Jack's hangover finally muted itself after two shots of vodka. He had spent the last hour in his suite, talking on his bank of telephones with Emil Rodriguez, his second-in-command, and trying to round up all his delegates and have them briefed for the platform fight that would come tomorrow. There was a knock. Jack told Rodriguez he'd call him back and opened the door. Amy Sorenson stood outside, carrying a pile of briefing papers in an envelope. Her chestnut hair was pinned up atop her head.

"Hi, Amy* " Jack kissed her warmly, then drew her inside and tried to kiss her again. She turned her head away.

"Not this time, Jack. This isn't like Buenos Aires. My husband's here."

Jack sighed. "You're on business, then."

Any stepped out of his arms and straightened her fetching blue suit. "Brace yourself," she said. "I've got bad news."

"I'm braced. I've been braced for months."

Amy's nose wrinkled at the appalling stench of tobacco, liquor, and the residue of perfume. She perched on the edge of a chair, then carefully pushed a cigar-filled ashtray as far away as she could. Jack pulled up a chair and sat on it backward, gazing at Amy over the chairback.

"What's up?"

"You're not going to like this at all. There's going to be a big credentials fight tonight over the California delegation." Jack stared at her.

"The Jackson people are gonna spring it on us. They're claiming that a winner-take-all primary is inherently discriminatory against minorities."

"Crap." Jack's reply was immediate. "The California primary's been a winner-take-all for as long as I can remember."

"The challenge gives everyone a chance to dismember our largest bloc of delegates, and do it in a righteous cause."

"We followed all the rules. We won the primary fair and square."

Amy looked exasperated. "The rules, Jack, are what the convention says they are. If they strip our delegates, they open the convention to a series of parliamentary and procedural battles that could unhinge everything. That's what Jackson, Gore, and Barnett want-if things get chaotic, it improves their chances of getting the nomination. If they can fuck us over and hand us a procedural defeat before the first ballot, they can hope to acquire defectors from our camp during the second ballot."

"Great. Just great." Funny how he just couldn't get used to women who used words like fuck. Hell, Jack couldn't get used to the way men used the word these days.

Some days more than others he felt like a relic.

"The showdown's all going to be about the rule books and who can manipulate them best. Who's the parliamentarian for your delegation?"

Jack shifted uncomfortably in his chair. " I guess I am."

"Do you know anything about parliamentary procedure?" Jack thought about it. "I've sat on a lot of corporate boards. You'd be surprised at some of the tricks they pull." Amy sighed. "Do you know Danny Logan? He's our campaign parliamentarian. I want you to take your instructions from him."

"When I last saw Logan, he was lying under a bar stool at LAX. "

Amy's eves flashed. She tossed her chestnut hair out of her eyes. "He'll be sober tonight, I promise you."

Jack thought for a moment. "Do we have the votes?"

"Can't tell. Dukakis is hedging, like always. The people who can save us are the superdelegates. Most of them are congressmen and senators who would do anything to prevent a bloodbath. They may vote for us just to keep things sane. And of course they know Gregg a lot better than they know the Duke and Jackson, let alone Barnett."

"This is all crazy."

"The Democrats haven't had a convention that's gone past the first ballot since 1932. Everybody's making it up as we go along. "

Jack rested his chin on his big hands. "I remember that convention. My family listened to it on our radio. We were Roosevelt all the way. I remember my dad breaking out the bootleg hootch when Texas Jack Garner defected from Smith and gave Roosevelt the nomination."

Amy smiled at him. " I keep thinking of you as my younger… indiscretion. I just can't picture you as old enough to live through those times."

"Till Gregg came along, the only presidential candidate I voted for was Roosevelt in '44, when I was overseas. Before that I was too young to vote. In '48 I couldn't make up my mind between Truman and Wallace, so I never cast a ballot at all."

"You almost voted for George Wallace?" Amy seemed a little shocked. "That seems unlike you."

Jack felt terribly old. "Henry Wallace, Amy. Henry Wallace."

"Oh. Sorry. "

"Just to make it absolutely clear, the Roosevelt I mentioned was Franklin, not Teddy."

"That I knew." Grinning. "How'd your meeting with Hiram go? Or should I ask?"

Jack shook his head. "It was weird. I really don't know what to make of it." He looked at her. "Is Worchester okay? I wondered if he was ill. He didn't look healthy."

"Mmm."

"He's got this big sore on his neck. I read somewhere that sores like that could be a symptom of AIDS."

Amy blinked in astonishment. "Hiram?"

Jack shrugged. "I don't know the man, Amy. The only impression I had was that he really wasn't interested in me."

"Well." She ventured a brief smile. "I guess that means you got along all right."

"He didn't hand me any more dimes, anyway."

"That's encouraging." She cocked her head and looked at him. " I met a celebrity this morning. Josh Davidson. You ever met him?"

"The actor? What's he doing here?"

"His daughter's one of our delegates. He's here as an observer. I thought you might know each other, being actors and all."

"There are a few actors I haven't met. Honest."

"He's charming as anything. Real smooth."

Jack grinned at her. "Sounds like you're considering an older, uh, indiscretion."

Amy laughed. "Well. Maybe if he'd shave off the beard."

"I doubt it. That beard's one of his trademarks."

One of jack's phones rang. He looked at the row of telephones on his desk and tried to decide which one wanted him. Amy stood.

"Gotta go, Jack. That's probably Danny Logan anyway."

"Yeah." Parliamentary tactics, Jack thought. Oh, great. Another phone began to ring. Jack crossed the suite and picked up a receiver. He heard only a dial tone. It was setting out to be that kind of day.

With a nasal squeal of fury Mackie ripped the calendar o the petechiate wallpaper. It displayed an open-lipped pussy presented for his approval-which wasn't coming-framed in dark hair and olive-thigh flesh, the tentative smile of a Puerto Rican girl hovering off above it in the middle distance. Mackie put a buzz on his fingers and ran them across the photo. Bits of woman went everywhere, a flurry of coloredpaper snow. That made him feel better.

It was almost as good as the real thing.

But while it could be assuaged, nothing was changing the thing that was pissing him off in the first place: the man he had come to kill wasn't here. Mackie didn't take disappointment well.

Maybe if he hung out a while Digger Downs would return home. He kicked over a low table of blond, wood-like veneer, purchased from some rental store, and went to the kitchen, while tabloids, racing forms, and issues of Photo District News fluttered around the floor like wounded birds. The SounDesign stereo on the cinderblock-and-board bookcase spritzed robopop at the fading seams on the back of his leather jacket.

The icebox was like a fifties Detroit car, big and bulging, and banded with chrome from which even phony luster w long since gone. All it lacked was fins. He yanked the door open. Inside were a bunch of white cardboard fast-fo containers; half a deli sandwich, entombed in Saran Wrap, the meat gone the color of a morning-after bruise; a carton of eggs with the top ripped off, and two eggshells punctured, as if by a drunken thumb while some of their comrades were on their way to a morning-after omelet; two six packs of Little King and one of no-name creme soda; and plastic margarine tubs filled with this and that, mostly mold. There were a few little gray plastic cylinders that obviously held film. These Mackie opened and unspooled, gleefully bathing them in the dubious radiance of the one bare bulb protruding like a hemorrhoid from the ceiling.