THE WALDHOLTZ EXPLANATION

Enid Greene Waldholtz wasn't kidding when she began a press conference today with the words: "I'm here today to tell you about the last four years of my life with Joe Waldholtz." For more than four hours (one per married year) an alternately tearful and angry Enid Greene Waldholtz proceeded to tell her story of how she had been taken in by her husband, who is currently under federal investigation in a $1.7 million check-kiting scheme. In her rambling confessional, the Utah congresswoman said she will not resign, and attempted to give reporters a "full accounting" of how she says her husband duped her with a promised marriage gift of $5 million. "It was a virtuoso performance," says TIME's Nina Burleigh, "a remarkable combination of contrition and lawyerly acumen." It is also puzzling, says Burleigh. "She has shown herself to be a very intelligent woman while in Washington. So the turning over wholesale of her financial dealings to her husband, and her apparent failure ever to question those dealings, seems a bit strange." Still to come: Joe Waldholtz's side of the story. He is believed to be trying to cut a deal that would implicate his wife.