“Do you …” It was a brilliant question. Chaplin was utterly trapped. He was not visibly squirming only because of sheer force of will. Also, there was movement in the bedroom he was facing. “Please, tell me more.”

“I wanted to put an opportunity your way that is fairly unusual. We need to pay for the war. I’ve been in Washington long enough to know I can’t just appeal to patriotism.”

“You can’t?”

McAdoo chortled. “No one wants to buy that. They just don’t want to not buy it. Especially when their neighbors are around. Appealing to patriotism is a bit of a stalemate unless you’ve got something else you’re selling with it.”

This man was more complex than Chaplin had given him credit for. And what was going on in the bedroom? There were shadows falling on the window.

“Part of my job is keeping an eye on the country’s money. And a fantastic amount of money has to pay for the war. More than anyone can imagine. Fantastic. We’ve had a couple of loan drives, and they’ve done well, but …”

Chaplin sensed where this was going. “I’ve bought over a hundred thousand dollars’ worth of bonds myself.”

“I know.” He put his hands out as if to calm him. “We all know. That’s good.”

It was Mildred. She was in the bedroom. She was alone, and had shut the door behind her, and then crossed back again to lock it. She was still in her bathing suit, with her towel around her shoulders.

McAdoo said, “But people still think you’re a slacker.”

“I’m not!”

“I know,” he said again, this time less to calm him than in shared amazement. “But there it is. The idea of you being a slacker is more powerful than the reality of your situation.”

She was laying out her clothes on the bed.

“I think we can change that idea. I’ve noticed—heck, anyone who subscribes to The Wall Street Journal has noticed—that you’ve sold quite a few movie tickets in the last few years. We’ve never really harnessed that before. And I understand—heck, I was there when you were speaking there before—brilliant performance, truly humorous, and I liked that little one-hundred-eighty-degree”—he made a half circle in the air with his fingertip—“anyway, listen—I get the point.”

Chaplin smiled at him, to show they were confederates, but also staring through him to Mildred, who had maddeningly paused to rub some kind of lotion on her bare arms.

McAdoo didn’t notice the distance in Chaplin’s gaze. He was instead carried by momentum. “I’m wondering if you might put that same effort you just showed, with your Trotsky and whatnot, into selling the Liberty Loan.”

“What? Ask Pickford?”

“I know Mary Pickford will say yes. That’s why I’m asking you.”