it out to her over his shoulder. 'Here, take this copy of the Straits Times I grabbed at the KL airport. Maybe it'll help you relax.'
'I don't remember seeing you read it.'
'That's because I haven't yet,' he said. 'And I doubt I'll manage to keep my eyes open long enough to do so.'
Nori took the paper from his hand, set it down beside her, and yawned again.
'Thanks,' she said. 4Til be sure to fill you in on the local news over breakfast.'
He nodded.
'Just don't forget my horoscope,' he said in a tone that might or might not have been serious.
Sian Po had no sooner gotten to bed after returning home from his night shift at the precinct than he closed his eyes and dreamed he was in a gambling parlor managed by Fat B. There were women and flashing lights and he had somehow won an astronomical sum of money, hillocks of which surrounded him on every side.
The knock at his door awakened him just as, in his dream, he had begun to dance with a magnificent blonde who'd slid down off a pole and then told him she'd come all the way from Denmark to make his acquaintance.
Sian Po opened his eyes, jolted from the sparkle and glitz of his fantasy to the bland, curtained dimness of his studio apartment. Where had the sexy dancer gone?
He frowned with the realization that she didn't exist, and glanced at his alarm clock. It was five A. M. Had he thought he'd heard something?
There was another rap on the door.
Still a little disoriented, he got out of bed and went over to it in his pajamas.
'Who is it?' he grunted, rubbing his eyes.
'I've something for you from Gaffoor,' a hushed male voice said from out in the corridor.
Sian Po's Weariness instantly dissipated at the mention of his insider with CID. He unbolted his lock and pulled open the door.
The man was about thirty and dressed in civilian clothes, a light cotton shirt and sport jacket. Another investigator, or so Sian Po believed.
'You in Gaffoor's unit?' Sian Po asked.
The man shrugged noncommittally, extracted a white legal envelope from his jacket's inner pocket, and held it out to Sian Po.
'Take it, ke yi bu ke yi,' he said.
Sian Po snatched it from his hand.
The man stood there giving him a blank look. 'I'll tell Gaffoor you received his message,' he said, and turned down the hall.
The door shut behind him, Sian Po eagerly tore open the envelope. Inside was a folded sheet of paper. He slipped it out and read the note that had been written across its face.
Excitement flooded his squashed features.
Unbelievable, he thought. Just unbelievable.
Heedless of the hour, Sian Po hurried over to his bedside stand, located Fat B's phone number in his datebook, and rang him up.
As though the dream had been a true and marvelous premonition, his jackpot had arrived.
Chapter Twenty-Two
In the corridor outside the East Room of the White House, a room throbbing with reporters, prominent members of Congress, and other official guests invited to the Morrison-Fiore bill-signing ceremony, the President was both aggravated and anxious to put pen to paper.
He was aggravated because he had wanted to sign the bill while sitting behind the staunch and sturdy solidity of the Resolute Desk in the sound and secure comfort of the Executive Office, wanted to sign it at midnight when the folks around him were home in bed, or elsewhere in bed, or in some cases skulking between beds, zipping up, unzipping, getting tangled up inside their zippers, whatever the hell they chose to do with themselves when the sun went down and the lights were out here in the golden city on the Hill.
He was anxious because now that he'd been induced to make a huge ceremonial affair of the signing — C- SPAN cameras dollying about, kliegs in his face, the whole nine yards — he wanted it over and done with so that public attention could be turned to something of real significance to him, namely SEAPAC, a child he had guided from infancy, watching it take on polish, refinement, and sophistication under his savvy political eye. A treaty that he viewed as the most important policy effort of his tenure in the White House. That he believed was the blueprint for a new strategic and logistic collaboration in the Pacific Rim. That he was certain would reinforce America's ties with its Asian partners, and decide the future of its own security interests in the region. What was Morrison-Fiore in comparison, besides a piece of moot legislation, easing commercial restrictions that had already been bypassed with countless loopholes?
Impatient to get to his desk now — no Resolute by any means, no strong, lasting article of furniture made from the timbers of a bold expeditionary vessel, but rather a comparatively lightweight and characterless hunk of wood rolled out under the portrait of George Washington especially for this morning's swinging Big House hullabaloo — the President glanced into the room, where the function's primary mastermind, Press Secretary Brian Terskoff, stood to the right of the entryway schmoozing with a young woman Ballard recognized as an executive from the news department of one of the major television networks. A place where Terskoff might very well be seeking employment once the sorry, obstinate bastard got the ass-kicking he'd long deserved.
And what better time than the present to do that? Ballard suddenly thought.
He caught Terskoff's eye and crooked a finger at him, then waited as he pushed his way through the sea of invitees and into the corridor.
'Yes, Mr. President?' he said, stepping close.
'What's the delay?'
'They're working a bug or two out of the satellite feeds, technical stuff,' Terskoff said. 'We'll be on in five.'
The President looked at him.
'On in five,' he echoed.
Terskoff nodded. 'Maybe less.'
The President kept looking at him.
'You sound like the stage manager of a talk show.'
Terskoff seemed flattered.
'In a sense, that's my role here today,' he said.
The President leaned in close. 'Brian, if I'd had it my way, the signing would have been handled as a routine piece of business, something that passed quietly in the night,' he said. 'Instead, thanks to you, we've got ourselves a spectacle.'
'Yes, sir, I believe we do,' Terskoff said proudly, glancing into the room. 'A stately spectacle. That is my preferred approach to these events.'
'Your preferred approach.'
'Very much so, Mr. President.'
Ballard frowned, nibbling the inside of his cheek. 'You know,' he said, 'it occurs to me this approach might have been utilized to promote another of my little endeavors. One I feel hasn't been quite the attention-grabber I'd anticipated it might be.'
Terskoff scratched behind his ear, all at once unsure of himself.
'You're referring to SEAPAC,' he said.
'Yes,' the President said, snapping his index finger at Terskoff's chest. 'You guessed it. And what I'm thinking, Brian, is that it's still not too late to change things. For example, we could have football cheerleaders accompany
