Eric Lustbader - First Daughter

That includes Andre. After taking his lumps from his boss, Cyril Tolkan, for beating up on Jack, Andre has moved up Tolkan's crooked corporate ladder with alarming rapidity. Part of his motivation, of course, was to get out of Tolkan's doghouse, but far more worrying is the flame of his ambition, which is burning brighter than even Gus had imagined. Andre never comes to the church anymore, and ever since Reverend Taske returned from Andre's new lair with a black eye and a lacerated cheek, he doesn't even mention his name. Gus, enraged, wanted to go after Andre himself, but Taske wouldn't let him. Jack happens to overhear their conversation early one Sunday morning, which takes place in the rectory, where Jack is laboriously working his way through The Great Gatsby . The novel is interesting because, like Jack himself, Gatsby is an outsider. But it becomes downright fascinating when Jack, thumbing through a biography of F. Scott Fitzgerald he takes out of the local library, learns that the author was, like Jack himself, dyslexic.

"I've had enough standin' aside while Andre goes off on ev'rybody," Gus says.

"You just can't abide him taking business from you," Reverend Taske responds.

"Huh! Looka whut he did to you!"

"Occupational hazard," Taske says. "You're not my daddy, Augustus. I can take care of myself."

"By turnin' the other cheek."

"That's how I was taught, Augustus. That's what I believe."

"Whut you believe ain't nuthin' but a jackass's brayin'."

Jack sucks in his breath. He is compelled to get up, creep down the hall, put his eye to the crack between door and jamb he makes by pulling with his fingertips. In his limited line of vision, the Reverend Taske is eclipsed by Gus's planetary shape.

"Because your ire is up, I'm going to ignore your insult to me, Augustus, but I can't overlook your blasphemy toward God. When we're done, I want you to make penance."

"Not today, Reverend. I gots no truck with turnin' the other cheek. Moment I knuckle to that, I'm shit outta business. You-all gonna tell me that if I don't do fo' myself, God will?"

"I am concerned for your immortal soul, Augustus," Taske says slowly and carefully.

"Huh, you best be concerned with things that matter, like whut you gonna do 'bout expenses round here now that yo' famous bank vice president got indicted for embezzlement. Reg'lators gone pulled the plug on all his deals, including the one that's been keeping this place afloat fo' three years."

Jack hears the creak of a chair, figures the reverend has sat heavily down. "You do have a point there, Augustus."

"Now, you know I make a lotta money, Reverend, an' I'll give you as much as I can."

"The church isn't here to drain you of every penny you make."

"Still an' all," Gus perseveres, "whatever I can muster won't be enough. You gotta think long-term."

"If you have a suggestion," Taske says.

It's at that point that Jack knocks on the door. There is a short startled silence, at the end of which Taske's voice bids Jack enter.

Jack stands in the doorway until the reverend beckons him into the room. "What can I do for you, Jack? Having trouble decoding Fitzgerald's prose?"

"It's not that." Jack is for a moment at a loss for words. Taske looks weary, older. Why hasn't he noticed this before? Jack asks himself.

"Augustus and I are in the middle of a discussion, Jack," Taske says kindly.

"I know, that's why I came in."

"Oh?"

"I couldn't help overhearing."

"Huh, you betta close that door good," Gus says, "so you the on'y one."

Jack shuts the door firmly, turns around. "I heard about the money crisis."

"That's none o' yo' business," Gus says darkly.

"I think I have a way out," Jack says.

The two men seem to hang suspended between disbelief and raucous laughter. The thought that a fifteen-year-old has seen a way out of the fiscal quicksand the Renaissance Mission Church has unceremoniously found itself in is, on the face of it, ludicrous. Except, as both men know, each in his own way, this is Jack-and Jack is capable of extraordinary leaps of logic that are beyond either of them.

So Taske says, "Go ahead, Jack. We're listening."

"I was thinking of Senator Edward Carson."

Taske frowns. "What about him, son?"

"He was here last week," Jack says. "I read the papers-you assign me to do that every day, and I do."

Taske smiles. "I know you do."

"I noticed that Senator Carson got a lot of great press out of his visit here. He even spent some time with the parishioners before and after the service. He said he used to sing in his choir back home in Nebraska. I heard him accept your invitation to sing with our choir today."

"All true," Taske agrees. "What exactly is your point, Jack?"

"There's an election coming up this fall. Senator Carson's campaign war chest is big. According to the papers, he's the party's great future hope. The bigwigs are rumored to be grooming him to run for president one day. Him being here last week and this, I think the rumor's true. But to make a successful run, he's going to need every vote he can get. Last time I looked, there weren't too many blacks living in Nebraska, which is where the Renaissance Mission Church comes in."

"Huh. Sounds like the kid's on to sumthin'," Gus says. "Yes, indeed."

Taske's mouth is half-open. Jack can just about see the gears mesh in his mind, the wheels begin to turn.

"I don't believe it," Taske says at length. "You want me to offer him votes for funding."

Jack nods.

"But we're one small community church."

"Today you are," Jack says. "That's the beauty of the idea. You're always talking about expanding beyond the neighborhood. This is your chance. With Senator Carson's backing, the Renaissance Mission Church could go regional, then national. By the time he's ready to make his run at the presidency, you'll be in position to offer him the kind of help he'll need most."

Gus laughs. "This here boy thinks as big as the sky."

"Yes," Taske says slowly, "but he has a point."

"Carson's gotta go for it," Gus cautions.

"Why won't he?" Jack says. "He's a successful politician. His livelihood depends on him making deals, accommodations, alliances. Think about it. There's no downside for him. Even if you should fail, Reverend, he gets a ton of national press for helping a minority raise itself off its knees."

"Jack's right. The idea makes perfect sense," Taske says. He's chewing over the idea, looking at it from all angles. "And what's more, it just might work!" Then he slams his palms down on the desk as he jumps up. "I knew it! The good Lord bringing you to us was a miracle!"

"Here we go," Gus growls, but Jack can see he's as proud of Jack as Taske is.

"My boy, who would have thought of this but you?" The Reverend Myron Taske takes Jack's hand, pumps it enthusiastically. "I think you just might have saved us all."

LYN CARSON stood at the bedroom window of the suite high up in the Omni Shoreham Hotel. Dusk was extinguishing the daylight, like a mother snuffing out candles one by one. Ribbons of lights moved along Massachusetts Avenue, and the skeletal structure of the Connecticut Avenue Bridge was lit by floodlights. She and her husband were here for a few days to escape the depressing reality that each hour of each day pressed more heavily in on them.

Alli was somewhere out there. Lyn tried willing her into being, to stand here, safe beside her.

Hearing Edward moving about in the sitting room, she turned. She knew why he liked this storied hotel above all others in the District. Though its architecture was blunt to the point of being downright ugly, it was downstairs in room 406D that Harry Truman, whom Edward so admired, had often come to play poker with his friends Senator Stewart Symington, Speaker of the House John McCormack, and Doorkeeper of the House Fishbait Miller.