The Second Messiah (13 page)

When Josuf hesitated, Jack inclined his head. “I’m listening, go on.”

“The two men my daughter saw sometimes came here from Damascus to buy Walid’s fragments.”

“How do you know that?”

“From Safa’s description of one of the men, and the old white Mercedes they drove. My daughter ducked behind some rocks as the car drove past. She managed to see the passenger’s face. He was a middle-aged man with a gray beard. He wore a broad white panama hat with a black band around it. It sounds like one of the men I often saw Walid deal with. He usually drove here in a white Mercedes.”

“Who are the men?”

“Criminals, from the Syrian underworld. They sometimes buy artifacts from the Bedu, to sell them in turn to wealthy collectors for a profit.”

“Are they Bedu?”

Josuf nodded. “Settled Bedu. They bribe border guards to help them cross frontiers.”

Jack said, “Do you know who they were working with?”

“No one from among my people, I am certain. I phoned Walid. He is in Jerusalem, visiting friends. He believes either these men came of
their
own free will to steal the scroll or that they planned it with someone working on the dig. Walid says that the men are ruthless enough to have killed the professor.”

Jack let the Bedu’s words sink in. Then he said thoughtfully, “How can your daughter be so certain they’re the same men? The light couldn’t have been great.”

“My daughter told me that the man with the hat had a lame walk and a withered hand. That fits the description of one of the criminals Walid dealt with. You see, many years ago this man stepped on an Israeli land mine. He suffered serious injures to a hand and foot. In Arabic, he’s sometimes called by the name Slow Foot, because he drags his leg behind him. But he calls himself Pasha.”

Yasmin said, “You have to tell all this to the police, Josuf. For Jack’s sake.”

Josuf shook his head, his face troubled. “I can tell them nothing. My people would curse me as an informer.”

Yasmin met his stare. “Even if it meant an innocent man being imprisoned for a murder he didn’t commit?”

“It could also mean my throat being cut. But I want to help you find these two men. They are the real criminals. And I think I know where they can be found.”

“Where?” Yasmin asked.

“Walid told me of a Catholic monastery called St. Paul’s, near Maloula, outside Damascus.”

Jack considered. “I’ve heard of Maloula. It’s a mainly Christian town that dates from the fourth century. One of the few places in the world where Aramaic is still spoken.”

Josuf nodded. “The same language that Jesus spoke. The same language that’s written in many of the scrolls discovered at Qumran.”

“Go on.”

“Walid heard that an elderly priest there has worked translating scrolls and fragments for these black-market criminals. A religious man should have nothing to do with murder. Perhaps if he learns of the crime these men may have committed, his conscience will cause
him
to help you. For your sake, I hope so. I do not believe you are a killer, Mr. Cane. However, if you are to make the Israelis believe it, then you must go to Maloula and find out more about these men. It would take a half day’s journey across the desert through Jordan and Syria, no more than that.”

Jack said, “I have a visa that allows me to cross into Jordan from when the team visited Petra. But I’d be wasting my time trying to get into Syria. I have an Israeli border stamp on my American passport. There’s no way the Syrians will issue me a visa. They hate Israel and anyone who’s even been there.”

Josuf replied, “You forget that the desert has always belonged to the Bedu, Mr. Cane. No borders will prevent my tribe from traveling where they want. But you will both need your passports for part of the passage if the lady means to travel with us. And it will not be a journey without its dangers.”

Jack frowned. “What are you saying, Josuf?”

“I know a way to get you to the monastery at Maloula.”

LELA WAS AT
the desk in the office trailer, reading through her notes, when Sergeant Mosberg knocked on the door. “My apologies for disturbing you, but you said you wanted to speak again with Jack Cane, Inspector.”

“That’s right.”

“He’s gone.”

“What do you mean, gone?”

Mosberg blushed. “I’ve checked Cane’s tent and the rest of the camp and he’s nowhere to be found. I’ve even sent some of my men to search the hills but no one’s seen him.”

Lela jumped to her feet. “What about Savage and Yasmin Green?”

“Miss Green drove to Nazlat a couple of hours ago in her SUV. She returned for about thirty minutes and left in that direction again. One of my men tells me that Savage visited Nazlat soon after Miss Green and later returned.”

“Did anyone check the vehicles before Savage and Green left?”

Mosberg said sheepishly, “No, Inspector. No such orders were given.”

Lela angrily stuffed her notebook in her tunic and moved to the door. “Keep looking for Cane, Sergeant.”

Lela stormed toward Savage’s tent. When she tore open the flap, the American was lying on his bed flicking through a magazine and sipping from a can of Heineken. He lazily got to his feet. “What can I do for you, Inspector?”

“Where’s Jack Cane?”

Savage shrugged. “Hey, you got me there. Last time I saw him was over an hour ago in his tent. Why, what’s up?”

“Where is Cane, Savage? And don’t play me for a fool.”

“Hey, I don’t know what you’re talking about, Inspector.”

At that precise moment, Lela heard the clatter of a helicopter descending. The tent material rippled as the rotor blades whirred and then died. Seconds later the tent flap was thrown open and Mosberg appeared. “You have an important visitor, Inspector.”

As Lela stepped outside Savage’s tent she saw her boss, Chief Inspector Danni Feld, climb out of the helicopter and duck his head under the dying blades. He hurried toward her. Feld wore civilian clothes, not his usual crisp police uniform, which suggested that he’d been summoned unexpectedly. As he reached Lela he stood upright and gave her a wave.

“Inspector Raul.”

“Sir, I thought it was your day off.”

Feld vainly patted down a raised flap of graying hair. “So did I. How is the investigation going?”

“I’m still gathering evidence.”

Feld scratched his head as he studied the Dead Sea landscape. “It must be a very interesting case, Lela, that’s all I can say.”

“Sir?”

Feld turned to stare at her. “I got an urgent call from the head of Mossad, no less. He wants to see you straightaway. Says it’s a matter of grave urgency.”

Lela was puzzled. Israel’s national security agency had a reputation as one of the best and most secretive intelligence organizations in the world. “I’m in the middle of a murder investigation. What does Mossad want with me?”

Feld jerked his thumb toward the helicopter. “I wish I knew. But I’ve a feeling you’ll get your explanation in Tel Aviv. You’re to fly there immediately.”

ROME

THE SLEEK BLACK
Mercedes bearing Vatican diplomatic plates and a fluttering gold and white pendant turned into the Via della Conciliazione with a gentle squeal of brakes.

Sitting in the back of the chauffeured limousine that afternoon was a large, beefy, red-haired man with a pale complexion and bright green eyes. Sean Ryan removed his monsignor’s black biretta from his head and ran a handkerchief over his damp brow. It was only April but already the temperature was up to a cloudless seventy, the trees along the banks of the Tiber in full bloom.

Two thousand years of history lay around him, a ragged sprawl of ancient crumbling monuments and temples, and at the heart stood the famed Colosseum and the Forum. To the tourists, Rome seemed rather grand and noble, but Ryan knew it was also the most sordid and sinful of cities, and that some things had changed little in two thousand years.

On the Via Claudia, homosexual men dressed as women still solicited as prostitutes, much as they had during Emperor Caligula’s time. Immigrant black girls as young as fourteen had sex with their customers in city lanes and park bushes, just as their predecessors had during the time of the Caesars. Once the girls had been freed black slaves; now they were impoverished refugees from Africa.

As the Mercedes glided silently down the Via della Conciliazione toward the Vatican, Ryan glanced idly out of the window.

The broad street that led up to the magnificent St. Peter’s Basilica was lined on both sides with gaudy souvenir shops and kiosks, cafés,
and
currency exchange bureaus. Ryan didn’t appreciate the cheap commercialism that was permitted to exist a stone’s throw away from the burial place of St. Peter, crucified and tortured on a whim of the Emperor Nero, and his broken body dumped in a pauper’s grave on the ancient Roman hill that was now the symbol of Christianity. But this morning Ryan had other things to worry about.

His meeting with Cardinal Cassini was scheduled for noon. Ryan was Chief of the Corps of Gendarmes, with command of the Directorate of Security Services, responsible for protecting the pope and the Vatican State. He wondered what was so important that the head of the Curia had summoned him to his office.

Ryan’s personal history was an outlandish mix. He had at various times been a police detective with the Irish police, An Garda Síochána, an amateur heavyweight boxer, a champion target shooter, a gambler, boozer, and a womanizer until, at age twenty-eight, the car he was driving recklessly while he was over the alcohol limit had caused the deaths of his pregnant young wife and their two-year-old son. After that, there seemed nowhere for Ryan to deliver himself but into God’s hands. Soon after came the priesthood.

Ryan looked up as a flock of pigeons scattered in front of the car when it approached St. Peter’s Square, and he replaced the handkerchief in his pocket.

The Mercedes didn’t go through the Vatican front entrance—that was for the pilgrims and tourists—but instead veered right. There was a barrier down, three blue-uniformed Swiss Guards on duty. Ryan thought the young men looked blatantly ridiculous in their medieval uniforms, their private parts bulging through their skintight pants.

But of course, the real security was more discreet—inside the gate and off to the right was a long, gray brick building where a heavily armed plainclothes unit of the Vatican’s security services was stationed. At that moment, one of the doors to the security building opened and a man with a mustache stepped out, a holstered Beretta clipped under his leather jacket, his eyes cautiously scrutinizing the Mercedes’ occupants.

Ryan recognized Angelo Butoni at once. He was one of the young detectives with the security office, and Butoni waved when he saw Ryan roll down the window.

“Monsignor Ryan, always a pleasure to see you.”

“Angelo, it’s yourself. Keeping busy, I hope?”

Butoni raised his eyes in mock despair. “As always. You’ll be glad to know we’ve improved the security patrols, just as you ordered.”

Ryan smiled. “No trouble to you Angelo, me boy, and that’s the truth of it. Keep up the good work.”

One of the Swiss Guards lifted the barrier and Ryan’s Mercedes passed into the Vatican.