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We endured what seemed a month of abuse, although it must have been only a few days. Toward the end of that week, I walked into the Stanton suite and found the governor and Susan, huddled together on the couch holding hands, deep in conversation with a balding, middle-aged man who looked like an Israeli army officer, perhaps because he was wearing a khaki shirt with epaulets. He was eating half a cantaloupe, filled with a great ball of cottage cheese, flecks of which dotted his chin.

"Henry," the governor said. "This is David Adler. David, this is Henry Burton."

We nodded at each other, warily. "Henry, we're tryin' to figure out some way to n+-rli this thing around," Stanton said. "David's got some good ideas, I think."

"I wouldn't go overboard," Adler said. "You're running against a tidal wave. Chances are, you're fucked."

"I was just saying to David, maybe we could do some ads-positive ads, folks from down home, folks who know me tellin' what Jack Stanton is really like."

"Henry, you're a New Yorker?" Adler said, finally wiping his chin. "Henry, you think New Yorkers are gonna give a rat's ass what some yokel says about anything? Governor, I've got to tell you: HeeHaw never made it here. You gotta use your kanoodle, Governor. You gotta think: what've I got that'll work in the Apple? One thing you got, you're good with the folks. I don't give a shit what Leno said, I liked you crooning to the old lady. It was shmaltzy, but it was real. So I figure, the only thing you can do is get down where the folks live."

"We've been trying that," Susan said.

"No, I mean on TV," Adler said. "They watch these trashy shows. They watch Oprah and Crapola. You do your thing on that, they'll be watching. It'll get through."

"It'll just be trash," Susan said. "They'll just go after him on the trash."

"Yeah, sure," Adler said, getting up from the table now, beginning to pace. He was a fireplug, with thick, muscular shoulders and forearms. "It'll be all about trash at first, but if he can't handle that, he ain't goin' anywhere in this thing anyway-right, Governor? You don't have much of a shot talking to them about the national debt if they think you're a-whatever."

"Jack, don't," Susan pleaded, "A president doesn't do that sort of thing. We've got to think about keeping whatever dignity we have left."

"Excuse me, ma'am," Adler said. "But who knows what the fuck a president does these days?"

He was very crude; Susan, for once, was taken aback. Our eyes met. I communicated: Do we really need this asshole? She communicated: Who knows? We're desperate, Jack's casting about-let's see. "Couldn't we start with something a little bit softer?" she asked. "Well, I know Regis Philbin from the old country," Adler was saying. "He probably owes me a favor."

And then I had an idea. "We've been treating Freddy Picker as if he were involved in some different campaign than this one-but, Governor, he said the other night he wanted to start a conversation. Why don't you invite him to come on a show with you?"

"Why would Picker do it?" Adler said. "He could only lose. He's smart, he'll say Yeah sure, I want a 'conversation' and then work us on the details until Tishah-b'Ab."

"You may be right, but I've got a feeling he'll do it," Stanton said. "Did you see him the other night? He's not into playing games. And even if he does fuck around with us on this, at least we'll have him on the defensive. Henry, what is it, Thursday, Friday? Why'd it take us all week to think of this?"

"Because," I said, "it's difficult to think straight when you're getting the shit kicked out of you."

I was watching the six o'clock news in my room when Daisy came.

She banged hard on the door. When I answered it, she took tw
o s
teps into the room and just stood there-furious. "You couldn'
t t
ell me I was fired?" she said. "You couldn't fucking pick up the phone?"

"Wait a minute," I said. "Fired? I didn't know that."

"You knew about David Adler. You had to."

"Yeah, but what's that . . ." I hadn't even thought about the impact Adler might have on Daisy.

"They sent Ferguson, the assassin. He said they were going to make some adjustments. They were going to split the media job. Adler was going to do the positive spin, I was going to do the-the comparative, I think he called it."

"Well, that's not getting fired," I said. We were still standing in the short hall just outside the door to my bathroom, facing each other. "But it's not too terrific, either."

"Not too terrific?" she said. "Henry, what do you think the chances are that we'll run another fucking negative ad in this campaign? And don't you think it's kind of insulting that they think I can only do negative? And what am I gonna do now? Go back to Washington, work congressional races for Arlen or maybe get fired by him, too?"

"He won't fire you," I said.

"Right, he's too much of a flicking liberal to fire a woman. But he won't make my life particularly pleasant, or profitable, either. I'll get all the hard cases. I'll have a great fucking batting average. The word will go forth: Hire Daisy and Die."

"Look, this isn't exactly a hot campaign right now," I said. "How much of a future you think any of us have here? How did you leave it with Howard?"

"I told him to get fucked and walked out."

"You did?"

"What would you have done?"

"I don't know," I said. "I guess I would've just taken what they offered-and figured that after the Adler phase passed, I'd be back or the whole thing would be in the toilet."

"The Adler phase is the toilet," she spat. "I can't fucking believe you. Why didn't you fight for me? He's gonna do positive spin? What can he do that I couldn't do?"

"I didn't know he was going to do positive."

"And if you had known?"

"Well, positive isn't easy," I said.

"Henry, what the fuck does that mean? Did you see my positives, the ones down in Florida, the ones we didn't use?"

"Yes."

"And?"

"They were okay"

"Henry!" She swung at me then, but she wasn't as good at slapping as Susan, and the blow landed harmlessly, half on my arm and half on my chest. She came at me--to be hugged, I realized one second too late. Reflexively, I past out my hands and caught her by the biceps and held her at arm's length.

She looked at me, stunned. She looked in my eyes and saw--what? Not enough. "Oh shit, Henry," she said, shaking herself free of my grasp, wiping her eyes. "God damn you."

"Daisy--" I tried to hug her now, but she pushed site away. "Henry, you are one cold sonofabitch," she said, and was gone.

I stood there for a moment, then turned and looked at my hotel room. I went to the window, pulled the drapes for the first time in a week and looked out--a modern office building directly across from me, men in shirtsleeves sitting in offices, well-dressed women moving between offices. Potted plants.

I went to look for Daisy. I knocked on her door. No answer. l went to the headquarters suite; no one had seen her. I went down to the lobby and found Richard--checking out.

"I'm not quitting," he said. "I'm just taking a little leave of absence." "Richard," I said. I felt woozy. "Wait--c'mere." I pulled him from the checkout line, over to a quiet corner of the lobby. "You can't bail now."

"I'm not bailing completely," he said. "I'm just gonna work out of Washington for a time. Scorps call me, I'll talk strategy and bullshit, just like always, tell 'ens how Picker's the flavor of the week and Jack'll be back, like he always is. Jack or Susan call, I'll talk strategy and bullshit with them, too. But I ain't sticking around here right now I ain't taking no marching orders from that fucking mesomorph.

Y'knowhattamean? Fucking guy says to me, 'I do two hundred situps a day, how many you do?' So I look at him and say, 'Two hundred 'n' one.' Y'knowhattamean? Me and David Adler come from different parts of the jungle--so, Henri, let him have his fucking day. This thing's 'bout gone anyway."

There wasn't much I could say to that.

"Henri-look, man, I been through this shit a hundred times," Richard said. "That's what these guys do. They love you, they stop lovin' you. They say, 'I'm payin' this guy ten thousand dollars a month and he ain't made me God just yet, so fuck 'im.' "

"But this was different, wasn't it?" I asked.

Richard laughed. "Different doesn't even begin to describe it," he said. Then he softened. "Yeah, Henri-it was different. He was worth it. But, you know, I'm always relieved to be gettin' home. Much as I like room service, I'm scared shitless on the road, 'specially when a campaign starts goin' sour and you have time to think. Y'knowhattamean? I'm always afraid I'm gonna keel over and die in some hotel room, alone in my underpants, working for some stranger who can't give a speech to save his fucking life. This shit we do is a lot of fun, but ultimately-it sucks. Au revoir, Henri. 'C'est la vie . . . say the old folks.' "

" 'It goes to show you never can tell,' " I replied, completing the Chuck Berry lyric.

"You're okay, my man," Richard said. "Take care of your ass."

I lay flat on my back, fully clothed, paralyzed, staring at the ceiling. I couldn't believe it. The assholes had staged a coup; no, they hadn't even staged it, they had fallen into it. Richard and Daisy were gone; Howard and Lucille were still around but they always would be--and now David Adler would be calling the strategic shots. I could not imagine being a part of that campaign. I could not imagine getting up off the bed. I would die alone, in a hotel mom sixty blocks from my actual home, which I didn't have the courage to live in. But at least I would not die in my underwear; I lacked the energy to take off my clothes.

Susan came late that night. She knocked on the door. I let her in. She walked past me into the room, turned the desk chair toward the bed and sat down on it. "You okay?" she asked.

"No," I said.

"I know," she said. She didn't say anything for a long while. She was wearing a charcoal-gray suit. She had just come in from some event, I realized. "Things are happening--and I just can't believe they're happening to us, that they're real," she said. "You read the paper. You see Jack's name. I see my name. And you can't believe the people they are talking about, saying these things about, are anyone you know, much less us. Henry, you know us. This is not what we're about."

"History," I said, "is what we're about."

Her eyes filled with tears, but she held them in place. "I know you must be hurting," she said. "I know it's a difficult moment--with Daisy, and Richard, going. I didn't want them to go, you've got to believe that."

"And the governor?"

"He thinks Adler may help . . . in New York. I'm like you: not so sure about that. But Lord knows we need help." She said this almost airily, sarcastically. But she caught herself, and began again more quietly and seriously. "Henry, we need help. And I have to ask you a personal favor. Please, do not leave us now. I don't know if we could survive it. Daisy, Richard--that's bad enough. But if you were to go, the impact on everyone--the staff, the muffins--would be devastating. The impact on Jack would be . . . unimaginable. And you know how I feel about you," she said, staring at me evenly.

"How's that?" I asked, taking a leap into uncharted territory. "You know, I've kinda been curious about it since that night in Chicago. I mean, what was that all about? It didn't seem to have all that much to do with me. Was it that you were feeling lonely? Needy? Or were you just trying to play catch up with the governor, after Amalee McCollister told you about Loretta."

"Henry!" she said. "That is just too cruel." Then she softened a bit. "But I guess I deserve it. It was wrong. I was needy. I wasn't thinking." Me neither: I was just reacting. I remembered the way she'd left that night, gathering her clothes, slipping through the slant of anti-

crime light, the rift in my curtain. I realized that I hadn't felt any residual titillation since. That was odd. Susan Stanton was not unattractive; the forbidden nature of the event had been extremely provocative. But I hadn't allowed myself to be aroused by it. It had been service, not sex--a strangely humiliating service, part of my disgraceful role in the McCollister business. Now, however, watching her perform in my mom as Susan Stanton, watching her struggle for something more intimate and emotionally compelling than Susan Stantonhood, I suddenly remembered her tongue, her hands moving on me--and I found myself growing excited.

"Henry," she began again, oblivious to my arousal. "Jack loves you. He needs you now--not as his deputy campaign manager but as a friend, a member of the family. There aren't many people he can trust. He trusts you. Please don't leave him--not now, not like this. Stay with us for a little while, until we have a better sense of how this is going to resolve itself. It may not," she said, her voice catching now, "be very long. But please, don't cut us loose."

"All right," I said, without nearly enough hesitation, reacting to her emotion, surprising myself.

She rose, gave me a peck on the forehead, and left.

I thought about this afterward. I thought about loyalty. It was the ultimate attribute of the perfect servant, and I was nothing if not loyal--to my employers. I was more loyal to the Stantons than I'd been to Daisy. I had sat there, considering all the angles while David Adler made his pitch, all the consequences for Jack Stanton and the campaign. But I hadn't given a moment's thought to the impact it might have on Daisy. It hadn't even crossed my mind--and she knew that. Of course, I could never have stopped Stanton from hiring the asshole. But I could have said, "What does Daisy think about all this?" I could have at least said that; I could have thought of her. If she and I were involved in something deeper than a campaign romance, shouldn't I have thought of her? And if we weren't involved in something deeper than a campaign romance, what sort of game had I been playing, what sort of stunted creature was I?