She paused before continuing. “When we were at the Cape, that first summer, we were on the beach, alone—except for the usual pack of watchers. But they were giving us our space. Jack was in his wheelchair on the deck. He could see us, and we waved at him. Bob took my hand. He held it tight. It almost hurt, but I didn’t say anything. He said, ‘if anything ever happens to …’ I wouldn’t let him go on. But he insisted. ‘You’ll have to finish,’ he said.”

She was crying now. Addis felt the moisture forming in his eyes; his throat was tightening.

“Imagine Sam in his place. Brings in his hacks. Undoes the little we’ve been able to do—what he and his idiot pals on the Hill weren’t able to stop. Or that Brew didn’t water down. We will have to … But Sam—ever notice how he smells? Moldy. I can’t bear it. Never could.”

Addis didn’t want to consider where she was leading. Her husband’s body was still in pieces at Walter Reed Hospital, and she was thinking of … . Of what? Where was her invalid son, Jack, now? Who was watching him?

“The funeral will be the day after tomorrow,” she said. “Taking calls, receiving visitors, accepting sympathy and pity—I’m not very good at that. Then, then, after that I …”

Addis did not ask what she meant. If he did not ask, he would never have to lie about his first conversation with Margaret Hanover after the assassination of her husband—in which she was thinking of politics. But of what precisely? Succession? The election? She had said “I.”

This is too much. Mind if I just slip out, and …

But perhaps this was her manner of dealing with the shock and pain. Fixate on a concrete future.

“Nick, will you do a favor for me?”

“Anything.” He clenched a fist behind his back.

“I know you were planning a trip to Louisiana, to sort things out. After the funeral is done, will you still go? I’d like to have that business cleared up. Find the missing pieces—we all have our missing pieces, don’t we? Make certain.”

I’d rather the fuck not.

“I’m sure no one will bother with it now,” he said.

“You’re right, but just to be sure. Will you see what you can do?”

As Addis nodded, the questions began. Would this be an official trip? Would he have to explain his absence? Should he tell McGreer? Or anyone else? It felt wrong, he thought. But he couldn’t do anything but agree. He didn’t have the heart—or was it the strength?—to say no.

Damn. I’ve become a floater … . Call a press conference. Time to rewrite all those magazine profiles about Nick Addis.