Butterfly (57 page)

you the best.”

Danny grinned. “Thank you, Senator. Or should I call you Dad?”

“I know you’ll take care of my little Bluebonnet over there. She’s made me raht proud,

catching herself a fine husband like yourself.”

Danny was feeling right proud of himself as well. For a wedding gift the senator had

deeded to the newlyweds ten thousand acres of the choicest cattle country in Texas.

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Kathryn Harvey

As the band struck up the “Cotton-Eyed Joe” and dancers linked arms to form wagon-

wheel spokes, Danny made his way to where Angelica was standing with her mother. He

was congratulated along the way, slapped on the back, had his hand shaken, and told

what a blessed day this was, praise the Lord, and when he finally came up to her, Angelica

shrank back.

“Are you enjoying yourself, Mother?” Danny said to the senator’s wife, who was out-

fitted in the best from Neiman-Marcus and dripping with diamonds.

“God bless you, Reverend,” she said, dabbing her eyes with a lace handkerchief.

“You’ve made me the proudest mother in Texas.”

Danny turned to his bride. The band was calling out, “What do you say?” and the

dancers were yelling, “Bullshit!” Danny moved close to Angelica, grinned out over the

merrymaking guests and said quietly, “Smile for our friends, Angelica.”

She was pale. Paler than the lace of her veil. She was thinking about the coming night,

in the honeymoon suite of Houston’s finest hotel.

Danny reached for her hand, found it cold, and gave it a painful squeeze. “You’re my

wife now,” he said in a voice only she could hear. “You have to do as I say. Now, smile for

our guests.”

Angelica smiled. She wanted to cry.

Danny felt prouder today than he had in a long time. He’d pulled off a real smart one,

marrying the rich senator’s only daughter. What a stroke of genius it had been, and what

a switch! Getting her pregnant and forcing her to marry him.

“You do as I say,” he had warned her four weeks ago, “or I go to your daddy and tell

him you’re carrying his bastard grandchild.”

Angelica had begged and pleaded with him. She had been confused, she hadn’t known

which way to turn. The Reverend had seduced her on the night of a political barbecue on

her daddy’s ranch. She hadn’t liked it; she discovered she hadn’t liked the Reverend Danny

Mackay. But then he’d forced her two more times after that—he was a guest in their

house, and she hadn’t dared cry out. “Who’s he going to believe?” Danny had said. “You

or me?”

Angelica knew how passionately her father supported Danny Mackay and his Good

News Ministries, how he was helping Danny to build a brand-new cathedral outside

Houston. Her word against the Reverend’s? And so she had let Danny have his way. To

her horror she had come up pregnant.

“I go to your daddy,” Danny had threatened, “and I tell him that you confessed to me,

your spiritual counselor, that you’ve had it off with some ranch hand. How do you think

he would take that?”

Angelica had an idea of how he would take it. Her fundamentalist Christian father

would not be beyond throwing her out of his house, penniless and shamed.

In fear and panic she had agreed to marry Danny. But now, as she watched the thirsty

dancers ordering up more “long-necks,” as she thought of the honeymoon suite and what

Danny was going to make her do, Angelica Mackay knew she had made a mistake.

Danny looked at his watch and scanned the crowd. Bonner was late. What was hold-

ing him up?

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249

This deal with Royal Farms was so important to Danny that he had sent his right-

hand man off to California on the eve of his wedding. Danny had wanted Bonner to

stand with him as his best man, but he wanted Bonner in California even more, checking

out this deal that seemed too good to be true.

It was being handled through an Austin stockbroker. Danny couldn’t believe his luck.

Everyone knew that Royal Burgers brought in billions annually. Hell, there was a several-

year waiting list to purchase one of its franchises, and then the price was half a million.

And here he was, being offered the very agricultural firm that was the sole supplier of all

those restaurants! He would be a fool not to jump at it. But caution was always good prac-

tice. Royal Farms’ financial statement listed “income from investments.” “What invest-

ments?” Danny had asked the Austin broker. The man couldn’t tell him. So he’d sent

Bonner off to Los Angeles to look into Royal Farms’ holdings.

“When will you be breaking ground for the cathedral, Reverend?”

Danny turned and found himself looking into the stern face of a Superior Court jus-

tice. “Just as soon as I get me a shovel, Hank!”

The judge laughed. Like the senator, he was one of Good News Ministries’ biggest

supporters.

Danny sometimes had to marvel at his meteoric rise in TV evangelism. It all went

back to that incredible night when a man had died during his revival and had somehow

come back to life again. That incident had brought Hallstead to Danny’s hotel room, and

from there, well, Danny often thought of himself as having been shot out of a cannon.

The television audiences went crazy for him. The sex appeal and charisma that oozed

from him onstage to electrify a live congregation traveled just as easily over television air-

waves. Danny wasn’t diminished a bit by the small screen; his voice was no less com-

pelling, the magic not the slightest bit weakened. Power was power, he had discovered,

whether he used it dominating a woman in bed or belting out the Gospel to half a million

people by way of TV antennas.

And it wasn’t just that he was handsome, dynamic, and young that made people like

him. Some of his appeal lay in the fact that he stayed away from Bible fundamentalism.

While Danny was very familiar with Scripture—he had studied and absorbed the Bible

the same way he had
Mein Kampf
and
Profiles in Courage—
he preferred to preach a broad

moral message, reminding people that they had sinned but that they could find salvation

if only they would listen to him. People listened. And they sent in their dollars because

they believed that money bought them grace with God.

Even religion can be made into a tool of power.

Machiavelli had first spoken those words to a young Danny twenty-five years ago, and

he was speaking to him still. Danny Mackay knew that he was living proof that the plan

sketched out in
The Prince
did indeed work. Which was why, back in 1973, Danny had

established the Reverend Danny Mackay Award for Achievement.
A prince demonstrates

that he admires talent by honoring men of ability.
A bronze plaque was given out annually to

the Christian Man or Woman of the Year. Danny’s foundation regularly presented awards

of money to citizens who performed good deeds, to students who excelled, to companies

that served the public good.
Nothing wins more esteem for a prince than distinctive acts in

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Kathryn Harvey

civil matters.
Danny had also set up college scholarships, funded missionary programs over-

seas, and conducted TV telethons to raise money for recovering drug addicts.

Good News Ministries was now bringing in millions of dollars annually, making it

one of the wealthiest churches in the country. And Danny Mackay, its founder and leader,

was growing more famous with each passing Sunday.

And rich, too.

Danny got the idea to create a “shell” company to facilitate the building of his per-

sonal fortune. “We create a bogus company,” he had explained to Bonner, “and through

it I borrow money from the Ministries. Of course, there is no company really, so the

money goes right into my pocket.”

That was how Danny had purchased those two big office buildings in downtown

Houston and the yacht charter outfit in Galveston, and now Royal Farms in California.

The ministry’s money belonged to God, and with it Danny was going to build the

biggest, most impressive house of worship the Lord had ever seen. But his own money

was his own, and he did with it as he liked.

“Will you please excuse me for a minute?” he said to the judge. Danny made his way

through the crowd, receiving congratulations along the way, and pausing once to

exchange a few words with the owner of Houston’s largest department store.

“How’s that little girl of yours doing?” he asked in his sincerest voice.

“Just fine, Reverend. She should be out of the hospital in a few days. And those flow-

ers you sent really perked her up. God bless you.”

When he reached the other side, he walked up to two men who were neither eating

nor drinking but standing off from the crowd, their faces blank. “Did you find out the

name of that reporter?” Danny asked one of them in a low voice so that no one else could

hear.

The man produced a small notebook from an inside pocket. He opened it to a page

and handed it to his employer. Danny read the information and nodded gravely. It was

the name and address of a reporter who had written some damaging remarks about

Danny in a nationally syndicated column. Danny looked at the address—the reporter

lived in Washington, D.C.—and memorized it.

“Find out where his kid goes to school,” Danny said quietly, handing the notebook

back. “And where his wife works. Find out where his parents live, too.” That might

work—his parents.

He took one last look at the name and filed it away on his private list, the list that had

once been headed by the unfortunate Dr. Simon Waddell. In twenty-five years, six names

had been removed from the list. But eleven had been added. Danny would eventually get

around to taking care of all of them.

And then there was Bonner at last, pushing his way through the crowd.

Danny excused himself and went off into a private corner with his friend. “What hap-

pened?”

“I’m sorry I missed the ceremony, Danny. I told the pilot I was in a hurry, but there

was a storm over Phoenix and we had to reroute through Utah.”

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251

Danny wasn’t interested in that. He had trouble standing still. He looked this way and

that around the large honky-tonk, not missing a thing, and said, “Tell me about your

visit. Did you meet this Highland woman?”

“She wasn’t available, but I met with the next two in command.”

“And?”

Bonner ran a hand through his corn-silk hair. At forty-six he still had his unusual

angelic looks. And he photographed well on television. Folks liked to see him up there on

the stage, right next to Reverend Danny. “Royal Farms owns some outfit that publishes

textbooks, a string of beauty salons, and a men’s clothing store in Beverly Hills. Nothing

worth the bother of going out to California and looking at.”

“Tell them we’ll sign the papers first thing tomorrow.”

Bonner laughed. “On the first morning of your honeymoon?”

Danny looked over at the frail young woman in white, who seemed to be trying to

hide behind her buxom mother. She had shrunk from him when he’d walked up to her.

And she had flinched when he touched her. Well, tonight he was going to give her some-

thing to flinch about.

“Hell,” he murmured, feeling good. “Call Austin right now. Tell them we’ll sign the

papers this afternoon. Don’t want that Highland broad suddenly realizing what a good

deal she’s giving us and backing out, do we?”

35

The smell of rain had hung over Los Angeles for days, and yet no moisture fell from

the metallic sky. Although Southern California never got enough rain and everyone

prayed for it now and then because of frequently threatened droughts, Trudie never liked

the rain. It ruined her business. You can’t dig a pool in mud. So she was keeping her fin-

gers crossed that the deluge would hold off long enough for her to finish this latest con-

tract. The man for whom she was scooping out a pool up on Coldwater Canyon had just

won an Academy Award and was one of the hottest items in movies. The stamp of

TruePools on his upper step could mean spectacular referrals for Trudie.