by Jon Land
* * * *
CHAPTER 41
I
t was 1948 and I was just a young boy. Barely into my teens, I think. Yes, because it was just before the first war with the Jews, the Mavtah, that changed our world forever.
Our village, the village of Bani Nai’m, was poor. We had no money. We sold off what few possessions we had in order to survive. A common tale, I know, but it belongs to me all the same. I was reduced to begging in the streets to feed my family. Sometimes I stole. When I was caught, I was beaten. Once a shopkeeper hit my head against a wall and my memory has been weak ever since.
But the day I saw the devil for the first time remains clear. He came as a lost soul, neither Jew nor Palestinian. He was not familiar with our land and I heard him offering money for a guide. He wanted to go into the desert which I knew well, since our village was located on its edge, and often my father and I would go exploring in the caves.
My father would tell me the stories of our proud history. I think he knew what the future held for us with the Jews and he wanted that history preserved, wanted me to stay proud no matter what happened. So I knew the desert and I led the devil out there, sitting beside him in the passenger seat of his Jeep.
Of course, I did not realize he was the devil then. That came later, though not very much, and I blame myself to this day.
The devil asked me to guide him to the very caves I had explored with my father. You can see my tears now, hear my sobs, because it hurts so much to remember even to this day. I was drawn to him and I’ll tell you why: because he was everything I wish my father had been. He was big and strong, with arms that bulged out from his shirt. It was warm, so he rolled up his sleeves, and that is when I saw the tattoo of the red cross for the first time.
I wanted to be big and strong like the devil. My father, you see, was a small man with bad breathing. I had grown out of appreciating him and it had been a long time since he took me to explore the caves. I went with this stranger, became his guide, not so much for the money he offered as to just be with him. Recapture the feeling I had once enjoyed with my father before his breathing got so bad he could hardly walk. I blamed him for that and imagined the stranger was my real father, and he would teach me things I hadn’t learned yet.
He was good at making the weak believe in him, and I was weak. I admit that. I see now that is why he chose me. That is how he works, sensing our weakness and preying on it.
I showed him the way into the desert and the whole time he kept one hand on his tightly fastened canvas pack. I asked him what was inside, but he wouldn’t tell me. I remember being confused, a little scared. That was the first time I began to wonder who this stranger really was. He told me he was a soldier and I made myself believe him, but I knew he was something much more than that.
We drove deep into the desert, several miles, as the sun began to weaken, and I wanted it to be over, regretted ever coming. The stranger finally stopped the car and we hiked to one of the caves. We drank lots of water, but his canteen never emptied, and it always tasted cold. I remember being scared by that too, but I was so thirsty, I just kept drinking.
Finally we climbed toward one of the cave openings. Inside he asked me to hold his flashlight while he dug. Now I was sure he was a soldier because the shovel he had was the folding kind I knew soldiers carried. He dug a hole and placed the entire pack into it. I remember how careful he was to fill the hole back in. But I never found out what was inside that canvas pack; I was afraid to ask and he never told me. I remember wanting to run when his back was turned and he was busy filling in the hole, because I knew he was going to kill me. And I did run, as soon as night fell. It was several miles back to Bani Nai’m, but I don’t think I ever stopped. I knew I had been party to something evil, but I didn’t understand how evil until I finally got home to find my mother crying and my father gone. The war with the Jews had begun.
The sorrow you hear in my voice is real, unchanged by the passage of time. I never saw my father again, and I knew it was my fault. I had forsaken him to ride with the devil. So my father died because I stopped believing in him. The devil had taken away what little faith I had left.
I knew the evil one had come to Palestine so the war could begin—I helped him begin it! I don’t know what he buried in that cave, but I’m certain to this day that as soon as the last shovel full of dirt covered whatever was inside that pack, the first shots were fired. Life for the Palestinians would never be the same. Our world had changed forever and I had been a party to that, an accomplice.
But in the folly of youth, I thought I could set things straight. I thought if I could dig up whatever the devil had buried, I could end our misery. I never acted, though, until we heard of my father’s death. After the funeral, I began venturing into the desert again in search of the cave, carrying only a shovel slung from my shoulder while other boys carried guns. I would go for days at a time looking for the cave where the devil had buried the pack, believing I could undo what he had done. But no matter how long and often I searched, I could never find the same cave again.
I thought if I could find it, and dig up what the devil had buried, I could bring my father back. Tell him how sorry I was and how much I wanted him to show me things again and tell me the tales of our people. Sometimes I would wake up at night and the devil would be leaning over me. I would awake screaming and I knew it was the devil’s way of warning me not to interfere with his work.
His work . . .
He had destroyed my people, made many of us turn to his evil ways as the only way we could survive. We have lived with violence and hate this long, because we have convinced ourselves it is our only recourse.
Yet I know that somewhere in the desert lies the cave where he buried what could be the only hope of our people. Over the years I have continued to look; less often as I grew older and, lately, not at all.
But I still have the same shovel, always at the ready. . . .
* * * *
CHAPTER 42
H
ow long as it been since you went to the desert?” Ben asked.
Abid Rahman shrugged. “A few years now. I finally gave up.” The gray pallor of guilt that had disappeared during his story returned. His hands began to tremble. “I say to you now that I probably would not have been able to look inside that pack, anyway. I would have been too afraid of what I might find. Maybe that is what the devil wanted me to do all along. Maybe the world is better off I didn’t.” He looked up at Ben. “Do you think I can go home now?”
“Soon. If you saw the cave again, would you know it? If I showed you the very hole you watched the devil dig, would you remember it?”
“Inshalallah. God willing.” Abid Rahman suddenly pressed himself against the cold stone wall. “Why? Has it been found? Is that what you’re telling me?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Yaa Allah! You don’t know what you have done!”
“I’m not the one who found it.”
“But something terrible happened to whoever it was, didn’t it?”
Ben felt chilled by the eerie prophecy of Abid Rahman’s question, but didn’t respond.
“That is the way of the devil, you see,” Rahman continued. “He called himself a guardian, I remember that now. The punishment for anyone who invaded his realm would be unspeakable.”
“Then you must have been braver than you thought, because you kept searching.”
Rahman’s face sagged in sadness. “Except I found nothing.”
“It might not be too late, Abid, if you’ll come with me into the desert.”
“Are you foolish enough to believe you can stop the devil?”
“If it’s not too late.”
“You can’t stop the blood. You can only keep it from your own hands. That much I know from my day with the devil.”
Ben kept his tone calm and patient. “And you’ve seen him again.”
“The other day. In the village of Bani Nai’m, where I still live. Do you kn
ow my village?”
“I’ve heard of it, but don’t think I’ve ever been there.”
“Almost unchanged these many years. Small cement houses and roads full of potholes. We have more electric poles now, and television antennas on many roofs, but a lot of our apricot and guava trees have died. The figs and the pomegranates too. Why do you think that is, Inspector?”
“I don’t know.”
“I think it’s because of the devil. The evil remained after he left, spreading slowly, killing slowly. I think that’s what it was. And, you know, I swear, I swear . . .”
“Take your time, Abid.”
Rahman steadied himself with several deep breaths. “I swear that after the devil returned the other day, the few good trees our village had left shed their leaves.”
“Was it the same man you remembered?” Ben asked.
Rahman shook his head. “He sent his disciples this time. I don’t know how many I saw, but they all carried the mark of the upside-down cross on their arms. I was afraid they had come for me, knew my only chance was to finally tell my story and hope someone believed. So I came to Jericho, to the police headquarters, but they must have followed me. I noticed the woman in the square before I ever reached the Municipal Building.”
“And you saw these others in Bani Nai’m, on the edge of the desert?”
“Yes.”
“More than one of the men you saw had the mark of the cross?”
“Oh, yes.”
“And might you remember when you saw them?”
“The other day, not long ago, like I told you.”
“You remember when we first met?” Ben posed patiently.
Abid nodded tentatively. “In the square. When I thought you might have been one of them.”
“You made me show you my arm.”
“I still didn’t fully believe.”
“Because the woman who tried to kill you didn’t have the mark either.”
“Evil is sneaky.”
“But when you saw the men the other day in your village, you approached them, didn’t you?”
Abid nodded, very slowly.
“I would like to hear what you said to them.”
Abid’s eyes flashed, remembrance filling them with excitement. “Yes! Yes! I accused them of my father’s death, of the destruction of my people. I asked what more they could do to us, why they had bothered to return.”
“This was before Monday.”
Rahman looked confused. “When did I see you in the square?”
“Monday.”
“Two days before, at least. Yes, it was two days, I’m almost sure.”
“Did they seek out your help again? Looking for a guide, perhaps.”
“I sought them out this time. ‘Why us?’ I asked them. Why again?’ “ Rahman’s face dropped in sadness. He sobbed, sniffled.
“But you came to Jericho.”
Rahman looked up imploringly. “I had to warn people. I had to tell people they had come back, about the horror sure to be coming too while it could still be stopped.”
“Would you like to help me stop it?”
“It is what I have been waiting for all my life.” Rahman straightened, looking suddenly quite sane. “Allahu maa asabirin. God helps those who are patient.”
* * * *
CHAPTER 43
I
nstead of waiting for Isser Raskin to return her call, Danielle went to see him in the subbasement level of National Police Headquarters where he performed his magic in a modular cubicle. By now Isser should be ready to provide the full report on the rock Danielle had given him.
She started to knock on the open doorway of his partitioned office when she saw he was not inside. More, his desk had been cleared off and all of his personal items removed from the walls.
Danielle felt her stomach quake. She leaned against Isser’s chair to steady herself and then walked to the office of the department supervisor, barging into his office after a cursory knock.
“I’m looking for Isser Raskin.”
The man took off his glasses and glared at her, befuddled. “He’s not here.”
“I can see that.”
“He’s been transferred. The instructions came down last night.”
“Transferred where?”
“I don’t know.”
“How can I reach him?”
“You can’t.”
“Why not?”
“His transfer was to a division of intelligence. Special assignment. Overseas, I believe. He was very happy about it.”
“I’m glad.” Danielle could feel her heart beginning to pound, a tremor of fear mixing with the frustration that had coursed through her. “But he was handling some case work for me.”
“I understand, Pakad.” The supervisor turned to his computer. “If you tell me the case, I will see who the work was transferred to.”
“Er, I’m not sure he would have had the chance to log it yet.”
“Give me something, anything.”
“Try Judean Desert.”
The supervisor worked some keys. “Sorry, Pakad. Nothing on that.”
“How about rock?”
“Just ‘rock’?”
“Try it. Please.”
The supervisor did as she requested and shook his head. “Sorry.”
“Could he have left something for me?”
The supervisor shook his head again. “I’m sorry, I checked his box myself. He left in quite a hurry, though. He must not have gotten around to you, I’m afraid.”
“I understand,” Danielle said, and stiffly backed out of the supervisor’s office.
She retraced her path to Isser’s cubicle. She entered and, although feeling she was somehow invading Isser’s privacy, began riffling through his drawers.
Except for office materials, all of them were empty. Nothing inside of note.
Including the rock she had given him.
Danielle sat down in Isser’s chair and took a series of deep breaths. Her stomach, forever queasy, began to betray her again. She dragged over the empty trash can in case nausea overcame her.
What had Isser said in his phone message yesterday? Something about wanting to get confirmation from an outside source. She could listen to her voice mail and replay it but—
That thought steered her gaze upon Isser’s phone. Like hers, it was built with a digital display. She reached to the keypad and hit redial.
A number, unfamiliar to her, appeared on the display. The last number Isser had called before he left the office yesterday.
Danielle jotted it down.
* * * *
W
hat is it that you teach, Professor?”
“Who did you say this was?”
“Pakad Danielle Barnea of the National Police. If you would like to come down to headquarters ...”
“No,” Professor Maurice Bernstein of Hebrew University told her. She had been trying to reach him in vain since late that morning, then finally got Bernstein on the phone during his afternoon office hours. “That isn’t necessary. I am a professor of geology.”
Danielle felt her stomach lurch again and squeezed the phone tighter, recalling the tape of the Americans at work in the Judean Desert.
“And, yes, I spoke to Isser Raskin yesterday, just before he brought his sample over for me to analyze.”
“The rock, you mean.”
“Why don’t you just ask him all this?”
“He called you for confirmation. I’m doing the same.”
She could hear Bernstein sigh. “Where would you like me to start?”
“What does the label on it mean?”
“The rock’s a sample,” Bernstein droned, as if it were obvious. “The number ‘561’ refers to the depth it was found at underground.”
“There were about a hundred other rocks in the case.”
“Yes, and I would expect the highest number to have been around one thousand or slightly more.”
“That’s rig
ht,” Danielle recalled.
“Increasing concentration of hydrocarbons the deeper they drilled. They stopped when they were sure.”
“Sure of what?”
Danielle dropped into her chair as Bernstein told her.
