Hotel attendants led groups of 10 autograph seekers through the swinging glass doors to the lobby of the Charles Hotel and up two flights of stairs to the auditorium where Clinton was waiting.

Rules posted outside kept the line moving briskly. No customer could present more than two books for Clinton to sign. The senator would not sign anything except Living History, and would not, under any circumstances, speak to the press.

Clinton’s schedule for the day also included a private meeting in the hotel’s presidential suite with a variety of local politicos and public figures—including University President Lawrence H. Summers, who served as secretary of the Treasury during the Bill Clinton presidential administration.

Some people waiting in line were taking advantage of Clinton’s proximity to garner a signature for friends and family members miles away.

“I just bought the book so I could get it signed for my mom,” said Divinity School student Sarah Knapp. She and friend Haemin Lee sat down in the shade of a potted tree after an hour of waiting in line. “She lives in Indiana, and the senator couldn’t get that far.”

Some 30 inching footsteps behind them, Wayland resident Peggy Patton noted the preponderance of other middle-aged women among the waiting crowd.

“People are willing to give her a chance,” she said. “I guess that’s what we’re doing—giving her a chance.”

As the hour passed, a small insurrection took hold at the end of the queue. Former Extension School student Heidi Erickson—who gained public notoriety in May when 72 dead Persian cats were discovered in the refrigerators of her two local homes—arrived half an hour late, and the Wordsworth representatives had run out of admission tickets.

Now leading a group of about 40 ticketless autograph seekers, whom she dubbed “the Hopefuls,” Erickson followed the length of the line, shouting out requests for the little blue slips with an extended palm.

“I went through the whole line looking for tickets,” she said, grinning broadly beneath her platinum locks. She carried a copy of Clinton’s book beneath one arm—one of the pre-signed copies that Wordsworth began selling when the tickets ran out, she explains.

But a signature was not enough for Erickson. She wanted to meet Clinton and—like all of the Hopefuls—shrugged off attendants’ claims that this would be impossible without a ticket.

Some did not even have a book. Shakia Gaither and Malak Yusuf, who had arrived at 12:30 p.m., were hoping for more than a signature. They hoped to woo Clinton to address the City School, a Dorchester-based non-profit organization that aims to instill the capacity for social leadership in local youth.

“People would definitely listen to her,” Yusuf explained.

“I admire her,” Gaither added.

The Hopefuls were still far from the entrance to the hotel as 1 p.m. neared. But under considerable pressure from Erickson, who trotted purposefully to and from the lobby, many managed to be ushered upstairs.