William F. Buckley Jr.: A Life

I met Bill and Pat in 1965, when Bill was running for mayor of New York, and I learned then that they had a wonderful time “winding each other up,” as the Brits say. One night during the campaign, Bill was writing a speech at dinner (!) in the upper room of a restaurant. Nearby, a huge crowd of Buckley fans was waiting to hear it delivered. He typed away on his Olivetti, surrounded by utensils and piles of yellow paper. Bill wrote something about Eleanor Roosevelt, who, he said, “certainly took her own time dying.” As he finished each page, he passed it around the table for us on the campaign team to look at, and when that one got to Pat, she screamed, in that way we got to know and love, “BIIILL! YOU CAN’T SAY THAT!” If there had been any doubt in Bill’s mind, that removed it. The line stayed in, and when he read it, the crowd exploded.

A quarter century later, they were still at it. In 1991 my wife and I and two of our children stayed with Bill and Pat at the chateau in Rougemont, Switzerland, that they rented each winter for years. We were living in Paris, and I had asked Bill if we could bring our daughter Susie’s cat with us. It was to be a clandestine op: The cat would be kept in a closet in our room, the staff under strict instructions from WFB not to say a word to Pat, who loved dogs, and only dogs. At breakfast the morning we were leaving, Bill turned to Susie and with a huge grin and said, “Susie, how’s your little pussycat?” Pat produced exactly the reaction Bill had desired. I feared the exhaust from Rocket Pat would spoil the skiing in Gstaad for weeks.

And then there was the dinner with Mayor Bloomberg four or five years ago. This time Pat was having the fun. She lit into the mayor, cutting off his arguments at every turn. Bill was reduced to saying, “Er, Ducky, I think what the mayor was trying to say — ”

“BIIILL, I CAN HEAR WHAT HE’S SAYING!”

“ — was only — ”

“BIIILL, WHY ARE YOU SUPPORTING HIS RIDICULOUS POSITION?”

“ — that — ”

“BIIILL!”

But Pat was right, and she had the mayor behaving like an asymptote looking for a straight line.

Such love. Such fun. She packed his bags when he went traveling. She packed his picnics when he went driving. She looked after his clothes. She ran the menage. Such fun. Such love.

Mr. Oliver is a senior director at the White House Writers Group. This article was originally published in a special issue of National Review magazine, commemorating the life of William F. Buckley Jr.