“Of course, Congressman,” Jacobs said, reaching into the pocket of his cardigan. He took out a pack of Marlboros and a shiny metal lighter etched with the image of a battleship.

“Navy?” Charlie asked.

“Yes, indeed,” Jacobs said. “Aide to Admiral Beatty in the Mediterranean. Then on an aircraft carrier in Korea. But nothing like you in the thick of it.”

“Service is service,” said Charlie.

And he knew that service of a different sort was still part of Jacobs’s life.

Earlier that morning, the pneumatic drill had started rat-a-tat-tatting. Charlie had assumed that fellow hangover victim Sinatra would soon put a stop to it. But he didn’t, such was the urgency to upgrade the estate for the president’s arrival. So Charlie had dragged himself out of bed and headed to the empty kitchen, where coffee was already brewing. He poured himself a cup, walked outside to enjoy the fresh air, sat down on a chair next to the pool, and lit a cigarette. He took in the cloudless blue sky as a hawk passed overhead, his gaze following the creature over Mount San Jacinto. When the bird of prey was no more than a black speck in the distance, he stared blankly off into the sky. He thought about his father waking up in the prison infirmary at the Tombs, alone and afraid. Lost in those thoughts, Charlie sat in a daze, then slowly began to take notice of the shapes in front of him, the figures visible through the sliding glass door that led to Sinatra’s bedroom inside the house. Sinatra was sitting on a chair wearing only a towel wrapped loosely around his potbelly. Jacobs stood behind him carefully spraying what seemed to be paint on the bald spot at the back of his boss’s scalp. Jacobs then retrieved two different hairpieces from the closet, showed them to Sinatra, and placed one on his head. Seeing the great man half naked and half bald was unsettling; Charlie realized he’d been more dazzled by Sinatra than he’d wanted to admit. And in the casual intimacy of the scene, presumably one repeated every morning, he began to understand the deep bond between the two men.

They walked away from the helipad site past several one-story bungalows curving around the main house to the pool area. Judy had her arm hooked through Sinatra’s in the front of the group; Lola lagged at the end, behind Charlie. She seemed bored.

“Should we go back inside?” Lola asked.

“No, the sun is so nice,” said Judy. “Let’s get towels and sit by the pool.” Even though there was snow a hundred twenty miles away in Los Angeles, the temperature in Rancho Mirage was in the sixties. Clear skies and a cozy desert heat.