“Who’s Pamela?”

“Pamela Warren. My publisher. We’ve gotten a couple of early notices already. They’re dismissing the book as the figment of the old mobster’s imagination. One reviewer is labeling it a hoax.”

“Don’t blame me,” Lowe said. “Marienthal’s the one who’s screwed everything up.”

Greenleaf abruptly ended the call.

Mac and Annabel Smith greeted Kathryn at their apartment door and led her to the dining room, where she placed the shopping bag on the table. “The tapes,” she said.

“The tapes,” Smith said, emphasizing the words. “Rich gave them to you?”

“In a sense. He’d had them in a public locker at Union Station. He gave me the key before taking the train to New York.”

“He’s on his way there now?” Annabel asked.

“Right. He’s going to visit his mother and go to Hobbes House at some point.”

“Why is Mr. Lowe with you?” Mac asked.

Kathryn explained, ending with a rueful laugh. “He thinks Rich has the tapes with him. If he only knew they were in this shopping bag that he was sitting next to in the cab.”

Kathryn removed the plastic bags containing the tapes and Rich’s handwritten notes from the shopping bag and laid them on the table.

“Have you heard them?” Mac asked.

“No,” Kathryn said, “and I don’t want to. You can listen if you’d like.”

“I have no interest in hearing them,” said Smith. To Annabel: “You?”

She shook her head.

“What does Rich want you to do with them?” Annabel asked.

Kathryn inhaled and blew air through pursed lips. “He told me to ask for your advice, Mac.”

“He did, did he?” Smith said. “What if I don’t have any advice?”

“That would be a first,” Annabel said, playfully.

“Let me explain,” Smith said. “These tapes-or more accurately, the use they might be put to-have significant political ramifications. If they end up with Republicans like Senator Widmer, they’ll be used to attack a sitting president, who, I might add, is doing a good job in my opinion. But what if the charges made by Russo on the tapes are true? What if the president did order the assassination of a visiting head of state while CIA director? Hardly the sort of thing a president of the United States should have on his résumé.”

Annabel went into the kitchen to get something to drink and returned with a pitcher of iced tea she’d prepared earlier. She poured three glasses, handed them to her husband and to Kathryn, and raised her glass in a toast. “To the famous tapes,” she said, adding, “are you interested in my opinion about what should happen to them?”

“Of course,” Mac said.

“The question is whether the man on those tapes is telling the truth. Unfortunately, he’s dead and can’t vouch for what he told Rich. It’s my understanding that Rich never came up with any corroborating evidence to support the claims about President Parmele. Am I right? Mac, you’ve read the book.”

“Skimmed it,” he said. “No, there doesn’t seem to be anything to corroborate Mr. Russo’s story.” He looked at Kathryn: “Do you know of anything, Kathryn? Has Rich indicated any supporting evidence he might be sitting on?”

“No,” she said, sipping her cold tea. “He said a few times that he wished there were some hard facts to back up Louis Russo.”

“Well, Kathryn,” Smith said, “the only advice I can give you is to do with the tapes what Rich wants done with them. After all, they do belong to him.”

Annabel chimed in: “Has Rich told you, Kathryn, what he wants done with them? Has he instructed you what to do with them?”

“He told me-”

“Yes?”

“He told me that if you didn’t feel strongly about the tapes going to someone-to the president or Senator Widmer-that I should use my own judgment.”

“I’ve thought recently,” Smith said, “that another option would be to donate them to an institution for safekeeping, not to be opened to researchers for a specified period of time.”

“But does it matter how much time passes,” Kathryn asked, “if what’s on the tapes isn’t true?”

Neither Mac nor Annabel replied.

“I think I’d better go,” Kathryn said, “but I don’t want to bump into Geoff Lowe again if he’s still downstairs.”

“No problem,” said Annabel. “We’ll leave through the garage. I’ll drive you.”

“Oh, no, there’s no need to-”

“I insist,” Annabel said.

Kathryn put the tapes and notes back into the shopping bag, and Mac walked her to the door. “I wish I had some wisdom to dispense,” he said, “but somehow I know you’ll do the right thing without anyone’s advice.”

“I’ll try,” she said, kissing him on the cheek.

When they were gone, Smith called down to the desk. “Is Mr. Lowe still there?” he asked.

“Yes, he is, Mr. Smith.”

“Send him up.”

Lowe’s first words upon entering the apartment were “Where’s Kathryn?”

“She left,” Smith said.

“Left? Where did she go?”

“I have no idea, Mr. Lowe. We haven’t been formally introduced.” Smith extended his hand, which Lowe took weakly. “Iced tea?” Smith asked. “My wife makes very good iced tea.”

“No. Thanks anyway,” Lowe said, looking past Mac into the apartment’s recesses.

“I told you she’s not here,” Smith said. He walked to the open sliding glass doors to the terrace and looked back. “Join me, Mr. Lowe?”

They stood side by side, their hands on the terrace’s railing, their attention on the Potomac River. “I’m well aware, Mr. Lowe, why you and Senator Widmer would like to have those tapes. Your hearings won’t have much bite without them.”

“We can do without them,” Lowe said, his voice betraying his true feelings.

“Perhaps,” said Smith. “Let me ask you a question. There’s considerable doubt about the veracity of what Mr. Russo said on those tapes. What I don’t understand is why you and the senator would want to hold a public hearing based upon allegations that can’t be substantiated.”

Lowe’s hands in motion substituted for words. “The book, the taped voice of a dead man, the questioning. It’s politics,” he said finally.

“Politics,” Smith repeated, not trying to keep scorn from his voice. “The game of politics. Well, though everybody seems to say it is, I don’t consider politics a game, Mr. Lowe. Politics are more important than that. Is winning the political game that vital to you and your boss, Mr. Lowe? Are you and the senator really willing to destroy a president of the United States in order to win what you consider a game?”

“Parmele doesn’t deserve a second term,” Lowe said.

“Isn’t that for the voters to decide?”

“As long as they have the facts.”

“The facts as you perceive them. Mr. Russo’s claims don’t represent facts. They might be true, but there’s not a shred of evidence to back them up. I’m a lawyer, Mr. Lowe. I deal in evidence. I deal in the facts. And one fact, as far as I’m concerned, is that you and others like you don’t belong in government on any level. I find you despicable. I think it’s time you left. Thanks for stopping by.”

“You’re part of this, aren’t you?” Lowe snarled. “You’ve been helping Marienthal hide those tapes all along. Well, Smith, you and anybody else involved in this cover-up will answer to Senator Widmer and the committee. We’ll drag you in front of it and make your life miserable.”

Smith left the terrace, went to the apartment door, and opened it. Lowe glared at him from the terrace, fists clenched at his sides, his face red and sweaty.

“Good day, Mr. Lowe,” Smith said from the door.

Lowe stormed from the terrace and pushed past Smith, his shoulder bumping him. Smith watched him go down the hall to the elevators and disappear into one.

Smith went to his office, where he called Frank Marienthal’s room at the Watergate Hotel to tell him what had transpired.

“He’s gone to New York?” the father said. “What’s he doing there?”

“Visiting Mary, according to Kathryn, and then having a meeting with his publisher.”