Divine Fury (8 page)

Daggart turned away from the window and settled down in the tall, black leather chair behind a blond, wood desk.
 
In front of him was a white legal pad with eight names on it.
 
They were all members of a Congressional subcommittee holding hearings in a few days on a bill requiring mandatory prison terms for all drug offenders.
 
He steeled himself for the next three hours of persuasion.
 
At least he knew they would eagerly take his calls.
 
With the ministry’s millions of viewers, financial clout and the influence the church wielded with other evangelists, Daggart knew the Congressmen would be on their best behavior.

Nine years earlier, Daggart had been on a much different career trajectory.
 
He was six months away from receiving his doctorate degree in divinity school when he decided the rarified air of academia was not where he wanted to spend his life.
 
It was another life change that surprised many people who knew him.
 
The first had occurred when Daggart, midway through college, shifted his studies and life focus away from business and toward religion.
 

He’d been the president of his high school and a star athlete.
 
He could have been valedictorian but made a calculated choice to let someone else have that honor.
 
Most figured he would zoom through a top college and head on to law school, become a doctor, or wind up a wealthy captain of industry.

Those who knew him well were less surprised by the shift.
 
He’d had a strict religious upbringing.
 
Although popular in school, Daggart carefully avoided the vices that his classmates seemed all too eager to embrace.
 
He avoided alcohol, smoking, drugs and never dated although any girl in the school would have been flattered by an invitation.
 
When his best friend confessed to having had sex with a girl, Daggart dropped him in an instant.

Daggart still had been immensely popular.
 
He might not be the guy to show up at a party with a fifth of rum.
 
But he was the one to win the biggest football game with an inspirational speech and a 40-yard pass in the final seconds.
 
He even orchestrated the departure of a terrible chemistry teacher, both a bit senile and too fond of the bottle, and did it so deftly that the teacher still gave Daggart glowing college references.
     

It was that sense of self, actually, that drove him from the academic world at the age of 31.
 
Daggart thought of himself as an impact player.
 
Anything less would be disappointing and almost a form of sloth on his part.
 
In terms of his relationship to God, it would be a sin.
 
How could he make a difference for God? How could he put his stamp on the world and Christianity?
 
It wasn’t by writing yet another thesis on the New Testament or ministering to a congregation of Protestants in a sleepy suburb somewhere for the next 20 years.
 
He was meant for more.
 

So, Daggart went shopping.
 
And he found Jimmy Burgess.
 
Burgess was a native Tennessean and the son of a lay preacher who had been a revival-tent prodigy before he was a teenager.
 
Now, he was six-foot-three with a jaw that looked as if it could break ice.
 
He was 42, no longer a kid but exuding life, energy and a raw charisma.
 
Burgess was still working the rural fire-and-brimstone circuit, filling local churches and revival tents, when Daggart got down to business.
 
He smoothed the edges, honed the message and weaned Burgess from his fondness for Kentucky bourbon.
 
He hung Brooks Brothers in the preacher’s closet alongside the jeans and cowboy boots.
  

They found a big church in California’s Orange County with a pastor looking for an assistant.
 
Within a year, he and Burgess split off to form Soldiers of Christ Ministry, moved up the coast to Los Angeles and took two-thirds of the congregation with them.
 
Then, a moderately successful televangelist made the mistake of letting Burgess guest host his Wednesday night live show.
 
Between the first and 60
^th
minutes of the show, the audience increased by 40 percent.
 
Within a week, the producers dumped the original host and gave the show to Burgess.
 

In the four years since, Burgess and Soldiers of Christ Ministry (SOCM) had kept climbing in viewership and revenues, spinning off side projects in books, videos and even tour junkets to the Holy Land.
 
Daggart had created a separate operation called Divine Fury with its own website for the faithful seeking a more activist brand of worship.
 

Daggart had led the charge into the political fray, using SOCM as his platform.
 
Even when he was young, Daggart had worried about the decline of morality and the victory of sin.
 
As he became even more aware of the weakness and perversion in mankind, he’d just become more disgusted.
 
Drugs.
 
Promiscuity.
 
Abortion.
 
Homosexuality.
 
He had seen religion decline in status and importance his whole life, eroded like a soft shoreline in a rough sea.

No more.
 
Daggart was determined to reverse the tide.
 
He picked up the phone and dialed the first Washington number on the list.

Chapter 9

THE BIRTHDAY PARTY that Eddie Denovo threw for himself on his 50
^th
birthday was old-school newsroom.
 
The photo editor of the San Francisco News simply invited everyone to pile into the nearby M&M, the venerable Irish pub with ancient barstools and a horseshoe bar that had accommodated thirsty editors, reporters, photographers, politicians and neighborhood regulars for four decades.
 
He bought everyone their first drink, explained this was more of a wake than a celebration and then kept ordering more for himself.
 
Quarters were tight and it was clear the event was more of an inspired launching pad for the evening than the main event in itself.

Lee piled out with a dozen reporters and editors, climbed into one of three cabs the group flagged down for the four-minute ride to Slim’s, a popular South of Market night club typically
 
jammed to overflowing when popular bands rolled in playing country, Cajun, hard rock and everything in between.
 
It was blues night and still early enough for the party to stumble their way to an open cluster of tables in the back.
 
The quartet on stage was led by a thin guy in his 20s wearing an all-red outfit and wailing convincingly about lost loves, wasted lives and depression so dark that it feels like the sun will never rise again.

Lee sat across from Lorraine Carr and she seemed to be channeling the sad lyrics.
 
She looked numb as she stared at the stage and Lee realized how accustomed he was to seeing her brimming over with laughter and life, whether working hard on a story, convincing her staff to make the extra effort or just describing some outlandish event she’d attended the previous night.

“Hey,” he snapped his fingers to get her attention.
 
“What do you want?
 
I’m buying.”

Her face unfroze and Carr smiled.

“Well, in that case, how about something with Belvedere vodka, citrus and not too sweet,”
 
she said.
 
“Surprise me.”

Lee went to the bar and ordered two Belvedere gimlets and asked the bartender to make them dry if that were possible.
 
As an afterthought, he asked for doubles.
 
He brought the drinks back to the table, handed one to Carr and took a sip of the other.
 
He could live with that.
 
The bartender must have substituted some fresh lime juice for most of the sweetened, bottled stuff.

“Hmmm.
 
I like,” said Carr, taking an exploratory sip and then a larger gulp.
 
“He can order a drink.”
 
She licked an index finger and drew a mark in the air in front of her face.

“Hmmm.
 
Okay,” he said.
 
“Doesn’t like sweet drinks.”
 
He licked his finger and marked his own invisible scorecard.

Carr thought for a moment.

“Not one of the worst jerks in the newsroom,” she said, making another mark.

“Wow.
 
Standards are getting pretty high here,” said Lee, his finger poised.
 
“Most idealistic editor.”

“Gee.
 
Most idealistic,” said Carr, contemplatively.
 
“I suppose you’re right.
 
But
you
aren’t actually putting that in the plus column, are you?”

Lee thought for a moment.

“Yes.
 
I am,” he said.
 
“We cynics need you guys.
 
It’s the only thing that keeps us from spiraling down the toilet.
 
Plus, it reminds us of our youth.”

“No,” said Carr.
 
“We’re just enablers.
 
You cranky old farts need to hit bottom, figure out what you care about and do something about it.
 
Get off your butt and live life.”

“Ouch,” said Lee.
 
“I mean ‘
Ouch.
’
 
I’m not that much older than you.
 
What?
 
Six or seven years? ”

“Almost ten,” said Carr.
 
“I know your birth date.
 
I am your boss, after all.
 
And, the ‘old’ part is the least of it.
 
It’s the rest.
 
Don’t be afraid to care.
 
Commit to something you care about.
 
I don’t mean mocha lattes.”
     

“C’mon, Lorraine,” said Lee.
 
“What is this?
 
Freud night at Slim’s?
 
I’m going to have to put, ‘Gets too serious.’ In the minus column.”

“Oh, crap, you’re right,” she said.
 
“It’s because you’ve gotten me drunk.”

“Gets women drunk,” she said, making another mark in the air.
 
Then, she drew a question mark with a dot at the bottom, and added:
 
“And takes advantage?”

Lee was quiet for a moment.

“So the question is what?” he asked a little indignantly.
 
“Do I mix wine and sex?”

“Actually, I was thinking more along the lines of: ‘What would
that
be like?’” said Carr.
 
She said it with a small smile that didn’t change while she held his stare with her own.
  

Lee was still searching for something to say when she stood up, said goodnight and walked out the door.

Chapter 10

AS CONFERENCE ROOMS go, the Bunker was downscale.
 
It had the basics: erasable whiteboards; comfortable chairs; computer-compatible projector.
 
But the table was cheap – chipped woodgrain veneer over particle board.
 
And the windows looked out on the blue-walled cubicles that surrounded the room and not the views of the bay, bridges and golden hills enjoyed by San Francisco’s legal and business elite.
 
It was mainly the non-view that gave the room its
 
nickname.