“You’re not the only one.”

“There’s nothing I wouldn’t be willing to undertake.”

Waddell had once gotten himself elected to a term in the United States House of Representatives. Ever since then, he’d been trying to get back into office. He had tried for the Senate, but Dan Russell, currently governor, had trounced him good. Rountree figured that, at this point, the Colonel would settle for any office—alderman, customs collector, health inspector—but he didn’t say so. Waddell still had a following in town, in the capitol in Raleigh, on the State Democratic Committee. No sense starting a feud—just put him off awhile.

“It’s time we took back this country,” Waddell said, stabbing an index finger into the white tablecloth. His voice was a note too strident. The waiter glanced his way, then quickly went about his chores. “It’s getting so it isn’t safe to walk the streets. God-fearing women are being shoved into the gutter, gentlemen are being set upon by roving gangs—”

“You’re preaching to the choir, Colonel.”

More quietly, the Colonel said, “Some men can hold a crowd—maybe you need such a man.”

Waddell could hold a crowd, Rountree had to admit. Waddell was one of the last of the old-time barnburners. He could throw his voice to a thousand people. He could work them up and gentle them down and then get them hot again, plying them with fiery slogans, sentimental clichés, and cheap showman’s tricks. Mainly, he had that voice: sonorous, rhythmical, hypnotic. When he’d spoken at the old Opera House during his congressional canvass, it had sounded like the voice of God. It would get so soft the crowd would hush, leaning in to hear. Then in the next sentence, it would box their ears. Men came away with glassy eyes and balled fists; women came away in love.

But the others had been quite definite: keep Waddell out of it.

Maybe Rountree could distract him—the old fox was a fool for flattery. “Heard you at the Opera House, back when you were running for Congress.”

“So long ago! And you still remember.” Waddell beamed. “That was something. Did you know that I spoke off the cuff that day?”

“I had no idea.”

“There wasn’t time, you see. The nomination had only come vacant the day before. But you must have been a mere boy!”

Rountree had never thought of himself as a mere anything, but he nodded, remembering. It was the day he had decided to follow the law. “I was ten years old. You had five hundred people in the palm of your hand.”

Waddell wagged a finger playfully. “Good people know the truth when they hear it. I was just the conduit.” He sat back, smiling, and finished his shrimp with careful, precise bites.

To Rountree, Waddell was just a stage actor, too old to play the part he craved.