“Problem?” Cass said to the most official-looking one.

“Are you Cassandra Devine?” he said.

Cass moved closer to the microphone so that the conversation could be heard by seventy-five thousand people.

“Uh, yeah.”

“I have a warrant for your arrest.”

“You’re going to arrest me?” she said, the words echoing out onto the Mall, stirring a rumble in the crowd. “What for?”

“Incitement to destroy government property, 18 USC 1361.”

A rumble went through the crowd.

Cass said into the microphone, “And are you going to arrest all of them?”

“Anyone who destroys government property will be arrested.”

Cass turned to the crowd. “Did you hear that?”

“Yes!”

“And what do you say to that?”

“SHUT THE FUCK UP!”

“All right, that’s it,” the top cop said to his undercops. “Arrest her!”

At the sight of the police closing in on their leader, seventy-five thousand members of generation whatever surged toward the stage in what the Post called a “Banana Republic tsunami.” The police had not anticipated quite this degree of solidarity and were simply overwhelmed by the critical mass. The stage, which began to sway under the weight, became a large rugby scrum. Cass wrestled free of the arms of the law and burrowed toward the rear of the stage. At one point, she stepped on something soft that moved and heard a loud groan of complaint that on closer inspection turned out to be Terry.

“Come on,” she said, grabbing him by the arm. They managed in the confusion to get off the stage and ran in the darkness toward the Robert Taft Carillon and, beyond that, Union Station.

“Did they get her?” the president asked Bucky. Bucky looked harried. They were in the presidential suite of a hotel in Charleston, South Carolina, late for a live televised debate that no one would be watching, given what was going on in Washington. The TV screen showed a helicopter’s-eye view of what television anchors generally call “the unfolding drama.”

“Not yet. But don’t worry, chief, they’ll get her,” Bucky said.

The president shook his head. “It’s a damn nightmare freak show. Just what we need, a goddamn thirty-year-old blond fugitive. Why the fuck did I let you and Cohane talk me into this?”

“Sir, she’s not going to get away. There are ten thousand police and federal agents searching for her.”

The president was back to watching the screen. The scroll at the bottom read, THOUSANDS OF ARRESTS IN “BOOMSDAY” MELEE ON MALL…

Cass and Terry made it to Union Station, where they caught the Red Line metro all the way to the end of the line, a place aptly, Cass thought, called Shady Grove.

They found a bar not far from the metro stop that had a TV.

“Well,” Terry said, “this’ll do wonders for business. ‘I’m sorry, Mr. Tucker is not in today. He is a fugitive from justice. May I take a message and give it to him in the event he is apprehended?’”

“Don’t worry,” Cass said. “We can always go to North Korea. I’m sure they’ll take us in.”

They sat in the corner, an eye on the TV.

Cass said, “This would be the moment when our faces pop up on the screen and the bartender reaches for the phone.”

“We should call Allen.”

“Good idea.” Cass took out her cell phone.

Terry said, “Bad idea.”

“Do you remember how to use a pay phone?”

“I think you put coins in it.”

After several attempts, they reached Allen Snyder, Esquire. He told them that the FBI did not normally tap the phones of lawyers. He said he’d find out what he could and call them back on the pay phone. He called back an hour later and said that there was a warrant out for Cass’s arrest but not for Terry’s. “You can come in from the cold,” he said, adding, “Do I even need to point out that if you assist Cass, you’re aiding a fugitive?”

Cass and Terry made their arrangements. Terry headed back to the Shady Grove metro stop.

They said good-bye in the shadows by the parking lot.

“It’s going to be cold tonight,” Terry said. “And you’d better not try checking into a hotel.”

“I was in the army, remember?” Cass smiled.

“Okay,” he said, “but avoid minefields.”

Randy had been barred by the Federal Election Commission from participating in the debates. But he had managed to turn this to his advantage by conducting shadow debates on the Internet, acting as if he were there onstage with the other candidates. The media were only too happy to include him. Just as the debate was getting started, he went online and denounced the president-this time avoiding four-letter words-for “criminalizing a peaceful demonstration” and demanded that he lift the fugitive warrant on Cass. Just for good measure, he called on him to resign.

Judy Woodruff of CNN, moderator of tonight’s debate, had her laptop in front of her.

“Sir,” she said to the president, “just a few minutes ago, Senator Jepperson, who is not allowed to be here, accused you of deliberately undermining a peaceful demonstration on the Mall. According to various legal experts, it is not clear that burning a Social Security card is a federal crime. Did you personally give the order to the police to intervene in the PASS demonstration?”

The president looked as though he himself were on the verge of deploying the f-word. “Judy, I came here tonight to this wonderful state of South Carolina to debate the issues, not to comment on an ongoing law enforcement matter. And that,” he said, grinding his teeth, “is what I plan to do.”

It was the consensus of those who watched the debate that the president did not acquit himself particularly well. Gideon Payne-of all people!-criticized the government’s tactics at the demonstration and demanded that the president intervene personally to lift the warrant on Cassandra Devine. The president, now drawn in, called Cass a “saboteur” and even hinted that she was an agent of North Korea. This last assertion drew laughter from the debate audience, which, under the debating rules, is not supposed to express emotion. All in all, the president looked, as one observer said afterward, as though he were about to pass a kidney stone. He did not linger after the debate for the usual faux display of onstage collegiality and chitchat with the relatives of his opponents. Meanwhile, Randy, who had conducted his interview from a trailer outside the hall, waded into Spin Alley, where he was mobbed by delighted reporters.

Three days later, Gideon Payne won the South Carolina primary. Randy came in second; Peacham, third. Randy’s strong showing was attributed to the state’s historical predilection for rebels.

Chapter 38

Cass had her hair cut and dyed black at a salon and wrapped a scarf around her head. She bought a sleeping bag at an outdoors store, lifted a shopping cart from a supermarket, and became a bag lady, sleeping in parks and woods. A few days later, Terry dropped off, at a predesignated point, cash and a “clean” PDA of the kind used by intelligence agencies, called a “StealthBerry” (supplied by Randy’s guy Mike Speck; it was difficult to trace its transmissions geographically). Now she could communicate with her followers as well as certain members of the media. Her fugitive status had greatly enhanced her celebrity.

There is no opportunist like a politician. Randy, sensing a very good thing, plunged in. He denounced the government for driving “the woman I love” into hiding. Cass, listening to this on her SB, rolled her eyes. Randy further demanded the resignations of the “little tyrants in the White House”-this was assumed to be a reference to Bucky Trumble and Frank Cohane. As a final flourish, Randy boasted that he would happily render Cass aid and assistance-“if she asks for it,” which got him off the legal hook. Thumping the podium, Randy said, “If President Peacham wants to have me arrested, I say to him”-the audience braced for another expletive-“you know where to find me!” The line received tremendous applause and wide reportage. Everyone on the Jepperson campaign staff was happy to retire STFU.