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"Vanessa was sending a distress signal," Gray said. "She wasn't wearing her mother's wedding ring," he explained. "It's been on the ring finger of her right hand since Clete placed it there the day her mother died. That morning, it was notably absent. She kept bringing her hand into view, especially when she knew the cameras were on her. I think she wanted someone to notice that she wasn't wearing it."

Daily said, "You really think she was signaling for help?"

"Yes."

"The ring could have been misplaced," Barrie argued. "Maybe it wouldn't stay on because of all the weight she lost. Or she might simply have grown tired of it. It could

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have been at the jeweler's being resized or cleaned. There are dozens of plausible reasons for her not wearing it."

"That's right, there are," Gray said. "If I were back in Wyoming watching her on TV and saw that she wasn't wearing it, I might be mildly curious, but not necessarily alarmed.

"However," he continued, coming to his feet, "since Spence was sent to ice me, since I witnessed your house being vaporized, and since I know that surveillance teams are following you, I'm inclined to be more than mildly curious."

"And I think you're right," Barrie admitted grudgingly. "That press conference was Vanessa's only public appearance since her `seclusion.' If she's as healthy as the White House claims, she would have launched back into her schedule, right?" On impulse, she picked up Daily's phone and dialed a number she had committed to memory.

"Who're you calling?" Gray asked.

"Vanessa's office."

"Remember, everything you say is probably being monitored."

"They'll just assume I'm up to my old tricks. Turn down the TV."

The sudden silence was as jarring as the racket had been. "Good morning,"

Barrie said pleasantly when her call was answered. "My name is Sally May Henderson. I represent the Daughters of the American Revolution. We would very much like to present the First Lady with one of our distinguished service awards in recognition of her ongoing campaign to feed and shelter the homeless."

She emphasized that the organization wished to present the award in person. "The publicity would bring to the nation's attention the continued need for the shelters and soup kitchens the First Lady has been so instrumental in organizing." Politely, but firmly, she was told that a meeting

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wasn't possible in the near future. The First Lady was still recovering from her recent indisposition.

"I see. Well, please extend to her our warmest regards. We'll be in touch again." She hung up and turned to Daily and Gray. "Her staff has been instructed not to schedule any appointments for her until they get the go-ahead from Dr. Allan."

Gray turned up the volume on the TV again, then said, "David is going for broke."

"It seems so."

Daily was rubbing his jaw, looking worried. "Are you suggesting what I think you are?"

Bondurant said, "Vanessa has become less of an asset and more of a liability. David eliminates liabilities."

"You're guessing," Daily stressed.

"Uh-uh. I know." Gray returned to the sofa and sat down. For a moment no one said anything.

Finally, Barrie spoke up. "My career has been a joke. I've screwed up more often than not. God knows, my gut instinct is anything but reliable. But this time I know I'm right. Our president is a criminal." She looked up at Gray. "I may distrust my instincts, but I trust yours."

"Thanks." He glanced at Daily, then back at her. "Look, you two should take an extended vacation, somewhere out of the country. If David is convinced that you've given up, that you're no longer a threat, he'll relax his vigilance. I'll take it from here, and hopefully save Vanessa before David can implement plan B."

"Not bloody likely," Barrie said heatedly. "We're talking about the attempted murder of the First Lady. As a citizen, I can't turn my back on that. Not only that, but I was the first one Vanessa approached for help.

If I hadn't misread the signs, she might be safely with her father now.

Because I dropped the ball, she's still under her husband's tyranny.

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"And it's because of his treachery that I've lost everything that was important to me. Cronkite, my home, my job. I've got a vendetta against that son of a bitch in the Oval Office. And God help him. Because I'm the worst kind of enemy to have. One who has nothing left to lose."

"Except your hide," Daily said, wheezing.

"No," she said softly, "except you, Daily."

"Don't turn those teary eyes on me, missy. You've got shit for brains.

Both of you," he said, cutting his eyes between her and Gray.

"How can we not expose Merritt for what he is?" she asked gently.

"You're talking crazy. Have you two listened to yourselves? He's the freaking President of the United States. The highest office in the land and the most powerful individual in the world. You fuck with him, you'll wind up dead."

Barrie looked at Gray and saw in his eyes a commitment that matched her own. Ironically, the very thing that had kept them apart now bound them together.

Turning back to Daily, she said, "If Merritt plans to have me killed, I at least want to put up a fight. But I refuse to place you in danger. Take the long vacation."

"You should leave this afternoon, as soon as arrangements can be made,"

Gray urged.

"Where would you like to go, Daily? Mexico?"

"And get the trots? Hell no."

"The Bahamas?"

"There's a hurricane in the Caribbean. Don't you watch the news?"

"Australia?"

"I'm not going anywhere," he said firmly. "Why would I leave and let you two have all the fun?"

"It's not going to be fun, Daily," Gray said with the manner of an undertaker. "You can't fuck around with these EXCLUSIVE 269

guys. When it comes to carrying out an assignment, they mean business. So we must mean business too. At the risk of sounding melodramatic, this could easily become a life-ordeath situation."

"I'm already in a life-or-death situation," Daily retorted. He spread his arms to encompass the shabby room. "I've got less to lose than Barrie. I have an incurable disease. I've got no wife, no kids, nothing. The way I figure it, if I can help you, I won't die forgotten."

Barrie crossed the room, leaned down, and kissed the top of his head.

"You're decrepit and ugly, but I love you dearly."

"Cut that out. I hate that mushy shit." He waved her off. "Okay, Bondurant, what do we do first?"

/3arrie smiled at Jayne Gaston's son across the threshold of his home.

"Hello, Mr. Gaston. Barrie Travis. Do you remember me?"

"All too well. What do you want?"

"I brought you this," she said, holding out a potted blue hydrangea. "May I come in?"

He hesitated, deciding whether he would speak with her. Finally, he stepped aside. "For a few minutes."

Ralph Gaston, Jr., was a mild-mannered man in his midthirties who had gone soft around the middle. He lived in a neat brick house in the middle of the block in a middleclass suburb of D.C. Barrie had located him through the telephone directory.

She was led through rooms that were clean but littered with toys. "My wife took the kids to the mall," he explained as he stepped over a Playskool lawn mower.

"I'm sorry I missed them. I wanted to convey my condolences to them as well."

She followed him onto a screened back porch, where it appeared he'd been watching an NCAA football game on a

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portable TV. He turned down the volume and took a sip of the beer on the end table. He did not offer her anything to drink. She took a seat in the aluminum lawn chair he indicated.

Barrie began by clarifying that anything they said was strictly off the record. "I'm not here as a reporter. It might actually make you feel better to know that I was fired from WVUE."

"In fact it does make me feel better," he said bluntly. "You got no less than you deserved, Ms. Travis. My mother was a lady. She had dignity, and rarely called attention to herself. You made a black comedy out of her death. After the media circus you created at the hospital, I find it difficult to be civil to you."

"I don't blame you. More than anything, I regret that your bereavement was made so public."

"Are you trying to apologize?"

"Very much so."

"Apology accepted." He started to get up. "Now if you'll excuse-"

"Your mother must have been enormously excited when Dr. Allan hired her,"

Barrie said, forestalling him.

"What makes you say that?" His voice cracked like a whip, surprising her.

"Uh, well, because he placed so much trust in her."

"Oh," he said, visibly relaxing. "Yeah, she felt really fortunate to get such a good job. She said it was particularly gratifying to have such an important patient."

Barrie's journalistic instinct was sizzling like bacon in a hot skillet.

What had she stumbled upon here? Her initial motive had been sincere: She had wished to apologize for her gaffe and its effect on the Gaston family.

But this meeting with Ralph Gaston was also part of her and Gray's strategy to protect Vanessa. They could hardly report the President's alleged crimes to the local police.

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They had nothing substantive to take to the Justice Department. They couldn't assault the White House with guns blazing. Their attack had to be much more subtle.

Gray's view, with which Barrie and Daily concurred, was that the administration must be destroyed from within. It must collapse upon itself like a dying star. The energy of Merritt's presidency must, paradoxically, cause its own extinction.

Information was the only weapon available to them. They needed to know exactly what had happened in George Allan's lake house. Barrie had volunteered to start with Jayne Gaston's son. She hadn't really expected to learn anything of monumental importance, but maybe she had under-estimated the potential of this interview.

Ralph had used words like fortunate and gratifying to describe his mother's feelings about her job as the First Lady's private nurse, which implied that she had felt unworthy of the post. Why? Barrie wondered.

"Did your mother have a history of heart problems?"

"Only for the past couple of years," Ralph said, somewhat defensively.

"But she stayed on top of it. She got regular checkups, took her medication religiously. You couldn't keep Mom down if you tried. She loved her work. She was an excellent nurse."

"That's what I've heard. Dr. Allan raved about her. So did the President."

"He sent flowers to the funeral."

"Really? He sent me flowers once." In another lifetime. Before she knew that he was a killer. "Had your mother suffered a previous heart attack?"

"It was mild," he replied, resuming his defensive posture. "She recovered quickly. It never affected her work."

"No one has questioned her skills or her performance, Mr. Gaston."

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He rubbed his hands over the tops of this thighs. Barrie recognized it as a nervous gesture. The middle-class suburbanite with the soft middle was no longer quite so mild-mannered. He said, "If Mom was good enough to attend the First Lady, she was good enough to attend anybody."

"Precisely."

"She was eminently qualified."

"I'm sure she was. How did she like working for Dr. Allan?"

"What do you mean?"

Barrie flashed him an insider's smile. "Just curious. You know how egotistical doctors can be. Some of them think they walk on water. I just wondered if that had been your mother's experience with Dr. Allan." "She never said."

Barrie knew immediately that he was lying. "I take it your mother was satisfied that the First Lady was getting the proper treatment for her illness?"

"Mrs. Merritt didn't have an illness. She just needed a long rest."

"Of course. That's what I meant."

"No," he said, shaking his head, "you meant to imply that my mother would deliberately overlook it if a patient was receiving improper treatment."

"I implied no such thing, Mr. Gaston. The President has gone on record praising your mother and Dr. Allan for the excellent care they provided Mrs. Merritt."

"So what's your point?"

What was her point? "It's just a shame that for all his healing talent, Dr. Allan couldn't save your mother's life."

"He said he did everything he could."

"And you believe him?"

"Why wouldn't I? He's a great doctor and a decent man. He gave Mom a chance when no one else would."

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"A chance?"

"To work." Suddenly he shot to his feet. "I don't want to talk about this anymore. My mother died only a few days ago. I'm still very upset." "Of course. I'm sorry."

Barrie did not pressure him. She was coming away with much more than she had hoped to gain. Actually, she was leaving with more questions than answers and was eager to do some further investigating.

"It was awfully kind of you to see me." At the front door, she clasped his hand warmly. She believed that, like the rest of the nation, he had been conned by the men in power. So, although he had been borderline rude to her, she felt only pity for him. "Please convey my sympathy to the rest of your family, and, again, I apologize for any heartache I contributed."

Ralph Gaston, Jr., watched as Barrie Travis made her way down the sidewalk and got into a car parked at the curb. He waited until she had driven away before moving hastily to the telephone.

His call was answered on the second ring.

Ralph had spoken with a federal agent only twice in his life-the day before yesterday, when one had appeared at his mother's wake, asking to speak with him alone, and now. Both times, his mouth had gone dry and his palms had grown wet.

"You told me to call if that reporter showed up. Well, she just left my house."

"You spoke with her?"