George continued to grumble, but Caroline looked up to catch Nathaniel’s gaze. He was thinking the same thing she was. The budget! All this time they’d been looking for the delivery of a tangible gift, but the budget was the only major item to hit the White House today. Could there be something hidden in it?
“How can I see a copy?” she asked.
George looked taken aback. “They only printed three copies. One has been sent to the Senate, one to the president, and the other is still at the Treasury.”
“Who has the president’s copy?” Nathaniel asked.
“I do. It’s locked in my desk.”
Caroline stood, leaving her ham untouched. “George, I need to see it. Now. Tonight.”
“I just sat down,” he protested.
But Nathaniel and his agents were preparing for another tedious shift walking the grounds overnight, and if the surprise was hidden in the budget, they both wanted to know. It was a ridiculous hope, but she couldn’t shake it.
Five minutes later, George was unlocking his desk. The budget was in a large box in his bottom drawer, a hundred loose-leaf papers that had yet to be bound. He handed it to her.
“I’ll need it back by eight o’clock tomorrow morning,” he said. “Don’t let it out of your hands.”
“I won’t.”
Anticipation hummed as she waited for George to leave, then carried the box to her desk. Nathaniel stood beside her as she lifted out the stack of typewritten pages. At least there was a table of contents. She traced her finger down the list of agencies. Agriculture, Army, Bureau of the Engraving, Consular Affairs, Court of Federal Appeals—none of these resonated with her. She didn’t even know what she was looking for, but she kept searching the mammoth document. The Census, District of Columbia transportation, Education, Farm Services—
Education?
The budget allotments for education began on page forty, and her fingers shook as she lifted the pages away.
“What are you looking for?” Nathaniel asked.
She dared not answer. It was too farfetched. She didn’t want to get her hopes up or look foolish. At last she found the proper page and saw rows of funds allocated for school construction, the printing of textbooks, for training teachers...
And for a school in Washington, DC, to train immigrant girls and women.
Her vision blurred. How could this be happening? Her breaths came in shallow spurts, and her heart surged. She clamped a hand over her chest as she blinked, struggling to see.
“Are you crying?” Nathaniel asked in amazement.
“Of course not.”
She used her cuff to blot her eyes so she could see again, but yes, on line twenty-four was funding for Petra’s school.
She sank into the desk chair. “Line twenty-four,” she choked out, and Nathaniel leaned over to read.
Soon the corners of his mouth twitched. “Happy birthday,” he said quietly.
She laughed, and he did too. What else was there to do? It was impossible to know how this had happened, but somehow Luke had managed the impossible.
She stood up and clasped Nathaniel’s hand as they gazed down at the document, amazement still cycling through her, and she was glad he was there to share this moment. She squeezed his hand, and he squeezed back as electricity flowed between them. If nothing else, line twenty-four was concrete proof that her brother was an amazing man.
The next morning she sought out George for insight the moment he walked into their office.
“How does money get allocated for educational budget requests?” she asked, still a novice where the inner workings of Congress were concerned.
“There’s a committee for education, headed by a fellow from Indiana. Check with him.”
Preparations for Thanksgiving celebrations meant it took a maddening two days before she was able to find a few hours to escape to the Capitol. She wandered the halls of the grand building in search of Congressman Arthur Blanchard from Evansville, Indiana, the man in charge of the congressional committee for education.
Ordinary congressmen weren’t afforded personal offices,and in the long hours between meetings, they retreated to the congressional retiring rooms draped in velvet, stuffed with comfortable seating, and filled with cigar smoke. It was a masculine retreat into which no lobbyists, visitors, and certainly no women were allowed. Congressman Blanchard was heading down the white marble corridor toward the retiring rooms with a folded newspaper in one hand and an unlit cigar in the other when she found him. She grabbed his arm just before he passed through the door.
