Virgin (23 page)

"When's it
due back?"

"Today, I
would assume. They took it on a two-day special--unlimited mileage. But there's
nothing to say they won't keep it till tomorrow. They have an option for extra
days."

Tomorrow--he
prayed they wouldn't keep it till then. Especially since he wasn't even sure
this Ferris couple were the ones he wanted. The tire tracks around the Resting
Place might not be theirs.

But they were
the only lead he had.

If only there
were some way to involve Shin Bet in this. He could have the tire tracks
identified as to their size and brand and from that get a list of what vehicles
used them as standard equipment. If a Ford Explorer was on the list, he'd issue
an all-points alert for the Ferrises and their vehicle.

But Shin Bet
would want to know what crime they'd committed or were suspected of committing.
Theft? What did they steal?

Kesev could not
answer those basic questions, so Shin Bet had to stay out of it. He was on his
own.

He wrote down
his home phone number and handed it to the Eldan clerk.

"I will be
close by and will be checking in with you frequently. But if I am not about,
call this number immediately should you hear from the Ferrises. Leave your
message on my answering machine. Make sure you fill in whoever relieves
you."

"Are they
dangerous?" Chaya said, a note of anxiety creeping into her voice.

He smiled to reassure her. It wasn't easy. He wanted to grab the
front of her blouse and pull her half across the counter and shout that they
may have stolen a relic that God Himself had designated as
untouchable
and
only God
Himself knew what might happen to Kesev--to
the entire
world
--if it was not returned immediately to its designated
Resting Place.

Instead he kept
his tone low and even.

"Absolutely
not. They are just a couple of tourists who may have witnessed something and we
may need to question them. The problem is that they don't know we're looking
for them and we don't know where to find them. Not yet. But with your help we
can clear up this matter swiftly and everyone can go about their business."

Meanwhile, he
didn't have to sit idle.

He went to one
of the Hilton's house phones and asked the operator to connect him with the
Ferris room. He slammed his fist on the counter when she informed him that
there was no Ferris registered at the hotel, then glanced around to see if he'd
startled anyone. He did not want to attract attention. He forced himself to
return the receiver gently to its cradle.

Then he moved
to a pay phone and called all the major and some of the minor hotels in Jerusalem,
asking to be connected to the Ferris room.

No luck. They
weren't registered in Jerusalem. One could almost believe they'd driven to the
north end of Route 90, and instead of turning left toward Jerusalem, turned
right toward Jordan.
Or worse yet, were hijacked by some PLO crazies. . .

The thought
staggered Kesev, weakening his knees.

The Mother . .
. in the hands of that rabble!

No. Such a
thing was unthinkable, so why torture himself with it?

Kesev found
himself a seat in the lobby where he had an unobstructed view of the Eldan
desk.
He calmed himself with the thought that he had done all that one man
could do at the moment. All that was left was the waiting. So he sat and
waited. He was good at waiting. An expert.

Sooner or later the Ferris couple would show up to return their
car. When they did he would confront them. He'd know if they were hiding
something. And if they were, he'd
get it
out of them. First by intimidating them with his Shin Bet credentials. If that
didn't work, there were other ways.

Kesev slipped
his left hand into his pocket and gripped the handle of the long folding knife
he always carried.

Yes, he thought
grimly. He knew other ways, and he was quite ready to use whatever means were
necessary to return the Mother to the Resting Place.

14

Tel Aviv

"It
should
be right around the next corner to the left," Carrie said, glancing
between the street signs and the map on her lap.

"I sure as
hell hope so," Dan muttered from the front seat.

Carrie reached
forward and gave his shoulder a gentle rub.

Poor Dan. Not a
happy camper at the moment. He'd complained most of the trip that her sitting
in the back made him feel like a chauffeur. Carrie was sorry about that, but
with the way the Explorer had bounced around the hills, she'd been afraid the
Virgin would be harmed. She'd folded down part of the rear seat and pulled the
Virgin's blanket-swathed form beside her to steady and protect it.

But even after
they'd hit paved road she stayed here, her fingers gripping one of the cords
that bound the blankets. Carrie felt
good
sitting close to the Virgin.
Despite the danger in smuggling her out of the country--Carrie had no idea how
the Israeli government felt about smuggling, but she was sure it could cost Dan
and her years in jail if they were caught--she felt strangely calm.
At peace.

"Damn this
traffic!"

Poor Dan. He
was anything but at peace. They'd got lost twice already, and now they were
sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic that would give Manhattan's cross-town
crawl a run for its money, all of which might have been bearable if the air
conditioner had been working. Tel Aviv in
the
summer . . . almost as hot as the desert they'd left this morning, but
suffocatingly humid thanks to the Mediterranean, only blocks away.

"At
last!" Dan said as he turned off Ibn Givrol in the northern end of the
city.

Carrie saw it
too: The Kaplan Gallery. Gold letters on black marble over two large windows
filled with paintings and sculpture. A spasm of anxiety tightened her fingers
around the cord. She prayed Bernard Kaplan would help them. If not, where else
could they go?

Dan had called
him from Jerusalem and asked if he could arrange a shipment for them similar to
the one he'd arranged for Harold Gold. Dan said Kaplan had been noncommittal on
the phone but gave them directions--not very good directions--to his gallery. Dan
double-parked and turned to her. "Stay with the car. I'll leave the engine
running and run inside. Hope this isn't a wasted trip."

Carrie nodded
and watched him disappear through the gallery doors. She sat in the heat and
fumes, ignoring the glares of annoyed drivers as they inched around the
Explorer. As long as they weren't police . . .

Dan seemed to
take forever inside the gallery. Finally, when she was almost ready to run in
and see what was taking him so long, he emerged with a man in a gray business
suit--tall, tanned, silver hair slicked straight back. Dan introduced him as
Bernard Kaplan. He said Mr. Kaplan had called Harold in the interim and Harold
had vouched for them.

"He wants
to get a look at the size of our, uh, sculpture."

"Ah,
yes," Kaplan said with a British accent--or was it
Australian?--and flashed a dazzling set of caps as he
looked at the bundle. "About life-sized, as you
said. I'll
have a couple of my men bring it in
and we'll--"

"That's
okay," Carrie said quickly. "We'll bring it in ourselves."

Kaplan glanced
at Dan who nodded and said, "It could be fragile and this way we'll take
full responsibility for any damage."

Kaplan
shrugged. "Right. Very well, then. I'll have one of my men find a parking
spot for your car."

With Carrie
taking the shoulders and Dan the legs, they carried the bundled Virgin the
length of the gallery to the shipping area at the rear where they placed her on
a bench.

Before she
could stop him, Kaplan had a knife out and was cutting the cords.

"What are
you doing?" Carrie said.

"Going to
take a look at this sculpture of yours."

"Must
you?"

"Of
course. How else can I list it for the manifest?"

She watched
anxiously as Kaplan cut the rest of the cords and unwrapped the blankets. He
gave a low whistle when he saw the Virgin's face. His diction seemed to
regress.

"Well,
now, that's bloody somethin', in'it?"

He leaned
closer and touched the Virgin's face, running the tip of his index finger over
her cheek. Carrie wanted to grab his wrist and yank him away, but restrained
herself.

A few more
indignities, Mother Mary, then you 'II be on your way to safety.

"What is
this?" Kaplan said. "Some sort of wax? I've never seen anything like
it. The detail is incredible. Where'd you get it?"

Dan glanced at
Carrie before he spoke. On the trip from the desert they'd agreed that rather
than invent a series of lies, the best course was to give no answers at all.

"We'd
prefer to keep our source a secret," Dan said.

Kaplan nodded
and straightened. Carrie sighed with relief as he folded the blankets back over
the Virgin.

"Very
well. But 1 see no problem shipping this out. We'll simply list it as a wax
sculpture--a piece of contemporary art."

An idea flashed
in Carrie's mind. She turned to Dan. "Why can't we do that ourselves? Ship
it home on the plane with us?"

"You could
do that," Kaplan said. "You wouldn't need me for that. But remember,
anything going aboard an El Al flight gets a going over like no other place in
the world. Direct inspection, dogs, metal scanners, X rays--"

"Never
mind," Carrie said quickly as she imagined the Virgin's skeleton lighting
up on an inspector's fluoroscopic scanner. "We'll do it your way."

"Very
well," Kaplan said. "I can include it with a consignment of our
crates I've scheduled for shipment, and have it on a freighter out of Haifa
tonight."

"Wonderful!"
Carrie said. "When will it get to New York?"

"It's not
going to New York," Kaplan said. "At least not on this freighter. The
Greenbriar
will get your shipment to Cork Harbor. After that, we'll have
to make other arrangements for the second leg."

"Can't we
get a nonstop?" Carrie said. Kaplan's smile was tolerant. "No, love.
We don't want a direct route. Why draw a line straight to your door? Much safer
to break up the trip. We ship your crate to a fictitious name in Cork where one
of my associates picks it up, holds it a while, then puts in on another ship to
New York. Bloody near impossible to trace."

Carrie was
uncomfortable with the thought of the Virgin lying in a moldy warehouse in
Ireland, but if this sort of route would safeguard her secret . . .

"How do we
pay you?" she said.

"Cash,
preferably."

She looked at
Dan. Cash? Who had cash? All she had was the AmEx card Brad had given her.

"Do you
take plastic?"

Kaplan sighed.
"I suppose we can work something out."

Jerusalem

Kesev had given
up sitting and waiting. Now he was pacing and waiting. He'd explored every nook
and cranny of the lobby, browsed all of the shops until he thought he'd explode
with frustration. Where were these people, these Ferrises? They had to turn in
their rental sooner or later. Didn't they?

An awful
thought struck him. He ran to the Eldan counter. Chaya was still there. She'd
just finished with a customer when Kesev arrived.

"How many
offices--rental centers--do you have?" he said.

"I'm not
sure," she said, furrowing her brow. "Let's see . . . a couple in Tel
Aviv, a couple in Haifa, one at Ben Gurion Airport--"

This was worse
than he thought. "Can these people, the Ferrises, turn their car in at any
of them?"

"It's not
a practice we encourage. In fact, there's a drop-off fee that--"

Kesev tried to
keep from shouting. "Can they or can't they? A simple yes or no will
do."

"Yes."