Derek Nally's campaign headquarters is an office in Ireland's most famously by-passed town, and the venue seemed an apt one yesterday evening. Tipperary-born and living in Wexford, the former garda and founder of Victim Support has chosen Naas for the rearguard action designed to stop the presidential race passing him by.
Owned by John Dunne, his friend and campaign manager, the office is the last bastion of male resistance in the 1997 presidential campaign.
It's not exactly a smoke-filled room, but Dunne was doing his best to redress the deficiency last night, as the team settled in for another long evening in the nerve centre.
"It's a nervous centre at the moment, all right," quips Nally, as his secretary relays phone messages from targeted councillors and passes on word of who is turning up on the evening's radio news programmes.
Nally leaves the room to hear a councillor interviewed on RTE's Daily Record and returns with good news for his campaign manager: "Rory Murphy says he'll back me unless the whip is on." Dunne nods: "Well, in fairness to him, he said that to me all along."
The team's fate is in the hands of Fianna Fail, they all agree. If the biggest party doesn't actively oppose it, Nally will get the four council nominations he needs.
Last night they were clinging to Noel Dempsey's apparent assurance on radio that the whip would not be applied.
Meanwhile, a campaign map outlines the eight council meetings on which the result depends. Clare is first up, tomorrow, followed by "Super Monday" when Louth, Cork, Wexford, Carlow, Kilkenny, Dublin South and Kildare will have their say.
Kildare has thrown a slight spanner in the works, by tabling four names for consideration: Nally, Dana and two undeclared candidates who would be the council's own initiative.
These are the former GAA president Jack Boothman and "some Brady woman", says Nally, with an inquiring look which elicits no reply from his campaign manager.
The office is not exactly a hive of activity, but the would-be president is keen to reassure us that there's more to the campaign than meets the eye.
"We don't just have the two people," he says of Dunne and his secretary, and it's hard to know if he's speaking with irony or pride when he adds: "We have four." One of the four may be the anonymous bank manager who dived out of the room as soon as the reporter was shown in. "He's helping me as a friend, and I told him he might be better off not going public," Nally explains.
Clare has a key role, being the only council meeting this side of the weekend. Having played a big part in the political careers of several famous Irishmen, the Banner County now has a chance to add to the Hall of Fame: Daniel O'Connell, Eamon de Valera . . . Derek Nally.
For those commentators who don't think the 60-year-old is a serious Aras prospect, he is keen to point out that it was the media's idea. In early July the Evening Herald included him in a list of 10 plausible candidates.
Phonecalls from friends followed and the idea took hold, even if, as time runs out, that hold remains tenuous: "And if I'm too old for the job at 60, as some people say, then it's a sad and sorry country we live in."
He will be spending "day and night for the next few days" trying to contact each of the target 240or-so councillors in person. If the nomination is secured, the team will wake up on Tuesday morning with a big headache, and not just from celebrating.
Mary Banotti's appeal for a ban on election posters suits the Nally campaign just fine, but everything else, including a team of canvassers, is still to be put in place.
"There's no doubt about it, it will be a major challenge," the candidate says. "We'll have to set up an infrastructure in all 41 constituencies and then we'll have to arrange to meet everybody. We'll be calling in every friend we have on Tuesday and Wednesday."
Those friends should be warned: they'll be looking for money, too.