Butterfly (39 page)

with him.

The minutes ticked by. No word came from the silent hospital.

Danny jumped back to his feet and gave them his anger. “We have to show the Lord

that we don’t deserve such punishment. We have to show the Lord how much we love that

man lying in that hospital. Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us now offer ourselves up in

the place of our fallen president. Let us offer ourselves to God in his place! Let us vow on

this very spot to give up a life of sin and Satan worship and promise to return to the path

of righteousness—for John Kennedy’s sake!”

The crowd went wild. They shouted up to God. They made promises, bargains, any-

thing, so long as He let the President live.

Danny stood with the sun behind him, his arms outstretched, his slender body shud-

dering with passion and magnetism. The radio news crew had taken up places close to the

bus; his words were at that very minute being broadcast over half of Texas. From a dis-

tance away, while they waited for news from inside the hospital, a television crew aimed a

camera at Danny and let the film roll.

“I tell you, brothers and sisters,” he bellowed. “Make your peace with the Lord right

here and now! Promise Him on this very spot that you are ready to make sacrifices in

order to save our beloved president! Brothers and sisters, ask not what your president can

do for you, but what you can do for your president!”

“Hallelujah!” they screamed. “Amen, brother! Praise the Lord!”

Bonner Purvis stood to the side, stupefied. He had seen Danny deliver some rousing

sermons, but none compared with this. He looked at the adoring expressions on the faces

of the people as they gazed up at Danny. He saw how
his
they were, how ready to be used

by him and led over any edge. It made Bonner think of those old news clips he had seen

of Hitler.

Bonner suddenly recalled something that happened three years ago, on a day not

unlike today. They had pulled their bus into some small town in the Hill Country, and

Danny, nervous and agitated, had gone in search of something. That night, while the

revival was at its most feverish pitch, Danny disappeared. He came back four hours later

looking strangely pale and calm. The next day Bonner heard on the radio about a local

physician, Dr. Simon Waddell, who had been found murdered—butchered—in his bed,

and the police were questioning everyone in the area. Of course, if asked, a hundred peo-

ple would have sworn Danny was in the tent that night around eleven o’clock. Danny

knew the psychology of crowds, he could hypnotize them into believing any illusion. But

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Danny hadn’t been there, Bonner knew. Not in the flesh, only in the thoughts of a reli-

giously hysterical crowd. And months later the police finally chalked up the murder to a

drug addict, whom Dr. Waddell must have surprised in the act of stealing narcotics.

As he thought about that night, and as he watched his best friend manipulate the mob

outside the hospital as if they were puppets, and as he heard Danny shout the words—

“Kennedy’s spirit will live!”—that were going to launch him into instant celebrity, Bonner

Purvis suddenly saw the future, and he shivered with excitement.

Carmelita Sanchez heard the news when she went into the nightclub where Manuel

and his friends usually spent the day playing cards and arranging drug deals. She didn’t

make it as far as the back room, where Manuel was waiting for her to take her to the abor-

tionist. The radio was on over the bar. The janitor was standing there like a department-

store mannequin, leaning on his broom, staring at the radio, his eyes filling with tears. “At

approximately one o’clock P.M. central standard time,” the announcer was saying,

“President John Fitzgerald Kennedy died at Parkland Hospital of a gunshot wound to the

head.”

Time suddenly ceased for Carmelita, just as it did for the rest of the nation. While cars

were pulling over on freeways and schoolchildren were being sent home and the entire

telephone system was jammed with calls, Carmelita came to a halt in the stale darkness of

a Dallas strip joint. A voice was coming out of the radio and filling the club. The speaker

wasn’t identified, and it had been years since she had last heard that voice, so she didn’t

know who it was who was calling upon everyone to make sacrifices so that Kennedy

might live.

Her own tears began to gather and tumble as a grief like none she had ever known

overwhelmed her.

She stared at the radio and felt the power of the recorded speech race toward her in

waves. It was a speech she would hear over and over again in the weeks to come, as it was

replayed on every television and radio station across the country, the famous “Reverend

Danny” speech that had been made spontaneously outside the hospital where Kennedy

lay dying. The young prostitute was as moved and manipulated by Danny Mackay’s pow-

erful oratory as many other people were, and just as many other people were doing, she

found herself thinking: Yes, I have to change my ways.

And then it hit her.

God did not want her to be a whore any longer.

Carmelita Sanchez was used to kneeling. She did it in sleazy hotel rooms with name-

less customers; she did it in church every Sunday. This was the first time she had knelt on

the linoleum floor of a striptease nightclub.

The day clerk behind the front desk of the Bar None Hotel was sobbing softly into her

arms. Two old men sat on the Naugahyde sofa, their eyes glassy and staring. Beverly

Highland had come to a halt in the middle of the lobby and listened to a familiar voice

roll out over the radio waves.

He was here. In Dallas. Just a few miles away.

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167

Like everyone else in America, Beverly was in some way affected by Danny Mackay’s

moving prayers. But Beverly was affected in a way that was different from the effect on

everyone else.

Her body was stiff and rigid. She trembled slightly. Her head moved once or twice.

He was actually here.

She could get into her car and—

But she didn’t move. Danny kept her nailed to the spot. He told her she should give

up her life of sin and corruption. He told her to accept the love of Jesus Christ. He told

her to make sacrifices for John F. Kennedy. He told her,
he
told
her,
to return to the path

of righteousness for our president’s sake. And while he told her all these things Beverly

heard something she had heard in Danny Mackay’s voice before, years ago—
power.

And then she knew beyond a doubt that, as he had promised, Danny Mackay was a

man who was going places.

He had foretold it nine years ago when he had thrown her out of his car. And here he

was, using people, stepping on them in his maniacal climb to the top. He even used a

dying president for a foothold.

As she stood in the middle of that dismal hotel lobby, hearing a car horn honking out-

side, someone running by in the street, the desk clerk sobbing softly, the voice of Danny

Mackay on the radio, Beverly suddenly very much wanted him to become Someone.

Because someday he was going to fall. She was going to make him fall. And she

wanted him to fall from the greatest possible height. No matter how long it took, she was

going to be patient. She was going to wait and watch and see. And when the moment was

right, she was going to return to Danny Mackay and push him over the edge.

“Rachel?” came a tremulous voice.

She turned. Carmelita was standing in the doorway, a carpetbag in her hand.

“Rachel,” she said, “I’m going with you.”

March

22

She languished in the bath while massage jets shot hard pulsating streams of hot water

against her naked body. She felt as if she were floating in a world of pure sensation. There

wasn’t an inch of her skin that wasn’t caressed, warmed, softly lapped by the oily, per-

fumed water. The air was scented with jasmine, gardenia, and lavender; the ferns and

moss and Madonna lilies in the indoor garden that filled a corner of the bathroom were

heavy with dew from the mist of the bath. With a lazy hand she reached for a crystal

stemmed glass and slowly sipped chilled white wine. Then she tilted the glass and let a lit-

tle spill on her bare breasts. The sudden cold after so much heat was stimulating.

She closed her eyes and rested her head against the black marble. The sunken bathtub

was very large; she could almost swim in it. The fixtures were gold and swan-shaped. Lush

plants and tropical flowers grew in green malachite boxes all around the bath; the walls

were mirrored with gold veining. At the foot of the black marble steps a carpet of deep

llama fleece stretched away over the entire floor of the bathroom. A brass service cart held

buckets of ice and a bottle of wine; the silver domes of the covered dishes preserved the

freshness of Camembert and Brie, crunchy French bread, chocolate truffles, Italian pas-

tries, slices of papaya, melon, and pineapple. There was even a silver samovar that kept the

rich Viennese coffee hot while allowing a little of the cinnamon aroma to escape into the

steamy air.

When she felt a slight breeze brush her exposed shoulders, she opened her eyes. He

was standing by the door, smiling. He had come in soundlessly. A beautiful young man

with a well-muscled body and long blond hair. He wore a white tennis outfit and was per-

spiring; she thought he looked just like a champion after a victory at Wimbledon.

She watched him as he slowly, teasingly undressed. First the shirt, up over his head,

causing him to stretch his torso. Then the shoes and socks. Finally the shorts. He was

blond all over; he was perfection.

He climbed the steps up to the sunken bath one by one, deliberately taking his time.

She watched his every movement, the ripple of every sinew and line of his body. He

stepped into the hot water and stood between her legs, looking down at her. She saw con-

ceit and vanity around his blue eyes and thin-lipped mouth. She felt her breath catch in

her throat.

He knelt in the water and, with his hands resting gently on her knees, leaned forward

and kissed her. His mouth was sweet.

They kissed for a long time, entwined and floating in the perfumed water, sending

trickles over the sides and down to the thick llama rug. Then he stood again, this time

straddling her with one leg on either side of her. She reached up and stroked him,

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Kathryn Harvey

bringing him to full erection. The condom had already been placed near the bath. She

liked this part, putting it on him. When it was on, she sat up and took him into her

mouth. She tasted a pleasant flavor—cherry. That was a nice touch.

The door across the bathroom opened silently again. The man who entered this time,

quietly closing the door behind himself, was very dark, nearly black. While her mouth

made gentle, intimate love to her tennis player, who stood over her, she watched the sec-

ond man undress. He, too, was beautiful, perfection.

He stepped up into the enormous bath and slid down behind her, cradling her

between his legs, his hands on her breasts, while her blond lover knelt down and entered

her in the hot, oily water.

She closed her eyes again and delivered herself up to the delicious sensation of pure

pleasure. Her two lovers kissed her, caressed her, left no inch of her body unexplored. Her

back rested against a hard, muscled chest, strong arms came around her waist, and rough,

callused hands held her breasts, while another strong, hard body moved between her legs,

his hands gripping her thighs, his mouth on hers, sucking the breath out of her, his

thrusts sending jasmine-scented water lapping over the sides of the bath.

She cried out more than once.

The three moved as one. They drew her up out of the water and led her down the

steps onto the soft llama fleece. Her blond lover filled a glass with wine and dipped her

nipples in it; then he sucked them clean. He drew her down to the carpet and pressed her

onto her back while he knelt at her side and continued to kiss her bruised lips. She held