Wholly Smokes (5 page)
Adair Badcock
Nothing could be further from the truth. Although it is true that a company agent was aboard, there was nothing secret or sinister about his mission. He was there simply to observe, and watch out for company cigar interests in Havana. The agent was a cousin of Blessington’s, Adair Badcock. He had no intention of harming an American ship, as his final cable to the home office indicates. Indeed, it can be argued that he was incapable of subterfuge.
CHEERIO ALL
EXHILARATING TO BE ABOARD STOP SHIP
IS VERY BUSY COMMA
ALWAYS PEOPLE RUSHING ABOUT STOP
I SEEM TO BE IN THE WAY MUCH OF
THE TIME EXCLAMATION
SOME OFFICER VERY RUDELY INFORMED
ME TODAY THAT I MAY NOT SMOKE
NEAR SOMETHING CALLED THE POWDER
MAGAZINE STOP
WE SHALL SEE ABOUT THAT STOP
REGARDS ADAIR
Nothing further is known; evidently Adair went down with the ship.
Blessington and the rest of America went to war. As he told the board:
At last! We have a chance to help an oppressed people and also to secure the important Havana and Manila cigar interests of our beloved General Snuff. It would be a national tragedy if those interests were to remain in the cruel hands of Spanish oppressors. Let us keep them in our far more benign hands boys.
With this in mind, I am prepared to take part in the scrap personally. I must avenge my cousin and my countrymen – and do some business in Havana and
Manila. I am therefore raising a regiment. If Teddy Roosevelt can have his “Rough Riders,” I will have my cigar contingent – my Puff Riders!
Blessington soon rode off to Cuba, whence he sent the following letter home:
My beloved Letty,
Life here is very hard, what with the swamps, the heat, and the sickness all around. Speaking of which, I believe I have discovered the cause of malaria. I have noticed that men who smoke cigars seem immune to the disease, while non-smokers soon come down with it. Perhaps, when all this madness is over, we can use that in our advertisement – A C
URE FOR
M
ALARIA
.Incidentally, I have not received your usual shipment of cigars. I hope you haven’t forgotten to send it! I cannot abide the local ‘Havana’ products, which are inferior. I will wait instead for your next consignment of our very own Dunkelmeister Grandees. How I long for you, my dear, and for a fine old Yankee stogie!
Your affectionate husband,
Blessington
This was his last letter. The stogies never arrived, and Blessington succumbed to malaria.
The Lady Has a Light
for your
DunkelmeisterGrandee–
Yes, Miss Liberty
believes in Your
Freedom – to smoke the
smoothest, finest-tasting
cigar of your life.
“Bring me those tired of
ordinary cigars, those
yearning to draw freely”
–
Try this new land of
smoking. You’ll never
go back to the old.