began again, emitting a slightly flat but very spirited "With Crimson in triumph flashing." Vag was prepared to face the world...