On a recent April evening, it was business as usual at the annual Beaver County Democratic Dinner in the ballroom of The Fez restaurant in Hopewell: chicken on the menu, party stalwarts on the dais, and interminable speeches on the program.

	Steven Senne, Associated Press Chris Heinz, stepson of Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry, smiles after being introduced to the crowd by Kerry during a campaign event last month in New York. Click photo for larger image.

But in the audience, something was stirring. Women of all ages were lining up at a table near the front, clutching copies of the Pittsburgh society magazine Whirl featuring Christopher D. Heinz -- son of the late Sen. John Heinz, R-Pa., and stepson of Sen. John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, presumptive Democratic nominee for president -- staring somberly from the cover.

There, in person, was young Heinz himself, tall, unassuming, with flashing dark eyes, and stooped-Cary-Grant shoulders, patiently signing each copy. Finally, United Steelworkers organizer Frank Snyder acknowledged what many in the room were thinking:

"Chris Heinz," he intoned from the lectern, "you are one good-looking guy." Heinz blushed as the room erupted in laughter.

It was all in good fun, but it also was a telling example of the magnetism Heinz brings to political gatherings. Speculation is building, around Pittsburgh anyway, that he could emerge as a political star in his own right after he finishes campaigning for his stepfather in November.

While there was a touch of nostalgia in the Beaver County crowd, none of the women who flirted and grasped his hand could be heard saying anything like, "I loved your father."

This was a dinner full of die-hard Democrats, after all, and Heinz's father was a Republican -- albeit of the endangered moderate species. But most in the room seemed to accept or presume that by virtue of his mother Teresa's 1995 marriage to Kerry, and his own prominent role in his stepfather's campaign, Chris Heinz was one of them now.

Heinz's presence at the dinner, where he did not speak and said he was there to "observe and learn," only fanned the rumors that he was coming back "home" to start a political career of his own as a Democrat, and possibly one with the resources, name recognition and charisma to challenge U.S. Rep. Melissa Hart, R-Bradford Woods, for her seat in the 4th Congressional District.

But Heinz is coy about his ambitions and skillful at deflecting those kinds of questions with self-deprecating jokes. In an interview at Kerry headquarters in Manhattan, Heinz initially looked startled when asked whether he will challenge Hart for her seat. But then he grinned.

"I'm not planning on it," he said, adding, "I wouldn't rule it out."

Heinz insists that he is a long way from deciding whether he will enter the world of politics. But he doesn't deny that he is taking steps to make that possible. If he does pursue a political career, he says definitively that it would be in Pennsylvania, where his great-great-grandfather founded the H.J. Heinz Co. in 1869 and where his father represented the state as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate from 1971 until his death in 1991.

This fall Heinz, who is 31, tentatively plans to establish his residency in the Pittsburgh area as he campaigns for Kerry in the hotly contested states of Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia.

He says he believes the issues among swing voters in those states -- such as the decline in the quality of new jobs, the loss of manufacturing jobs, the cost of health care and supporting the aging population -- will be pivotal.

"If we can't win in that part of the country with what we're offering versus some kind of dressed-up social conservatism, we're going to have a hard time nationally," Heinz said. "And selfishly, it's a great place to hang my hat."

Perhaps, but Rich Stampahar, chairman of the Allegheny Republican party, notes that the 4th District has twice re-elected Hart, a staunch conservative -- the last time by a large margin -- despite a Democratic voter registration edge.

"There's no doubt the Heinz name will have an impact," said Stampahar, who described himself as a longtime political ally of the late senator. "But we have a very strong candidate in Melissa Hart. She has a track record and people know what she's done. "

Heinz grew up in Washington, D.C., and feels most at home at his family's house in Sun Valley, Idaho -- where he worked as a waiter and ski instructor the year after college -- but he says Pennsylvania is his natural home for politics. And though he and his brothers spent summers in Fox Chapel, he acknowledges that if he does get involved in politics his detractors could make his late arrival an issue.

"I wouldn't run away from that," Heinz said. "Hopefully I would have lived there long enough to generate local support from people who I got to know. I think you've got to be who you are."

Teresa Heinz Kerry also stressed that her son would need to get to know the political terrain of Pennsylvania better if he were to consider a 4th District race.

"He needs to develop his own roots and his own touch," she said. "He's a bright kid, he works very hard, he's very practical and smart. But he would have to convince the people of that district that he's worthy of their trust and that he deserves their vote because he's worked hard for it, not just because his name is Heinz."

Heinz's high-profile role in the Kerry campaign has allowed him to try on the role of politician while safely in the shadow of his stepfather. And he says the next six months will weigh heavily on his own decisions.

He expects the race to be one of the nastiest campaigns of his lifetime.

"I'm pretty sure if John wins that all will be forgiven in my mind and I'll think that politics is great," Heinz said. "But if he doesn't, I don't know that I would want to get into elected politics with George Bush and his machine in office."

Heinz's father said after his first 100 days in office that he had "attempted to wear no label, neither 'liberal' nor 'conservative' nor 'pro-labor' nor 'pro-management.'"

And there is an echo of those sentiments when Chris Heinz talks about his own ideology, joking that when he registers to vote he can "totally see myself signing [Independent] just because I hate being pinned down.

"My heart is with moderates first and then Democrats second, people that just want to sit down and solve problems," he said.

He considered himself a Republican when he was a teenager and worked as a U.S. Senate page on the Republican side of the aisle. But he says the party has changed and that there's something "a little radical about that party for me."

Though he speaks with admiration of Republicans such as Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania and former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, he thinks his father would have a hard time being in today's GOP.

Since his mother married Kerry, Heinz has developed a close relationship with his stepfather -- bonding over sports and motorcycles, and as history buffs.

But he says his father is still his biggest influence. As the youngest of three brothers, he developed a close relationship with H. John Heinz III, who helped spur his avid interest in politics, history and foreign policy.

He laughs remembering how as a "little man," he woke up every morning at 6:30 and trundled downstairs to eat breakfast and read the morning papers with his father, discussing politics or world events and becoming a devoted reader of The Washington Post by the fourth grade.

"I was a pretty willing student, which was a useful thing because my dad was a pretty demanding guy. But that never bothered me," he said.

He says his mother's international background helped raise his awareness of "what it means to be an American," and that both his parents taught the boys to be outspoken and opinionated.

Heinz followed in his father's footsteps when deciding to go to Yale University -- the day he received his acceptance letter was the day his father was killed in a plane crash over Pennsylvania.

At Yale, Heinz immersed himself in modern American history, especially the period around the Vietnam War. His friends say he was shy and reserved at first, but warm, and that he was resolutely focused on making his own way despite his family's extraordinary wealth and his connections.

"I always had a sense in how seriously he took his studies that he was studying for public life, really developing a deep understanding of American history," said his longtime friend and Yale roommate Devon D. Archer.

After college Heinz took a job with Cambridge Associates of Boston, an investment advisory firm for non-profit companies, and he joined a private equity firm in New York after graduating from Harvard Business School.

A classmate from Harvard, Deron J. Haley, describes Heinz as one of the "hardest working guys" he knows.

"He's one who has never wanted to be perceived as having a good deal from the beginning and riding that through life," Haley said. "He's always wanted people to know that he's worked for what he's got."

For now, Heinz says he is focused on the campaign, while maintaining a sense of humor about the number of times his name is linked with the phrase "rich and single" in the gossip columns or that he is compared to John F. Kennedy Jr. -- descriptions Haley says he "hates."

But Heinz insists that it's easy to avoid the New York Post's "Page Six" by being home by 10 p.m.

No such luck last week. In a New York Post item entitled, "Ladies say pass the Heinz," he was described as being "mobbed by groups of hopeful girls" at a New York book party.

When asked about that kind of coverage, Heinz sighs and says: "I'm hoping that's going to stop one of these days."