46
He needed to escape the dinner. The synapses in his brain were starting to hum with energy, energy that was only partly due to the memory of Anna’s dress.
Back in his hotel room, he changed into boxer shorts and a Bonds singlet, took a Budweiser from the mini-bar, and sat down at the table to put his thoughts on paper. The ideas were like a cloud formation that was starting to resemble a figure of some kind, neither definite nor concrete, that would be, of course, defined by the eye of the viewer. Snippets of conversations Tom had overheard at the State Dinner replayed in his mind and intersected and merged with these ideas.
Tom worked on his notes, trying to fashion a whole out of his fragmented thoughts, trying to think globally and provincially at the same time. He balanced, calcu
