The Stairmasters

In the seventh episode of Mad Men, "Red in the Face," Slattery makes a pass at Betty and Don has a revenge. Elsewhere, Pete buys a gun, further fueling my theory that Pete is the original American Pyscho.

Previously on Mad Men: Betty discovered the joys of therapy; Slattery and Joan were hot, together and apart; Pete was mad his wife refused to be whored out; and Betty gave a lock of her hair to Eddie Munster, the evil spawn of divorced Helen Bishop.

At the office, Don is on the phone with Betty’s therapist, so the two men can discuss all of her most private thoughts and feelings. The therapist says that Betty is mostly “consumed with petty jealousies and overwhelmed by everyday activities. Basically, we’re dealing with the emotions of a child here.” The therapist says that Betty’s instability is not uncommon, especially after the loss of a parent. He hopes that Betty will become more forthcoming (no, Betty, don’t tell that skunky shrink anything!) and they can get down to the deeper issues. Don is surprised that Betty could contain the depth required to have “deeper issues,” but he does seem genuinely concerned for the well being of his wife.

In another office, Slattery is on the phone with his wife, assuring her that he’s drinking his milk while simultaneously pouring a very healthy amount of vodka into said milk. He tells his wife to go to “Mims” and bring their daughter, then is interrupted by Bertram Cooper, the other half of Sterling-Cooper. Cooper announces that the “Nixon boys” will be stopping by at the end of the week, but Nixon himself won’t be coming, “thank god, otherwise I’d have to move the piano out of my office.” This is one of those jokes I totally don’t get because I was born in 1986. Did Nixon hate pianos? Or did he love pianos but tended to embarrass himself by playing badly on any piano he saw? Bertram continues that hopefully Nixon will decide he needs an advertising agency. Slattery notes that it’s often the people with the “best product who make the worst client.” It’s hard to imagine anyone looking at Nixon and Kennedy side by side and thinking that Nixon had the better product. Cooper admonishes Slattery to stop smoking so much, because it’s a sign of weakness, and tells a story about how Hitler didn’t let Neville Chamberlain smoke during their negotiations in Munich, so after an hour Chamberlain “would have given Hitler his mother as a dance partner”. Slattery responds that the only thing he can get from that story is that Hitler didn’t smoke.

At the end of the work day, everyone’s heading out the door towards the bar. Slattery stops by Joan’s desk and tells her that the family is out of town, so she should come over. Another woman walks over: Carol, Joan’s roommate. Slattery pulls Joan away for an “accounting question,” and tells her that he’ll take her away on a trip soon, but not that night. She tells him she needs some notice for that, and he tells Carol and Joan to be good as they walk out. Carol gives him the fakest smile ever, so she obviously has a good radar for poor character.

At Peggy’s desk, Don is telling her that she can stay late to work on the Belle Jolie lipstick account as long as she isn’t dragging the next day. Slattery walks up and convinces him to come out for a drink. Pete comes over and asks if he missed something, and Slattery says, “No, Don and I talk all the time when you’re not around.” Hah! This is why, even though Roger Sterling is sort of an weasel, I love him anyway. The two men walk off without even glancing at Pete. As Pete wishes him goodnight, Slattery tosses off a “Good night, Paul.” Then to a chuckling Don: “I love doing that.” Pete turns his attention to Peggy, calling her a “busy little girl” and then reminding her that staying up late “isn’t good for your skin.” Peggy doesn’t mind being treated like a child or pet by Pete, and laughs that she’s actually working on copy. He asks a few unbelieving questions, then offers to take a look at it for her. He claims to do it for a lot of the other men; I definitely expected this to end with Pete stealing Peggy’s ideas for his own glory (as we know he has aspirations for creative and is willing to break the rules, as evidenced by the steel account in the episode “New Amsterdam”), but thankfully this show isn’t Melrose Place.

At a crowded bar, Slattery and Don are drinking and discussing the hiring and firing structures at another agency. Slattery’s distracted by two women at the end of the bar, one of whom looks a little like Rachel McAdams (aka, perfect) and the other like a less-freaky Chloe Sevigny. Rachel and Chloe notice our Mad Men back, and Slattery notes that “at a certain age they lose that…that glow of pure youth. It’s like they hit thirty and somebody puts out a light.” Even though I have 8 and a half years to go, somebody called me an old maid tonight, so on behalf of women of all ages: Fuck you, Slattery (you sexy, silver fox, you). Don mentions that he has to get home to Betty soon, and Slattery relates how his wife stopped cooking when his daughter stopped eating: “They’re fighting it out, and I’m the one that gets hurt.” Don can read the subtext and says he’ll call Betty and tell her that Slattery’s coming home too.

Betty is running around the house in curlers and a slip when Don calls. She can tell it’s Don just by the sound of him lighting up a cigarette, and asks, “You are coming home, right?” He tells her that Slattery invited himself to the Draper home, and brushes off her concerns about having enough food. Cut to dinner, where the two men are eating steak and Betty is having a salad. She tells Slattery that she doesn’t want any, because she’s a vegetarian sometimes. A wife who’ll give her steak to your boss and eat a salad with a smile? Don is so unappreciative of Betty. Slattery relates how his wife is always looking things up in her little calorie book, and Betty shares how she “was pudgy as a girl, if you can believe it.” In eighth grade, after a summer at swim camp, she came into Home Ec with a pattern for “big girl pajamas” because she hadn’t realized how much weight she lost. Slattery says that when he was a kid they would swim in pools, “sometimes naked.” Don says that he used to swim in a quarry; Slattery is surprised, and tells Don, “by the way you drop your G’s every once and a while, I always thought you were raised on a farm. Someplace with a swimmin’ hole.” Don doesn’t respond to this probing of his past (I was surprised he volunteered information about the quarry in the first place), and goes to find more liquor.

Many drinks and cigarettes later, Betty brings out a chocolate sheet cake with “Mommy and Daddy” written in frosting on top. Slattery’s worried that he’s been crashing Betty and Don’s anniversary, and Betty assures him that it was just Sally trying out her new frosting machine. “Mommy and daddy: simple, colloquial, to the point. She writes like her father.” All three pick up cigarettes, and Slattery leans across the table to light Betty’s. Slattery tells Don to get his own, since “three on a match.” Betty doesn’t understand that expression, so Slattery explains that during the war, in the trenches, “first man lights up, they notice you. Second man, Jerry takes aim. Third guy, Auf wiedersehen.” I love the part in Forgetting Sarah Marshall when Jason Segel is watching Project Runway in the middle of the night and crying over Heidi auf’ing one of the contestants. Anyway, Don interjects that that “three on a match” saying was probably thought up by an ad man to sell more matches. “Do you tell your kids there’s no Santa Claus?” Slattery jokes. Betty robs Don’s shoulder as she murmurs that he would never. Don watches his wife as she asks Slattery to tell another story, “a true one.”

Slattery says that his father was in the trenches (World War I, I guess?) with a bayonet. “Think about that: poking a man to death three feet away from you. What’s that sound like?” Betty says that Don never talks about the way; “The war? His war, you mean?” Slattery asks, implying that the Korean War can’t compare to his WWII. Don answers that “There’s not much to say. You boys used up all the glory.” Slattery tells a story about running oil down in the South China Sea, and seeing a plane doing recon. He starts, “maybe I was bored, but I thought, ‘We should get that little plane.’” and Don interrupts, “Bored? What about scared? That never comes into these stories.” “You’re making me look bad in front of the lady,” Slattery says. Betty assures him that that would be impossible, and Don doesn’t look so pleased now at what a charming hostess his wife is. Slattery says that they blew that plane out of the sky, and went off course to see where the plane hit the water. They saw the wreckage, but no body. “Bet they gave you a medal,” Don says, and Slattery says, “They did, but not for that. It was for drinking.” That I find very easy to believe. Slattery picks up the empty vodka bottle, and Don goes out to the garage to get some more.

Betty starts clearing the table, and Slattery follows her into the kitchen. He immediately starts putting on the moves, hands encircling her tiny waist as he says, “I can’t believe you’ve had two babies.” As politely, but not as firmly, as possible, she tells him not to do that. “You’ve been making eyes at me all night,” he wheedles. “You can’t tell me that I’m not giving you hot pants.” She offers to make more coffee (and seriously, how drunk is he to be doing this with Don right outside in the garage?), and Slattery gets in close to her face to tell her that he’ll fall asleep thinking of her tonight. At the sound of the door opening, Slattery detaches from Betty and they both try to play it cool. Don knows when he walks in that something happened, though, and Slattery pours himself a goodbye drink (a full glass of vodka!). Slattery tells Don that he was just saying how lucky Don is to have such a beautiful wife and kids, so he should enjoy it. They sip their vodka, and Slattery says he’ll take his for the road. Don stands at the doorway and yells, “That’s my car!” and “Lights!” I feel like some people will be up in arms about Don letting Slattery do such blatant drunk-driving, but a: Slattery is Don’s boss, so no matter how friendly they are Don still has to defer to Slattery’s judgement, b: Don’s probably so pissed at seeing Slattery in the kitchen with Betty that he doesn’t care if Slattery drives off a bridge, as long as he’s out of the Draper home immediately, and c: It was the Sixties, man, lighten up.

As Slattery swerves away, Don goes into the kitchen to interrogate Betty. He asks her what happened with Slattery, and she says nothing, except “your drunk boss ruining our evening.” “You seemed to be having a grand time,” he angrily says. “You made a fool of yourself… you were throwing yourself at him, giggling at his stories.” Betty says rightly that she was being friendly, and tries to walk off. Don roughly grabs her arm and tells her, “I don’t like to be treated that way in my own home. I know what I saw.” Betty looks at his hand on her arm and asks him, “You want to bounce me off the walls? Would that make you feel better?” Don seems to realize that Betty is entirely in the right here, and responds to her very mature, pointed questions by saying, “Sometimes I feel like I’m living with a little girl.” That’s just a taste, Betty, of the therapeutically-specific things Don will torture you with if you open up to that evil shrink.

The next morning, Pete explains to the Mad Boys that he didn’t make it to the bar last night because he had dinner with his in-laws. He’s carrying a big blue box: two people got them the same wedding gift, so he’s returning it during lunch. The present is a chip and dip, one of those ceramic things with big bowls (that look like lettuce leaves) for the chips and a small bowl (that looks like a tomato) for the dip. Ken and Paul laugh at it, and Pete doesn’t understand why they think it’s so silly. At least it wasn’t one of those chip and dips with a pool and a fat man on the diving board, is what I say. Pete earnestly tells them about going to a friend’s house and having dip made of sour cream and brown onions, and Ken (I’ve decided that I like the character of Ken so much that I’m going to stop calling him Malfoy) jokes, “You’re going to have to give me that recipe sometime.” I think that emasculating Pete is like holding a dog’s favorite toy just out of its reach: you know you shouldn’t torture him like that, but it’s just so fun to watch him go nuts trying to prove his manhood/catch that chewy bone. Pete mentions that it cost $22 bucks, which seems like what a chip and dip would cost today, so that must have been a very expensive chip and dip. The boys ask why he has to do it today, and Pete says, “I like doing things for her.” Yes, like whoring her out to ex-boyfriends in order to advance your writing career! Paul takes his turn on the HMS Pete’s A Girl: “When you’re done shopping, come join us [at a bar they’re going to for lunch]. I hear they make a great grasshopper.”

In an entirely manly office, Don is smoking when Slattery stops by. He comes bearing a bottle of booze to replace all the liquor he drank the night before, and is all smooth jokes and smiles. Slattery starts, “About last night…” but Don isn’t making this any easier for him. “When a man gets to the point where his name’s on the building, he can get an unnatural sense of entitlement.” Don says he doesn’t understand what that means, so I guess that he really does place the blame fully on Betty for last night’s awkwardness. Slattery tells a story about how he got extremely drunk once, tried to go home and was forcing his key into the door when he realized he was in the wrong apartment building. He finishes, “At some point, we’ve all parked in the wrong garage.” Don realizes through this indirect apology that it’s Slattery that’s the slime, but he pretends otherwise by thanking Slattery for the booze and telling him, “Betty’s going to want that glass back.” As Slattery leaves, he stops and thinks that maybe he should get a whole case of those “sorry I tried to fondle your wife” bottles. Or, maybe you could stop fondling other people’s wives? Just a suggestion.

At the department store, Pete is in line with a bunch of women at the returns counter. The woman behind him comments that her husband would rather be drinking at lunch then returning presents, “even when we were newlyweds. He’s in advertising.” They exchange names, and Pete says he doesn’t know her husband. “That’s because you’re here at lunch,” she says. It’s Pete’s turn at the counter, and he explains that they got two chip and dips, even though they registered for just one, and he doesn’t have a receipt because it was a gift. Pete will go on repeating these three things over and over, so just imagine that the last sentence is repeated in between each of the following sentences. A pretty redhead comes to help him, but can’t find a registry under the name Campbell. Pete realizes that Trudie must have put it under her maiden name (emasculation scale reads: 3), just as a strapping young man carrying a tennis racket walks up. Matherton calls Pete “Humps the Camel Campbell,” which is not the most flattering nickname. The redhead immediately starts smiling at Matherton, so Pete has to deal with both the lame wedding present and the cute girl picking the manly man over him (emasculation scale: 5). Matherton walks away, and the redhead says that she can give Pete store credit, but not cash. Pete turns on the charm, and by charm I mean disgusting sliminess. Dude, she knows that you’re married, she’s not going to want to “work this out” by having drinks with you. She isn’t having it, which makes her about eleventy three times smarter than Peggy. When he realizes that she’s not budging, he says, “By the way, Matherton? He has the clap.” Heh. Sometimes I like when Pete is being a twelve year old.

The Mad Boys are walking into Pete’s office after lunch to see what Pete got with his store credit: a penis. No, wait, sorry, that’s a rifle. (Same difference, of course.) Pete laughs, “Why not, right? Boys will be boys.” Then he points it at Ken, Harry and Paul in turn, making them all squeam and turn away. This reminds me of all those PSA’s where the two boys are hanging out and they find their father’s gun and one shoots the other in the face. I think there were two versions of that commercial: the regular for gun safety, and another where the boys were smoking pot, for anti-drugs. Pete takes his gun to the main office floor and points it at each pretty woman walking by, because he’s a PSYCHOPATH. Hilde, Pete’s fabulously un-humorous secretary, steps in front of him and pushes the gun down. Deflating his metaphorical erection that he’s been threatening the women of the office with, perhaps? This episode really lends itself to a Freudian reading. Hilde is totally a babe, by the way; cuter than Peggy and not as show-boaty as Joan. She kind of looks like Kate Mara, who’ll always be “that girl who got knocked up by Ephram’s piano teacher and had to have an abortion” from Everwood, although other people might know her from Brokeback Mountain (as Heath Ledger’s daugher) or the fifth season of 24 (as Shari Rothenberg, and I can’t give any more details than that because I didn’t watch that season).

In the board room, Slattery has gathered the troops to discuss tomorrow’s visit from Nixon’s people. Slattery says that Nixon’s nomination is a lock, so all they need is an opponent. Paul suggests it could be Lyndon Johnson, but Cooper, talking like your crazy old grandpa who everyone just humors, dodders that “It’s going to be Kennedy! Bastard blackie won West Virginia, now where does that leave us?” Sure, Grandpa, just drink your prune juice. Slattery sums up Nixon: experienced, a veteran, can fight Communism, not a Catholic. Pete points out that attacking Kennedy for his religion is a bad idea, and Kennedy keeps making the other candidates apologize for being intolerant. Slattery tells the boys that they may be too young to remember, but when Nixon was running against a woman for Congress in California, he “practically shot her in the face to win. If it is Kennedy, Nixon will lower himself to the occasion.” Cooper chimes in again that it’ll be Kennedy, and Slattery remarks to Don, “Good, a Catholic son of a millionaire. A boy, too scared to do anything but go on vacation.” Cooper says, “I met him. He is a boy.” Paul points out that he’s only four years younger than Nixon; Slattery counters that Nixon’s been vice president for eight years. Cooper finishes, “He doesn’t even wear a hat.” Pete, in possibly his only moment of genius, says, “I don’t know. You know who else doesn’t wear a hat? Elvis. That’s what we’re dealing with.” The rest of the table stares at him in disbelief, and Cooper yells out, “Remind me to stop hiring young people!” I bet Cooper is a fantastic grandfather. But Pete is so completely right, and it shows how Sterling Cooper is lagging behind the times that the heads of the company don’t get the Kennedy-Elvis comparison. Slattery says, “America does not want some greasy kid with his hand on the button,” and then winks to Don. “Now, if the adults can weigh in…” Don looks a little uneasy at Slattery’s total dismissal of Pete, but it could be because he’s ambivalent about working on the Nixon case (I believe this was shown in the first or second episode) or because he doesn’t want to play on Slattery’s team anymore.

At the Draper home, Betty is finishing cooking dinner when Don arrives. She’s proud of her big roast beef, but Don has to be a dick and says, “A whole roast beef. You know it’s just me tonight, right?” There’s a lot of glaring and unspoken anger, which is pretty par for the course in the Draper residence.

At the Campbell home, Pete is sitting in the corner with his rifle, and Trudie is yelling about how the money from that present was for the two of them, and she can’t believe how immature he is. The shot slowly pushes in, and it’s just like a mother punishing a naughty child. Emasculation scale: 10. Nicely done, Trudie.

At the Sterling Cooper office, Don walks towards the elevator banks. Pete gets off with his gun, and Don and the elevator operator (who sort of looks like Dule Hill) watch him go. Don addresses the operator by name, and as they get into the elevator Don pulls out a giant wad of cash. Mischief is in the air, and I like it! Although, where is Don going if Pete is just arriving in the office?

Pete is sitting on the couch in his office, looking like a boy on time-out, with the gun leaning against the wall. Peggy comes in to give him her Belle Jolie writing to look over. She notices the gun, and Pete asks her if she’s ever been hunting. Has Pete met Peggy? I’d say the answer to that is pretty obvious. Pete says that he’s been a few times, and that killing an animal is an “incredible sensation.” When a man you know to be untrustworthy starts talking about death that way, you should back out of the room slowly and not sit down on the couch next to him, like Peggy does. Pete says that he’s always wanted to pick up the animal he just killed, carry it on his shoulders to a cabin in the woods, and “hang it up between a couple of trees, cut it open, drain it, dress it. And then I’d take my big hunting knife and I’d cut his loin right out of the side.” While Pete is rhapsodizing, Betty looks straight ahead uncomfortably. Pete continues that he’d go into the cabin and hand the meat to a woman waiting by the stove, and she’d cook it for him and then watch while he eats it. Peggy looks at him and half-whispers, “That would be wonderful.” Don’t feed Pete’s Davy Crockett fantasies, Peggy! I think that the main reason Pete continues to be semi-interested in Peggy is that she’s the only one who doesn’t emasculate him; instead, she tends to feed his delusions of manliness. I guess that’s a pretty good reason to like somebody.

Pete says that he’ll take a look at her copy, and Peggy takes her cue to leave. Out in the main office, Peggy is so turned on by Pete’s wilderness fantasy that she has to go buy a ham sandwich and cherry Danish from the food cart.

Betty is shopping in the grocery store when she sees Helen Bishop. Betty greets her warmly, but Helen is obviously reluctant to talk to her. Helen says that she found a lock of Betty’s hair among creepy Glenn’s things the other night. Betty tries to explain, but Helen isn’t having it: “He is nine years old. What is wrong with you?” That seems a bit harsh to say to someone’s face. He told her she was pretty like a princess! She’s not made of stone! Betty responds to Helen’s question with a not terribly hard, but still shocking, slap to the face. Betty than walks out, leaving her cart full of food. While I think it was unwarranted for Don to call her a little girl before, Betty could have handled that in a way more mature way. But maybe Helen’s direct question (“What is wrong with you?”) made her feel like everyone is ganging up to question her sanity, so she lashed out at Helen in a way that she can’t lash out at Don.

Slattery and Don are out to lunch, eating oysters and drinking martinis. Slattery is surprised that Don is “such a fan of the mollusk,” and Don says it’s like “eating a mermaid.” That would not make me want to eat oysters, personally. Slattery asks if Don wants another drink, and Don responds, “You’re leading this dance.” It’s obvious that Don is going to eat as many oysters and drink as many martinis as Slattery will. Slattery tells him approvingly, “I always thought you were a man who could keep up.” Don grins, thinking, “I can’t wait until later, when I have my ‘And the student becomes the master!’ moment.” They finish the meal with two slices of cheesecake and more martinis; Don is slouched so far down in his booth that he’s almost horizontal. They talk about “true love,” and more specifically Desi and Lucy (from I Love Lucy). Slattery isn’t surprised that they’re getting divorced after their remarriage: “Did he walk up one morning and say, ‘Oh yeah, I forgot…I hate you!’” Heh! Slattery says that he likes redheads, because “their mouths are like a drop of strawberry jam in a glass of milk.” Who the heck is putting jam into milk? Especially since Slattery usually takes his milk with vodka. Don says, a little drunkenly, that he doesn’t like drinking milk and hates cows. Me too! They agree to have one more martini each, instead of coffee, and then head back to the office.

At the Draper home, Betty is sitting at the table and drinking wine, alone in the middle of the day. Francine drops by, pretending to have a shirt of Bobby’s that actually belongs to Francine’s son. Betty explains that she’s trying the wine for a dinner party she’s planning. Francine asks, all faux-concern, how Betty is doing, and then gets to the point: she heard what happened in the supermarket with Helen and wants to know if it’s true. Betty says that she doesn’t know what happened, and it’s almost unbelievable. Francine says, in a rather sweet, supportive way, “I don’t know anyone who doesn’t want to take a good poke at her. She’s so selfish. All those long walks, and the pathetic job at Benson’s jewelry.” Betty chimes in, “And that John Kennedy, I hate him.” Francine is all, “Wha?” I guess she doesn’t know the reason that Betty was babysitting is that Helen was helping the Kennedy campaign. Kennedy is the real selfish one, taking divorced mothers away from their maladjusted children at night!

Francine continues to reassure Betty that people will “be glad to know that you’re not a marshmellow.” Now Betty is worried that people thought she’s weak, and Francine says that Betty’s just so sweet and perfect. Betty says that her mother “always said that, ‘You’re painting a masterpiece. Make sure to hide the brush strokes.’ She was always really beautiful. But then I think, why am I doing all this? I’m not that vain.” Oh, yes, the concept of “effortless beauty,” so familiar to any girl who’s picked up a woman’s magazine in the last 60 years. Francine asks what Dr. Wayne, her therapist says, and Betty laughs that he doesn’t say much beyond, “Tell me more about that.” But he did try to look down her neckline the other day. Betty says that “As far as I’m concerned, as long as men look at me that way, I’m earning my keep. And every once in a while, I think, no, this is something else. I don’t want my husband to see this.” “Earning my keep,” she says? Oh man, the gender politics in this show just continue to astound me.

Don and Slattery return to their building for the meeting with the Nixon people, but blocking the elevator is the operator we saw Don talking to earlier. The operator tells them that the elevator is out of order, and he doesn’t know when it’ll be fixed. Don jokes that they go back to lunch, but Slattery says that Cooper will have a seizure if they’re any later, and the two men head to the stairs. When Slattery turns his back, Don gives a subtle tip of the hat to the operator. The operator, who’s black, looks less than thrilled to being part of this rich man’s prank war. In the stairwell, Don and Slattery huff and puff as they make their way to floor 23. Don is obviously at an advantage due to his younger age, and Slattery has to stop and catch his breath. Don pushes Slattery to keep going, and Slattery insists that Don (who is smoking while climbing) walk behind him. Stair montage! I want to note that the music on this show is so excellent. On floor 17, Slattery has to stop and lean against the wall. I was pretty sure that he was going to have a heart attack, but instead he tells Don that he doesn’t want to rest. Don says, “I forgot, Navy man.” They interrupt two young employees necking in the stairwell, but don’t yell out, “Oooh, busted!” like I would have. Don offers to run ahead to tell the others that Slattery is on his way, and Slattery says, “My name is on the building. They can wait for me.” Pride goeth before the fall, indeed.

A few flights from their floor, Slattery slips on the stairs. He tells Don that he lost his tie clip, but he’ll find it and Don should keep going. He obviously isn’t willing to look weak in front of this younger, more able man. Don agrees, and practically skips up the stairs. He enters the Sterling Cooper offices coughing heavily, but pulls it together enough to meet the three men from the Nixon campaign. A few seconds later, Slattery staggers through the door. One of the Nixon men mentions how highly one of their other clients speaks of Slattery, and Slattery responds to that by bending over and hurling up an impressive amount of puke. I feel bad for whoever has to clean up that mess of oysters, martinis and cheesecake. The men all scatter backwards, and Don helps Slattery sit down. A secretary brings Slattery some water, and Cooper leads the Nixon men into the conference room, away from the puke. Don stays behind to ask if Slattery’s ok. Slattery is eyeing Don suspiciously, resenting him for being so pulled together after 23 flights, and possibly suspecting Don’s deception. Don gives him a light slap on the shoulder and walks off, grinning to himself. So not only is he able to pay back his boss in a roundabout way, but he also probably ruined Sterling Cooper’s chances of being hired for the Nixon campaign, something he didn’t want to do. The student has become the master!