She was taken to another webpage, which was essentially a private letter written from Henri to her.
My dearest Hannah,
If you are reading this now, it is because you truly are a Dubuisson, and therefore clever as fox—I salute you! Unfortunately, it also means things have gone horribly wrong. This letter exists as a Plan B, if you will, to be activated only in the direst of circumstances. That you are reading it now means I have already sent you the guidebook with its clues, and therefore, my dear, we are both in grave danger.
Read this letter closely. Our lives may now depend upon its instructions. I am counting on you.
For the next several moments Hannah sat very still in the back of the cab, her heart pounding like a drum. Only when her breathing slowed was she able to continue reading the letter.
As you know, for the last several years I have conducted numerous archeological digs throughout Israel. The university has paid me well and covered the excavation costs. My real reason for remaining in Jerusalem, however, has been to continue my search for a most significant treasure. A treasure beyond your wildest dreams, Hannah. Locating this treasure has been my life’s work.
But I am not alone in my search. A very old and very powerful secret society of treasure hunters is searching too. They are called the Cancellarii, and they will stop at nothing to find it. For years they have tried to uncover the hiding place of my secret map, and I fear they may at last be close.
Do not underestimate the Cancellarii, Hannah. They are smart, determined, and dangerous. It is entirely possible this letter is already in their hands. For this reason, I have not placed all my instructions in one location, but have instead spread them out, ensuring their safety.
Hannah, I need you to retrieve the treasure map and keep it safe from the Cancellarii. I have already given you the tools you need. You are my clever little fox.
Find it.
Hannah sat there, stunned, with the phone in her hand. She looked out the window. In the distance, she saw the enormous stone walls surrounding the Old City, and the domes of its churches, synagogues, and mosques rising above.
Hannah had asked for an adventure, and now here it was, burning like a coal in her lap. A secret society called the Cancellarii was after her. She was meant to search for a treasure map and keep it hidden for Henri. And though he insisted Hannah had everything she needed, she had no idea where to begin.
More than ever, she had to find him. Only Henri could explain what to do with the map. Only Henri would know how to deal with the Cancellarii.
Please Henri, she thought. Please be safe at home.
“Almost there,” said the cabbie. “But I won’t be able to park beside Damascus Gate. Too many people right now.”
From the side pocket in her backpack, Hannah removed her ‘emergency fund’ and counted out money for the fare. The moment the cab stopped she flung the money onto the front seat, jumped out the back door and bolted into the crowd, wheeling her red suitcase behind. She checked her shoulder and saw the young Palestinian idling his motorcycle by the curb, attempting to park, but a traffic officer waved him along. The young man fixed Hannah with his eyes, and the two stared for an instant. The traffic officer began blowing his whistle. The motorcyclist gunned his engine, glanced at Hannah one last time, and sped away.
Hannah hurried over the polished cobbles leading to Damascus Gate, her suitcase clunk-clunking along. As she passed beneath its enormous limestone arch and entered the Old City proper, she suddenly halted. Hannah gazed about her, turning in place.
She was here. In the ancient city of Jerusalem.
The Muslim Quarter was a mindbending labyrinth of dark twisting alleys and cool shaded cafés and yellow birds chirping from rusty old cages. She smelled frankincense, its gray smoke floating like ghosts through the marketplace. Dogs barked. Children hollered. Bells jangled on the handles of nut carts and date carts. The alleys were crammed with wet boxes of vegetables and tables of T-shirts, plastic combs from Taiwan and stacks of CDs, enormous burlap sacks filled with coffee beans and lentils and old men reading newspapers amidst clouds of cigarette smoke and women hanging laundry on rooftops and TVs blaring from every window, shop, restaurant, and home.
It was a dizzying carnival for the senses. Hannah was barely ten feet inside the city, and already she was lost. Just this morning Hannah had waved goodbye to her mother in Belgium. Now here she was, a young Jewish girl with a backpack and a red suitcase in hand, standing alone in the Muslim Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem—one of the most exotic places on earth.
Somewhere in this chaos was a path to Henri’s home in the Jewish Quarter. But Hannah had no idea how to find it. She looked about for a friendly face. None jumped out. The truth was, she was a Jew in an Arab neighborhood, and there was little love between the Palestinian Arabs and the Jews of this town. It had been this way for more than half a century. Each culture had their own separate area within Jerusalem to protect their holy places. Same for the Armenians, and the Greeks, and the Moroccans, and the Russians and the… come to think of it, since Jerusalem was considered a holy city to all three major religions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—nearly every nation on Earth had some special nook in this city, reserved for their unique form
of worship.
And yet even with all those different cultures and languages and beliefs and races, all of them brushing shoulders in the narrow alleys of Jerusalem, none got along worse than the Palestinian Arabs and the Israeli Jews. For this reason, Hannah thought it best to leave her Hebrew behind and speak in English or French on this side of town.
She approached a man selling olives on a rickety table. There were green olives and black olives and purple olives, olives in jars and olives in boxes and heaps of olives floating in buckets of oil. “Which way to the Jewish Quarter?” she asked in French.
The man spit an olive pit into his hand and let it drop. Without looking at her, he jabbed his thumb in the direction of a nearby alley.
Hannah wheeled her suitcase over the flagstones, the alley cool and smoky beneath the shade of awnings. A dog skulked past, and two boys sprinted after. Arabic pop music blared from a window overhead. The alley opened onto a small plaza. Hannah saw café tables with men playing backgammon. Children kicked a soccer ball against a wall that was, she realized, probably twice as old as Belgium. Her path didn’t continue straight, but split into several more alleys, each leading from the plaza. There was also a set of stone stairs leading up to… a home? A mosque? A distant ringed planet? Anything seemed possible.
Leaning against a nearby wall, three Palestinian boys shared a single cigarette, passing it between them. As they talked, they kept glancing her way. They were perhaps sixteen years old. She could smell their cologne. One boy tossed the cigarette and squashed it beneath his shoe. He approached Hannah with a smile.
“You are lost?” he said in Hebrew.
She nodded.
“You need a guide?”
“That depends,” she said in English, glancing left and right down the alley. “What is your fee for guiding me to the Jewish Quarter?”
“For you?” he said. “Very good price. A good deal for you. I am the very best guide.”
“How much?” she repeated, gripping her suitcase’s handle with both hands.
“How much you want to pay?” he said, opening his arms in a gesture of generosity.
Lost she may be, but Hannah was no fool. There would be no generosity coming from this one, with his oily smile and stink of cologne, his frequent glances at her grip on the suitcase.
“I will find my own way, thank you,” she said.
“Come on!” he insisted. “You did not even say how much. How much you want to pay? I will take you! I know Jerusalem!”
Before Hannah could respond, another Palestinian boy suddenly appeared between them. He argued with the first in rapid-fire Arabic.
It sounded like a squabble.
This newcomer was half the size of the first and considerably younger, though he stood his ground like a lion. Hannah had no idea what he was saying, but he was saying it loudly and fiercely, and the older boy was backing up, eventually rejoining his friends with a look of sheepish defiance.
This new boy, who stood six inches shorter than Hannah, took her confidently by the arm and led her toward a coffee stall on the other side of the plaza. “Forget them,” he said. “They are gangsters. You know gangsters?”
Hannah nodded.
“Gangsters,” he repeated, mimicking two pistols being fired. “There are too many in Jerusalem.”
This new boy wore a blue, American style T-shirt. He wore American style sunglasses that were too big for his face. He said he was eighteen, though he appeared younger
than Hannah.
“You like coffee?” he asked.
She nodded.
“My family makes the very best coffee. Please, sit.” The boy proudly pushed his uncle aside and began portioning out coffee grounds. Pouring the water. Setting it all to boil. It was a very basic coffee stall. It had a charcoal burner, a few cups, and a soapy bucket to wash them.
As the boy prepared Hannah’s coffee, he talked. He talked a lot, and quickly, jumping from subject to subject, his hands moving all the while. But Hannah was still on her guard. Too much had happened too quickly for her to trust anyone at this point.
The boy said he was an avid fan of American films. Did she watch American films? No? But they were the best! He said everything that needed to be known could be learned from American movies, which is why he had dropped out of school, and his name was Samir Yusef, but everyone called him George Clooney—just like the famous American actor—because Samir was so handsome and was always kissing the girls. He said he was also an excellent dancer and on the instant began clapping a complex rhythm above his head and sashaying his hips until his uncle, the proprietor of the coffee stand, smacked the back of his head.
The boy rubbed his scalp, scowling at his uncle.
“You are French?” he asked Hannah.
“I am from Brussels. From Belgium.”
“Your accent sounds French,” he said, pouring the coffee into a small white cup and passing it to her.
She took a sip. It was bitter. “We speak French in Belgium.”
“French? Really?”
She nodded, taking another sip.
“Ah! Then I must help you,” he declared.
She narrowed her eyes. “Why must you help me?”
“Because I am George Clooney! And you are a sad, pretty French girl, so lost in my city.”
“I am not French, I am from—”
“And do you think I am handsome?”
Hannah assessed him, tapping her chin. “First, you are vain. You posture like a peacock, and your sunglasses are too big. But I confess you are handsome.”
He grinned.
“Second! You look nothing like George Clooney. It is a ridiculous name. You must change it.”
The boy looked aghast. He opened his mouth to protest.
“Third!” she interrupted. “If you are eighteen then I will eat my shoes. Right here on the spot.”
He appeared more hurt than ever. “I am nearly eighteen. I do not look eighteen?”
“You are not a day older than eleven, and you know it. Now what is your guide fee? I must reach my grandfather
at once.”
He held up his hands in defence. “Easy! Take it easy! I will take you to your grandfather’s home,” he said. “In exchange for… a kiss.”
She scowled with suspicion. “On the hand?”
“On the lips of course!”
She thought about this, tapping her chin.
“If you prove trustworthy, like a knight, and take me to my grandfather, then you will earn a kiss. That is fair. But not on the lips. It will be here.”
She touched her left cheek.
“How close to the lips?” he asked.
They haggled for a while, until a distance of 1.5 inches from the lips was agreed upon for the placement of a kiss. But only after Clooney, which he insisted she call him, proved trustworthy and fulfilled his promise.
“Don’t worry, I know all the shortcuts,” Clooney assured her. He led her up the stone steps that climbed from the plaza. He had offered to help with her suitcase but she refused. Clunk, clunk, clunk went the suitcase. They emerged on a flat rooftop. Hannah saw couches and plastic chairs and a TV set balanced atop a milk crate and lots of laundry lines strung from aerial antennas. The rooftops of Jerusalem were where people relaxed in the cool of the evening. She and Clooney crossed the rooftop, descended down another set of steps, and suddenly Hannah found herself in someone’s home.
“Is this your home?” she asked.
“No.”
Spread upon cushions on the carpeted floor, a family ate dinner around a pot of rice and vegetables. Clooney said something in Arabic, they said something back, and with no further explanation, he directed Hannah through the kitchen, down a hall with old photos of mustachioed men on the walls, and finally into the washroom. He hopped onto the sink, opened the window and clambered out, dropping to the cobbles of yet another alley on the far side.
Hannah’s head was spinning. “Whose home is this?” she called down from the window.
“Pass me your suitcase,” he said, reaching up.
Reluctantly, she passed him her suitcase.
“Now you,” he said, helping Hannah down into the alley.
Landing safely in the alley, she brushed the grit from her hands and smoothed her summer dress. “Thank you,” she said. “That was quite interesting. I still have no—”
At the sound of Hannah’s voice, four young men, who were lingering on the steps of a nearby shop, looked up. Clooney went rigid.
“Are they friends of yours?” she asked.
The four young men stood as one.
“This way,” said Clooney, turning brusquely in the opposite direction and leading Hannah away.
“Do you know them?” Hannah repeated, checking her shoulder. All four of the young men were now following.
“Yes,” he said. “This way.” He yanked her down another alley and then down a flight of steps.
“Are we in trouble?” she asked.
Clooney said nothing. Then he paused, “What is in your suitcase?”
“My things.”
“Do you need them?”
“Of course I need them!”
“Then we will come back for them. But we must escape.”
“Escape?”
Clooney tugged the suitcase from her grip and wheeled it into the nearest shop and yelled orders at the shopkeeper, who quickly stowed it behind the counter.
“It is safe,” he said.
“For you, perhaps. But I could never find this place again.”
“Come, we must hurry!”
“I am not going anywhere until you tell me what is happening. Why are those boys after you?”
“An old matter. Nothing to do with you.”
“What does that mean?”
He sighed. “I swindled them.”
Hannah squared both fists upon her hips. “You assured me you were trustworthy!”
“For you, yes!”
“I do not see the difference.”
“They are swindlers themselves,” he said, as though nothing could be more obvious. “Swindling is all they understand. If I did not sometimes give them a proper swindling, how could they ever trust me?”
“Your logic is ridiculous. I expect you will now try to swindle me as well.”
“Never! You are a pretty French girl, sad and alone, and I am your brave rescuer!”
“First, I do not need rescuing. Second,
stop saying I am sad. Just because I wear a dress does not mean I dislike adventure. Third, I am not French. I am from Bel—”
Clooney grabbed her wrist and jerked Hannah into a run just as the thugs appeared in the alley.
Sprinting now, Clooney led Hannah into an open marketplace. Evening was upon the city, and the market stalls were festooned with long, looping chains of tiny colored lights. It was like a festival, with the smells and smoke of cooked meat hazing the multi-colored dimness. Clooney pulled her left, then right, dodging between vendors and then halted as the thugs unexpectedly cut them off.
“Now what?” asked Hannah, the two of them slowly backing up.
In a flash, Clooney whipped a slingshot from his back pocket, loaded it with a stone from the market floor, and fired. The stone knocked the leg from a table stacked with tomatoes. The tomatoes crashed to the floor, and the thugs slipped and stumbled into a pile of twisting arms and legs.
Before the boys regained their feet, Clooney led Hannah out of the marketplace and they sprinted up another set of steps to the nearest roof. Up top, there were laundry lines and TV antennas, potted plants, and a rusty old bike. But no exit. They were trapped.
Looking frantically about, Hannah saw a heap of peppers drying upon a plastic tarp. She had an idea.
“Help me fold the tarp,” she said, and together she and Clooney wrapped the peppers within and then stomped them into a fine red dust. Hannah carried the bundled tarp to the edge of the roof. She peered over the edge. Just below, she saw the four thugs racing for the steps that led to her rooftop. She opened the tarp and heaved its contents into the air. The pepper dust rained down onto the boys, and they swatted at the burning cloud, rubbing their eyes, which only made
it worse.
“Good thinking!” said Clooney.
Hannah smiled proudly.
In the alley below them, the thugs yelled and cursed and coughed and cried.
“No time to waste. Quickly, follow me,” said Clooney, racing to the nearest TV antenna. A cable was strung from it, swooping over the cobbled alley thirty feet below, eventually tying off to another TV antenna on the far side.
Hannah and the Magic Eye Page 2
