The Solomon Key (43 page)

The Holy See is awake and searching for the very thing that has occupied our own interest over the last few years. Surely your people look for it in Israel as well, but what I have heard, the rumors I have caught wind of, suggests a more sinister reason for locating the holy instrument than anything I could have ever imagined. I know that the Vatican is spotted with sinful men and thus sinful action, but I have always held fast to my faith in the Holy Father. No longer. I wish I could speak to Isaiah now, for his thoughts on this matter would fall on open ears.

All that I will say for now is that the beliefs the Reformers held concerning Mystery Babylon, the woman on the Beast, the revived Roman Empire, and even the Pope, are not looking so ridiculous from my current position. The Vatican has an agenda, an agenda that I cannot take part in. It pertains to our archeological pursuits, of resurrecting the presence of God on earth. I always believed that such a discovery could only be good, to prove to the nations that God does indeed exist. No longer would atheism have a shred of validity while being blinded by the light of the shekinah. But it seems as though I was wrong, that I underestimated Satan’s cunning ways.

As you know, many have assumed that the treasures listed in the Copper Scroll were from the Second Temple, that the Essenes hid the Temple treasure just before the destruction in 70 AD. But you and I both know that the things listed in the Scroll are objects from the First Commonwealth, not the second! As you pointed out earlier, the authors used Mishnaic/Aramaic spellings and a style of letters other than archaic Hebrew, pointing to an alphabet and writing style a couple of centuries earlier than what is commonly believed. In addition, Josephus recorded the treasures as still present within the Temple when the Romans took it.

But Benjamin, if the Copper Scroll is indeed an inventory of the treasures from the First Temple and were written under the supervision of Jeremiah, then I must ask myself, why did they not recover the treasure for the Second Temple? If we are right about Haggai and Zachariah being involved in the process, why then would they have kept the instruments secret, being that both of them witnessed the destruction of the First Temple and the rebuilding of the second? The only answer that I can find being of any satisfaction is that they both wrote about the Messianic Temple being the ultimate glory and not the Second. Perhaps they knew the fate of the Second Temple before it was even completed. And that line of thought takes me to Second Maccabees…

“It was also in the writing that the prophet, in obedience to a revelation, gave orders that the Tent and the Ark should accompany him, and that he went away to the mountain where Moses went up and beheld God’s inheritance. And Jeremiah came and found a cave-dwelling, and he took the Tent and the Ark and the Incense Altar into it, and he blocked up the entrance. And some of those who followed him came up to mark the road, but they could not find it. When Jeremiah found out about this, he reprimanded them and said, ‘The place shall be unknown until God re-gathers the congregation of His people together and shows His mercy. Then God will show where they are, and the Glory of God will be revealed as it was revealed in the days of Moses.’”

If that account is true, then Jeremiah never intended for anyone to find the Ark. And if so, then maybe what your brother believes about the Third Temple is correct, that it will not contain the Ark and will fall short of bringing to fruition the Messianic era. Perhaps we should give another look at the Protestant view of eschatology, of the Tribulation and the Temple built by the Antichrist. I am wary to write that for so many reasons, but my worldview is crumbling with every new step I take.

There is an agenda to find the Ark, and those behind it are not interested in God’s glory. I do not know that I want to help them find it, not if Jeremiah locked it in a chamber for which he did not have the key. If he did that, then he must have fully expected the Messiah to come and reestablish the Ark’s presence along with the rest of the nation. As long as the second ring is lost, the secret societies that wish to gain access to the Ark and use it for their own purposes can do no such thing. Perhaps the two Copper Scrolls have led them to the location, that together they reveal the 64th treasure to be the Ark, telling even where it rests. But without that ring, I believe they will stand just outside its location for as long as it takes their mortal bodies to turn to dust. In some unknown way, it is hidden from mankind, and only Solomon’s rings can unlock its secret location.

That must have been what Father Baer finally realized, that the Ark was never intended to be found once it was hidden. Benjamin said that his brand of orthodoxy believed the Messiah would be the one to sort everything out and that any efforts by man to do so were nothing short of sin. He said religious Zionism and the Temple Movement were attempting to create an atmosphere in which the next Temple would
have
to be built, but a Temple that would fall far short of Ezekiel’s Messianic Temple.

Father Baer and Benjamin must have realized that a third Temple would somehow function as a major piece in an established New Order of the Ages and thus wanted no part in it. But then the second ring was found, and all the pieces were suddenly out on the table. That drove them back into action, not to find the Ark, but to keep it from being found, from being used as a tool to jumpstart the building of the next Temple and the rise of the Antichrist — the birth of the New World Order. He remembered Benjamin saying that if the Antichrist’s Temple had to be built, he hoped it would be built without Jewish hands having to kill Muslims. Of course he didn’t go so far as Isaiah in suggesting that accepting the Antichrist’s Temple was a sign of accepting the Antichrist himself, but was there a difference? Though Father Baer hadn’t mentioned the agenda to eliminate the Muslims, to destroy Mecca and the Dome of the Rock, it had been of major concern to Benjamin. And then Scott remembered what Benjamin said about Israel having to be purified before the Messiah could come. And that purification, if he’d interpreted it correctly, was the Great Tribulation itself.

He closed the book, finally beginning to understand the predicament he was in, why the ring was so important. The world had just been waiting for it to show up. And then it had… right in his lap.

As he shut his eyes, he thought it a pity that, after all he’d been through with the ring, he wouldn’t actually get to see how it all played out, what Malachi planned on doing with just one of the four pieces.

As he drifted into a light sleep, a cool breeze carrying him there, he figured it all came down to what Melissa Strauss knew about the ring — why the government wanted her dead, and why the Mossad needed her alive.

40

I
t was Jennifer.
She was standing beside him, talking to him, looking into his eyes. There was commitment there, passion and hope beaming desperately in her gaze. Her lips were moving, but he couldn’t hear her voice, though he didn’t need to. He knew what she was saying.

“I forgive you.”

His heart dropped into an abyss, and tears welled up in his eyes. Grabbing her hand, he pulled her to him, enveloping her in a passionate embrace. His face was buried in her hair, and the familiar smell of it broke down the dam that had for so long suppressed the memories of this love. They kissed, her lips against his striking a symphony of words that no language could contain...

Using the back of his hand to wipe away a tear, he swore at the dream’s cruelty, or at reality for interrupting it. It was still light out, though the sun had begun its plummet to the earth. He cursed again, this time at his weakened state, and dropped his head back against the ground. Getting up was going to be a process. When he finally got to his knees, he noticed just how low the temperature had dropped, and cold tremors shook his body. He forced himself to his feet and stumbled to the train tracks. They stretched out before him and disappeared around the trees some two hundred yards away. He began walking, the dream like a ghost beside him, haunting his every step.

Seeing only one wooden slat at a time pass beneath his feet, he couldn’t recall it getting dark. It was the biting wind going straight through him that had finally reminded him of his surroundings.

His feet slowed, cold in the sneakers. He was conscious of the stone beneath the wood, the way it felt, the way it sounded. It seemed loud out here in the middle of nowhere. He stepped up onto a frozen rail and, looking out before him, could only see dark voids mocking him with their blank expressions. The tracks were his only reference point, his only map.

As he walked along the tie, a voice came out of the darkness and asked him, “Do you think she wouldn’t have forgiven you? Is that why you went and hid from her? You’d rather her believe you’re dead than to find out what you did. You couldn’t bear the thought of her knowing. You thought she would leave you, that she would think you were a monster.”

That’s not why.

“
You hate what you look like through her eyes. Through anyone’s eyes. That’s why you hid. You hate yourself. Your selfishness, your inability to face the consequences. You left her defenseless. A widow with no one to protect her from the soldiers. From the tests.”

Stop.

“Don’t you see? Your inability to deal with your guilt has only made things worse for everyone.”

And how am I supposed to get rid of my guilt?

“You can’t, obviously.”

So then what the hell is the point?

“The point is that you need help. You need to escape the burden you’re carrying.”

It’s a little late for that, isn’t it?

“It’s never too late.”

Will it bring her back? Will it bring all those people back to life?

“No.”

Then why should I care? Let me pay for what I’ve done.

“You think this is an adequate payment?”

It’s all I have.

“That’s pathetic. Community service would bring better results. You think that hating yourself means anything to anyone? You think Jennifer is happy being dead now that you hate yourself? What do you want, people to feel sorry for you?”

No. I want to stop the pain.

“Is that why you wish the rusty saw had taken your head? You think that would’ve been retribution enough? Well, you’re wrong. And unless you get that burden taken care of, this is just the beginning of your pain.”

What about Cindy?

“What about her?”

What of her pain?

“I can’t say. I wasn’t there when she died.”

Is it possible?

“What?”

That she found freedom?

“In death?”

Before death.

“Anything is possible.”

I hope she didn’t die the way that Mayhew said she did.

“It’s not your problem.”

The hell it isn’t. I’m the one who got her killed.

“You’re not accountable for her soul. Only your own.”

That’s convenient.

“It’s true. Think about all the things you heard Jack talk about.”

I don’t want to.

“Why not?”

I don’t know. Leave me alone.

“Fine.”

He wrestled with himself like that for another hour before sensing a change in the environment. The air around him was hollow, empty, the wind coming up from under him now. Things sounded different too, a broader emptiness echoing through the black, the faint sound of trickling water accenting the freezing wind. He no longer had the sense of forest trees peering down at him. He was in the open. On the bridge.

Feeling his way off the tracks, he made his way to a stone wall and sat down against it. Waited for the dawn.

****

When the darkness finally gave way to daybreak, Scott wasn’t surprised to find another cloudy day waltzing across the sky to greet him. Placing his head in his hands, he tried once more to make sense of his situation, of what had happened to his life… but now reality seemed more like a single, unintelligible drug-crazed dream than something actual sense could be wrung from. And, for a second, he took comfort in the fact that it would soon be over — a few more hours and then…

He struggled to his feet. Despite being masked by heavy clouds, the dawn offered enough glow for him to make out his surroundings. The bridge he’d spent the night on stretched over a gorge that rested maybe two hundred feet below, a trickling stream snaking steadily through it. The bridge itself was a hundred yards long with short stone walls on either side. He figured there had to be a nearby road that would be providing access to the tracks. Unless they were coming to meet him via helicopter. Looking up into the clouds, he waved to the NSA satellite he was sure had his heat signature, if not a live ultra-definition close-up of him, on some large screen in a room full of very shady men.

He turned toward a distant noise.

Quickly rechecking the two insignificant weapons he had, he wished he’d taken the time to grab a grenade or two before walking off. Oh well, so he wouldn’t get to take them all with him. Walking away from the wall and stepping onto the tracks as the sound of an engine grew nearer, he made sure he was standing in the middle of the bridge, over the lowest point of the valley below him — the spot he’d be aiming for in a few moments.

The morning breeze was blowing west into his face, and he could make out the bare trees on the other side of the bridge. They seemed to be waving goodbye. He could hear the sound of tires bouncing over the tracks now, and he again hoped that the NSA guy from Isaiah’s house would be there, that he would be able to look him in the eye while he blew his head open. That man who fueled his hopes and dreams with a lie, who had used his precious wife to get to him, would surely die if it was within Scott’s power to make it so.