"Believe me," said one participant, "there was a sigh of relief on Capitol Hill that John Tower wasn't there during the sensitive business of using these troops and balancing it with diplomacy." (Humor among the big boys: After Cheney was "inducted" into his Pentagon job in the spring of '89 following the Tower fiasco, Adelman offered him a beer. "Beer, hell," Cheney said, "I'll have a double Scotch.") When Saudi King Fahd was less than enthusiastic about the proposed influx of U.S. forces last August, it was Cheney the president dispatched to perform the delicate arm-twist.

"Wow, Cheney?" exclaimed an aide to former defense secretary Frank Carlucci, who with Cheney, Adelman and Donald Rumsfeld had been a bright young Nixonaut at the Office of Economic Opportunity, where they set about dismantling the poverty program. "We've had 500 requests for interviews about [Colin Powell]. This is the first one for Cheney."

Adelman: "The only time [Dick Cheney] was really furious with me was on the court. Dick's a little wild on the court, winds up like crazy. Well, one time when he served, [Carol Adelman] got hit in the stomach, got the wind knocked out of her. And I said to her - it was a joke - in hushed, worried tones, `Does Dick know your condition?' And he just about fainted. Then she said to me, `You jerk, why'd you do that?' And Dick turned to me and said, `That really was not funny.' He was really mad."