(1982) The Almighty

by Irving Wallace

  Ramsey, with an interpreter at his side, had joined other guests in the makeshift seating arrangements, had tried to be attentive to the ceremony, had half-listened to speeches by biblical scholars and archaeologists. For Ramsey, the speakers had been relatively lifeless. What had pumped life and blood into the day had been the scrolls themselves.

  That evening, in the King David Hotel, Ramsey had tried to infuse some of that energy into his story. Calling New York to dictate the piece, he had been modestly pleased with his handiwork. But he had still suspected, despite knowledge that Armstead had personally suggested the assignment, that the story would be given little prominence in a normal New York day replete with murders and muggings, bribery and graft, and at least several sex scandals.

  This morning, which was hot as ever, Ramsey had hired a taxi to take him the three quarters of an hour drive from Jerusalem to the Tel Aviv Hilton. There had hardly been time for a shower, a change of clothes, a sandwich on the run, and no time at all to reply to the phone messages from Victoria -who, to his surprise, was in Paris, not Geneva - before he had to catch the press bus to Ben Gurion International Airport. He was still in the airport’s temporary press room, finishing his second drink, when he realized that he was being paged on the public-address system.

  Setting down his glass, he came to his feet. ‘They’re paging me. I missed it - where do I pick up the call?’

  The Israeli press officer beckoned him. ‘You can take it next door. Let me help. Come along.’

  They walked to the claustrophobic adjacent room. The officer picked up the phone, spoke twice in Hebrew, handed over the receiver. ‘Paris on the line for you. They’re making the connection.’ He went to the door. ‘Don’t-forget, we’re leaving any minute.’

  Once he was alone, Ramsey brought the receiver to his ear. ‘Hello. This is Nick Ramsey.’

  ‘At last,’ a distant voice sighed. The voice belonged to Victoria Weston. ‘Where have you been, Nick? I was so worried. I’ve been trying to get you for over a week -‘

  ‘Hello, Vicky. I got your messages when I stopped by the Hilton, but there wasn’t time to call you back. How’d you know I was at Ben Gurion?’

  ‘The hotel told me you were on your way to the airport.’

  ‘Boarding a plane to Cairo any minute. When I came to Tel Aviv, Armstead had an interim assignment for me.’

  ‘Terrorist stuff?’

  ‘I wish it had been,’ said Ramsey. ‘A tour of defense installations. A dav covering ceremonies at The Shrine of the Book.’

  ‘The what?’

  ‘The Dead Sea scrolls museum. Good story, but it’s not going to help the Record soar. Sa-ay, these calls - is anything wrong?’

  ‘Everything - or maybe nothing.’

  ‘And what are you doing in Paris? I thought you were -‘

  ‘In Geneva, you thought. Well, that’s part of it, and I wanted to talk to you after it happened. I mean the Bauer kidnapping. The secretary-general of the United Nations was grabbed by Carlos while I was there.’

  ‘I read the stories in the Jerusalem Post and the Herald Trib along the way.’

  ‘I had it alone, Nick,’ she said quickly. ‘Did you read the by-line on the big scoop?’

  ‘There was no by-line on the first story I read. The wire services credited the New York Record.’

  ‘There was a by-line on the story in New York. Want to guess?’

  ‘Mark Bradshaw? Not again?’

  ‘Again. I phoned Dietz immediately, positive I was the

  only one to have it, and he told me they were already on the presses with it. What is Armstead doing - double-covering our stories with another staffer?’

  ‘I suppose he wants to make sure. That Bradshaw’s a lucky bastard. I wish I had some of his luck. And Armstead - I would never have predicted it, but he’s turned into something of a genius.’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘Sending us and Bradshaw to hot spots where things happen. He should rank high with the Central Premonition Registry. But this time he’s going to miss out, with me in Israel and you in Paris. What are you doing in Paris anyway?’

  ‘Armstead recalled me from Geneva until he had another assignment. Until something happens, I’m twiddling my thumbs.’

  ‘Well, not a thing is going to happen there, and as far as I can see,.not a damn thing is going to happen here. This trip is zero, zilch. Good to know that our publisher is human - wins some, loses some, like everybody else. Anyway, maybe we’ll see each other soon.’

  ‘I hope so, Nick.’

  ‘Ditto on this end. Hey, somebody out there is calling for me. I’m afraid it’s bon voyage time.’

  ‘Nick, call me when you get to Cairo.’

  ‘Real soon, baby. We’ll have plenty of time together yet.’

  At midafternoon the blue minibus, moving at moderate speed, turned off Herzl Boulevard in Jerusalem and entered onto Ruppin.

  Inside the rented bus, Cooper, the model of a businessman tourist attired in a light summer suit, with conservative necktie and white Oxford-cloth shirt, leaned closer to the window until his nose almost touched the glass. To his right, he could see the buildings of Hebrew University passing by and the university stadium ahead. Pulling away from the window, he caught a glimpse of the stately pillared Knesset, Israel’s parliament. Narrowing his eyes, gazing up the aisle through the bus windshield, he could make out the graceful arc of a white dome, the roof of the Dead Sea scrolls museum, not quite directly ahead, somewhat to the right in the near distance.

  ‘We’re almost there,’ Cooper proclaimed, straightening in his seat. He raised his voice so that the other seven men in the bus could hear him. ‘We’ll be there in a few minutes, so on your toes. You’ve all been to the museum. You know your way around. You have your assignments. You know what to do.’

  ‘Clear enough,’ called back Quiggs from the front seat. Cooper sat in silence for a half minute as the bus rolled on and the white dome grew larger in the windshield.

  Cooper resumed speaking once more, almost idly. ‘Krupinski will drive this bus into the parking lot beside the museum. He will leave the wheel, abandon the bus, and with Pagano go to the two empty Fords in the lot. They will stand around, have a smoke, watch the time, be ready to get into the driver seats. Meanwhile, the six of us will alight from this bus like tourists, a tour party from Liverpool, remember. Queue up at the ticket office - there’s a sign in English and Hebrew that identifies it - and when we have our tickets, move on singly or in pairs to the glass entry booth. Once through the booth, there’ll be the long black-pebbled concrete walk to the Israel Museum on the small hill ahead. Before that, second turn off to the right, there’ll be a sign reading the shrine of the book. That’s it. Make your way casually to it - no running. You’re sightseeing - you’re tourists, remember. Go up the rise in the turnoff, four steps, more walk, two steps, to the head of the steep staircase leading down into the courtyard. The second we start down, we go into action.’

  Lafair waggled his hand. ‘What if we get mixed in with some other tourists, real tourists, going down the staircase?’ ‘Odds against it, but possible,’ Cooper replied. ‘If that happens, you stop them at that point and cover them, immobilize them there until the getaway.’ He addressed the others. ‘We all keep going. Fast. I’m allowing three minutes from entry of the museum to exit. Got it?’ ‘Got it,’ called back Quiggs. ‘Any questions?’ asked Cooper. There were none.

  ‘One caution,’ stated Cooper, ‘based on last-minute intelligence from Pagano.’

  Everyone in the bus except the driver turned around to listen attentively to their leader.

  ‘You recall, after the entrance hall and souvenir area in the museum, there’s the tunnel with its lighted glass showcases,’ stated Cooper. ‘Ignore those. Don’t bother with them. They display the Bar Kokhba manuscripts and Masada scrolls and coins, potsherds, and other artifacts. Those are not the great treasures. Go on past them into the main circular central hall. Avoid t
he elevated pedestal in the center of the room. It contains leaves of the Isaiah scroll, but these are photocopies, fakes, not the original. Go for the ten showcases around the room. They contain the originals of the Dead Sea scrolls from Qumran cave. Don’t try to break the glass in the display cases. We don’t know how thick the glass is. We don’t know if the glass is tied into an outside alarm. Instead, use the duplicate keys we had made. The keys may take seconds longer, but they are surer and safer. Each display case has a keyhole in the wooden frame at the bottom. Insert the key, lift the lid, remove the scrolls. And away we go.’ The bus jolted into a turn.

  Cooper looked out the window. ‘Here we are. We’re passing the two Fords we’ll use. To the rear, Krupinski - park there.’

  As the bus eased across the parking lot, they all sat tense with expectation, noting only three other unoccupied vehicles.

  As they parked, Cooper spoke quickly once more. ‘About the getaway. If it goes well, we leave as casually as we went in. The four of you go nice and easy to your cruise ship in Haifa. Leave your bags of scrolls with me. Gus and I will head back into Jerusalem to do what we have to do before flying out of here. If anything goes wrong, if we’re pressed, then we’ll scram fast as we can, follow the alternate plan, take a different route, drop you off in pairs at your contact points where you’ll have changes of clothes, and then you’ll leave the country.’ He addressed himself to Krupinski and Pagano. ‘In either case, when we leave this lot, remember, no speeding, no jumping red lights. The Israelis have camera boxes over their traffic signals to take pictures of offenders. Once we’re on the wing, we’ll meet up in Paris as agreed.’

  Cooper looked out the window. The bus had drawn to a stop. The engine died.

  ‘All right, boys,’ Cooper said quietly, ‘we’ve got work to do. Let’s move.’

  The bus door opened. Krupinski left the wheel, descended, followed by Pagano. Momentarily Cooper watched them saunter away toward the Fords. He stepped into the aisle of the bus and trailed after his colleagues and out onto the baking parking lot.

  They broke into two groups, ad-libbing conversations with each other as they headed across the lot to the booth with the sign reading ticket office. They fell raggedly into line, each finding Israeli change, each paying for his ticket, each moving on to the neighboring booth, a glass enclosure framed in blue, with a sign that said entrance.

  Cooper led the way into the entrance. Inside, there was a disinterested young man with a Band-Aid on his chin and a museum badge on his sports jacket, chatting in Hebrew with a fat adolescent Jewish girl who was seated nearby munching on an apple. The young man automatically glanced at each ticket, hardly noticing them as he passed them through.

  They were gathered in the open again, on a broad pebbled concrete walk. Cooper stepped ahead of the others, as if guiding a tour group. They trudged along slowly, several of them mopping their foreheads with handkerchiefs and complaining of the heat. They went past the first pathway to their right, the museum’s exit from the rear bookshop and rest rooms, and straggled toward the walk that led to the museum. A posted sign read the shrine of the book.

  At the sign they slowed, assembled behind Cooper and turned off to another walk, stepping up the pace, climbing three short sets of steps. They were dwarfed by a towering black slab of wall on one side and the white dome on the other.

  Rounding a corner, they assembled once more at the top of a sharply angled stone staircase leading down to a courtyard. There were no real tourists in sight.

  Cooper squinted at his watch, lifted his head to encompass the others, and dipped his head toward the staircase. ‘All right,’ he ordered.

  As if on signal, the six of them whipped out their grotesque colored woolen ski masks and pulled them over their heads. Quiggs had already extracted his Koch submachine gun from

  one of the shopping bags he was carrying. Hurrying down the staircase, each of the others tugged free his loaded Spanish Magnum handgun. They hit the floor of the courtyard almost in concert. They spun left and dashed across the court to the actual entrance to the underground museum.

  In the lead, Cooper could see the personnel he had expected - at the open metal doorway, inside the entrance, two museum employees, one a ticket taker wearing an ordinary suit, the other an elderly guard in some semblance of a uniform, wearing a drooping gun holster. Not far behind them, seated next to a souvenir stand of booklets and tapes, a beardless clerk sat reading a paperback.

  Cooper’s sudden appearance in the frightening slit-eyed mask, brandishing a gleaming handgun, startled all three members of the museum personnel into temporary paralysis. Cooper burst inside, and the other five masked figures streamed in after him. As Shields came abreast of him, Cooper reminded him, ‘The alarm you located yesterday -probably off, but make sure it’s fully disengaged.’

  The ticket taker had his hands up, and so did the souvenir clerk. The only one who tried to resist, the elderly entrance guard, slid one trembling hand to his holster. Cooper took a rapid step forward, lashed him on the head with his gun. The old man groaned, began to crumple. Cooper caught him, jerked free the guard’s gun, and let the limp body fall to the floor. Quiggs, having set aside the submachine gun and shopping bags, was in back of the ticket taker, bringing his arms down. Tying his wrists behind him with a thin hemp rope removed from the pocket of his suit coat, Quiggs shoved the man to the floor then dipped into his own pocket again for a wadded-up handkerchief and stuffed it in the ticket taker’s mouth. At the same time Cooper was binding the wrists of the unconscious guard and gagging him. Overly was doing the same with the souvenir clerk.

  Swiftly Cooper leaped to his feet. Gesturing for Quiggs to remain at the entrance, he snatched up the shopping bags, passed one to Overly, passed the others out to Lafair, De Salvo, Shields as they ran into the museum tunnel. Overly followed them and Cooper brought up the rear.

  On the run, they scurried through the crushed-basalt tunnel between the illuminated display cases holding the Bar

  Kokhba and Masada documents. As they approached the ascent to the main circular museum room, a squat uniformed museum guard materialized. Cooper sprinted ahead, gun high, and saw that this guard was unarmed and already had his hands up. Cooper gestured for his cohorts to bind and gag the second guard.

  As they did so, Cooper quickly circled inside the exhibit room to see if it was otherwise occupied. Hidden by the central pedestal, a short couple, apparently man and wife in their sixties and apparently both partially deaf from the hearing aids in evidence, were peering intently into a showcase bearing the brown Habakkuk Commentary scroll. Cooper was upon them with his gun before they knew it. They were too bewildered to resist, and Cooper hastily herded them, stumbling, to the others, where they were tied and gagged and ordered to lie down beside the prone guard.

  Without the loss of a second, members of the gang fanned out around the room, each inserting his key into a preassigned display case. Five glass lids went up, the genuine fragile Dead Sea scrolls, sheets of ancient leather, some sewn with threads of flax, were drawn out and stuffed into the shopping bags, several scrolls coming apart. Five more glass lids went up. More scrolls were dropped into the shopping bags.

  The heist was over.

  At the entrance to the Israel Museum and The Shrine of the Book, Prime Minister Salmon of Israel, with Egyptian Ambassador Nahas beside him, had quickly left the limousine and escort at the curb, had ignored the public entrance and led his guest through the open gate next to it.

  Despite his seventy-two years, the prime minister was striding across the pebbled concrete walk as rapidly as an athlete, fast enough to force the Egyptian ambassador to gasp for air and the three younger bodyguards, two mustached Israeli ones and the ambassador’s clean-shaven Egyptian one, to break into a trot to keep up with him.

  The prime minister was late, very late. A politician who always took pride in his promptness, he considered tardiness an unforgivable sin. But the last-minute meeting with Ambassador Nahas
had gone on longer than he had expected. Salmon had been painfully aware that his entourage, the

  consultants, aides, ministers accompanying him to the Cairo meeting, were already on the plane awaiting his arrival.

  Still, this further delay was necessary. Leaving the Knesset, he had promised the Egyptian ambassador a brief glimpse of the Dead Sea scrolls museum. For Salmon, it was a matter of pride. His father, as much as any man, had been responsible for the museum’s holdings. The new ambassador had not yet seen them, and Salmon was eager and proud to show them off.

  The prime minister slowed down slightly. ‘You know the story of the discovery of the scrolls?’

  ‘Yes, I had read about it,’ Ambassador Nahas puffed.

  ‘My father, Yitzhak, was one of the main people responsible for their acquisition. On the eve of the United Nations vote to partition Palestine, and the outbreak of fighting, my father accompanied Professor Elieze’r Sukenik, the Hebrew University archaeologist, from Jerusalem to Bethlehem where a dealer had the recently discovered scrolls. Very dangerous, very dangerous. But the trip was made safely and the ancient parchments purchased, and now they reside here for all the world to see. Nearly two thousand years old, those scrolls!’

  Salmon pointed to one aide.

  ‘Let’s take a shortcut, go into the museum by the back way. It’ll save time, give us a few minutes extra to view the treasures. Then we’ll be off, fast as we can, for the airport and Cairo.’

  Inside the Dead Sea scrolls museum, Cooper had run to the tunnel opening and whistled loudly three times. He waited, heard Quiggs whistle back three times and was satisfied. The signal for all to depart. He waited again, saw Quiggs and his submachine gun coming toward him swiftly. When Quiggs joined him, Cooper whirled, shouting to the others for the benefit of his bound victims, ‘Carlos says let’s get out of here!’ He and Quiggs and their colleagues, with their filled bags, were rushing across the room to the doorway leading into the rear corridor when suddenly, unexpectedly, the doorway was filled with men, strangers - one, two, three, four, five of them entering the museum, two in mufti, three in uniforms and armed. Cooper saw the startled looks on their faces and