Stand up the real Dick Cheney

This week Tony Blair will enjoy a rare glimpse of Bush's enigmatic vice-president

Ever since it happened, he has been the Pimpernel, the man whose whereabouts have been as mysterious as those of Bin Laden himself. But on Monday, precisely six months after September 11, Dick Cheney will be surprisingly visible - and in London.

The US vice-president will be seeing Tony Blair at a meeting that might be construed as a get-together between the second and third most powerful men in the world: the two people who probably have the nearest thing to a veto on President Bush's plans to invade Iraq, or anywhere else.

For Mr Cheney, talking to Mr Blair will be a gentle warm-up for a 10-day Middle East trip, including countries such as Egypt, Jordan and Turkey, whose leaders will be less amenable. Officials are trying to play down the significance of Iraq - the most urgent purpose is "high-level bonding" with Middle Eastern leaders whom, it is accepted, the White House has neglected.

On the Palestinian crisis, Mr Cheney will be listening, apparently. On Afghanistan, he will be sharing information. In Britain, he may also be mumbling sheepishly about steel tariffs. When it comes to Iraq, he is likely to do the talking.

For them all, it will be a rare glimpse of the most enigmatic figure in US politics. Everyone assumes he is a cautious Iraq-hawk, keen to get on with the removal of Saddam Hussein, but pragmatic about the method and timing. But with this man, no one is sure.

Perhaps by the end of Monday, a handful of British officials will have some clue to the really interesting question about Dick Cheney - not where is he, but who and what?

Despite the official stonewalling about his "undisclosed location", there is every reason to believe he has not been underground with the shadow government teams in Virginia or Pennsylvania, but has spent most of the past six months where anyone would expect: with his wife and labrador puppy at their official 33-room mansion, the Naval Observatory, behind the pine trees next to the British embassy in Washington. His wife Lynne was just finishing supervision of a £275,000 makeover (mostly in a customised shade of pale green) when the attacks came.

The vice-presidency has always been a mysterious office because, constitutionally, the holder has nothing worthwhile to do. Running-mates are usually chosen for electoral reasons, so by the time they take office they have served their purpose and spend their time being ritually humiliated. When Mr Cheney was chosen, the mould was smashed from the start.

Some perfectly respectable analysts still contend that Mr Bush is in office rather than in power. "Cheney IS the president," a presidential scholar recently remarked.

The evidence for this hypothesis is weakening. But it remains a kind of miracle - for the administration if not the outside world - that the people running the world's most open society have managed to hide the essential balance of power within the government behind the Oval Office spin machine and the Observatory's striped silk curtains.

For there is also a completely opposite theory: that Mr Cheney, who was visibly at the centre of events until September 11 and for a few days thereafter, was shafted by Mr Bush's political eminence grise, Karl Rove, to end the damaging speculation about the president's weakness and ensure that the focus remained on the leader.

This became especially urgent immediately after the attacks when Mr Cheney provided a graphic account of his controlled response that contrasted with Mr Bush's evident confusion as he zig-zagged the country on Air Force One.

In Washington, access is power. Successive secretaries of state have been frustrated because their offices are across town, while the national security adviser has been able to whisper his or her opinion into the presidential ear.

Though he has spent more time at the White House in the last three months, Mr Cheney has not been there as often as he once was.

Even so, the logic that led to his original selection has not changed. "Cheney's like the president's big brother," says David Corn, Washington editor of The Nation. "If he argues something forcefully, he doesn't necessarily get his way but it's very, very important."

Mr Cheney had ambitions once, and actively contemplated a run against Bill Clinton in 1996 before being put off, it is said, by fears of revelations about his (then secretly) gay daughter. Someone might also have mentioned his indifferent looks, stand-offish manner, dreary speaking style (redeemed by a hint of self-deprecation), health problems and far-right beliefs.

Mr Cheney may put sugar on his message during his world trip, but not everyone will find it sweet. "Mr Cheney's not as hard-faced as some people think. He can certainly lay on the charm," said a Washington diplomat. "But then again, he's not that nice either."