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the territory, I’m into it. So here’s the problem, Neal. We think we have a real shot at the VP thing, and after that, who knows? The Senator is of that stature, Neal. Trust me on that, okay?”
    “Okay.”
    “Right. Call our movie Remember the Eagleton. Conceptually speaking. You remember the Eagleton thing, Neal. McGovern’s people tab this senator from the Show-me State, turns out his brain runs on batteries. The Party is a little touchy on the subject. Now they check these things out a little more closely. Like a proctoscope.”
    “So a drugged-out, boozing teenage thief stands out.”
    “There we go.”
    “I’d think, then, you’d want her to stay disappeared.”
    Lombardi stopped the car at a gate. He pulled one of those garage-door gadgets out of his pocket and hit a combination of numbers. The gate swung open.
    “Ali Baba,” he said. “It’s this post-Watergate ethics thing, Neal. Everybody’s talking values. Family. You have a front-runner who’s been ‘born again,’ although you’d think once was enough, right? Everybody looking for Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Shit, we’d probably run Jimmy Stewart, except he’s a buddy of Ronald Reagan’s.”
    Lombardi pulled the car slowly down a long, crushed-stone driveway flanked by willows.
    “The front-runner,” Lombardi went on, “dresses like Robert What’s-his-name in Father Knows Best, and drags his daughter around all over the place. We have more kids in this campaign than in the Our Gang comedies.”
    “Maybe Chase should just buy a dog, with a cute little ring around the eye.”
    “I’ll make a note. But seriously, Neal, we have to have Allie back by convention time.”
    “Looking like Elinor Donahue.”
    “Yeah. And quietly, Neal. The press and the Party people are going to be all over us.”
    He parked the car on the side of the circular driveway in front of the house, or in front of part of the house. The house was endless, like The Ancient Mariner. A broad expanse of manicured lawn led down to the ocean and a private dock and boat house. Neal saw a fence he assumed screened a pool, and a double tennis court. Grass.
    “Where’s the helicopter pad?” Neal asked.
    “Other side.”
    Lombardi handed Neal’s bag to your basic livened servant, who disappeared with it.
    “Hey, Rich, I have an idea. Maybe you could make like Allie never existed—airbrush her from photos, steal her birth records, kill anyone who remembers her….”
    “Pretty good, Neal. But don’t joke like that in the house, okay?”
    Okay.
    Senator John Chase was one of those rare people who resemble their photographs. He was tall, craggy, and muscled, with an Adam’s apple and a set of shoulders that competed for attention. He looked like an Ichabod Crane who had bumped into Charles Atlas on the road someplace. He stalked into the room and headed straight for the bar. “I’m John Chase and I’m having a scotch. What are you having?”
    “Scotch is fine, thank you.”
    “Scotch is fine, and you’re welcome. Soda or water?”
    “Neither.”
    “Ice?”
    “Mr. Campbell in fifth-grade science told me ice melts and becomes water.”
    “Mr. Campbell wasn’t drinking fast enough. Here you are.”
    Just because the room was exactly what you’d expect doesn’t mean it didn’t impress, Neal thought. Three walls were glassed in, and all the furniture was casual and expensive. Each seat offered an ocean view. Neal took the proffered drink, perched himself on the edge of the sofa, and took a sip. The whiskey was older than he was. A point that Chase picked up on right away.
    “Are you as young as you look, Neal?”
    “Younger.”
    Chase turned a chair around and sat down, leaning over the back. It was a campaign photo of the no-nonsense legislator getting down to some serious turkey talking. “I thought the bank would send somebody a little more mature.”
    “You can probably still trade me in for the toaster or the luggage.”
    “How old are you,