Stone picked up the phone and ascertained that this was true. “Give them whatever they want,” Stone said. “We’ll be down in fifteen minutes.”

They made it in that time to find the Lees digging into omelets on the patio by the pool. They joined them.

“You look very well rested,” Kate said.

“Thank you,” Stone replied, “so do you.”

“I can’t believe how well I slept,” Kate said.

Stone ordered breakfast for him and Ann, then looked up to see Sam Meriwether approaching; he waved him to a chair, and Sam ordered breakfast. “They said at your place that you were over here,” he said to Kate and Will.

“As you see us,” Will replied.

Sam shook his head. “I still don’t know what happened last night. Dick Collins and I ran the numbers over and over, and as best we could figure, we were going to be three delegates short at the end of the voting—Dick said four. Then if we had gone to a second ballot, Otero and Willingham could have taken the nomination. I don’t understand it. Why did they fold when they did?”

“I can enlighten you,” Will said. “I have it from the horse’s mouth—that is, Ed Eagle’s. It went like this: Stone, here, called Ed on the floor and told him to tell Otero that we had the votes to win on the first ballot. Otero didn’t believe it at first, but Ed brought him around, then they went over to Virginia and sandbagged Mark Willingham. That was it: Otero went back to his delegation and conceded, then Willingham folded, too.”

“Wait a minute,” Sam said. “You’re telling me we won the nomination on a bluff?”

“That’s what I’m telling you,” Will said. “And I don’t think Stone will deny it.”

“Stone?” Sam said incredulously. “Is that what happened?”

Stone shrugged. “Ann ran the numbers, and somebody had to do something. I’m sorry we didn’t have time to check with you or Kate, Sam, but we had to move New Mexico off the dime before the chairman called on them to vote, otherwise it would have been over.”

“Well,” Kate said, “we couldn’t have that, could we?”

“I swear to God,” Sam said, “it would never have occurred to me to bluff.”

“That’s because you’re such a nice, honest, straightforward man, Sam,” Kate said, “whereas Stone . . .”

“Stone,” Ann said, “you’re blushing.”

“My true character has been revealed,” Stone said.

“And a truer character never lived,” Kate said. “What would you like in the new administration, Stone? Attorney general? Ambassador to the Court of Saint James’s? Appointment to the first vacancy at the Supreme Court? Name it!” Everybody was laughing now.

“Maybe ambassador to Tonga,” Stone said, “or anyplace with good beaches, golf courses, and little work to do.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” Kate said.

—