If I had money, I tell you what I'd do, I'd go downtown and buy a Mercury or two. So goes the Alan Jackson classic, Mercury Blues, but should you need only one cool Merc then today's Marquis might be it. That is, if its price doesn't give you the blues.

Yesterday was April 1st and since everybody else on the planet was pulling pranks, I played it straight, which was actually the biggest prank of them all. Hooray reverse psychology! Fully 90% of you also felt that the seller of yesterday's wasn't fooling when he set his price.

Donatien Alphonse François de Sade, better known as the Marquis de Sade, was an 18th century French Libertine who spent a lot of his life in either prison or the loony bin, mainly on account of his published works which many equated to dogs humping your legs. He was also the dude for whom the term sadist was based. Fun fact!

Fast forward a century or two and feast your eyes on the painful sexiness of today's , resplendent in erotic white with a cosseting interior of blue mouse fur. What's that you say, this old Panther doesn't have you thinking it's a totally sexy cougar? You perhaps think it's not a total MILF - a Mercury I'd Like to Flog? Well, looks my friend, can be deceiving.

That's seemingly the whole point of this cool sled- like Snow White, it's a sleeper. You see, while on the outside this big Merc is almost all Cleveland Applebees' Early Bird dinner, under that patina of high-waisted pants and blue salon hair there lies a throbbing love muscle of an engine. That's a be-turbo'd Mod-V8 that's claimed to be good for 408-horses at the back tires.

Whoa, cleanup on aisle three!

Let's have a look, shall we? The ad notes that this Merc has been in the family since new and when it was factory fresh it had some sort of accident. That doesn't seem to have had any impact on its being able to chase tail as it now has fully 222,XXX miles on its Panther frame and body. There's only 40-some thousand on the mill, and 60K said to be on the built 4R70W. The turbo is apparently a fairly recent (10K) addition. Build thread pics .

Along with the hot engine - seriously, that turbo must bake the serpentine belt - there's also a bunch of suspension and stopping upgrades. Those include poly bushings (squeak, squeak,squeak) all around, Bilsteins (ohh, fawn-say!) P71 springs, and slotted discs at each corner. Also, the rear suspension is said to have been reinforced to handle all the action.

As noted, and aside from the GT-wannabe wheels and tires, the car gives no clue as to what lies beneath, sort of like a librarian surreptitiously hiding a g-string. Other than its stockiness there's nothing overtly remarkable about the body, so I won't remark on it.

The interior is likewise almost all stock and shows a healthy patina of wear across its acres of space. There is a fancy pants stereo in there, and in the trunk as well as I guess it takes that much to overcome the delicious turbo whine and V8 growl. The battery has also been relocated to the boot.

This is a rare and amazing Marquis as it represents the epitome of a stealth fighter car. Well, seeing as it's a Panther it's more of a stealth C17, but you get the picture. The question for right now is, did the seller of this sexy beast get the pic when setting its $5,500 price tag.

What do you think, is this sexy sleeper worth $5,500 left on its dresser? Or, is this a Mercury with a price that doesn't have you rising?

You decide!

, or go if the ad disappears.

H/T to Ryan P for the hookup!

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