Sunday, 16 July 2006. 1:28 a.m.
They remained next to each other, talking, for a long time; kissing every few words, as if they couldn’t believe that they had found each other and that the other person was still there.
‘Wow, Doc. You really know how to take care of your patients,’ Andrea said as she caressed Doc’s neck and played with the curls in her hair.
‘It’s part of my hypocritical oath.’
‘I thought it was the Hippocratic Oath.’
‘I took a different oath.’
‘It doesn’t matter how much you joke around, you’re not going to make me forget that I’m still angry with you.’
‘I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the truth about myself, Andrea. I guess lying is part of my work.’
‘What else is part of your work?’
‘My government wants to know what’s happening here. And don’t ask me any more about it, because I’m not going to tell you.’
‘We have ways of making you talk,’ Andrea said, shifting her caresses to a different place on Doc’s body.
‘I’m sure I’ll be able to fight off the interrogation,’ Doc whispered.
Neither woman spoke for a few minutes until Doc let out a long, almost silent, moan. Then she pulled Andrea to her and whispered in her ear.
‘Chedva.’
‘What does that mean?’ Andrea whispered back.
‘It’s my name.’
Andrea exhaled her surprise. Doc sensed the joy in her and hugged her tight.
‘Your secret name?’
‘Never say it out loud. Now you’re the only one who knows it.’
‘And your parents?’
‘They’re no longer alive.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘My mother died when I was a girl and my father died in a prison on the Negev.’
‘Why was he there?’
‘Are you sure you want to know? It’s a shitty, frustrating story.’
‘My life is full of shitty frustrations, Doc. It’d be nice to hear someone else’s for a change.’
There was a brief silence.
‘My father was a katsa, a special agent for Mossad. There are only thirty at any one time, and hardly anyone at the Institute reaches that rank. I’ve been in it for seven years and I’m only bat leveyha, the lowest grade. I’m thirty-six years old, so I don’t think I’m going to be promoted. But my father was a katsa at the age of twenty-nine. He did a lot of work outside Israel and in 1983 he undertook one of his last operations. He lived in Beirut for several months.’
‘You didn’t go with him?’
‘I only travelled with him when he went to Europe or the United States. Beirut wasn’t a good place for a young girl back then. It wasn’t a good place for anyone, really. That’s where he met Father Fowler. Fowler was on his way to the Beqa’a Valley to rescue some missionaries. My father had a great deal of respect for him. He said rescuing those people was the bravest act he’d ever seen in his life, and there wasn’t one word about it in the press. The missionaries simply said they’d been released.’
‘I suppose that kind of work doesn’t welcome publicity.’
‘No, it doesn’t. During the mission my father uncovered something unexpected: information suggesting that a group of Islamic terrorists with a truck full of explosives was going to make an attempt on an American installation. My father reported this to his superior, who replied that if the Americans were sticking their noses into Lebanon they deserved everything they got.’
‘What did your father do?’
‘He sent an anonymous note to the American embassy, to warn them; but without a reliable source to back it up, the note was ignored. The next day a truck full of explosives crashed through the gate of a Marine compound, killing two hundred and forty-one Marines.’
‘My God.’
‘My father returned to Israel, but the story didn’t end there. The CIA demanded an explanation from Mossad and someone mentioned my father’s name. A few months later, while he was returning home from a trip to Germany, he was stopped at the airport. The police searched his bags and found two hundred grams of plutonium and proof that he was attempting to sell it to the Iranian government. With that amount of material Iran could have built a medium-sized nuclear bomb. My father went to jail, practically without a trial.’
‘Someone had planted the evidence against him?’
‘The CIA had its revenge. They used my father to send a message to agents all over the world: if you find out about something like this again, make sure you let us know or we’ll make sure you’re fucked.’
‘Oh, Doc, that must have destroyed you. At least your father knew that you believed in him.’
There was another silence, this time a long one.
‘I’m ashamed to say this, but . . . for quite a few years I didn’t believe in my father’s innocence. I thought he had grown tired, that he wanted to earn some money. He was completely alone. Everyone forgot about him, including me.’
‘Were you able to make your peace with him before he died?’
‘No.’
Suddenly Andrea embraced the doctor, who began to cry.
‘Two months after his death, a highly confidential sodi beyoter report was declassified. It stated that my father was innocent and supported this with concrete proof, including the fact that the plutonium had belonged to the United States.’
‘Wait . . . are you telling me that Mossad knew all about it from the beginning?’
‘They sold him out, Andrea. In order to cover up their duplicity they handed the CIA my father’s head. The CIA were satisfied, and life went on - except for the two hundred and forty-one soldiers, and my father in his maximum-security prison cell.’
‘The bastards . . .’
‘My father is buried in Gilot, to the north of Tel Aviv, a place reserved for those who have fallen in combat against the Arabs. He was the seventy-first member of Mossad to be buried there, with full honours and acclaimed as a war hero. None of which erases the unhappiness they caused me.’
‘I don’t understand it, Doc. I really don’t. Why the hell are you working for them?’
‘The same reason my father put up with jail for ten years: because Israel comes first.’
‘Another crazy person, just like Fowler.’
‘You still haven’t told me how the two of you know each other.’
Andrea’s voice darkened. That memory was not exactly pleasant.
‘In April of 2005 I went to Rome to cover the death of the Pope. By chance I got hold of a tape in which a serial killer said he had killed a couple of cardinals who were to be part of the conclave electing the successor to John Paul II. The Vatican tried to suppress the story and I ended up on the roof of a building fighting for my life. Let’s say that Fowler made sure I didn’t end up splattered on the pavement. But in the process, he made off with my exclusive.’
‘I understand. That must have been frustrating.’
Andrea didn’t have a chance to reply. There was a tremendous blast outside that shook the walls of the tent.
‘What was that?’
‘For a moment I thought it was . . . No, it couldn’t be—’ Doc stopped in mid-sentence.
There was a scream.
And another.
And then many more.
60
THE EXCAVATION
AL MUDAWWARA DESERT, JORDAN
Sunday, 16 July 2006. 1:41 a.m.
Outside there was chaos.
‘Bring the buckets.’
‘Take them over there.’
Jacob Russell and Mogens Dekker were shouting contradictory orders in the middle of a river of mud that was flowing from one of the water trucks. A giant hole in the back of the tank was spewing out precious water, turning the ground around it into thick reddish sludge.
Several of the archaeologists, Brian Hanley and even Father Fowler ran from one place to the other in their underwear, attempting to form a chain with buckets in order to salvage as much
of the water as they could. Little by little, the rest of the sleepy members of the expedition joined them.
Someone - Andrea wasn’t certain who it was because the person was covered in mud from head to toe - was trying to build a wall of sand near Kayn’s tent to block the river of mud that was heading towards it. He sank the shovel again and again in the sand but before long he was shovelling mud so he stopped. Luckily the billionaire’s tent was on slightly higher ground and Kayn didn’t have to leave his retreat.
Meanwhile, Andrea and Doc had dressed quickly and had joined the chain with the other latecomers. As they handed empty buckets back and sent full ones forward, the reporter realised that what she and Doc had been doing before the explosion was the reason why they were the only ones who had bothered to put on all their clothing before coming out.
‘Get me a welding torch,’ Brian Hanley was shouting from the front of the chain next to the tanker. The chain passed the command along, repeating his words like a litany.
‘There isn’t one,’ the chain signalled in reply.
Robert Frick was at the other end, well aware that with a torch and a large sheet of steel they could have soldered the hole, but he didn’t remember unpacking one and didn’t have time to look. He had to find some way of storing the water they were managing to save but couldn’t find anything large enough.
Suddenly it occurred to Frick that the large metal containers they had used to transport the equipment could hold water. And if they carried these closer to the river of water, they could collect more. The Gottlieb twins, Marla Jackson and Tommy Eichberg lifted one of the boxes and tried to carry it over towards the leak but the last few feet were impossible as their feet lost traction on the slippery ground. Even so, they did manage to fill two of the containers before the water pressure began to weaken.
‘It’s emptying out now. Let’s try to cover the hole.’
With the water nearing the level of the hole, they were able to improvise a stopper using several feet of waterproof canvas. Three people were pushing on the canvas, but the hole was so large and irregular that all it did was slow down the leak.
After half an hour, the result was disappointing.
‘I think we’ve managed to save about 475 gallons out of the 8,700 that were left in the tank,’ said Robert Frick, dispirited, his hands shaking with exhaustion.
Most of the members of the expedition were milling around in front of the tents. Frick, Russell, Dekker and Harel were next to the tanker.
‘I’m afraid there’ll be no more showers for anyone,’ Russell said. ‘We have enough water for ten days if we allocate just over twelve pints per person. Will that be enough, Doctor?’
‘It’s getting hotter each day. By noon it’ll reach 110 degrees. That’s going to be suicide for anyone working out in the sun. Not to mention holding at least some back for personal hygiene.’
‘And don’t forget we have to cook,’ said Frick, evidently worried. He loved soup and could envisage himself eating nothing but sausages in the coming days.
‘We’ll have to manage,’ Russell said.
‘What if it takes longer than ten days to complete the job, Mr Russell? We should fetch more water from Aqaba. I doubt that it will compromise the success of the mission.’
‘Dr Harel, I’m sorry to inform you, but I’ve learned from the ship’s radio that Israel has been at war with Lebanon for the past four days.’
‘Really? I had no idea,’ Harel lied.
‘Every radical group in the region is supporting the war. Can you imagine what would happen if a local merchant happened to tell the wrong person that he’d sold water to some Americans running around in the desert? Being low on water and dealing with the intruders who killed Erling would be the least of our problems.’
‘I understand,’ Harel said, aware that her opportunity to get Andrea out of there had vanished. ‘But don’t complain when everyone starts getting heat stroke.’
‘Fuck!’ said Russell, venting his frustration by kicking one of the truck’s tyres. Harel could hardly recognise Kayn’s assistant. He was covered in mud, his hair was wild and a disturbing look on his face belied his usual demeanour, the masculine version of Bree Van de Kamp6, as Andrea said, always calm and unflappable. It was the first time she had heard him curse.
‘I was just warning you,’ Doc replied.
‘What’s up, Dekker? Do you have any idea what happened here?’ Kayn’s assistant turned his attention to the South African commander.
Dekker, who hadn’t said a word since the pitiful attempt to salvage some of their water supply, was kneeling at the back of the water truck studying the enormous hole in the metal.
‘Mr Dekker?’ Russell repeated impatiently.
The South African stood up.
‘Take a look: a round hole in the middle of the truck. That’s easy to do. If that had been our only problem, we could have covered it with something.’ He pointed to an irregular line that ran across the hole. ‘But this line complicates matters.’
‘What do you mean?’ Harel asked.
‘Whoever did this put a thin line of explosives on the tank which, together with the pressure of the water inside, made the metal bend out instead of bending in. Even if we’d had a welding torch, we couldn’t have covered the hole. This is the work of an artist.’
‘Terrific! We’re dealing with fucking Leonardo da Vinci,’ Russell said, shaking his head.
61
MP3 File Recovered by the Jordanian Desert Police from Andrea Otero’s Digital Recorder after the Moses Expedition Disaster
QUESTION: Professor Forrester, there’s something I’m very curious about, and it’s the supposed supernatural occurrences that have been associated with the Ark of the Covenant.
ANSWER: We’re back to that.
Q: Professor, there is a series of unexplained phenomena cited in the Bible, like that light—
A: It’s not ‘that light’. It’s the Shekinah, God’s presence. You must speak respectfully. And yes, Jews believed that there was a luminescence that appeared between the cherubim from time to time, a clear sign that God was within.
Q: Or the Israelite who fell dead after touching the Ark. Do you really believe God’s power resides in the relic?
A: Ms Otero, you have to understand that 3,500 years ago, human beings had a different conception of the world and an entirely different way of relating to it. If Aristotle, who is closer to us by more than a thousand years, saw the Heavens as a bunch of concentric spheres, imagine what the Jews thought about the Ark.
Q: I’m afraid you’ve lost me, Professor.
A: It’s merely a question of scientific method. In other words, a rational explanation - or rather, the absence of such a thing. The Jews couldn’t explain how a golden chest could appear to shine with its own independent light, so they limited themselves to giving a name and a religious explanation for a phenomenon that was beyond Antiquity’s comprehension.
Q: And what is the explanation, Professor?
A: Have you heard of the Baghdad Battery? No, of course not. It’s not something you’d hear about on TV.
Q: Professor . . .
A: The Baghdad Battery is a series of artefacts found in a museum in the city in 1938. It was composed of clay vessels, inside of which were copper cylinders, held in place by asphalt, each containing an iron rod. In other words, the whole thing was a primitive but effective electrochemical instrument that was used to coat different objects in copper through electrolysis.
Q: That’s not so surprising. In 1938 that technology was almost ninety years old.
A: Ms Otero, if you’d let me continue, you wouldn’t sound like such an idiot. The researchers who analysed the Baghdad Battery discovered that it originated in ancient Sumer, and managed to date it back to 2500 BC. That is a thousand years before the Ark of the Covenant and forty-three centuries before Faraday, the man who supposedly invented electricity.
Q: And the Ark was similar?
A: The Ark
was an electrical condenser. The design was very intelligent, allowing the accumulation of static electricity: two gold plates separated by an insulating layer of wood, but joined by the two golden cherubim that acted like positive and negative terminals.
Q: But if it was a condenser, how did it store electricity?
A: The answer is fairly prosaic. The objects in the Tabernacle and the Temple were made of leather, linen and goat hair, three of five materials that can generate the greatest amount of static electricity. Under the right conditions, the Ark could release about two thousand volts. It makes sense that the only ones who could touch it were the ‘chosen few’. You can bet the chosen few had very thick gloves.
Q: So you insist that the Ark didn’t come from God?
A: Ms Otero, nothing could be further from my intention. What I’m saying is that God asked Moses to keep the commandments in a safe place so they could be venerated for centuries to come and be the central aspect of the Jewish faith. And that human beings have invented artificial ways of keeping the legend of the Ark alive.
Q: What about other disasters, like the collapse of the walls of Jericho, the storms of sand and fire that wiped out whole cities?
A: Invented stories and myths.
Q: So you reject the idea that the Ark can bring disasters in its wake?
A: Absolutely.
62
THE EXCAVATION
AL MUDAWWARA DESERT, JORDAN