The driver came running up, bent over beneath the spinning blades, and opened the door. A gust of warm, dry August air swirled into the interior of the helicopter.

`Mr Graves?'

`That's right.'

`Come with me please.'

Graves got out, carrying his briefcase, and walked to the car. He climbed into the back seat and they drove off away from the runway towards the freeway.

`Do you know where we're going?' Graves asked.

The driver consulted a clipboard. `One-oh-onethree-one Washington, Culver City, I have.'

`I think that's right.' Graves settled back in the seat. California numbering: he'd never get used to it. It was as bad as a zip code. He opened his early edition of The New York Times and tried to read it. He had tried on the helicopter but had found it impossible to concentrate. He assumed that was because of the noise. And the distractions: when they passed over San Clemente, halfway between Los Angeles and San Diego, he had been craning his neck, peering out the window like an ordinary tourist. The President was there now, had been for the last week.

He looked at the headlines: trouble in the UN, arguments in the German parliament about the mark, Britain and France squabbling… He put the paper aside and stared out the window at Los Angeles, flat and bleak in the early morning light.

`Good trip, sir?' the driver asked. It was perfectly said - no inflection, no prying, just detached polite interest. The driver didn't know who Graves was. He didn't know where he had come from. He didn't know what his business was. All the driver knew was that Graves was important enough to have a government helicopter fly him in and a government sedan pick him up.

`Fine, thanks.' Graves smiled, staring out the window. In fact the trip had been horrible. Phelps had called him just an hour before and asked him to come up and give a briefing on Wright. That was the way Phelps worked - everything was a crisis, there were no routine activities. It was typical that Phelps hadn't bothered to let Graves know beforehand that he was even in Los Angeles.