The Six Messiahs - Mark Frost [170]
"You start," she said.
Frank pushed his hat back and hooked his thumbs on his belt. "I'm gonna have to ask you about the Chinaman."
She squinted her eyes and studied him again; for such a good-looking man, she had to admit, his character didn't seem all that deficient.
"Have you had any unusual dreams lately, Frank?"
Frank thought for a moment. "No, ma'am."
"Then first I have to tell you a very strange story."
"Come in, come in, Rabbi Jacob Stern," said the Reverend, waving an arm toward a velvet sofa in the corner of his office. "Delighted to see that you could join me today."
"I was able to find time in my busy schedule," said Jacob.
The Reverend did not rise from the desk or offer to shake his hand; Jacob took a seat on the sofa beside a large globe resting on an oak stand. Aside from a gilded Byzantine icon on the wall behind the Reverend's desk and a King James Bible lying open on a reading stand, nothing suggested that this served as the office of a cleric. Furnishings plush, even opulent, like a picture Jacob had seen of John D. Rockefeller's study. The air felt heavy and cool. Thin strands of brilliant white light cutting through wooden window blinds into the shadowy room were the only reminder that the house rested in the middle of a desert. Motes of dust spiraled up from the heavy Persian carpet and danced in the beams. His eyes adjusting to the half-light, Jacob couldn't see the Reverend distinctly in the darkness behind his desk.
"A very comfortable room," said Jacob.
"Do you like it? I had them build my House with the thick adobe walls that are such a characteristic feature of the local architecture; it keeps the heat at bay until well into the afternoon. The furniture is all donated, by the way, gifts from my more generously endowed followers. I don't believe a man of the cloth should receive a regular salary, do you, Rabbi? I think it violates the sacred trust between God and his ... representatives."
"All very well for God, but a man's got to eat."
"Tithing; that's the answer, and of course, like most common sensible ideas, it's been with us for hundreds of years. Everyone in the community making the same sacrifice—or shall we say contribution—setting aside a portion of their earnings to support the shepherd of their spiritual flock, be it preacher, priest, or rabbi."
"Ten percent is the usual figure," said Jacob.
"I've made the tiniest innovation," said the Reverend, leaning forward into a scallop of light. "I take one hundred percent."
Day's eyes crept into view for the first time in the hot slice of sunlight. Jacob felt them reaching out at him like oiled tentacles and looked away. He swallowed hard. His heart skipped a beat.
"I had the great fortune to baptize a steady stream of millionaires into our church early on in my ecclesiastical career. I can't tell you the tithing was entirely their idea, but once the suggestion entered their minds it met a remarkable degree of receptivity. And I discovered there is an extraordinary surplus of wealth in these western states; shipping, cash crops, silver, oil. Millionaires are hardly the rare bird you find in the East— to be blunt, out here they are practically a dime a dozen. And despite all this talk about camels and the eyes of needles, I have found that a rich man is just as desperately in need of salvation as any destitute sinner."
"They're still with you, these former millionaires."
"Oh, yes. Right here, in The New City," said Day, neglecting to mention how the sight of these former captains of industry and their pampered wives mucking out the latrines still filled him with happiness. "And if you were to ask them, well, I'd be shocked if to a man they didn't say that their lives were one hundred percent richer today."
"One hundred percent."
"So much senseless heartache, the strictly material life. So much disquiet and worry about holding on to what you've accumulated. Straining to make its value grow beyond any reasonable fulfillment