The Boudicca Parchments (34 page)

“Oh come off it. SHaBaK have pictures of both of them – and probably half their members. They
know
what both of them look like.”

“You’ve seen him recently. You know what he looks like
now
.”

“Unless he’s shaved off his beard.”

“Actually he has – according to CCTV footage from the airport.”

“How did he manage to get back into the country undetected?”

“Well it appears that he used an American passport and his mother’s maiden name.”

“And that’s all it took to give border control the slip?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Jesus Christ!”

“Anyway, it’s up to you. I don’t want you to take any risks, but according to your reports, when you confronted him in England you were dressed in leathers and a helmet and he didn’t realize that you were a woman. So if you go there now, dressed like a tourist, he won’t recognize you. And that should give you an advantage.”

“And what if Daniel or Ted greet me and let the cat out of the bag?”

Dovi thought for a moment.

“That could be a problem.”

“And why don’t we just warn them?”

“We haven’t got a contact number. They both lost their phones in the explosion.”

“Knowing Daniel, he would have got a new one at the first opportunity and given the number to all his contacts.”

“Maybe he did, but we’re not on his contact list.”

“And he hasn’t contacted me either.”

“There is something else Sarit.”

“What?”

“We had a call from his father.”

“Whose father?”

“Daniel’s. He was acting on his son’s instructions. It seems that Daniel and Ted were at Solomon’s Stables last night.”

“Solomon’s Stables?”

“Yes. Or rather the mosque that was built there ten years ago.”

“What were they doing there?”

“Exploring the water cisterns and tunnels. Apparently they thought they might find some relics or artefacts there.”

“And did they?”

“No. But an attempt was made to kill them. Instead an Arab who was helping them was killed. And now we’ve got to enter into some delicate diplomacy with the
Waqf
to handle the situation.”

“And we know all this because…”

“He told his father.”

“And did he tell his father something that might actually help us, like where he was going now?”

“We think so.”

“
Think
so?”

“His father claimed that he didn’t know. But we think that’s because Daniel requested it. He presumably doesn’t want anyone to know that he’s looking for artefacts without permission of the Antiquities Authority. But we know that’s where HaTzadik and Bar Tikva are going… and we know
they
think that Daniel is going there too. So I think it’s a pretty safe bet.”

“And you want me to go there to cover his ass?”

“It would be nice to have some one there who has his interests at heart… and the skill to protect them. But it’s up to you.”

Sarit had already been thinking about it and her mind was already made up.

“I’ll go.”

Chapter 79

“It’s magnificent,” said Ted as the cable car carried them up toward the top of Masada. Through the glass, Ted saw the plateau draw ever closer while in the other direction the ground receded and the panorama of the desert and the dead sea unfolded before his eyes. They had eschewed walking up the snake path, favouring the practicality of saving their strength for the exploration they had yet to undertake, over the experience of treading that ancient path cut into the pinkish grey rock.

When the cable car arrived at the top and its doors opened, they stepped out onto wooden walkway, that led to an entrance: the snake path gate. The entrance was an archway and inside it they found temporary shelter from the intense sunlight. Sitting down on the stucco benches, they tried to get their bearings and work out a strategy.

“There’s a tourist shop,” said Daniel, pointing to the side.

“Do you need it?” asked Ted.

“Not for myself. But you can get a guidebook there – or even a headset to listen to the commentary.”

“That’ll only slow us down,” said Ted. “I’ll listen to
your
commentary. And if I’ve got any questions I’ll ask.”

And with that, they walked through the arch on the other side that led them across paving stones and onto the ruins of a mountain fortress that had become the stuff of legend. As they walked across the open surface, they felt the morning sun beating down upon them. Even at this early hour the solar rays were harsh. By mid-day they would be oppressive. But at least there were few people about at this time. They almost had the site to themselves.

Ted looked around to take in the view. Masada was essentially a giant table in the Judean Desert – a rock plateau with walls that were cliffs rising 1300 feet above the surrounding ground to the east and 300 feet to the west, the difference being due to the relative heights of the surrounding bedrock. Although less than 200 feet above sea level, it’s positioning in the Dead Sea Rift valley meant that its plateau stood 1500 feet above the surface of the Dead Sea.

From where Ted stood, it was hard to see some of the edges of the plateau. It’s shape was rhombic, nearly 1800 feet on its longest axis and half that on its shortest. Although essentially a ruin, parts had been rebuilt, whilst remnants of other parts had been exposed to hip height by archaeology. In one direction stood the reconstructed Northern Palace and in another, the massive Western Palace.

“So where do we go?” asked Ted.

“Let’s start over there,” said Daniel, pointing straight ahead to an area marked “Quarry”.

He led the way to an open area, marked off by a protective metal rail. The reason for the rail was obvious. There was a very large hole on the ground, maybe fifteen feet across exposing large amounts of rock.

“This must be where they quarried the stone to make the round stone blocks that they rolled down the hill onto the Romans – as well as the arrowheads and spears.”

“They must have given the Romans quite a run for their money,” said Ted, nodding approvingly.

“Interestingly, Josephus doesn’t actually describe any resistance. The way he tells it, they just sat here, like sitting ducks until it became clear that they were doomed and then they chose death over slavery, rape and defilement. The men killed their wives and children, then they drew lots and chose ten men to kill the others – to avoid the Biblical injunction against suicide and finally their leader Eleazer ben Yair killed the other ten. Not that Josephus was there. He based his account on the survivors.”

“There were survivors?”

Ted was surprised.

“Two women allegedly from Eleazer Ben Yair’s own family and five children. They allegedly hid in the water cisterns.”

“Allegedly.”

“As I’ve said before, Josephus’s account isn’t unbiased. He characterizes the mass suicide as murder, portraying it as a wicked and barbaric act, ignoring what the Romans would have done to the people had they survived. And there are other discrepancies.”

But Ted was only half listening. He was leaning on the metal rail, looking down at the quarry, concentrating on the an opening at the side of the bottom of the hole and how it appeared to lead off to the side.

“Do you suppose that leads anywhere?” he asked, pointing to the opening.

Daniel stared long and hard at the narrow opening.

“It
could
, I suppose. But I have a feeling it’s just a couple of extra feet in – and in any case too narrow to crawl.”

“But something could be
put
there. Like some of the other finds.”

“Anything hidden there would have been found by now. This is part of the well-excavated area, don’t forget.”

Daniel led on to an open area, with Ted following more slowly and looking around. Daniel had been here a number of times. Ted, in contrast, though familiar with the story from his many years of scholarship, had yet to actually set his eyes upon these ancient stones. So this was a new experience for him.

“These were the store rooms,” Daniel explained.

Rooms was perhaps not the right word. Archaeological excavation had exposed the walls to a height of maybe eighteen inches, but it was essentially a ruin and there was no ceiling.

“Presumably this is all that was left after the Romans wreaked their vengeance.”

“It’s more complex than that. This is actually a reconstruction. There were twenty three store rooms in all. The first seventeen were built as one room, which was later subdivided. Then six more were added. This part here is the southern side of the access corridor. As you can see, each room is 27 metres by four.”

“What do you mean a reconstruction?”

“It was actually an earthquake that brought the walls down. But the room was set on fire and the wooden beams brought down.”

Daniel paused, as he remembered what had happened to him in the house in Ashwell, when this little adventure had started. He continued speaking.

“When Yigael Yadin excavated this site in the sixties, he found a thick layer of ash on the ground from the fire. The large ceramic vessels that stored various items had been smashed, although they’d been smashed from the side, as if in a deliberate act of destruction, rather than by the collapsing ceiling. This confirmed what Josephus had written. Anyway, Yadin decided to erect the walls again.”

“Were the storage jars empty?”

“No that’s another thing. They were full or partly full. According to Josephus, the Jewish leaders at Masada didn’t want the Romans to think that they were killing themselves because they had run out of food, so they didn’t actually destroy the food, but left it intact.”

“And what was in the vessels?”

“Various things: oil, flower, wine. And the vessels were marked with names or single letters. Possibly heads of household – although that would imply familial ownership and clash with the idea of a collectivist community. Also some of the vessels bore inscriptions like “fit for the purpose of holiness” – the word for fit is ‘kosher’ – or in other cases warnings like “these jars are disqualified.”

“And where are these jars now?”

“In the Masada Museum, down below. We can look at them later. Let’s go on.”

“Where to?”

“The bathhouse.”

The bath house was still standing. Although a ruin, it’s features could still be made out. It consisted of three chambers: the cold room, the tepid room and a hot room. The hot room was the main one, heated by a hypocaust that was heated by an oven outside the building. One could still see a few remaining patches of the frescoes that had once adorned the walls. But most of the black and white tiles of the mosaic floor were gone. In their place one could see the stone pillars that supported the upper floor and separated it from the lower so that hot air from the oven could be circulated and hot water pipes run in to feed the large pool.

“This was the main public bath house. There’s a smaller one on the lower terrace of the Northern Palace near here, that was probably originally a private bath house for Herod the Great and his family.”

“How many people were here? I mean when the rebels made their last stand.”

“Ah yes, Ted, now that’s a very interesting question. You see they had enough weapons for an army of ten thousand. Josephus says there were 967 fighters.”

“That seems like a very exact number.”

“Exactly. And that’s one of the reasons for scepticism. Especially as only thirty bodies or skeletons have ever been found. And twenty five of those were in a cave at the foot of the mountain and some scholars now believe that they were Romans.”

“Some scholars?”

“Well they were re-buried , by the State of Israel, with full military honours. But even at the time, some sceptical voices were raised. Firstly they were
originally
buried with pig bones. Jews wouldn’t do that.”

“Maybe it was a deliberate act of defilement,” Ted suggested. “The victors gloating over the vanquished.”

“That’s possible. But there were other factors. Like the fact that they were powerfully built – suggesting professional soldiers rather than volunteers defending their homeland. The fact that they were found at the bottom the mountain.”

“You said that
twenty five
of them were found in the cave at the foot of the mountain. What about the other five?”

“Well a man in his early twenties, a woman of about seventeen or eighteen and a child of twelve were found in the Northern Palace. And two men were found in the public bathhouse. But what was interesting is something else they found in the public bathhouse. A full head of woman’s hair cut off with a sharp instrument while she was still alive.”

“Do you mean a skull?”

“No, just the hair… and
no
body or skeleton.”

Ted found this deeply puzzling.

“What does it mean?”

“Well one theory is that she was a foreign woman – possibly attached to the Roman encampment – who was captured when Masada was seized from the Romans at the start of the rebellion. There’s a passage in Deuteronomy that says that if a woman is captured in war, her head must be shaved and her captor must then wait a month before having sex with her. Presumably the idea was to make her less attractive and to discourage him from doing so. But later it became a general practice to cut the hair off female captives.”

“But why would they have a woman out here? Would she have already been a slave? A camp follower?”

“That’s anyone’s guess. But I’m just wondering if she could our enigmatic author of the Domus Aurea and Temple Mount Parchments… AKA Boudicca’s daughter.”

“Lanosea.”

“Exactly.”

They went outside and looked around a bit. Ted was looking at one of the inscribed metal plaques that offered explanations of the nearby features.

“You said before that the five survivors were found hiding in one of the cisterns.”

“Yes.”

“Well it says here that there was a major water cistern here. That water was collected below and brought up by donkey. There’s a Watergate down there. I think we need to check it out.”