“You make sure you lift with your knees,” Charlie said. “Hernias aren’t anything to mess around with.”

Nealy smiled. No one ever talked about hernias in front of her.

“You look so familiar, Nell. She looks familiar, doesn’t she, Charlie? Have you ever been to Fort Wayne?”

“She looks like Cornelia Case, even though not everybody thinks so.” Lucy shot Mat a trenchant look just before he disappeared into the Waynes’ motor home for the cooler. “Now I’m stuck with a lame power drill.”

“Good gracious, you do! Look at her, Charlie. She looks just like Mrs. Case. Why, the two of you could be sisters.”

Nealy definitely didn’t want the conversation continuing in this direction. “I’m sorry I didn’t have anything to bring with me for dinner. We’re a little short on groceries.”

“Now, don’t you worry about that. We have more than enough.”

As the meal progressed, Nealy found herself thinking of all the state dinners she’d helped plan, formal affairs where each place setting held as many as twenty-seven items. Not one of them could match the pleasure of this evening. She and Mat kept exchanging glances so full of wordless communication it was as if they’d known each other forever. Lucy giggled at Charlie’s teasing. Button toddled around the table so she could visit everyone and, inevitably, found her way into Mat’s lap.

Nealy was entranced with the Waynes. Bertis had been a homemaker all her life, and her conversation was filled with stories about her children and grandchildren, her church, and her neighbors. Charlie had owned a small insurance agency and recently passed the reins to his oldest son.

The Waynes weren’t reluctant to share their views of Washington, and neither was Mat. Over the Dole fruit cocktail cake, she discovered that he was a political junkie who was very much disillusioned with the country’s elected officials.

By the time darkness settled over the campsite, she knew the Waynes were staunch patriots, but not blind ones. They rebelled at the idea of giving handouts to everyone who asked, but were more than willing to share all they had with those who were truly in need. They wanted the federal government to stay out of their private lives, but at the same time find a way to put an end to drug traffic and violence. They worried about having enough health insurance and expected Social Security to work for them, but didn’t want their children paying the economic price for it. Although Mat didn’t agree with them about everything, they found common ground in their opinions of politicians as ineffective, blindly partisan, self-serving, and willing to sell out the country to protect their own interests.