The Pestilence (16 page)

To cheating and corruption, he would never, never yield,

And danger was his breakfast ev'ry day,

The cobbler in the hamlet and the farmer in the field,

Were always helping him get away.

“So we conclude our meeting and I thank you for your time,” said Victor standing across the desk from the CEO, briefcase in hand. “I'm very grateful for your exceedingly generous donation to the Chaput Foundation. You are truly doing God's work.” Victor turned to the CEO's assistant, “And thank you also for the delicious tea. Please, I can find my own way out.” The CEO rose and shook hands with Victor. His assistant waited smiling by his side. She turned to retrieve the tea-cups Victor had mentioned but found there weren't any in the room. She looked up puzzled, but Victor was already half way across the office; he rummaged in his briefcase for his hand sanitiser and started humming the song once more.

***

STEFANO called Dressler but the call went straight to voicemail and he hung up rather than leave a message. He used the hotel telephone to ring her room; again no answer so he slipped on his shoes and went looking for her. He visited the bar and the hotel's two restaurants. No sign of her. Stefano bit his lip in frustration. If Dressler wasn't working, sleeping or eating then the only other place she would be was the gym. He reproached himself for his sloppy thinking; he knew Dressler intimately and the gym should have been the first place he tried.

The hotel gym was a planning afterthought crammed into the basement in between the catering supply rooms and air conditioning maintenance. The three men who were using it were interspacing their routines with furtive glances in Dressler's direction. She lay on her back in the centre of the gym imperiously bench pressing seventy kilograms with ease. Stefano watched impatiently. She was working pyramids building up the reps; eight, nine, ten then coming down from the peak; ten, nine, eight. With every exertion her skin rippled with the reflection of the muscle underneath. Stefano jumped in on the rest.

“Have you done the rotas for the next few days?”

Dressler lay on the bench letting the lactic acid dissipate from her muscles. “Ja.” She didn't bother turning to face Stefano and lifted the bar for the next set of reps.

Stefano towered above her, emitting a restrained malevolent energy.

Dressler stopped mid lift, turning her head towards Stefano. “Right now?” A fierce mixture of incredulity and exasperation in her voice. Dressler slammed the bar into the rest. The bench shook in protest and the sound made every head turn in the gym. Dressler slid off the bench and raised herself to her full height. She was tall and broad, naturally intimidating, dwarfing most men but then most men were not Stefano. His eyes involuntarily raked her body and alighted on the perspiration glistening in the hollow of her throat.

“I have been waiting for them. I asked for the rotas hours ago.”

Dressler fixed Stefano with a cold stare. They stood toe to toe. The men in the gym turned away shrinking back from the looming inevitable confrontation. Dressler reached forward and touched Stefano's arm, her eyes softened. “What's wrong?” she said gently.

Stefano sighed and slumped onto the weight bench. Dressler slid in beside him resting one arm on the bar bell. Stefano was acutely aware of her shoulder brushing against his.

“Zero leads on the church, it's like they have disappeared from the face of the fucking earth.”

“They are re-grouping. The stadium and security is difficult for them.”

Stefano shrugged. “Maybe and now this damn footage. Chaput chewed my ass off because of it. I sent an investigator to the convenience store and the manager swears we took his only copy. I had cyber security perform a sweep of our systems at HQ. It showed that all records of the footage had been removed. I also had them check and confirm that Chaput's copy was deleted. The only thing they found was a trace of an expired Trojan on my laptop. If the video came out through my machine then whoever did it was top quality.” Stefano puffed out his cheeks. “But I just can't help thinking if we hadn't chased down the footage, it wouldn't have got out.”

Dressler shook her head. “It would have somehow.”

“He must know we were the source of the video.”

“Ja, if he chooses to look at you in that way of his then he will know. But then he will also know that you did not give it out.”

“He's not said anything yet. The journalists keep asking him questions about Mariam, but he ignores them. He just gets on with his business.”

Dressler began to feel her body cool and her muscles start to relax. “Come,” she said tapping Stefano on the knee. “I want to finish.” She got up and sauntered over to the lat pull down machine on the other side of the gym. His eyes tracked her as she moved. She glanced back, smiled and called out to him, “Hey, stop looking at my ass.”

Stefano laughed. “Send me those rotas or you're fired.” He rose and stalked out of the gym.

***

MARIAM was finalising the first draft of her paper. She felt it was finally in good enough shape for her colleagues at the university to provide her with some initial comments and feedback. In particular she needed Shimon's input. They usually talked most days but hadn't spoken since the night they were filmed at the convenience store. Mariam wanted to reach out, to check if he was okay and thought perhaps sending him the draft paper would be the initial step.

Mariam had set up her study in her old bedroom which was on the shady side of her mother's house. She always remembered feeling cold in this room, always feeling cold in this house. Her father's death had drawn a cloud over this place. A silver-framed picture of her and her father rested on her desk. Mariam was standing in front coming up only to his knees; she couldn't have been any more than three years old. He was dignified and handsome, confidently waving to her mother behind the camera. She drew her shawl tighter around her for protection from the cold and her memories.

Mariam heard her mother pottering downstairs in the kitchen and now the bark of her new friend coaxed her attention from the laptop and out of the window overlooking the cluster of houses. The dirt road was lined with cars and news trucks. The journalists and news crews stood respectfully on the threshold of her mother's house. To preserve her peace and that of her mother, the doorbell had long since been disconnected and one of the families in the Healed camp had lent Mariam their pet Canaan. Native to the Holy Land, this ancient breed of scavenging dog was square in stature with highly erect forequarters, a noble neck and a gorgeous tail which curved over her back. She was naturally wary of strangers which made her a particularly effective guard dog. Mariam had tied her up in the front of the house and her presence was sufficient to keep the global news media off her mother's porch.

For the first time in days Mariam bothered logging onto her email account at the university. Her inbox was surprisingly full. The cursor blinked; over 400 unread messages. She normally only received a few dozen a day, this was different. Mariam didn't open the messages, she didn't need to; the subject line in each told her all she needed to know.

The subject line of the first message; “How could you cheat?”

The subject line of the second message; “Die bitch.”

The subject line of the third message; “He's too good for you.”

The subject line of the fourth message; “Immoral whore.”

The subject line of the fifth message; “You should be stoned.”

It was a seething torrent of hate. The volume and intensity of the harassment was overwhelming. Mariam felt outnumbered, enveloped by the irrational hatred of hundreds of strangers. It was a direct attack on her identity.

Mariam stared blankly at the vitriol in her inbox. Every few moments her computer automatically refreshed and more poison dripped in. Her emotions cycled through confusion, bemusement then finally seething anger. Mariam bit her lower lip and the brief stab of pain sparked her into action.

Mariam scanned down the sender column but didn't recognise any of the names and realised that her email address, though private, was too easy to deduce. It followed the university's standard template; [email protected]. Her “out of office” reply confirmed her identity to her tormentors and she disabled it immediately.

Mariam had decided to follow Bill's advice and ignored anything to do with the story; the journalists now the emails, everything. Mariam offered up a prayer for a return to some semblance of normality and clicked the “select all” button to junk her entire inbox. She was about to press “ok” when one particular email caught her eye. It stood proudly above all others. The shock of seeing it hit her like a punch to the chest. This email sent all the other messages tumbling off screen. Mariam's mouse pointer trembled as she hovered above the message. It was from Dr Fara addressed to Dr Mariam Fara. It was a message from her father.

***

Timeline: The Pestilence minus 4 days. Information source: Email intercept between Dr Fara and Dr Mariam Fara.

Subject: Hello dear

Dear Mariam

I have followed your life with interest since I left. You have grown and become a doctor like myself and a leading light in your profession. You are smart, independent and intelligent which brings me much pride and satisfaction.

I am writing to apologise for leaving you. Life with your mother had become simply unbearable for me. When I saw that you would follow in her footsteps and become the same callous bitch of a woman I had no choice but to kill myself. I am a better man, free from the burdens of both of you. I have witnessed that your whoring ways are similar to hers. You both met fine men but were unable to keep your legs closed long enough to keep them.

My sincere hope is that your man dumps you in the cruellest way possible to expose you to the world as the evil hole that you are.

Please be kind enough to send my considerations to your bitch of a mother.

Hope all is well with you otherwise.

Keep in touch.

All my love,

Your loving father.

***

MARIAM felt sickened to the pit of her stomach. She tore her eyes from the screen and looked once more at the dirt road lined with cars and news trucks. She took a deep breath in, fighting to control the raw anger surging through her. In through the nose filling her diaphragm then forcefully out through her mouth while squeezing her core. Her clear-thinking rational mind was working hard to compose itself, but her hands trembled with rage. The Canaan growled a warning to an approaching journalist. Mariam went back to the screen, clicked through to her contacts and found what she was looking for. She entered the email address in the address field and typed.

Timeline: The Pestilence minus 4 days. Information source: Email intercept between Dr Mariam Fara and Hazel Sears.

Subject FW: Hello dear

Hi Hazel

See attached email I just received. Some monster created an email account in my dead father's name and sent me an absolutely beastly email. As much as I want to I just can't let this lie. I need your help. I was hoping you would be kind enough to use your special talents to track him (only a man would think of something so evil) down for me.

I want to pay this man a personal visit. I have a new pet guard dog that I am sure will want to make his acquaintance.

Thanks Hazel.

Mariam

***

MARIAM selected all the abusive emails in her inbox. No way now she was just going to ignore them. No way now she was just going to stay silent. Fuck them, she thought, fuck them all.

Timeline: The Pestilence minus 4 days. Information source: Email intercept between Dr Mariam Fara and multiple recipients.

Subject RE:

Your message was one of the hundreds of abusive messages I received. I found your words deeply hurtful and upsetting. You should look to yourself. Let him who is without sin amongst you, be the first to cast a stone upon her.

Dr Mariam Fara

***

MARIAM blocked the addresses of the people she just emailed. She had no desire to hear from any of them again. Next she sent her draft paper for peer review to her colleagues at the University of Jerusalem. She then went downstairs to help her mother prepare lunch.

***

Timeline: The Pestilence minus 4 days. Information source: BBC World News live broadcast.

Hugh Feades in the BBC World News studios in London: Jerusalem once again has become a focal point for global pilgrimage. Millions have been making the journey. All flights into the city are full, the buses and trains overflowing. Retracing the paths of ancient pilgrims people are now travelling in on foot, by cart and horse, their destination; the Teddy Stadium. They come in their hundreds of thousands not to watch football but to be touched and healed by Samuel Srour.

The BBC has learnt that for the first time since the global Electrical Phenomenon, Mr Srour has left Jerusalem. We believe that he is currently en route to Haran, his home village. Haran is the location of the original camp of the Healed, who are working to rebuild Mr Srour's shattered farm. The camp serves also as the centre of the Healed activity coordinating and resourcing other Healed led projects around the globe.

Our Deputy Middle East correspondent Rayaan Khan is reporting live from Haran.

Rayaan Khan: Thanks, Hugh. As you can see, I'm not at the Healed camp, which is a few kilometres outside Haran but within the village itself standing outside the home of Dr Mariam Fara. The Haran camp website which acts as an unofficial spokesperson for Mr Srour has stated that he would be leaving Jerusalem briefly today. Our sources indicate that Mr Srour may be coming not to visit the camp but to visit his long-time girlfriend Dr Mariam Fara.