F Paul Wilson - Novel 03 (12 page)

           
 
Up to that time she had used Brad's condo as a
vacation spa—her private retreat from the soup kitchen, from the convent, from
the world in general. She'd soak for hours in his whirlpool bath while watching
old movies from his laserdisk library. She'd return to the convent physically
and mentally refreshed. But last summer she asked Dan to drop her off on his
way to the
Museum
of
Natural History
to see a new exhibit. When he pulled up in
front, she asked him to come inside and see how the other half lived.

           
 
An hour later one of them was no longer a
virgin.

           
 
It
wasn't me. Oh, no . . . not by a long shot.

           
 
After the first time they both went through a
period of terrible guilt—Dan's much deeper and more racking than hers—and for a
while Carrie feared he might never speak to her again. Then their paths crossed
in a deserted hallway and he took her hand and said they had to talk. The only
place to do that was Brad's apartment. So they met there on the condition that
they would talk and nothing more.

           
 
And talk they did. Dan poured out his feelings
for her, his doubts about his calling, about the priorities of the priesthood
and the Church itself. Carrie told him that she had none of those doubts:
Sister Caroline Ferris was all she ever wanted to be, all she ever would be.
But she knew she loved him and she couldn't change that.

           
 
Despite their good intentions, they wound up
in the guest room bed again. And when they were together like that, neither
could find any wrong in it.

           
 
They made love here as often as timing and
circumstance permitted, which wasn't nearly often enough. And after they loved
they talked. Dan opened up to her as she was sure he opened to no one else.

           
 
And finally, Carrie opened to Dan. She hadn't
intended to, but one afternoon the story burst from her in a rash and she told
Dan about that man . . . her father . . . and how he'd started sneaking into
her bedroom at night when she was twelve. . . .

           
 
Mom had been sick for a while, almost
helpless. Her multiple sclerosis had accelerated to the point where the only
time she spent out of bed was in her wheelchair. That man had said his dear
Carrie had to do what Mom couldn't, that it was her duty as a good daughter.
And when it was over, and she'd cry, he'd tell her it was her fault for
tempting him and making him want to do what he'd done, and if she told Mom he'd
tell everyone what she'd done . . .
everyone.

           
For two years it went on, Mom
becoming increasingly disoriented, growing weaker and weaker, fading into the
sheets of her bed, and that man sneaking into Carrie's room with increasing
boldness and frequency until Mom died. She'd been so terrified of what would
happen with Mom gone that she ran away immediately after her funeral.

           
 
Ran to the Convent of the Blessed Virgin.
Virgin . . . something young Carrie Ferris was not. But the sisters had
accepted her and she'd been there ever since. She'd devoted her life to God,
and to Mary, but she'd never felt worthy of her calling.

           
 
Dan had been stiff and silent as she'd wept on
his shoulder. She'd never told anyone—
anyone
—until
then, and it felt so good to get it out. Yet she was so afraid, as she'd been
afraid all her life, that anyone who knew the truth would hate her and shun
her. But Dan had held her close and absorbed her racking sobs, and the secret
became a bond that welded them even closer.

           
 
Carrie kissed Dan's cheek and slipped from his
side. She found a terrycloth robe in the bathroom and wrapped it around her as
she wandered through the silence of the huge apartment.

           
 
She almost wished she smoked. As much as she
hated the smell, a cigarette would have given her something to do with her
hands. She liked to keep busy and she always felt at loose ends here in Brad's.
She couldn't do any cleaning because his housekeeper kept the place immaculate;
she couldn't rearrange things because none of it was hers. So she stuck her
idle hands—those Devil's workshops—into the pockets of the robe and continued
to wander aimlessly.

           
 
As she meandered through the dining room she
spotted the typed sheets Dan had been so intent on when she'd entered. She
sifted through until she found the face sheet. The title caught her interest.

           
 
Translation: the Glass scroll

           
 
The
Glass scroll.
What was that?

           
 
She glanced at the first paragraph and her
interest was piqued. She scanned the second, then the third. Captured, she sat
down and began to read.

           
I
have left this place only once. I traveled north to
Qumran
one night and stole upon the sleeping Essenes. I moved among them like a
shadow, taking two jars of scrolls and some ink. I loaded them on the back of
three goats and returned to the
Resting
Place
, where I feasted upon one
goat and kept the other two for breeding.

           
 
And then I began to write my story.

           
 
FROM THE GLASS SCROLL

           
 
ROCKEFELLER MUSEUM TRANSLATION

           
Jerusalem
—The
Old
City

           
 
Kesev followed Qadasiya north from the Via
Dolorosa. His footsteps echoed on the street stones. Well after
midnight
and all was quiet in the Moslem quarter.

           
 
Suddenly the sound of a car engine echoed off
the surrounding stone walls and bouncing lights cast long, jittering shadows up
ahead. Had to be a Jeep. A military patrol most likely. Things had been quiet
in the Moslem quarter for a while now, but the patrols stayed on schedule. That
was the way to make sure things remained quiet.

           
 
Kesev had donned Arab dress for the night—a
frayed jellaba and a striped keffiyeh held in place around his head with a worn
akal. He knew he looked more Arab than many natives of the quarter, and if the
patrol spotted him they'd stop and ID him. He ducked into an alley and crouched
behind some debris, waiting for them to pass.

           
 
One look at the Shin Bet ID in his wallet and
the patrol would wish him well and continue on its way. But Kesev didn't want
to be stopped at all—the supposedly sleeping walls were full of eyes. He didn't
want
anyone
to know he was here,
especially his superiors.

           
 
This business had nothing to do with the Shin
Bet.

           
 
Kesev stepped out of the alley after the
patrol had passed. He scanned the street to see if anyone else might emerge in
its wake. Nothing moved. Rising above the silent
Old
City
, the Dome of the Rock gleamed in the
starlight. A brilliant gold in daylight, it looked more silver now.

           
 
Continuing along Qadasiya, Kesev shoved three
sticks of gum into his mouth. He chewed steadily, savoring the peppermint
sweetness as he turned into the narrow side street that led to Salah Mahmoud's
antique shop. The dealer lived above his place of work, the better to keep
watch over his inventory, Kesev supposed.

           
 
Kesev had been watching the shop for three
days and nights now, and had finally paid it a visit this afternoon. Most of
the statuettes and carvings on Mahmoud's dusty shelves were junk, some outright
fakes, waiting to hook some well-heeled European or American tourist with a
craving to take home a piece of the
Holy Land
.

           
 
Mahmoud himself was obviously playing to the
foreigners with his waxed mustache and red fez perched atop his balding head.
With his jowls and rumpled suit, he looked like a transplant from
Hollywood
.

           
 
But the portly dealer's manner had changed
abruptly when one particular customer arrived. Mahmoud greeted the
German-speaking man warmly, ushered him to a secluded corner where they spoke
in whispers, then led him up a flight of stairs at the rear of the store. That
would be where the items of real value were stored, Kesev decided.

           
 
During an apparently casual perusal of the
artifacts and rickety third-hand furniture that passed for antiques, Kesev had
surreptitiously surveyed the premises and found no security device more
sophisticated than a bell attached to the inside of the front door.

           
 
Now, in the shadowed recess of that front
door, Kesev used a slim piece of plastic to slip the latch on the rickety,
post-World War II lock. Gently he eased the door open a few inches, spit the
gum into his palm, reached inside and used it to fix the clapper to the side of
the bell.

           
Once inside, he pulled a penlight
from the folds of his jellaba and wound his way among the dealer's wares to the
stairs at the rear. He had spent most of the evening mulling the best way to
proceed from here. He'd heard the squeaks and groans from the old wooden
staircase as Mahmoud and his customer had ascended this afternoon, so sneaking
up was out. That left a more direct approach.

           
 
Kesev switched the penlight to his left hand
and pulled a silenced Tokarev 9mm from his robe. Then he took a backward step
and charged up the stairs, taking them three at a time. He threw his shoulder
against the upper door and smashed through to the second floor. Days of
watching had told him that Mahmoud lived alone and slept in the room
overlooking the street. Kesev barreled straight ahead, burst into the room in
time to find a very startled and frightened Salah Mahmoud sitting up in bed,
reaching into the top drawer of his night table. Kesev kicked the drawer closed
on the dealer's wrist and jabbed the business end of the Tokarev against his
throat as he began to cry out.

           
 
"Not a sound, Mr. Mahmoud," Kesev
said softly in Arabic. "I have come to rob you, not to kill you. But I am
not adverse to doing both. Understand?"

           
 
Mahmoud nodded vigorously, his jowls bulging
and quivering under his chin, his eyes threatening to jump from their sockets.
He looked like a toad that had just come face to face with the biggest snake it
had ever seen.

           
 
"Wh-whatever it is you want,"
Mahmoud said, "take it. Take it and go!"

           
 
"That's a very good start."

           
 
Kesev allowed him to remove his hand from the
drawer. As the dealer cradled his injured wrist in his lap, Kesev switched on
the bedside lamp. He removed Mahmoud's snub-nose .38 from the drawer and tossed
it under the bed. Then he produced the scroll he'd coerced from Tulla Szobel
and dropped it on the sheet.

           
 
"I want the original," Kesev said.
Mahmoud stared at the scroll, then looked up. "I don't know what you are
talking about."

           
 
Kesev felt his anger flare but controlled it.
He forced himself to smile. It must have been a disturbing grimace because
Mahmoud flinched.

           
 
"Before I came here," Kesev said
evenly, "I decided I would allow you one lie. That was it. Now that it's
out of the way, you may answer truthfully. Where is the original?" "I
swear I don't know what you are talking about." He struck the dealer a
backhanded blow with the Tokarev.

           
 
Mahmoud fell on his side, a mass of quaking
blubber, moaning, clutching his cheek. Blood seeped between his fingers.

           
 
Kesev's arm rose to deliver another blow but
he reined his fury and lowered the pistol. Instead he grabbed the front of
Mahmoud's nightshirt and pulled him close. He turned the broad face so that
they were nose to nose. He wanted the dealer to look into his eyes, to see the
fury there to feel the truth of what Kesev was going to say.

           
 
"Listen to me, Salah Mahmoud, and listen
well. The original of that scroll was stolen from me. I intend to retrieve what
is mine, and for the past four years I have been searching for it. You are
merely the latest phase of that search. Now, you can be a stepping stone or you
can be a stumbling block. The choice is entirely yours."

           
 
Mahmoud opened his mouth to speak but Kesev
pressed the barrel of the Tokarev's silencer against his lips.

           
 
"But let me warn you. I will not tolerate
lies. This is extremely important to me and I have already expended enormous
time and effort in my search. I am out of patience."

           
 
He pressed the silencer more firmly against
Mahmoud's mouth.

           
 
"This pistol has a seven-shot clip loaded
with 9mm hollow point bullets. Do you know what a hollow point does after it
enters the body? It breaks up into a thousand tiny fragments. Each of those
fragments continues forward, tearing through the flesh in an expanding cone of
destruction. The bullet enters through a little hole and exits through a gaping
maw. It is not a pretty thing, Salah Mahmoud."

           
 
Sweat beaded the dealer's forehead, dripping
into his eyes.

           
 
"So . . . here are the ground rules: I
will ask questions and you will answer truthfully. The first time I think you
are lying I will shoot you in the left knee." The dealer stiffened and
shuddered. "The second lie will earn you a bullet in the right knee. The
third in your right elbow, the fourth in your left. The fifth bullet I will use
on your manhood. By that time I will have decided that you are either a
pathological liar, or you really don't know anything. I will then leave you.
Alive. And you will spend the rest of your days unable to walk, unable to use
crutches or a wheelchair, unable to feed yourself or wipe yourself, your urine
running through a tube into bag strapped to your leg. Is that what you
want?"

           
 
Mahmoud shook his head violently, spraying
drops of perspiration in all directions.

           
 
"Good," Kesev said.

           
 
He straightened and stepped back from the bed.
He had no particular desire to shoot this man, but he would do so. He had to
retrieve that scroll.

           
 
He pointed to the forged scroll on the bed.

           
 
"Now tell me: When did you get this
scroll?"

           
 
Mahmoud hesitated. His nightshirt was soaked
with sweat. His eyes darted about the room, like a rabbit looking for a hole to
run to.

           
 
Kesev worked the slide to chamber a round.

           
 
"No!" Mahmoud cried, trying to curl
into a ball.

           
 
Kesev pulled the trigger once. The Tokarev
jerked and gave out a
phut!
as a bullet
tore into the mattress near the dealer's face.

           
 
Mahmoud thrust out his hands amid the flying
feathers and began to whimper. "Please don't shoot me! I'll tell you! I'll
tell you everything!"

           
 
Kesev lowered the pistol a few degrees.
"I'm waiting."

           
 
"I made that scroll," Mahmoud said.

           
 
Kesev raised the pistol again.

           
 
"It’s true!" the dealer cried.
"I copied it myself from a crumbling original!"

           
 
"Really. And where did you find the
original?"

           
 
"I-I didn't. Two nephews of my father's
uncle's brother discovered it in a cave in the Wilderness. I don't know if it's
true, but they claimed one of Saddam's missiles uncovered it."

           
 
Now
we're getting somewhere.

           
 
Kesev felt relief begin to seep through him,
but he resisted it just as he'd resisted the rage. He could not let down his
guard, not until the scroll was safely back in his hands.

           
 
Mahmoud was still talking, babbling, flooding
the room with rapid-fire Egyptian-flavored Arabic.

           
 
"Their father brought their find to me: a
written scroll that was heavily damaged—the boys had been in a hurry and did
not know how to care for it—and a sealed jar with two unused scrolls within. I
laid out the written scroll as best I could and copied what was left of it onto
the blank parchments." He shrugged, almost apologetically. "I. . .
I've done this before. I have formulae for all the ancient inks. I was
especially careful with the copying because 1 knew the parchments would pass
the dating test." His attempt at a smile was a miserable failure. "I
figured, why sell one scroll when I could sell three?"

           
 
"Did you read it? Did you understand
it?" Kesev held his breath as he waited for the answer.