Saving Faith Read Online Free PDF Page B

to see precisely how he could help. He had personally brought a shipment of food and medicine to one country, only to discover there was no way to transport it to the interior regions. He had watched, helpless, as looters stripped his “care” package clean. Then he started working as an unpaid fund-raiser for humanitarian organizations ranging from CARE to Catholic Relief Services. He had done well, but the dollars amounted to a drip into a bottomless bucket. The numbers were not in their favor; the problem was only getting worse.
    That’s when Buchanan turned to his mastery of Washington. He had left the firm he had founded, taking only one person with him: Faith Lockhart. For the last decade his clients, his wards, were the most impoverished countries in the world. In truth, it was difficult for Buchanan to regard them as geopolitical units; he saw them as fragile clusters of devastated people under various flags who had no voice. He had dedicated the remainder of his life to solving the unsolvable problem of the global have-nots.
    He had used all of his immense lobbying skills and contacts in Washington, only to find that these new causes paled in popularity to those he had represented before. When he had gone to Capitol Hill as an advocate of the powerful, the politicians had greeted him with smiles, no doubt with visions of campaign contributions and PAC dollars dancing in their heads. Now they gave him nothing. Some members of Congress bragged that they didn’t even have passports, that the United States already spent far too much on foreign aid. Charity starts at home, they had said, and let’s damn well keep it there.
    But by far the most common retort was, “Where’s the constituency, Danny? How does feeding the Ethiopians get me reelected in Illinois?” As he was quickly ushered from office after office, he sensed that they all looked at him with pity: Danny Buchanan, perhaps the greatest lobbyist ever, was now muddled, senile. It was so sad. Sure, it was a good cause and all, who can doubt that, but get real. Africa? Starving babies in Latin America? I’ve got my own problems right here.
    “Look, if it ain’t trade, troops or oil, Danny, why the hell are you here wasting my time?” one highly regarded senator had told him. That could be the quintessential statement on American foreign policy.
    Could they be that blind? Buchanan had asked himself over and over. Or was he the utter fool?
    Finally, Buchanan decided he had only one option. It was completely illegal, but a man pushed to the precipice could not afford allegiance to pristine ethics. Using the fortune he had amassed over the years, he had taken to bribing, in very special ways, certain key politicians for their assistance. It had worked wonderfully. The aid to his clients had grown, in so many different ways. Even as his own wealth was dissipated, things were looking up, Buchanan believed. Or at least things were not getting worse; he would count the holding of precious, hard-won ground as a success. It had all worked well, until about a year ago.
    As if on cue, the knock on his office door startled him from his reverie. The building was closed, supposedly secure, the cleaning crews long since departed. He didn’t get up from his desk. He simply watched as the door swung inward, the silhouette of a tall man framed against the opening. The man’s hand reached out and flicked on the light.
    Buchanan squinted as the glare of the overheads hit him. When his eyes adjusted to the brightness, he watched as Robert Thornhill took off his trench coat, smoothed down his jacket and shirt and sat down across from him. The man’s movements were graceful, unhurried, as though he had plopped down for a leisurely drink at his country club.
    “How did you get in here?” Buchanan asked sharply. “The building is supposed to be secure.” For some reason Buchanan could sense that others lurked right outside the door.
    “And it is, Danny. It is.