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attention, he noticed all the
camera lenses coming to bear on him like the merciless eyes of a pack of hungry
wolves. He was well aware of the media's love of radical priests, so he'd made
sure he was in uniform tonight: cassock, Roman collar, oversize crucifix slung
around his neck. The works. He was well aware too of how his own
appearance--clean-cut sandy hair, slim, athletic build, younger looking than his
thirty-two years--jibed with that of his followers, and he played that up to
maximum effect. He looked decent, intelligent, dedicated--all true, he hoped--
and most of all, accessible. The reporters would be fighting to
interview him during and after the demonstration.
    And as far as
Dan was concerned, that was what this little jaunt to the Waldorf was all
about: communication. He hated the spotlight. He much preferred to keep a low
profile and let others have center stage. But no one else was interested in
this little drama, so Dan had found himself pushed into a leading role.
Media-grabbing was not his thing, but somebody had to get across the message
that these people needed help, that they couldn't be swept under the rug by the
presidential wannabe appearing at the Waldorf tonight.
    That wannabe
was Senator Arthur Crenshaw from California, and this high-profile fund raiser
was a golden opportunity to confront the senator on his radical proposal to
solve the homeless problem. Normally Dan wouldn't have given a second thought
to a crazy plan like Crenshaw's, but the way it had taken hold with the public
was frightening.
    Camps.
    Of course Crenshaw didn't call them camps. The word might
elicit visions of concentration camps. He called them "domiciles."
Why have a hundred programs scattered all over the country? Senator Crenshaw
said. All that duplication of effort and expense could be eliminated by
gathering up the homeless and putting them in
special facilities to be built on government lands. Once there, families would
be fed and sheltered together, with the children attending schools set up just
for them; all adults would receive free training for gainful employment; and
those who were sick or addicted or mentally ill would receive the care they
needed to make them productive citizens again.
    The
public--especially the urban-dwelling public-- seemed to be going for the
Domicile Plan in a big way, and as a result the concept was gaining support
from both parties. Dan could understand the attraction of getting the homeless
out of sight while balming one's conscience with the knowledge they were being
cared for as they were retooled for productivity, but he found the whole idea
unsettling. The domiciles did sound like concentration camps, or
detention camps, or at the very least, gilt-edged prisons, and he found that
frightening. So would many of the homeless folks he knew--and Dan knew plenty.
    But how many
homeless did Senator Arthur Crenshaw know?
    These were people. It was easy to forget that. Yes, they were on
the bottom rung of the socioeconomic ladder--hell, most of them had fallen off
the ladder--and they sure as hell didn't look like much. They tended to be
dirty and smell bad and dress in clothing that wasn't fit for the rag pile.
They offered nothing that society wanted, and some of them undoubtedly had AIDS
and wouldn't be around much longer anyway. But each had a name and a
personality, and they'd hoped and dreamed about the future before they'd
forgotten how. Truth was, they could all vanish into smoke and the world would
not be appreciably poorer, and only a few would mark their passing, and even
fewer would mourn them.
    But they were people, dammit!
    People.
    Not a cause.
    People.
    Dan hated that
the homeless had become such a trendy cause, with big-name comedians and such
doing benefits for them. But after the stars
took their bows, after they were limoed back to their Bel Aire estates, Dan
stayed downtown and rubbed elbows with those homeless. Every day.
    And sometimes at the end of a particularly