From a 1960 letter Flannery O’Connor wrote to her friend Maryat Lee. The letter is collected in The Habit of Being.
“The Royal Command”
by
Leonora Carrington
I had received a royal command to visit the rulers of my country.
The invitation, in gold letters in relief and adorned with roses and swallows, was bordered in lace.
I went to look for my car, but the chauffeur, who lacks practical sense, had buried it.
“It’s to grow mushrooms,” he told me. “Nothing better for mushrooms.”
“Brady,” I said to him, “you are an imbecile of the first degree. You have ruined my car.”
Actually, since the car was completely ruined, I had to rent a horse-pulled buggy.
Upon reaching the palace, an impossible servant, dressed in red and gold, said to me: “The queen went crazy yesterday; she is in her bathtub.”
“How unfortunate!” I exclaimed. “How did that happen?”
“It’s the heat.”
“Can I see her in any event?” (I hoped I hadn’t made the long voyage for nothing.)
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