“How does it come off?” Will asked.
“Later; now let me at that bow tie.”
She did something to it, and when Will checked it in the mirror, it looked almost as good as Vance Calder’s. There was a rap on the bedroom door. “Come in,” Will said.
A Secret Service agent poked his head in.
“No bulletproof vests tonight,” Will said adamantly.
“No problem, Senator,” the agent replied. “We’ve already checked the name, date of birth, and social security number of every guest and every Calder employee, including the caterers. Everybody’s clean. The car is ready when you are.”
Will glanced at his watch: five-forty-five. They were to be there early for an early dinner with the Calders before the other guests arrived. “Are we ready, Kate?”
Kate smoothed the front of the dress. “We’re ready. Where’s Peter?”
The boy appeared from the kitchen, looking surprisingly mature in his dinner jacket.
“The starlets are going to be all over you,” Kate said, straightening his tie.
“That’s my dream in life,” Peter replied, kissing his mother carefully on the cheek, so as not to muss her makeup.
“I understand the Calders have paired you up with someone for dinner,” Will said.
“Oh, great!” Peter grunted. “I’ll have to entertain somebody’s granddaughter, I guess.”
“Every woman is somebody’s granddaughter,” Kate said, steering him toward the door.
For the occasion, the Secret Service had come up with a limousine that Will thought looked very presidential. The three of them piled into the rear with one agent and made themselves comfortable.
Peter pointed to a complicated telephone console with many buttons. “I’ll bet you could start World War III with that,” he said.
“Probably,” Will replied. “Anybody you’re mad at? I’ll order up a cruise missile.”
“How about the biology department at Choate?” Peter said. “Biology was never my best subject.”
It was only a short drive to the Calders’ Bel Air residence. A uniformed guard stood at the gate, along with a Secret Service agent, and a crowd of press had already gathered outside the gate. A galaxy of strobes went off at their approach, and Will waved through the window. “Kitty has only allowed a couple of pool cameras onto the grounds,” he said, “and a couple of print reporters.”
“It’s like a Hollywood opening,” Peter said.
They drove up to the house, which was a low, sprawling Spanish-style residence with a tiled roof. Vance Calder and his wife, Arrington, were waiting at the front door. Next to them stood Lou Regenstein, and Charlene Joiner was on his arm, in an Academy Award — class dress, with cascades of newly styled blond hair spilling over her shoulders.
“Well, here we go,” Kate said, eyeing Charlene.
“Don’t bite,” Will replied as they got out of the car.
There were handshakes and cheek pecks all around; then, as they went into the house, Will spotted what he thought must be the most beautiful creature he had ever seen. He recognized her immediately as the teenage star of a new television series that had gotten a ton of publicity lately.
“And here’s Peter’s date,” Vance Calder said. “Peter, this is Astrid Bergson; Astrid, this is Peter Rule.”
For just a moment, Peter had the expression of a felled ox, then he recovered himself and shook the girl’s hand.
Vance leaned over, and whispered to Kate, “Don’t worry, she’s only sixteen, too, and very sweet.”
They had entered a broad hallway that ran all the way through the house to the gardens beyond, and Vance steered them into the adjacent living room, where a butler was waiting with flutes of champagne on a silver tray.
Everyone chatted like old friends.
Peter and Astrid, Cokes in hand, stood near the fireplace. “I’ve seen your TV show,” he said. “I think it’s terrific.”
“Thank you,” the girl replied. “I hear you’re at Choate.”
“That’s right. How can you manage both school and the show?”
“Oh, there’s a law about that. I’m tutored every day, and my grades are very good. How are you enjoying L.A.?”
Well, mostly, I’ve limited myself to the pool at the Bel Air Hotel.”
“You should see some of the city while you’re here.”
“I’d love to do that,” he replied.
“How about I show you around some this weekend?”
“Fantastic!”
“I’m coming east in a couple of years,” she said. “My deal with the show is that I can leave when college starts. I’m planning to go to the Yale Drama School.”
“Yale sounds great,” Peter said. “I think I’ll go there, too.” He gave her his best smile. “I was thinking of Harvard, but what the hell?”
She laughed a wonderful, tinkling laugh, through gorgeous teeth.
Peter sighed.
They sat at a round table, talking animatedly, while four courses of extremely pretty Californian cooking were served, with accompanying wines. Will silently thanked Arrington Calder for having had the presence of mind to seat Kate and Charlene on opposite sides of the table. It occurred to him, with a start, that Peter was probably the only male at the table who had not slept with Charlene Joiner.
45
By the time they were on dessert, the noise level in the hallway outside the dining room had risen to a dull roar. The paying guests were arriving and, if the volume of their laughter was any indication, were already beginning to get their thousand dollars’ worth.
Arrington Calder set down her coffee cup. “I think it’s time for us to go and mingle with our guests. Will, we’ve a microphone set up on the terrace; perhaps you’d say a few words to them first?”
“Of course,” Will said.
Arrington took his arm and led him out of the dining room, through the hallway, and out onto a terrace, which was elevated over the broad rear lawn and gardens. Everybody followed. As they stepped onto the terrace, applause broke out.
Vance stepped up to the microphone. “Good evening, and thank you all for coming,” he said. “I think it’s time you all met the reason we’re here. Ladies and gentlemen, the next president of the United States, Senator Will Lee!”
The crowd roared its approval as Will stepped to the microphone. Finally the applause died. “Good evening to you all. First of all, I want to thank our hosts, Vance and Arrington Calder, for being so kind as to allow us all to invade their home this evening.”
Much applause.
“Second, I want to thank them, as well as Charlene Joiner and Lou Regenstein of Centurion Studios, for organizing this event, and for extorting so much money from all of you. It’s important for you to know that, although there is a limit of one thousand dollars per person that can be contributed to a candidate, there is still no limit on what an individual can contribute to the Democratic Party, which can use the funds in the general election. Lou Regenstein and his board of directors have been so wildly generous as to promise a million dollars to the party, and I hope each of you will consider following their example.”
Much laughter and applause.
“I’ve promised Lou that I’ll do everything in my power to see that that money is spent on my campaign, and not George Kiel’s!”
More laughter and applause.
“Now I’d like to introduce you to my family: This is my wife, Kate, and our son, Peter.” He put an arm around each of them and pulled them forward as more applause broke out. “Kate is here so that she could meet Vance Calder again, and Peter is here so that he could meet Astrid Bergson.”