A former White House photographer paints a picture of the candidate for Edward Luce. What kind of president would Hillary Clinton make? Since she has already lived in the White House for eight years (from 1993 to 2001), we ought to have a surer feel for the prospect than for any previous incoming president.Yet the US remains as bitterly divided in its view of her as any public figure since she came to prominence 24 years ago.It is hard to think of another name - Donald Trump's included - whose mere mention can more quickly turn a placid dinner party into a shouting match. Everyone has a deeply held opinion. They just don't often overlap.story_article_left1"Hillary Clinton is an intensely private person - she gives away so little," says Robert McNeely, who spent six years with the Clintons as the official White House photographer. "If she weren't in politics, she could be a world-class poker player."As she admitted in her Philadelphia acceptance speech last month, she far prefers the "service" part of public service to the public dimension, which she sees as a necessary evil.In that regard - and many others - it is hard to think of two characters less alike than Bill and Hillary Clinton. "Bill craves attention," says McNeely, whose photographic book of Hillary's years as first lady comes out in January. "Hillary really doesn't care if people like her or not."You know a person by the company she keeps, goes the saying. But Hillaryland is too large, and far too political, to trust any single portrait that emerges. The result is invariably impressionistic.It is hard to shake off the suspicion that whoever is talking to you is pushing a hidden agenda. Those who know won't talk, goes the quip. And those who talk don't know - particularly with Hillary.Among those who know her well, only a handful spent as many hours in close proximity to the Clintons as McNeely. And while he was there, she barely noticed his presence. His job was to be unobtrusive. As director of White House photography, he took black-and-white photos that he developed in a darkroom in the White House basement.McNeely followed the first couple almost everywhere - not even the family's private apartment was off-limits. There was almost no meeting from which he was barred. The result is more than half a million photographs, taken between 1992 and 1998.block_quotes_start I suspect the real reason was they didn't want anyone to witness the shouting matches they were having block_quotes_end"The only time my access was curtailed was during the Monica Lewinsky scandal," he says. "The Clintons were worried that my pictures might be subpoenaed by Kenneth Starr [the special prosecutor]. I suspect the real reason was they didn't want anyone to witness the shouting matches they were having."Each of his pictures tells a story. One of the most revealing shows a 1994 press conference with Hillary Clinton seated in the East Room facing the assembled media. It was her first such event since becoming first lady. She was told it might be her last.The White House had been besieged by rumours about the death of Vince Foster, a Clinton family friend from Arkansas and presidential counsel, who took his life following revelations over the Clintons' failed Whitewater property deal - and a swirl of related subplots.The first lady's attempt to stop the firestorm dramatically backfired.full_story_image_hleft1Whitewater led to the appointment of Starr as special prosecutor, whose investigative peregrinations eventually chanced on that fateful semen-stained dress of a White House intern. The picture shows an earnest Clinton trying in vain to put a lid on a pressure cooker. But her husband's evasions over his dalliance with Lewinsky resulted in his impeachment - and the temporary breakdown of the US's most high-profile marriage."Those were tough years," says McNeely. "The whole atmosphere in the White House turned paranoid." A wounded Hillary reportedly threw crockery and ashtrays at her husband, often finding her target.She has faced innumerable press firing squads since then. Should she win in November, she will face many more. Should Bill thus become the US's first first gentleman - or first guy, as some have suggested - there will be as much amateur psychology, if not more, about the couple as there was in the '90s.story_article_right2With the Clintons, the marital psychodrama is rarely far from the politics. Another picture, also from the early White House years, shows Hillary standing in the Roosevelt Room near her husband, who is seated with aides.They are working on her healthcare reform bill, whose subsequent demise on Capitol Hill in 1994 triggered the second-biggest crisis of the Clinton years.She is clutching a sheaf of papers while casually running her other hand through her hair. At one level, the picture is unexceptional. At another, it depicts the shattering of a 200-year precedent.Hillary was the first first lady to take charge of a serious policy initiative - Hillarycare was her husband's top legislative priority. Her detractors, of whom there were many, had already bristled at her disregard for tradition."I suppose I could have stayed at home and baked cookies," she snapped during the 1992 campaign, thus offending the influential "stay-at-home mom" vote, and legions of sexists. Even though "Buy one Clinton, get one free" was one of the campaign's informal mottos, the idea of Hillary taking an overtly political role in the White House only further inflamed her critics. They thus took special glee in Hillarycare's defeat.But the pragmatic way she handled that humiliation revealed another side to her character. Much the same could be said 14 years later, when she dusted herself off after losing the Democratic nomination to Barack Obama.She quickly fell in behind his candidacy and later agreed to be his secretary of state."After Hillarycare failed, she did not sink into gloom, as Bill was prone to do at times," says McNeely. "She dived into the next project with the same workaholic zeal. Nobody should underestimate how tough she is."Many of McNeely's pictures show Hillary listening intently on the edge of presidential huddles - one on an MD80 plane during her husband's 1996 re-election campaign. These, too, speak volumes. The president would happily allow Oval Office meetings to run on until the early hours. People would wander in and out."Sometimes, people with no standing to the issue being discussed would just turn up and Bill would welcome them into his circle," says McNeely. "It would infuriate the first lady." Often, she would bring her husband's rambling meetings to a close and force him to take a decision.full_story_image_hleft2It was she in 1988 who convinced him it was too early to run for president - they were both in their early 40s. She also persuaded him in 1993 to hire David Gergen, a former Republican adviser, to bring perspective to a White House in disarray after the failure of healthcare reform."People say she is only able to run for the presidency because she is married to Bill Clinton," says McNeely. "That could be true. But I can't imagine Bill would have made it to the White House without Hillary."One of the most recent pictures in McNeely's portfolio shows her on a campaign bus when she was running for a New York senate seat in 2000. As first lady, this also broke precedent. Surrounded by reporters, she looks almost Zen-like. Is her expression a blank mask, or does it convey inner composure? For her by then lame-duck - although still popular - husband, the New York senate campaign was something of a life-saver.Al Gore, the vice-president, who was running as the Democratic presidential nominee, spurned the president's help, possibly fatefully. (If Gore had won the Clinton home state of Arkansas, there would have been no need for that Florida recount.) Bill thus poured his energy into his wife's campaign.story_article_left3Over the next two months, Bill will play a key role in arguing for his wife's historic bid. Speculation about his dicey health only rose recently when he gave his most personal address to date about the origins of their marriage. Even though he had lost none of his rhetorical command, he looked gaunt and his hands shook at various points.Hillary clearly enjoyed the celebrity glamour of the first lady role. Alt hough she never paid much attention to her wardrobe - "What she chose to wear often seemed to be the last and least important decision of the day," says McNeely - she liked it when others did.One of the pictures shows her being touched up for a shoot for Elle magazine. "They were adjusting her blouse and brushing a bit of rouge on her cheek and she seemed to be really loving it," says McNeely. "I said: 'You're really good at this,' and she just laughed."Another shows Hillary, trailed by Diana, Princess of Wales; Anna Wintour, editor of Vogue; and Katharine Graham, the owner of the Washington Post; at a breast cancer awareness event in the White House. Ralph Lauren is just in the frame. Clinton was in her element, says McNeely."She sensed Diana was a little tongue-tied and she just did all the talking," he says. "If you'll forgive me for saying so, Diana wasn't the sharpest tool in the box. But she knew enough to know that it was better not to say too much."Another photograph from this period shows the Clintons relaxing with the Blairs - the very pinnacle of power coupledom. Cherie Blair is kicking off her shoes, somewhat to the surprise of the Clintons.One of the most striking photographs is of a youthful-looking Hillary in 1992, on her husband's first presidential campaign trail, holding a voter's baby. She does not seem to notice it chewing on her sunglasses. An anxious onlooking parent seems unsure what to do.Even those most cynical about Hillary's authenticity will concede her abiding interest in children's rights - starting with her work for the Children's Defence Fund in the '70s.After Hillarycare failed, she turned her attention to expanding children's health insurance. That initiative did pass congress.full_story_image_hleft3In 2007, I had to switch a one-to-one interview with Hillary into a telephone interview because I had to catch an urgent flight to New Delhi to do paperwork for my daughter's adoption.Hillary asked where she was. I mentioned the name of the orphanage. "You mean the one behind Civil Lines in old Delhi?" she asked. "Yes, I've visited it." She then spoke knowledgeably on the subject for several minutes.My favourite photograph - and the most telling - shows Hillary at the Secret Service firing range in Beltsville, Maryland. A trainer steadies her shoulder as she fires the sniper rifle at a target. You can just make out the haze of an exploding glass bottle at the other end of the range. "Hillary is secretly a tomboy," says McNeely. "She loves this kind of stuff."She also takes the preparation seriously.I ask McNeely what her years as first lady tell us about the kind of president she would be.McNeely evaluates what he sees as her core traits.story_article_right4"She is very quick to judge people," he says. "If Bill senses someone doesn't like him, he will spend hours trying to convert that person. Hillary doesn't bother."Second, her White House would be "highly feminised". Her East Wing was a very female counterpoint to her husband's overwhelmingly male West Wing. She has already pledged that half her cabinet will be female. McNeely says the calibre of those she hired was generally higher. But she is also less Socratic."She would spend a lot of time selecting the right people," he says. "But my sense is that any aide who disagrees with her on the big subjects won't last very long in the job."Most importantly, she will always know more about her brief than anyone else. Grasp of detail will never be her weak point, although lack of an overarching vision has been."There isn't a person in the world who can outwork Hillary Clinton," says McNeely. "Isn't it funny that her opponent in this election is the laziest mind in the western world?"- The Financial Times..