Cross Bones (31 page)

“Yes.”

“Sylvain Morissonneau, possible murder victim and onetime possessor of Max.”

“Kaplan’s mystery woman.”

“Good one,” Ryan said.

“Minor characters?”

Ryan considered.

“Mr. Litvak, Israeli associate and accuser of Kaplan.”

“How does Litvak fit in?” I asked.

“Another party with an interest in Max,” Ryan said.

“Al right, then Tovya Blotnik,” I said.

“The IAA director?”

“Same reasoning,” I said.

“Jake Drum,” Ryan said.

“No way,” I said.

Ryan shrugged.

“Peripherals?” I asked.

“Dora Ferris, victim’s mother.”

“Courtney Purviance, victim’s employee.”

“We’re getting goofy.”

“True,” I agreed. “But one thing is clear. Somehow it al comes back to Max.”

“Hypotheses?” Ryan opened phase three.

I started.

“Proposition one. A group of ultra-Orthodox Jews has discovered Max’s identity and fear his presence at Masada wil taint the image of Judaism’s sacred site.”

“But we know Max is not J.C. So who is he?”

“A Nazarene. Suppose this ultra-Orthodox group has learned that those living in the cave weren’t with the main group of Jewish zealots. They were, in fact, Jewish fol owers of Jesus, maybe even members of his own extended family.”

“Yadin knew this? The IAA?”

“That would explain Yadin’s reluctance to discuss the cave remains, and the government’s refusal to do further testing.”

“Tel me again. Why are Jesus fol owers on Masada a bad thing?”

“The Israelis have made Masada a symbol of Jewish freedom and resistance against external forces. It turns out there were Christians living up there, Jewish or not? They think they’ve reinterred the bones of the last defenders of Masada, but they’ve got early Christians buried under their monument? It would be enormously disturbing, especial y for Israeli Jews.”

“Proposition one suggests some fringe group of black hats is wil ing to do what it takes to keep al this quiet?”

“I’m just throwing it out there.”

I remembered Donovan Joyce’s strange theory, and Lerner’s reaction to it.

“Remember that book I read cal edThe Jesus Scrol ?”

“The one about Jesus going geriatric?”

“Yes.” I held up two fingers. “Proposition two. A group of militant, right-wing Christians has learned of Max’s existence and believes he is Jesus. They fear the skeleton could be used to invalidate scripture.”

“Yossi Lerner believed that,” Ryan said.

“Yes.” I said. “And perhaps Ferris. And at one time, Morissonneau.”

“But Max isn’t J.C.”

“Weknow Max can’t be Jesus. But Lerner was sure he was Jesus, and look how he reacted. Maybe others think so, too, and they’re playing hardbal to make the bones disappear.”

“Proposition three.” Ryan gave my scenario a different spin. “A group of Islamic fundamentalists have learned of Max’s existence and believe he is Jesus. They want to use the bones to undermine Christian theology.”

“How?”

“Jesus at Masada would shatter the central concept of the resurrection. How better to kick the legs out from under Christianity?”

“And these Muslim fanatics wil stop at nothing to get their hands on Max. That works.”

I pictured Sylvain Morissonneau in his office at l’Abbaye Sainte-Marie-des-Neiges. I made a note to contact LaManche to find out if an exhumation and autopsy had been ordered.

“Proposition four.” I offered a hybrid of my proposition two and Ryan’s proposition three. “A group of Islamic fundamentalists have learned of Max’s existence and believe he is a Nazarene, perhaps even a member of the Jesus family. They fear both Christians and Jews might embrace this finding, reinterpreting Masada with zealots and early Nazarenes struggling against oppression, side by side. They fear the skeleton might be used to trigger a resurgence of religious ardor in the Judeo-Christian world.”

“And they’ve vowed to prevent that,” Ryan added. “That works.”

We took a moment to consider our hypotheses. Fanatic Christians, Jews, or Muslims believing the bones were those of Jesus or one of his family or fol owers? Each proposition was as frightening as the next.

Ryan broke the silence.

“So who is Kaplan’s mystery woman?” he asked. “And how does she link to Ferris? And how does she link to Max?”

“Excel ent questions, Detective.”

“I expect phone records this afternoon.”

Ryan pul ed me closer.

“Friedman wants to let Kaplan stew for a day.”

“Stewing can be productive,” I said.

Ryan kissed my cheek.

“I think we’re on the right track, Ryan.”

“Even if you’re on the right track, you’l get run over if you just sit there.”

“Wil Rogers,” I identified the quote. Another game.

Ryan’s hand went to the back of my neck.

“Not much doing on the Sabbath.”

Ryan’s lips brushed my ear.

“Day of rest,” I agreed.

“Little we can detect right now.”

“Mm,” I said. I think.

“But I have another excel ent question,” Ryan whispered.

I had an excel ent answer.

Yes!

In the Toronto airport I’d noticed a book on the tao of sex, health, and longevity. I hadn’t purchased it, but at the current rate, I was guessing I’d live to be 180. The deep breathing alone must have bought me a decade and a half.

Fol owing breakfast and an argument concerning my driving solo to Beit Hanina, Ryan headed to police headquarters and I drove solo to Beit Hanina.

Jake was in better spirits than when I’d left him.

“Got something you’re going to love,” he said, flapping a paper above his head.

“Beard’s recipe for grouse pie.”

Jake dropped his hand. “Your abrasions look better.”

“Thanks.”

“You have a facial or some kind of treatment?”

“Moisturizer.” I cocked my chin at the paper. “What do you have?”

“A memo from Haas to Yadin containing notes on the Cave 2001 bones.” Jake leaned close and squinted. “Just moisturizer?”

I squinted back. “Positively Radiant.”

“No treatment?”

Not one I was going to discuss.

“Let me see the memo.” I held out a hand.

Jake yielded the paper. The notes were handwritten in Hebrew.

“How long have you had this?”

“A couple of years.”

I shot Jake a look.

“It came mixed in with materials I requested on these first-century synagogue ruins I’m digging. Probably because there’s a first-century synagogue site on Masada. The thing popped into my mind while I was eating breakfast. I vaguely remembered skimming some memo from Haas. It had nothing to do with the Talpiot site, so I set it aside. I dug back through my files, and there it was. I’d never real y read it until this morning.”

“Does Haas mention an isolated articulated skeleton?”

“No. In fact it’s clear from his memo he never saw that skeleton.” A mile-wide smile. “But he mentions pig bones.”

“Pig bones?”

Nod.

“What does he say?”

Jake translated as he read: “‘This has nothing to do with the riddle of the pig tal ith.’”

“What does that mean?”

“I don’t know, but he refers to a pig tal ith ‘riddle’ or ‘problem’ twice.”

“What would pig bones be doing at Masada? And what does that have to do with Cave 2001?”

Jake ignored my questions. “Another thing. Yadin estimated there were more than twenty cave skeletons, but Haas catalogs only two hundred and twenty individual bones. He places them into two categories: those that are clear, and those that are not so clear with regard to age.”

He translated again from the memo.

“In the clear category, he lists one hundred and four old, thirty-three mature, twenty-four juvenile, and seven infant.” Jake looked up. “He says six of the bones belonged to ladies.”

There are 206 bones in the adult human skeleton. I did some quick math.

“Haas cataloged two hundred and twenty bones. That would mean ninety-six percent of the assemblage was missing.”

I watched Jake chew dead skin on the bal of his thumb.

“Do you have a copy of the photo in Yadin’s book?”

Jake went to his files and returned with a three-by-five black-and-white print.

“Five skul s,” I said.

“That’s another inconsistency,” Jake said. “Tsafrir wrote in his field diary there were ten to fifteen skeletons in the cave, not twenty-some, and not five.”

I wasn’t real y listening. Something in the photo had caught my attention.

Something familiar.

Something wrong.

“May I take a closer look?”

Jake led me to the back room. I took a seat at the dissecting scope, clicked on the light, and brought the center skul into focus.

“I’l be damned.”

“What?”

I increased magnification, shifted to the photo’s upper left corner, and slowly moved across the print.

At some point Jake said something. I agreed.

At another point I noticed Jake was no longer with me.

With each grainy detail, my apprehension grew. The same apprehension I’d felt upon spotting Max’s il -fitting tooth.

Had no one noticed? Had the experts been wrong?

Was I wrong?

I began again at the upper left corner.

Twenty minutes later, I sat back.

I wasn’t wrong.

32

JAKE WAS IN THE KITCHEN, KNOCKING BACK ASPIRIN.

“These bodies weren’t just dumped in the cave.” I flicked Yadin’s print. “They were buried. Laid out in graves.”

“No way!”

I placed the photo on the counter. “Notice the hands and feet.”

“The bones are articulated,” Jake said. “They’re lying in anatomical position.”

“Indicating at least some of these were primary burials.”

“No one’s ever interpreted the site that way. Why’s everything else so helter-skelter?”

“Check out the long bones. There.” With a pen, I indicated a smal puncture. “And there.” I indicated another.

“Tooth marks?”

“You bet they are.” I tapped several bones and some long, jagged fragments. “These were splintered to extract the marrow. And look at this.” I moved my pen to a hole in the base of one of the skul s. “Some critter tried to munch that brain.”

“What are you saying?”

“This wasn’t a body dump. This was a smal cemetery disturbed by animals. Roman soldiers didn’t just throw dead bodies into the cave after the siege.

People took time to dig graves and place these bodies into the ground. Animals later dug them up.”

“If the cave was used as a cemetery, then why the cooking pots and lamps and household debris?”

“The site may have been inhabited at one time, later used for burial. Or maybe people lived in an adjacent cave and used 2001 for burial and refuse disposal. Hel , I don’t know. You’re the archaeologist. But the presence of a cemetery suggests that the Roman-soldiers-dumping-bodies interpretation of the remains is wrong.”

Jake stil sounded skeptical. “Hyena and jackal predation has been a problem here for centuries. In antiquity, both Jewish and Christian graves in the northern Negev were covered with slabs to prevent animals from digging them up. Modern Bedouins stil use stones.”

“Looking at this photograph, I think there were two or three single inhumations, and maybe a common grave of five or six individuals,” I said. “The disturbances probably took place shortly after the burials. That’s why everything looks so chaotic.”

“Hyenas are known to drag remains back to their dens.” Less skeptical. “That would account for the large number of missing bones.”

“Exactly.”

“Okay. The cave contained graves. So what? We stil don’t knowwhose. ”

“No,” I agreed. “Haas’s memo mentions pig bones. Wouldn’t their presence suggest the burials weren’t Jewish?”

Jake shrugged a bony shoulder. “Haas talks about a pig tal ith riddle, whatever that means, but it’s unclear where this pig and its prayer shawl were found. Pig bones in the cave might suggest that the bodies there were those of Roman soldiers. That interpretation has its supporters. Or they could suggest that the bones were those of Byzantine monks. Monks had a smal colony on Masada in the fifth and sixth centuries.”

“According to Haas, the cave remains included six women and a six-month fetus. That doesn’t sound like Roman soldiers to me,” I said. “Or monks.”

“And remember, fabric found with the bones yielded dates of forty to 115C.E. That’s way too early for the monks.”

Jake refocused on the photo.

“Your take on this as a disturbed cemetery makes a lot of sense, Tempe. Remember the palace skeletons?”

I did.

“Yadin’s book gives the impression that he found three separate individuals, a young man, a woman, and a male child. He concluded, very dramatical y, I might add, that the palace skeletons were those of the last defenders of Masada.”

“That’s inaccurate?” I asked.

“It’s quite a stretch. Not long ago I was al owed to examine archival evidence pertaining to the northern palace loci, including al diaries and photos. I’d expected to see three distinct skeletons. Not so. The bones were scattered and very fragmentary. Wait a minute.”

Jake lay down the photo and took up the Haas memo.

“I thought so. Haas also talks about the palace skeletons. He describes both males as adults, one about twenty-two, the other about forty years of age.”

“Not the kid Yadin described.”

“Nope. And, as I recal , one male was represented only by legs and feet.”

I started to speak. Jake cut me off.

“And another thing. Yadin’s field diary referred to animal dung at the palace locus.”

“Hyenas or jackals might have dragged three partial bodies there from elsewhere.”

“Quite a different picture from the brave little family taking its noble last stand.”

I suddenly realized what had been bothering me about the palace skeletons.

“Think about this, Jake. After its capture, the Romans inhabited Masada for thirty-eight years. Would they have left corpses lying around in one of Herod’s luxurious palaces?”

“The palaces may have fal en into disrepair during the zealot occupation. But you’re right. No way.”