Lucas decided to go right to the heart of the problem and start with Porter Smalls. He called the number given him by Mitford, and was invited over. Smalls lived forty-five minutes from downtown St. Paul, on the east side of Lake Minnetonka.

His house was a glass-and-stone mid-century, built atop what might have been an Indian burial mound, though the land was far too expensive for anyone to look into that possibility. In any case, the house was raised slightly above the lake, with a grassy backyard, spotted with old oak and linden trees.

Lucas was met at the door by a young woman who said she was Smalls's daughter, Monica. "Dad's up on the sunporch," she said. "This way."

Lucas followed her through a quiet living room and down a hall, then up a narrow, twisting stairway. Lucas noted, purely as a matter of verifying previous information, that she was both big-titted and big-assed, as well as blond, so Henderson's description of Smalls's sexual preferences were showing some genetic support.

At the top of the stairs, she said, "Dad's out there," nodding toward an open door, and asked if Lucas would like something to drink.

Lucas said, "Anything cold and diet?"

"Diet Coke," she said.

"Excellent."

"Is Mrs. Smalls around?" Lucas asked.

"If by 'around' you mean the Minneapolis loft district with her Lithuanian lover, then yes."

"Maybe I shouldn't have asked," Lucas said.

"No, that's all right," she said cheerfully. "It's been in the papers."

SMALLS WAS SITTING ON a draftsman's stool on the open sunporch, looking out over the lake through a four-foot-long brass telescope. He was wearing faded jeans and an olive-drab, long-sleeved linen shirt under an open wool vest.

Lucas thought he looked less like a right-wing politician than like a professor of economics, maybe, or a poet. He was a small man, five-seven or five-eight, slender-no more than a hundred and fifty pounds-and tough-looking, like an aging French bicycle racer. He wore his white hair long, with tortoiseshell glasses over crystalline blue eyes.

Lucas knocked on the doorjamb and said, "Hello," and Smalls turned and said, "There you are," and stood to shake Lucas's hand. "Elmer said you'd be coming around."

"You want me?" Lucas asked.

"I'll take anything I can get, at this point," Smalls said. He pointed at a couple of wooden deck chairs, and they sat down, facing each other. Before going to the telescope, Smalls had apparently been reading newspapers, which were stacked around the feet of his chair. "What do you think? How fucked am I?"

Lucas thought about Weather and said, "My wife was watching TV this morning, as she was getting ready to go out, and the story came up, and she said, 'Smalls is truly fucked.'"

Smalls nodded. "She may be right. She would be right, if I were guilty... . Your wife works?"

"She's a surgeon," Lucas said.

"And you made a couple of bucks in software," Smalls said.

"Yes, I did. You've been looking me up?"

"Just what I can get through the Internet," Smalls said. He reached down, picked up an iPad, flashed it at Lucas, dropped it again on the pile of paper. "You think you can do me any good?"

"If I proved you were innocent, would it do you any good?" Lucas asked.

Smalls considered for a moment, staring over the lake, pulling at his lower lip. Then he looked up and said, "Have to be fast. Nine days to the election. If you don't find anything before the weekend, I couldn't get the word out quickly enough to make a difference. I need to be at the top of the Sunday paper, at the latest. My opponent has more money than Jesus, Mary, and Joseph put together, along with a body that ... never mind. Of course, even if I lose, it'd be nice if I weren't indicted and sent to prison. But I don't want to lose. I don't deserve to lose, because I'm being framed."

"The governor tells me you didn't do it," Lucas said.

"Of course I didn't," Smalls snapped, his glasses glittering in the sun. "For one thing, I'm not damn fool enough to leave a bunch of kiddie porn on an office computer, with all kinds of people walking in and out. The idea that I'd do that ... that's insulting."

"We talked about that," Lucas said. "The governor and I."

"And that rattlesnake Mitford, no doubt," Smalls said.

Monica came out with a bottle of Diet Coke and a glass with ice. She'd overheard the last part of the conversation, and said, "I promise you, Mr. Davenport, Dad's not a damn fool."

Lucas poured some Coke, took a sip, said "Thanks" to Monica and asked Smalls, "What do you know about this volunteer? Has she got anything against you? Did you have any kind of personal involvement with her?"

"No. That's another thing I'm not damn fool enough to do. Not since Clinton. If I were going to play around, there are lots of good-looking, smart, discreet adult women available. I really wouldn't have a problem."

"People sometimes get entangled-"

"Not me," Smalls said. He started to say something more, but then looked up at his daughter and grinned and said, "Monica, could you get me a beer? Or wait, no. I don't want a beer. This talk could get embarrassing, so ... sweetie ... could you just go away?"

"You sure you want to be by yourself, with a cop?" Monica asked.

"I think I can handle it," Smalls said. She patted him on the shoulder and walked back into his house, and down the stairs. When she was gone, Smalls said, "She's a lawyer, too. A pretty good one, actually." They both thought about that for a second, then Smalls said, "Look: I've done some fooling around. Got caught, too. Not by the morality police. It was worse than that: the old lady walked in on me."

"Ouch."

"Twice. The last time, she had her lawyer with her."

"Ahh ..."

"So I can be a fool, but not the kind of damn fool I'd have to be if I were guilty of this kiddie porn stuff," Smalls said. "I think before I jump. The women I've been involved with, they're pretty good gals, for the most part. They knew what they were getting into, and so did I. That sort of thing, for a guy at my level, is okay. Elmer couldn't get away with it, anymore, but I'm not quite as visible as the governor. The other thing is, political people are pretty social, and they knew what the situation was between Brenda and me. So, looking outside was considered okay, as long as it was discreet."

"I get that," Lucas said. "I guess."

"But some things are not okay," Smalls said. "Going after volunteers-the young ones-is not okay. A relationship with a lobbyist is not okay. I wouldn't look at kiddie porn, even if I were bent that way, which I'm not. If I were interested in drugs, which I'm not, I wouldn't snort cocaine or smoke pot around witnesses, at a party. I wouldn't chisel money from my expense accounts. You know why I wouldn't do any of that? Because I'm not stupid. I'm not stupid, and I've seen all that stuff done by people who were supposedly smart, and they got caught, and some of them even went to jail. If I were to do any of that, and get caught, I'd feel like an absolute moron. That's one thing I won't tolerate in myself. Moronic behavior."

"All right," Lucas said. "So this volunteer ..."

"To tell you the truth ..." Smalls was already shaking his head. "I believe her. I think she's telling the truth."

"Yes?"

"Yup. It sort of baffles me, but I believe her," Smalls said. "I'm not a hundred percent sure of her, but mostly, I think somebody planted that porn on my computer. People are always going in and out of my office. I think somebody went in there, called it up, and walked back out. Then she walked in ..."

"But how'd they know she'd toss the files on the keyboard?"

"How do we know this was the only time they tried it?" Smalls asked. "Maybe they did this ten times, just waiting for somebody to touch the keyboard. But the thing is, her story is too stupid. I keep coming back to stupidity, and whoever did this to me isn't entirely stupid. But the way she says it happened, this volunteer, this girl ... it's too stupid. If she's the one who did it, I'd think she would have made up a better story."