At the conclusion of the brief interment service, the mourners began making their way down the gravel path toward the row of cars parked in the lane, leaving only Irish and Van at the grave. At a discreet distance, cemetery employees were waiting to finish up so they could retreat indoors, where it was warm and dry.

Van was fortyish and string-bean thin. His belly was concave and there was a pronounced stoop to his bony shoulders. His thin hair hung straight down from a central part, reaching almost to his shoulders and framing a thin, narrow face. He was an aging hippie who had never evolved from the sixties.

By contrast, Irish was short and robust. While Van looked like he could be carried off by a strong gust of wind, Irish looked like he could stand forever if he firmly planted his feet on solid ground. As different as they were physically, today their postures and bleak expressions were reflections of each other. Of the two, however, Irish's suffering was the more severe.

In a rare display of compassion, Van laid a skinny, pale hand on Irish's shoulder. "Let's go get shit-faced."

Irish nodded absently. He stepped forward and plucked one of the yellow rosebuds off the spray, then turned and let Van precede him from beneath the temporary tent and down the path. Raindrops splashed against his face and on the shoulders of his overcoat, but he didn't increase his stolid pace.

"I, uh, rode here in the limousine," he said, as though just remembering that when he reached it. " Wannago back that way?"

Irish looked toward Van's battered heap of a van. "I'll go with you." He dismissed the funeral home driver with a wave of his hand and climbed inside the van. The interior was worse than the exterior. The ripped upholstery was covered with a ratty beach towel, and the maroon carpet lining the walls reeked of stale marijuana smoke.

Van climbed into the driver's seat and started the motor. While it was reluctantly warming up, he lit a cigarette with long, nicotine-stained fingers and passed it to Irish.

"No thanks." Then, after a seconds' reconsideration, Irish took the cigarette and inhaled deeply. Avery had gotten him to quit smoking. It had been months since he'd had a cigarette. Now, the tobacco smoke stung his mouth and throat. "God, that's good," he sighed as he inhaled again.

"Where to?" Van asked around the cigarette he was lighting for himself.

"Any place where we're not known. I'm likely to make a spectacle of myself."

"I'm known in all of them." Left unsaid was that Van frequently made a spectacle of himself, and, in the places he patronized, it didn't matter. He engaged the protesting gears.

Several minutes later Van ushered Irish through the tufted red vinyl door of a lounge located on the seedy outskirts of downtown. "Are we going to get rolled in here?" Irish asked.

"They check you for weapons as you go in."

"And if you don't have one, they issue you one," Irish said, picking up the tired joke.

The atmosphere was murky. The booth they slid into was secluded and dark. The midmorning customers were as morose as the tinsel that had been strung from the dim, overhead lights several Christmases ago. Spiders had made permanent residences of it. A naked senorita smiled beguilingly from the field of black velvet on which she had been painted. In stark contrast to the dismal ambience, lively mariachi music blared from the jukebox.

Van called for a bottle of scotch. "I really should eat something," Irish mumbled without much conviction.

When the bartender unceremoniously set down the bottle and two glasses, Van ordered Irish some food. "You didn't have to," Irish objected.

The video photographer shrugged as he filled both glasses. "His old lady'll cook if you ask her to."

"You eat here often?"

"Sometimes," Van replied with another laconic shrug.

The food arrived, but after taking only a few bites, Irish decided he wasn't hungry after all. He pushed aside the chipped plate and reached for his glass of whiskey. The first swallow played like a flamethrower in his stomach. Tears filled his eyes. He sucked in a wheezing breath.

But with the expertise of a professional drinker, he recovered quickly and took another swig. The tears, however, remained in his eyes. "I'm going to miss her like hell." Idly, he twirled his glass on the greasy tabletop.

"Yeah, me, too. She could be a pain in the ass, but not nearly as much as most."

The brassy song currently playing on the jukebox ended. No one made another selection, which came as a relief to Irish. The music intruded on his bereavement.

"She was like my own kid, you know?" he asked rhetorically. Van continued smoking, lighting another cigarette from the tip of the last. "I remember the day she was born. I was there at the hospital, sweating it out with her father. Waiting. Pacing. Now I'll have to remember the day she died."

He slammed back a shot of whiskey and refilled his glass. "You know, it never occurred to me that it was her plane that went down. I was only thinking about the story, the goddamn news story. It was such a piss-ant story that I didn't even send a photographer along. She was going to borrow one from a station in Dallas."

"Hey, man, don't blame yourself for doing your job. You couldn't have known."

Irish stared into the amber contents of his glass. "Ever had to identify a body, Van?" He didn't wait for a reply. "They had them all lined up, like. . ." He released an unsteady sigh. "Hell, I don't know. I never had to go to war, but it must have been like that.

"She was zipped up in a black plastic bag. She didn't have any hair left," he said, his voice cracking. "It was all burned off. And her skin. . .oh, Jesus." He covered his eyes with his stubby fingers. Tears leaked through them. "If it weren't for me, she wouldn't have been on that plane."

"Hey, man." Those two words exhausted Van's repertoire of commiserating phrases. He refreshed Irish's drink, lit another cigarette, and silently passed it to the grieving man. For himself, he switched to marijuana.

Irish drew on his cigarette. "Thank God her mother didn't have to see her like that. If she hadn't been clutching her locket in her hand, I wouldn't even have known the corpse was Avery." His stomach almost rebelled when he recalled what the crash had done to her.

"I never thought I'd say this, but I'm glad Rosemary Daniels isn't alive. A mother should never have to see her child in that condition."

Irish nursed his drink for several minutes before lifting his tearful eyes to his companion. "I loved heraRosemary, I mean. Avery's mother. Hell, I couldn't help it. Cliff, her father, was gone nearly all the time, away in some remote hellhole of the world. Every time he left he asked me to keep an eye on them. He was my best friend, but more than once I wanted to kill him for that."

He sipped his drink. "Rosemary knew, I'm sure, but there was never a word about it spoken between us. She loved Cliff. I knew that."

Irish had been a surrogate parent to Avery since her seventeenth year. Cliff Daniels, a renowned photo-journalist, had been killed in a battle over an insignificant, unpronounceable village in Central America. With very little fuss, Rosemary had ended her own life only a few weeks after her husband's death, leaving Avery bereft and without anyone to turn to except Irish, a steadfast family friend.

"I'm as much Avery's daddy as Cliff was. Maybe more. When her folks died, it was me she turned to. I was the one she came running to last year after she got herself in that mess up in D.C."

"She might have fucked up real bad that one time, but she was still a good reporter," Van commented through a cloud of sweet, pungent smoke.

"It's just so tragic that she died with that screwup on her conscience." He drank from his glass. "See, Avery had this hang-up about failing. That's what she feared most. Cliff wasn't around much when she was a kid, so she was still trying to win his approval, live up to his legacy.

"We never discussed it," he continued morosely. "I just know. That's why that snafu in D.C. was so devastating to her. She wanted to make up for it, win back her credibility and self-esteem. Time ran out before she got a chance. Goddammit , she died thinking of herself as a failure."

The older man's misery struck a rare, responsive chord in Van. He gave the task of consoling Irish his best shot. "About that otherayou know, how you felt about her mother? Well, Avery knew."

Irish's red, weepy eyes focused on him. "How do you know?"

"She told me once," Van said. "I asked her just how long you two had known each other. She said you were in her memory as far back as it went. She had guessed that you secretly loved her mother."

"Did she seem to care?" Irish asked anxiously. "I mean, did it seem to bother her?"

Van shook his long, stringy hair.

Irish withdrew the wilting rose from the breast pocket of his dark suit and rubbed his pudgy fingers over the fragile petals. "Good. I'm glad. I loved them both."

His heavy shoulders began to shake. He curled his fingers into a tight fist around the rose. "Oh, hell," he groaned, "I'm going to miss her."

He lowered his head to the table and sobbed brokenly while Van sat across from him, nursing his own grief in his own way.

FOUR.

Avery woke up knowing who she was.

She had never exactly forgotten. It was just that her medication, along with her concussion, had left her confused.

Yesterdayaor at least she guessed it had been yesterday, since everyone who had recently come within her range of vision had greeted her with a "good morning"ashe had been disoriented, which was understandable. Waking after having been comatose for several days to find that she couldn't move, couldn't speak, and couldn't see beyond a very limited range would confound anyone. She was rarely ill, certainly not seriously, so being this injured was shocking.

The ICU, with its constant light and activity, was enough to hamper anyone's mental process. But what really had Avery puzzled was that everyone was addressing her incorrectly. How had she come to be mistaken for a woman named Carole Rutledge? Even Mr. Rutledge seemed convinced that he was speaking to his wife.

Somehow, she must communicate this mistake to them. But she didn't know how, and that frightened her.

Her name was Avery Daniels. It was clearly printed on her driver's license, her press pass, and all the other forms of identification in her wallet. They had probably been destroyed in the crash, she thought.

Memories of the crash tended to panic her still, so she determinedly put them aside to be dealt with later, when she was stronger and had this temporary mix-up straightened out.

Where was Irish? Why hadn't he come to her rescue?

The obvious answer startled her unexpectedly. Her whole body reacted as though it had been electrically charged. It was unthinkable, untenable, yet it was glaringly apparent. If she had been mistaken for Mrs. Rutledge, and Mrs. Rutledge was believed alive, then Avery Daniels was believed dead.

She imagined the anguish Irish must be going through. Her "death" would hit him hard. For the present, however, she was helpless to alleviate his suffering. No! As long as she was alive, she wasn't helpless. She must think. She must concentrate.

"Good morning."

She recognized his voice immediately. The swelling in her eye must have gone down some because she could see him more clearly. His previously blurred features were now distinct.

His heavy, well-shaped brows almost met above the bridge of a long, straight nose. He had a strong, stubborn jawline and chin, yet it fell short of being pugnacious, despite the vertical cleft at the edge of it. His lips were firm, wide, and thin, the lower one slightly fuller than the upper.

He was smiling, but not with his eyes, she noted. He didn't really feel the smile. It didn't come from his soul. Avery wondered why not.

"They said you had a restful night. Still no sign of pulmonary infection. That's terrific news."

She knew this face, this voice. Not from yesterday. It was before that, but she couldn't recall when she had met this man.

"Mom left Mandy's room long enough to come say hello to you." He turned his head and signaled someone to move closer. "You have to stand here, Mom, or she can't see you."

An exceptionally pretty, middle-aged face materialized in Avery's patch of vision. The woman's soft, dark hair had a very flattering silver streak that waved up and away from her smooth, unlined forehead.

"Hello, Carole. We're all very relieved that you're doing so well. Tate said the doctors are pleased with your progress."

Tate Rutledge! Of course.

"Tell her about Mandy, Mom."

Dutifully, the stranger reported on another stranger. "Mandy ate most of her breakfast this morning. They sedated her last night so she would sleep better. The cast on her arm bothers her, but that's to be expected, I suppose. She's the sweetheart of the pediatric wing, and has the entire staff wrapped around her little finger." Tears formed in her eyes and she blotted at them with a tissue. "When I think of what. . ."

Tate Rutledge placed his arm across his mother's shoulders. "But it didn't happen. Thank God it didn't."

Avery realized then that it must have been Mandy Rutledge she had carried from the plane. She remembered hearing the child's screams and frantically trying to unfasten her jammed seat belt. When it came free, she had gathered the terrified child against her and, with the assistance of another passenger, had plunged through the dense, acrid smoke toward an emergency exit.

Because she had had the child, they had assumed she was Mrs. Carole Rutledge. But that wasn't allathey had been in each other's seats.

Her mind clumsily pieced together a puzzle of which only she was aware. She recalled that her boarding pass had designated the window seat, but when she had arrived, a woman was already sitting there. She hadn't pointed out the error, but had taken the seat on the aisle instead. The child had been sitting in the seat between them.

The woman had worn her dark hair shoulder length, much like Avery wore hers. She also had dark eyes. They bore a resemblance to each other. In fact, the flight attendant, who had made a fuss over the little girl, had asked who was the mother and who was the aunt, implying that Avery and Carole Rutledge were sisters.

Her face had been smashed beyond recognition. Mrs. Rutledge had probably been burned beyond recognition. They had misidentified her on the basis of the child and a seating rearrangement that no one knew about. My God, she had to tell them!

"You'd better go back now before Mandy becomes anxious, Mom," Tate was saying. "Tell her I'll be there shortly."

"Good-bye for now, Carole," the woman said to her. "I'm sure when Dr. Sawyer's done, you'll be as pretty as ever."

Her eyes don't smile either,Avery thought as the woman moved away.

"Before I forget it," Tate said, stepping close to the bed so that she could see him again, "Eddy, Dad, and Jack send their regards. I think Dad's coming to the meeting with the plastic surgeon this afternoon, so you'll see him then.

"Jack went home this morning." Tate continued talking, not knowing he wasn't speaking to his wife. "I'm sure he's worried about Dorothy Rae. God only knows what Fancy is up to without any supervision, although Eddy has got her working as a volunteer at the headquarters. None of them will be allowed to see you until you're moved to a private room, but I don't think you'll miss them, will you?"

He assumed that she knew who and what he was talking about. How could she convey that she hadn't the foggiest idea? These people were unknown to her. Their comings and goings were no concern of hers. She must contact Irish. She must let this man know that he was a widower.

"Listen, Carole, about the campaign." By the motion his shoulders made, she thought he had probably slid his hands into his hip pockets. He bowed his head for a moment, almost resting his chin on his chest, before looking at her again. "I'm going ahead with it as planned. Dad, Jack, and Eddy agree. They've pledged their support. It was going to be a tough fight before, but nothing I was afraid to tackle. Now, with this, it's going to be even tougher. Still, I'm committed."

Tate Rutledge had been making news recently. That's why his name and face were familiar to her, though she had never met him personally. He was hoping to win the primary election in May and then go up against an incumbent senator in the November election.

"I won't shirk any of my responsibilities to you and Mandy while you're recovering, but going to Congress is what I've been preparing for all my life. I don't want to wait another six years to run or I'll lose the momentum I've built. I need to do it now."

After consulting his wristwatch, he said, "I'd better get back to Mandy. I promised to feed her some ice cream. With her arms bandaged and all, well," he added, glancing toward her bandaged hands, resting in their splints, "you can understand. The psychologist has the first session with her today. Nothing to worry about," he rushed to say. "More precautionary than anything. I don't want her to be permanently traumatized.''

He paused, looking down at her meaningfully. "That's why I don't think she should see you just yet. I know that sounds cruel, but these bandages would scare her half to death, Carole. Once the surgeon rebuilds your face and you start looking like yourself, I'll bring her in for short visits. Besides, I'm sure you don't feel up to seeing her now, either."

Avery struggled to speak, but her mouth had the breathing tube taped inside it. She had overheard a nurse say that smoke inhalation had rendered her vocal cords temporarily inoperable. She couldn't move her jaw anyway. She batted her eye to convey her distress.

Misconstruing the reason for it, he laid a consoling hand on her shoulder. "I promise that your disfigurement is temporary, Carole. Dr. Sawyer says it looks much worse to us than it actually is. He'll be in later today to explain the procedure to you. He knows what you looked like before and guarantees that you'll look the same when he gets finished."

She tried to shake her head no. Tears of panic and fear overflowed her eye. A nurse came in and edged him aside. "I think you'd better let her rest now, Mr. Rutledge. I've got to change her bandages anyway."

"I'll be with my daughter."

"We'll call if you're needed," the nurse told him kindly. "Oh, and while I'm thinking of it, they called from downstairs to remind you that Mrs. Rutledge's jewelry is in the hospital safe. They took it off her when she arrived in the emergency room."

"Thanks. I'll get it later."

Now! Get it now,Avery's mind screamed. It wouldn't be Carole Rutledge's jewelry in the hospital safeait would be hers. Once they saw it, they would realize that a horrible mistake had been made. Mr. Rutledge would learn that his wife was dead. It would come as a blow to him, but it would be better that he discover the error now rather than later. She would lament the Rutledges ' tragic loss, but Irish would be overjoyed. Dear Irish. His bereavement would end.

But what if Mr. Rutledge failed to retrieve his wife's jewelry before the plastic surgeon began to change her face into Carole Rutledge's?

That was her last conscious thought before the pain-relieving medication claimed her once again.

Tate will never live to take office.

She was reliving the nightmare again. She tried desperately to ward it off. Again, she couldn't see him, but she could feel his sinister presence hovering above her, just beyond her field of vision. His breath fanned across her exposed eye. It was like being taunted in the dark with a sheer veilaunseen but felt, ghostly.

There will never be a Senator Tate Rutledge. Tate will never live. Senator Tate Rutledge will die first. There'll never be. . . Never live. . .