Butterfly (24 page)

orate fantasy she was going to orchestrate next Wednesday night. If it worked and she was

cured at last, as Dr. Raymond, her analyst, seemed to believe could happen, then Linda

could be free to enter into a relationship with someone like the attractive Barry Greene,

enter into it wholeheartedly and without fear.

She looked for Barry now and found him deep in conversation with a man and a

woman. By the look on his face, she judged money was being discussed. She decided to

get something to eat.

Helping herself to the baked oysters in mignonette sauce and accepting a fluted glass

filled with Cristal champagne, Linda retired to a chair at poolside, where she sat among

quiet conversations and serious eaters.

She watched the surfer-waiter. He wore a short red jacket and tight black pants. His

blond hair curled over the collar of his starched white shirt. He moved among the crowd

with the grace and ease of a cat. Linda saw more than one woman regard him with an

appreciative eye.

She recalled her one occasion in bed with him, and it got her to thinking once again

about her masked companion. The director had assured her that it was not uncommon

for a member of Butterfly to request the same man over and over again. Very few mem-

bers, in fact, opted for weekly variety. After all, a safe and unthreatening relationship

could be established, comfortable and sexually satisfying, with no strings attached.

How nice it would be, Linda thought wistfully, to have a relationship like that with

someone real, have children with him, grow old with him, and look forward to their

nights together in bed. She didn’t blame her two ex-husbands for wanting out of the mar-

riages. Linda knew she was guilty of making up excuses—a headache, early surgery in the

morning, exhaustion after an all-night emergency—and that wasn’t fair to them.

The evening wore on. The crowd shifted and moved like a restless sea. People made

contacts, avoided contacts, strutted and preened, or remained reasonably hidden, like Dr.

Linda Markus, whose mind was elsewhere. She accepted a cheese puff from a passing tray,

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103

and a taste of the salmon mousse, but smilingly refused the rich desserts and liqueurs. As

she was sipping Kenya coffee and watching Barry Greene move from contact to contact,

Linda wondered again if there would be a second date. So far she and Barry had met pro-

fessionally, at the studio, going over the weekly TV scripts of
Five North.
And then he had

asked her if she would like to accompany him to this party, and after some hesitation and

a little fear, she had accepted.

The music suddenly died down and Linda saw Beverly Highland step up on the small

stage occupied by the band and raise her arms for silence. It was amazing that so many

people could be so quiet. As soon as all talking and music stopped, it seemed that the city

of Beverly Hills was a deserted place. Not a sound reached the hilltop retreat.

Beverly spoke in a poised, assured way, explaining why the Reverend had not been

able to attend tonight’s party—he was at the hospital bedside of his younger child, who

had just undergone an emergency appendectomy—and then she went on to outline the

platform of the Reverend’s campaign, assuring her guests that they were supporting one of

the worthiest causes in the nation at the moment. “We are going to clean up our cities,”

she said. “With this man as president, and with the backing of Good News Ministries, we

will sweep smut from the face of America.”

There was applause and the music started again. Barry materialized at Linda’s side,

apologizing for abandoning her, assuring her that had not been his intention, and when

they climbed into his Rolls-Royce a little while later and he asked if she would like to come

to his place for a nightcap, Linda declined, pleading an early-morning surgery schedule.

“Another rousing success, Bev,” Maggie Kern said as she followed her employer up the

enormous winding staircase.

The last of the guests had gone; the musicians were packing up and the cleaning crew

was working silently around the grounds under the watchful eye of the estate’s security

team. The two women went into Beverly’s bedroom suite, where a French maid was draw-

ing down the satin sheets and laying out a silk-and-lace nightgown. In the enormous all-

marble bathroom another French maid was running her mistress’s nightly hot bath, filling

the air with the perfume of exotic oils.

Maggie kicked off her shoes and padded across the thick carpet to a small table where

late-night refreshments had been set out. Pouring two glasses of chilled Perrier, she

handed one to Beverly and then sank wearily into a chair upholstered in pale blue silk.

“Yes, it was a good turnout,” Beverly said as she handed her black mink wrap to the

maid. Then she went to the table and selected a carrot stick from the platter of freshly cut

raw vegetables. She hadn’t eaten all evening.

Maggie hadn’t eaten either, having been busy overseeing the smooth operation of the

party, but, unlike her employer who assiduously watched her weight, Maggie helped her-

self generously to the bagels, lox, and cream cheese.

“And in three weeks,” Beverly said as she walked to the window to look out at the cold

February night, “the New Hampshire primary.”

Maggie looked up at her and, for an instant, their eyes met and held. Then Beverly

returned to staring out the window.

104

Kathryn Harvey

They were both feeling the pressure of racing against time.

The forty-six-year-old secretary regarded her employer for a long moment. She could

see in Beverly’s slender body a rigidity that betrayed the tension and anxiety she must be

feeling. It had been growing in her, in both of them, ever since the Reverend had

announced the possibility of his running for president. Maggie could not remember a

time, in her twenty years of being Beverly’s personal secretary, when the Reverend was not

under Beverly’s careful scrutiny. She had never missed a
Good News Hour;
she knew his

every movement. And now that he was aspiring to the White House, Beverly was aspiring

right along with him.

In fact, it had become an obsession.

And where will it all lead to? Maggie wondered as she set down her empty plate and

retrieved her shoes.

Before leaving the bedroom, she paused again to look at her employer. Beverly had

that trancelike faraway look about her. Maggie knew there was no need to bother to say

good night—Beverly wouldn’t hear. Then Maggie looked at the calendar on the desk, and

the date, circled in red. June 11. It was so close now, so close….

Some minutes later Beverly bestirred herself, dismissed the maids, locked the door,

and walked slowly around the room, the chilled glass of Perrier in her hand.

Yes, it had been a successful party. Beverly had raised a lot of new votes for the

Reverend. A drop in the bucket, of course, for the billion-dollar-rich GN ministries,

which already had a following of a million people strong. She had raised the votes for

him, as another stepping-stone in his rise to power.

There was nothing Beverly Highland would not do to get him to the very top. She had

dedicated herself to that end. And this party was just another step on the ladder she so

anxiously climbed. June 11—now less than five months away. While the polls looked

good for the Reverend and predicted a respectable showing of voters, he was still not the

shoo-in. Two other Republican favorites still outstripped him. If he was going to get that

nomination in June, Beverly was going to have to step up her campaign. Nothing,

absolutely nothing, must get in the way of her ambition.

She sat on the edge of the bed and picked up the gold-framed photograph that stood

on her desk. His handsome, compelling smile reached out to her from behind the glass.

The photo was signed; he had added “Praise the Lord.” Beverly was fifty-one years old,

and if it took another fifty-one years, she was determined to reach her goal.

The top. The very top. With the Reverend Danny Mackay.

14

New Mexico: 1954

Danny Mackay, Danny Mackay,
the train wheels on the track seemed to whisper.

Danny Mackay, Danny Mackay
.…

When the whistle blew, Rachel awoke with a start. She experienced a moment of con-

fusion—where was she?—then, remembering, shifted uncomfortably in her seat and

looked out the window.

Desert. As far as the eye could see.

She had passed this way once before, nearly two and a half years ago, but the Rachel

Dwyer who now headed west, away from Texas toward Albuquerque, was a far cry from

the frightened fourteen-year-old who had gotten on the wrong Greyhound bus. That

skinny little girl had had no idea where she was going. But sixteen-year-old Rachel, the

woman who had already lived a lifetime, knew exactly where she was going.

To see that, someday, Danny Mackay paid for his crime.

When a wave of pain came over her, she clenched her stomach and held her breath.

When it subsided, she looked at her watch. It had been only two hours since her last pill.

It didn’t seem to have had any effect. The pain was getting worse. And so, she realized in

alarm, was the bleeding.

Glancing around at the few other passengers in the train car—thank God most of

them were dozing in their seats—she got up and very carefully made her way down to the

rest room at the end. There, her alarm turned to horror when she saw the amount of

blood she was losing.

She was in fact hemorrhaging.

Fighting panic, she looked at her watch again. The train would be pulling into

Albuquerque in less than an hour. She would get off and find a drugstore. Then she

would try to find her mother.

That was the first plan Rachel had made when she left San Antonio—to find her

mother. Even though she knew her parents had left the trailer park two years ago, Rachel

suspected they must still be somewhere nearby. When Dave Dwyer pulled up stakes and

moved, he never went far, just into the next little town that had a bar. Rachel was hoping

they were still in New Mexico. Her mother would take care of her.

Beyond that, Rachel’s plans were vague, the only specific one being a long-range plan.

Danny Mackay…

After taking another morphine tablet, she made her way back to her seat and collapsed

into it. The pills had come from Carmelita, who herself had once had an abortion.

105

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Kathryn Harvey

Carmelita…

Rachel closed her eyes and pictured the pretty olive face of her friend. Yesterday morn-

ing Rachel had awakened in her bed to find that face looking down at her, the big brown

eyes full of sadness. “I’m sorry,
amiga,”
the Mexican girl had said, “but Hazel sent me up

here to get you packed. She said you gotta leave. Here’s your wages.”

Still in a fog from her ordeal of the night before, Rachel had not quite understood.

“Where…” she had whispered, almost too weak to talk. “Where am I going?”

“That’s up to you,
amiga.
You just gotta get out of here. Otherwise, she says she’s

gonna
throw
you out. And she will. I seen her do it once.”

Then the fog had started to lift. “You mean Hazel’s throwing me out?”

Tears glistened in Carmelita’s eyes. “She says she don’t want no troublemakers in her

house.”

But Rachel knew Hazel’s real reason for kicking her out. Danny must have told her to

do it.

Belle and Carmelita helped her gather her few things together with tears streaming

down their cheeks. They gave her what money they could and then they went with her by

bus to the train station, where they hugged and cried some more.

“I wish I could go with you,
amiga,”
Carmelita had said. “But I just can’t leave

Manuel, you know…”

“It’s all right,” Rachel had said. “I understand.” And she did. Only too well.

“But listen,” Carmelita said, holding tight to Rachel’s arm, “you ever need me, you

just call and I’ll come running. You hear me? You ever in trouble, or you need money or