13th Apostle (5 page)

Day Five, early morning
Entrance Gallery, Shrine of the Book
Israel Museum, Jerusalem

Tuesday was Kids' Day at The Shrine of the Book Museum. Hassan Ben Gaza hated the weekly intrusion. He hated the indulged children. Most of all, he hated their infidel parents and grandparents who had expropriated the land of his ancestors.

A group of schoolchildren blocked his way. He skirted around them with practiced skill. Had he been seen, Hassan would have been forced to endure their taunts. Twisted across the shoulders and back, his huge skull looked as if it might topple off his misshapen body. A matrix of wrinkles crisscrossed his face. It was no wonder that more than one child, confronted by Hassan in the hall, had whispered the word “mummy” to a giggling companion. Their derision held more truth than they would ever know. Like the mummies who filled the screens of the old horror movies that Hassan so loved, he too waited patiently to make his dream of retribution come true.

Four years earlier, Maluka had rescued Hassan from a life of misery and crime. Out of work and desperate for money in a city in which forty men competed for even the most menial of jobs, Hassan had been spending his nights breaking into cars. The few shekels for which he risked his life and freedom were barely enough to pay for his family's basic necessities but kept them together as a family.

On the night that changed his life, Hassan lay flat on his back across the front seat of a car, attempting to dismantle the radio by flashlight. It was three in the morning and the street was deserted.

Maluka did not see the intruder until he was within a few feet of the car. Hassan had jumped up and caught Maluka with a stranglehold that Maluka did not attempt to resist. Hassan hesitated, uncertain whether to cut his victim's throat or run. Quietly, Maluka suggested that Hassan join him for a cup of coffee at an all-night restaurant. Hassan anticipated some unscrupulous but profitable offer. Nothing could have been farther from the truth.

During the next two hours, Maluka elicited Hassan's most deeply felt regrets and frustrations; a litany of the painful disappointments that had forced him to undertake such acts of desperation.

Never had Hassan met such a man. Maluka showed him understanding where others would have condemned him, offered compassion where others would have demanded punishment, and, in doing so, revealed himself to be the spiritual leader in whom Hassan could find hope and meaning.

Maluka put him to work as a gopher in his video production studio only a few miles from where he first found him that fateful night. Hassan's days were filled with the fetching and delivering of the million things that were needed to make the famous Muslims for World Truth Videos. Shown each night of Ramadan, Maluka's television specials were renowned for their powerful portrayal of the inhumanity of the West. Hassan never missed a broadcast. These were the product of Hassan's loins as great as any child.

When Hassan had proven himself for two years, Maluka rewarded him with an opportunity greater than Hassan had ever imagined. He had been chosen to serve as the eyes and ears of MWT—down within the very belly of the enemy.

“Where no hope existed, Allah has provided the way,” Maluka said gently. At any time in the past, it would have been impossible to place Hassan within the all-Israeli workforce at the Israel Museum. With the signing of the exhibition agreement between the two Museums, however, all had been changed. Included in the agreement, at the Museum of Amman's insistence, a minimal number of non-Israeli's were to be added as long-term employees. It was only a token stipulation, meant to provide public relations opportunities intended to calm those opposed to the arrangement. Still, the stipulation provided the small window of opportunity that would allow Hassan to be interviewed, then hired.

“To others, your work will appear menial, to our cause it will be immeasurable,” Maluka explained. There, among the most sacred of Jewish and Christian archives and artifacts, within the Museum itself, Hassan would sweep floors and empty garbage while carrying precious information back to the man who had given him life.

He had been sent with one purpose: to provide proof of the secrets the Dead Sea Scrolls held and that the Museum concealed from the public eye for decades.

“Imagine,” Maluka said, “with each note you copy and photo you take, you will help us lay bare a conspiracy perpetrated by some of the most respected men in the world. The guardians of these antiquities, past and present, will stand naked, exposed as those who have helped to perpetuate the supreme hoax.

“Once revealed, the secreted messages within these scrolls will prove beyond doubt that Jesus was nothing more than a mere mortal man and that the Church has been but a means to enslave its people as well as our own.”

“And then…” Hassan urged.

“And then our people and our faith shall be vindicated,” Maluka said.

“And truth shall prevail,” Hassan added.

It had taken the first eighteen months of Hassan's employ, to work his way into invisibility. Moving from corridor to office, his sad lowly figure was barely noticed. With each office cleaning, with each access to more secure storage facilities, he was able to avail himself of greater proof of the secreted messages of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

His daily ritual was unerringly secure; all possible relevant information was stored below the plastic bags that lined the garbage cans within each room. He remained well into the night with the excuse that he was a bit slow and was willing to work longer hours in exchange for the Museum's tolerance of his physical limitations.

“You pay me to get the job done, not punch a time clock,” he once remarked to the Director. DeVris had smiled, most likely with the thought that Hassan had little else to do to fill his nights.

Quite the contrary. Hassan worked late into the evening. Each hidden document had to be retrieved from its trash can, scanned into e-mail, then sent to Maluka on one of the computers for which Hassan had secured the password. When all had been transmitted, each document or photo had to be returned to its original location or destroyed. They were long days and longer nights, but Maluka's e-mail of confirmation each evening made it all worthwhile.

Then all was changed in a heartbeat. It was a typical evening, and Hassan had been involved in the process of sending Maluka the translation of a relatively unimportant section of one of the scrolls. He was seated at DeVris' computer and noticed a new e-mail had arrived from Ludlow. The Professor had no say in the decision to keep the most inflammatory sections of the Dead Sea Scrolls out of the reach of the public, so his communications were not among those that Maluka required Hassan to monitor.

On that night, however, the subject line of Ludlow's e-mail to DeVris pulled Hassan's attention from his task. On impulse, he opened it. The “secured the find” subject line on the e-mail was not explained in its message, but Hassan forwarded the e-mail to Maluka anyway.

In the three months that followed, Maluka had learned that a eleventh-century diary had been secured by Ludlow; one that could lead them to an artifact more valuable and more damning to the mythology of Jesus than any message contained within the Dead Sea Scrolls.

The cost of this knowledge had been sizable; two deaths of key personnel at the Israel Museum that the police attributed to a random mugging and a unforeseen suicide along with the temporary collapse of the Israel Museum's entire data base. The latter Maluka had not anticipated. Once he had infiltrated the secure portions of the system, an irreversible fail-safe mechanism triggered a shut down of the entire database. Fortunately, Maluka had time to access and download the information that he needed and then, in the few minutes before the shutdown, was able to introduce a tourniquet program that concealed the breach while affording future access to all e-mail.

“But what about all of the months of work?” Hassan had asked with some disappointment. “Are we to leave all of that behind?”

“I have come to realize that the public is more fickle than I imagined. A sixty-year-old conspiracy holds no interest for them,” Maluka explained. “Others tried to expose the cover-up in the nineties as the Vatican Conspiracy but people quickly lost interest. With the power of MWT Videos behind me, I believed I could inspire the public to demand the truth, though recently I have begun to doubt it.

“This, on the other hand,” Maluka continued, “is a collusion in the making. And if we are able to procure the scroll described in the diary, if indeed—as Ludlow believes—it dates back to the time of Jesus, every eye in the world will be upon us. This, my friend, is a gift from the hand of Allah. A discovery so great that none will dare deny it. And, most importantly, one that might yet be acquired before the Christian Infidels can once again swallow it up.”

Hassan had been reluctant to give up so easily. “But if Ludlow and DeVris locate the scroll, they won't hide it,” Hassan had protested. “Why don't we let them find it and bring it to the world?”

“As others before them did with many of the Dead Sea Scrolls?” Maluka asked pointedly. “No, DeVris is a poor academic in a world of very wealthy supporters. He watches contributors, without blinking an eye, write checks for ten times his annual salary. He has become bitter and greedy and sees the scroll only in terms of the potential wealth it may bring him.”

“But Ludlow…” Hassan interrupted.

“Yes, Ludlow sees the scroll's worth in terms of the truth it may hold. He is honest but weak. A bad combination. If they find this scroll, DeVris will sell it to the highest bidder, and Ludlow will have no say in the matter.”

Hassan hesitated. He knew better that to contradict his mentor. His fear of making so great an error in judgment would allow to him to give in. “But they worked together on The Cave 3 Scroll,” Hassan protested. “They were both instrumental in getting it here so that all the world might see it. Wouldn't they do the same for the new scroll?”

Maluka shook his head. “Ludlow, yes. DeVris, never. When the two of them first arranged to get The Cave 3 Scroll brought here from the Amman Museum, DeVris had only one thing in mind. If he got the actual scroll in his hands, he hoped he might discover some clue to the treasure described in The Cave 3's writings.”

“The treasure that no one has yet uncovered,” Hassan echoed thoughtfully.

“Exactly. If DeVris had believed that he could extract favors or fortune by keeping it hidden, he would have done so.”

Hassan had thought long and hard about Maluka's answer.

If what Maluka says is true, what then might DeVris be willing to do in order to get his hands on the new scroll?

Later that morning
Office of the Director of Acquisitions
Shrine of the Book, Israel Museum

Dr. Anton DeVris glanced down at the caller ID on his cell phone. Just what he needed, a call from Nathan McCullum, CEO of White Americans to Save Christianity. DeVris braced himself for the quick thinking he required to keep track of all of the lies, past and present.

McCullum's voice was warm and sympathetic, almost believable. “I just heard about Ludlow,” McCullum began. “How tragic. So sorry for your loss.”

After having read an account of Ludlow's brutal murder on the Internet, McCullum could have been expected to act in a number of predictable ways: he might have voiced his displeasure at not having been informed immediately by DeVris of the turn of events; he might have demanded an earlier estimated time of arrival for the translation of the final section of the diary; or he might have reminded DeVris how much he was paying him to keep things on schedule. A sympathetic acknowledgement of DeVris' loss, with not a single mention of the diary was not only out of character, it was downright suspicious.

Ludlow had been working full-time at the Museum when McCullum had first contacted DeVris more than six years earlier. McCullum's initial phone call to DeVris was of a completely innocent nature, related only to a donation.

“My accountants say I can use a tax break,” McCullum had explained. “And given all the negative press that Evangelicals are getting in the States these days, an ecumenical donation couldn't be bad for WATSC's image.”

WATSC, an acronym for White Americans to Save Christianity, was not your typical Evangelical congregation. Having risen from the back swamps of KKK country, WATSC—pronounced “watt-see”—found fertile ground in twenty-first century finance. In his climb to the top, McCullum, grandson of the founder, traded in Bible pounding for handshaking of the most influential kind. The big money that backed him and his enterprises agreed with his far, far right view of the world and had a vested interest in helping steer the U.S. in just the right direction.

Ludlow had tried to convince DeVris that WATSC was far more than a powerful political-financial institution. The old man couldn't have been more vehement if DeVris were being courted by the devil himself.

“Please say you're joking,” Ludlow had gasped when he first learned of McCullum's initial donation. According to Ludlow, WATSC's Nazis, as he called them, were so right-wing they made Pat Robertson look like a bleeding-heart liberal. “I'm telling you, Anton, they're not like you and me. When they want something they'll do anything to get it. No holds barred.” When DeVris had refused to turn down the donation, Ludlow added his final admonitions. “You're way out of your league with this one. I hope to God you don't live to regret it.”

DeVris had told McCullum about Ludlow's predictions of doom. They had a good laugh together about it. From that moment on, encouraged by McCullum's reaction, DeVris had begun to see Ludlow as little more than a past-his-prime academic.

Only DeVris' assurance that McCullum's contribution was a one-time occurrence had calmed the old boy down. God only knows what Ludlow would have done had he known the DeVris-McCullum connection would be ongoing.

In exchange for McCullum's continued contributions to DeVris' ever-growing personal retirement account, the Director had used his authority and veto power within the Museum to help McCullum's cause. The sum total of DeVris' memos, speeches, and power votes helped squelch any actions—within and without the Museum—that might have allowed nearly all of the Dead Sea Scrolls to be put on public exhibition. The translations that would have followed would have most certainly challenged some of Christianity's most sacred writings.

“The last thing we need right now is fuel for another attack on the Church,” McCullum had explained. “Lord knows, we had enough with those trumped-up child molestation accusations. Challenges to the historical validity of the Bible do no one any good, much less God-fearing Christians who do not need yet another test of faith.”

DeVris had accepted McCullum's point of view with grace, resisting temptation to add his personal thought that any such test of faith might have a considerable impact on WATSC's billion-dollar Evangelical empire as well.

To tell the truth, there were moments when Ludlow's disquieting predictions stirred a bit of fear in DeVris. A short phone call from McCullum, however, never failed to put the whole thing right.

Last year, Ludlow's decision to retire had come as a more than welcome announcement. The Professor's return to England had allowed DeVris the luxury of easy communication with McCullum. Not that DeVris was doing anything wrong. After all, he had never actually voted against his conscience. He simply allowed himself to keep an open mind to McCullum's insights. The fact that his votes helped to keep particularly provocative sections of the Dead Sea Scrolls under wraps was not as much testimony to his loyalty to McCullum as it was to the cogent points of McCullum's arguments.

Had others known of McCullum's support, they might have accused him of selling out. He would have argued that he simply was buying into a responsible approach to information sharing. Give the people what they can handle. No more. No less. It was better for them, and it was better for the world at large. And if, at the same time, McCullum's contributions helped make up for the Museum's unfair and inadequate pension policy, so much the better.

Ludlow's rare visits to the Museum to do research were always preceded by a courtesy call to DeVris, as per the Director's request. Advance warning of the Professor's visits gave DeVris plenty of time to remove any trace of the McCullum influence. All in all, things had been moving along quite smoothly.

Then, two months earlier, the Professor procured a piece of antiquity that McCullum was hell-bent on acquiring. From the day that DeVris told McCullum about the diary, DeVris had been walking a tightrope, trying to maintain a balance between McCullum's determination to obtain the diary and Ludlow's terror of allowing the secrets that the diary held to fall into “the wrong hands.”

Now, with Ludlow permanently out of the picture, and the diary apparently still secure within Ludlow's safe, housed behind the oven, DeVris was finally in control.

DeVris turned his attention back to the phone conversation. It was time for a contribution from him.

“From what the police told me when they notified me of the incident, Ludlow must have walked in on his attackers,” DeVris explained. “The intruders must have been in the apartment for some time trying to force Ludlow's wife to tell them where the diary was, apparently keeping her alive until Ludlow came home.”

“Lucky you followed my suggestion and had Ludlow get the diary to you,” McCullum concluded.

Fear shot through DeVris' body. McCullum was testing him, waiting for DeVris to assure him, once again, that the diary was safe in DeVris' possession.

The Director broke into a cold sweat. Perhaps McCullum was giving him one last chance to confess that he had been lying. If McCullum suspected that Ludlow had never given up the diary, DeVris might do better to just admit it and take his punishment like a man.

But how could he admit he only had the bits and pieces of the diary that Ludlow had doled out to him? How could he say he had been stringing McCullum along for weeks?

It had seemed like a foolproof scheme at the time. Ludlow, unwilling to turn over the diary, had agreed to upload a small section of the manuscript each day for DeVris to translate directly off the Internet. In exchange, DeVris had paid the small fortune demanded by the antique dealer for the diary and had agreed to provide Sabbie's services, without whom Ludlow would not have been able to decipher the more esoteric passages of the moldy manuscript.

Though the exchange had been more than fair, at the last minute, Ludlow had insisted on maintaining strict control. By using a special copyright protection program, the Professor had ensured that DeVris could view each day's section of the diary on the Internet but had barred him from copying the material into a document or from printing it out.

At least, that's what the old guy believed. DeVris had worked his way past a similar program used by online booksellers for customers who searched the contents of books. By instructing his computer to take screen shots, DeVris had been able to photograph each page of the diary and save them as PDF files for printing, reevaluation, and compilation at his leisure. He had allowed Ludlow to believe he was in control. It made the old man happy and, most of all, kept him quiet.

Without actually having the diary, DeVris had been able to provide McCullum with the ever-growing manuscript translation and copies of the original text for which McCullum paid extraordinarily well.

It would have been the perfect plan if DeVris had not lived in fear that McCullum might someday demand to see the actual diary. When that day came…well, DeVris never actually allowed himself to consider what might happen.

With notification of Ludlow's death, DeVris had feared his pretense might be revealed but the gods had been with him. The police had indicated that Ludlow's wall safe had been broken into but made no mention of the oven safe. Both Ludlow's assassins and the police appeared ignorant of its existence and DeVris had every reason to believe that it was still intact, the diary safe within.

All of his warnings to Ludlow to tell no one but his assistant, Peterson, of the existence of the oven safe had paid off…in spades.

It had been DeVris' additional good fortune that Ludlow had uploaded the last of the diary's pages only two days before heading for his meeting in the States with CyberNet.

As soon as things calmed down a bit, DeVris would fly to England, gain access to the apartment, get Peterson to open the oven safe, and bring the diary home with no one the wiser. Piece of cake. Until then, the Internet photos that DeVris had taken would continue to convince McCullum that the diary was secure within DeVris' hands. And, for all intents and purposes, it was. As Ludlow would have put it, what the top WATSC Nazi didn't know, wouldn't hurt him.

“So Ludlow's murderers never got what they were looking for?” McCullum reiterated.

“How could they?” DeVris replied with as upbeat a tone as he could muster.

“Good,” McCullum concluded, seemingly satisfied. “By the way,” he added nonchalantly. “Interesting turn of events, this Peterson thing, don't you think?”

DeVris froze. “What Peterson thing?”

“Oh, didn't you know? Ludlow's assistant has gone missing for two days now.”