The flight attendant reminded him to buckle his seat belt as the flight approached its final destination, Newark Liberty International Airport. He’d gone to the lavatory half a dozen times during the flight, painfully making his way up the aisle, grasping the backs of seats for support, and thanking the flight attendants profusely when they helped steady him on his way back.

She took the cane from his lap and placed it on the floor beneath his feet.

“Thank you,” he said. “Grazie.”

“Visiting family?” she asked before leaving him to attend to her pre-landing duties.

He looked up at her with cold, wary eyes surrounded by loose skin, yellowed from the chemotherapy. She was taken aback for a moment; his gray eyes testified to having seen things in his life she’d never seen, nor would want to.

“No, no,” he said. “It is, ah-it is business.”

She wished him well on the rest of his journey, patted his liver-spotted hand, and left. He looked out the window at the clouds through which they descended. He imagined the clouds would support his body and thought it would be nice to be nestled in them. The jet broke free of the overcast and New Jersey was sprawled out below. Louis Russo closed his eyes, picked up the cane, wrapped gnarled fingers around it, and waited for the plane to land.

“Excuse me,” he said to a Delta agent directing passengers to connecting flights. “The train to Washington? The Amtrak train?”

“Yes, sir, it’s… Would you like a cart to take you?”

“Yes, please. That would be good.”

An electric-powered cart driven by an airport employee delivered him to the rail link between the airport and Amtrak. He stood stoically on the platform, leaning on his cane, the small carry-on suitcase at his feet, waiting for the Acela Regional train, which had left New York’s Penn Station a half hour earlier. He’d used the men’s room at the station and considered buying a hot dog and soft drink at a Nathan’s stand, but his stomach was unsettled from the bumpy flight and he thought better of it. He stepped into a phone booth, pulled a slip of paper from a pocket, and dialed the number written on it in large letters.

The train pulled smoothly into the station as Russo completed his call. He showed his business class ticket to the female conductor, who pointed to a car toward the rear of the train. He chose one of the comfortable blue seats at the end of the car, close to the restrooms and the café car, wearily settled into it, and sighed. It had been a long, tiring day.

He’d departed from Israel’s Ben Gurion Airport at dawn, flying to Barcelona and waiting for the Delta flight to the United States. Sasha had packed his medications in a plastic bag and proudly showed him a red-and-blue-striped tie she’d bought for the trip. “You want to look nice,” she’d said. He thanked her and checked that his tickets were safe, swelling the inside pocket of his suit jacket. “Don’t forget the yellow pills at lunchtime,” she said as he climbed into the taxi in front of the apartment building. “And call the doctor if you don’t feel well.” His Israeli oncologist had given him the name of a physician at George Washington University ’s hospital.

He turned as the cab pulled away from the curb, saw her wave, wiggled his fingers in response, and sat back.

Israeli security forces had stopped them twice at checkpoints. Russo was asked to show them his airline tickets, which he did, and they were allowed to proceed.

Now, as the train pulled from the station on its way to Washington, and after he’d presented his ticket to the conductor, he leaned his head back and closed his eyes. There had been a moment while waiting for the train at the Newark station that he considered going in the other direction, to New York City, where he’d been born and raised, and where the happier days of his life had been spent. But that thought came and went. He would go to Washington where he was expected to be, where they would be waiting for him.

WASHINGTON, D.C.

Like most professional bartenders, Bob McIntyre was adept at doing and hearing many things at once-mixing drinks while taking in conversation at his small bar, and listening to the latest news from CNN that played on a plasma screen TV behind the bar. He mixed martinis, stirred not shaken, heard the CNN anchor report on news breaking in the Middle East, and listened to the arguments in progress between members of the Capitol View Restaurant’s luncheon club, where congressional staffers and mid-level executives paid fifty dollars a month for the privilege of having lunch at the restaurant, on the roof level of the Hyatt Regency Hotel on Capitol Hill.

McIntyre placed two frosted, stemmed glasses containing gin and vermouth on the bar in front of Geoff Lowe and a portly man named Rex, who managed a branch of the Riggs Bank. They were discussing President Parmele’s recent speech in which he opened the door to the possibility of raising taxes to bring a ballooning deficit under control.

“Can you believe it?” Lowe snarled, sipping his drink. “Can you friggin’ believe it? He wants to raise taxes so there’s more money for the government to spend on Democrat giveaway programs.”

The bank manager laughed heartily. “Raisin’ taxes when you’re runnin’ for a second term is pretty damn dumb, even for a politician.”

“At least he didn’t come up with ‘read my lips’ BS,” a Parmele defender said from the end of the bar. “At least he’s honest.”

Rex turned to McIntyre, who was pouring red wine into a glass. “What do you think, Bobby?” he asked the veteran barman.

“Well, balancing the budget’s a good thing,” McIntyre replied. “Wish I could balance my own. On the other hand, nobody wants to pay more taxes.”

Smooth. He was good at seeing both sides-or at least sounding as though he did. What he thought privately about Washington ’s major and sometimes seemingly only topic of conversation was another matter, reserved for discussion with regulars later at night who wouldn’t comment on his views with the size of their tips. At lunch, there were certain members whose beliefs were so set in stone that a mild challenge, even when their opinions were based upon shaky facts, was akin to spitting in their drinks. Lowe was one of those, his strident viewpoints mirroring those of his graying, crusty, outspoken boss, Karl Widmer, the senior senator from Alaska.

McIntyre glanced at Ellen Kelly, who’d turned from the conversation to speak with a woman, a House staffer from Mississippi, about a less volatile but no less provocative topic-the sexual scandal du jour.

How could a nice, pretty, polite young woman like Ellen put up with Lowe’s bellicosity? McIntyre wondered. Did he yap away about politics in bed? Probably.

“Another martooni, Geoff?” McIntyre asked, noting the empty glass.

“No can do, Bobby,” Lowe said. “Can’t afford to nod off during one of the old man’s speeches this afternoon.” He laughed. “At least not before he does.” His moment of levity was fleeting; he returned to his condemnation of the sitting president and dragged a reluctant Ellen Kelly back into the conversation. McIntyre smiled to himself as he watched the young woman with the curly red hair, the large green eyes, and a splatter of freckles across her nose and upper cheeks enter into the discussions, which by now included others at the bar and one or two nearby tables. It was impossible to know whose political views prevailed on any given day, although the anti-Parmele Republicans tended to talk louder and use more vitriolic language than their Democratic counterparts. If noise levels dictated a winner, Geoff Lowe and his supporters usually carried the day.

Lowe and Kelly brought plates from the buffet to the bar and ate there. McIntyre continued to mix drinks for those at the bar and to fill orders brought by the waitress, Mei, who was as adroit as McIntyre at sidestepping attempts to engage. The lavishly appointed room offered a stunning view of the domed Capitol, but not much of what was new in politics, where not much was ever new. His practiced ears picked up on what his wards were saying, particularly Lowe, who pontificated on why Parmele would fail in his bid for a second term. “I’m telling you,” he told a Democratic staffer from the Hill who’d joined the knot of people at the bar, “Parmele’s got plenty of skeletons in his closet, and Widmer knows what they are and where they are.” To Ellen: “Am I right, Ellen?”