The Dead Sea Codex Read online

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  Hard Shell Word Factory

  www.hardshell.com

  Copyright ©2005 by Sarah Wisseman

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  NOTICE: This work is copyrighted. It is licensed only for use by the original purchaser. Making copies of this work or distributing it to any unauthorized person by any means, including without limit email, floppy disk, file transfer, paper print out, or any other method constitutes a violation of International copyright law and subjects the violator to severe fines or imprisonment.

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  CONTENTS

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

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  For Emily and Nick

  Chapter One

  O Israel, return into the Lord thy god; for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity ... [Hosea 14:1]

  ALL EYES FOCUSED on her long blond braid and American blue jeans. Not for the first time, Lisa Donahue wished she had better protective coloring for traveling in the Middle East. Any moment now, someone would holler the remembered tag, “Hey, blondini!"

  She inhaled the mixed aromas of deep-fried chickpea balls, roasted spiced lamb, and corn sold by aggressive street vendors. Fragments of Hebrew, Arabic, French, and English assaulted her ears as native Israelis and visitors from many nations milled around the Tel Aviv plaza.

  It was wonderful to be back. She'd been afraid the reality wouldn't live up to her rose-colored memories of seven years earlier, when she'd been a wide-eyed archaeology student. She needn't have worried—Israel was still noisy, vibrant, smelly, and altogether enchanting.

  A live chicken, destined for dinner, squatted and clucked in a string shopping bag near Lisa's feet. Above the bag stood a plump housewife, obviously daydreaming about chicken stew with dumplings. A few feet away, several Orthodox Jewish men wearing black hats and long curls muttered and gesticulated. Two female soldiers wearing dark green uniforms gossiped and smoked French cigarettes, and a Bedouin in flowing robes talked loudly on his cell phone.

  When the Egged bus showed up, the crowd surged towards the door. As Lisa struggled to stay in front, she remembered that Israelis didn't like the idea of “lining up.” The best way of getting on a bus—or through any kind of door—was to pretend you were an Israelite crossing the Red Sea, vigorously parting the crowd with your elbows.

  Lisa bagged the remaining front seat, opposite a thirty-something businessman with sleepy brown eyes and a five-o'clock shadow. She dozed as they left Tel Aviv, opening her eyes occasionally to see palm trees swaying against a metallic blue sky and tall tan buildings.

  As they traveled out of the city, cement high-rises and modest houses gave way to scruffy bushes and reddish-brown soil—soil that blanketed thousands of years of history. No one could sink a spade anywhere in Israel without turning up potsherds or scrolls or ancient fortifications. When Lisa was an undergraduate here, a friend suggested the easiest way to become an archaeologist was to convert to Judaism, marry an Israeli, and dig up her new backyard.

  The Hebrew chatter from the driver's radio kept Lisa from really sleeping. As she felt the bus begin to climb, she forced her eyes open so she wouldn't miss her favorite scenery—the passage through the Judean Hills.

  The businessman watched her. Normally, Lisa liked talking to people when she was traveling. It was part of the adventure and she could try out her Hebrew or French or Italian.

  But this man's gaze reminded her of the Chevrolet salesman with slicked-back hair who put a hand on her knee when she was sixteen and on her way to visit colleges by Greyhound bus. She moved the hand. He put it back. She moved it again, sliding as far away from him as she could. Now, ten years later, she wished she'd stood up and yelled, "get your hand off my knee, you pervert!"

  Lisa caught herself before she smiled. Glancing sideways, she noticed the businessman's thick eyebrows and coffee-colored skin and wondered uneasily how long he'd been observing her reclining form. His gaze, no longer sleepy, made her feel undressed. She sat up straighter.

  "You are from America, yes?” he asked with an oily little smile.

  "Yes,” Lisa replied curtly, sick of being hit upon because she was young, blonde, and foreign. She began a mental catalogue of tips for young women traveling in the Middle East: Do dye your hair brown or black; Don't wear jeans; Don't fall asleep on public transportation...

  "On holiday, perhaps. You visit our museums?"

  She met his brown eyes briefly. “Business trip. I work for a museum at home."

  "How very interesting. Then surely you visit the Israel Museum and the Shrine of the Book—the home of the famous Dead Sea Scrolls?"

  Lisa was startled. Could this guy read her mind? “Yes, actually. I'm an archaeologist, here to look at some ancient ceramics."

  "Perhaps you arrange loans for your museum?"

  Now she was puzzled. Was he an Israeli Customs officer trying to prevent the export of illegally acquired antiquities? But he was wearing a well-tailored gray suit and polished black shoes, not a uniform.

  "Are you in the museum business, too?” she asked.

  The man laughed gently. “No, no, I am archaeology enthusiast only. I sell computer parts—for the Beirut branch of Microsoft."

  "Oh."

  A computer salesman. Lisa pretended to go back to sleep, shifting her long body slightly so he could no longer stare at her face. A spring from the ancient bus seat dug into her hip. Lisa longed for the padded futon of her own living room, enhanced by the furry bulk of her cat, Tango. She searched the landscape for distraction.

  The tan and brown hills meandered west of Jerusalem. They were crisscrossed with low terraced walls and the gray-green clumps of olive trees. Lisa leaned closer to the window frame, sniffing the pungent aromas of wild oregano and thyme. The holy city gleamed pale yellow in the morning light as the Egged bus swooped around the curves, following the perimeter road. The sight was even better in the late afternoon, when the setting sun turned Jerusalem's stone architecture into “the City of Gold."

  New suburbs sprawled haphazardly across the fields. She could see a lot of growth in only seven years. How many of the new buildings strayed into Palestinian land, she wondered? This tiny strip of land, barely the size of New Jersey, had been bitterly fought over since time began. Lisa could almost hear the tramp of soldiers—Assyrians from the north and Egyptians from the south—vying for control of the ancient highways and key trade routes between the mountains and the sea. The city of Jerusalem had eighteen conquerors in five thousand years—after King David united the land of Israel and established Jerusalem as its capital in the tenth century B.C., the place was overru
n with Babylonians, Greeks, Nabateans, Romans, Byzantines, Persians, Mamluks, and Ottomans.

  Modern British and the French rulers had carved the Middle East into political mayhem, while thousands of Jewish settlers claimed a homeland. They were still fighting, the immigrant Israelis against the Palestinian landowners, giving ground one week and seizing it back the next. Now, the Israeli Prime Minister had the unenviable job of dealing with the latest riots in the West Bank.

  Lisa glanced at her traveling companion, and discovered him watching her again. As their gazes met, his slid away.

  She wished him gone. That he'd get off in another part of Jerusalem, park his sleek self in an outdoor café, and chat up a Lebanese or Palestinian girl who liked older men. That he would not find out where she was staying.

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  "SHALOM! HEY, MISS, please ... we arrive at Yerushalayim. We are at your hotel, the Beit Gesher."

  The swarthy face of the driver loomed over her.

  Lisa sat up with a jerk. She had fallen asleep in spite of her uneasiness, and the Lebanese salesman was gone.

  "Todah rabah,” Lisa murmured, dredging up the Hebrew for “thank you” from some drawer in her cluttered memory. She groped for her carry-on, while the driver fished her rolling suitcase out from under the bus.

  A short walk along the narrow street brought her to a pristine hotel lobby, cozy with potted plants and overstuffed chairs. The room had the look of vintage 1960s. Lisa flipped her long braid over her shoulder and marched up to the front desk with as much dignity as she could muster in her bedraggled state.

  "Mees Donahue, yes? Room five.” The pretty young clerk with dark reddish-brown hair fastened in a clip took her passport and handed her the old-fashioned key.

  "Oh, I need to ask you about a room switch. I need the single room for four nights, and then I want to change to a double."

  "You have your friend Mees Perkins coming to join you?"

  "Yes, that's right. She's my colleague from our museum in Philadelphia. Ellen arrives on the twenty-eighth. We'll want a non-smoking room with two double or queen-sized beds and a private bath."

  "We arrange it. It is not too busy just now.” The young woman's clear tanned skin flushed. “Oh, I almost forget, this message is for you.” She handed Lisa a sealed envelope.

  No one knew she had arrived. Puzzled, Lisa opened it as she waited for the elevator.

  You are in danger. Don't tell anyone why you are here. I'll explain when I see you.

  It was signed with a scrawled C.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Chapter Two

  ...and he is a disciple of his mind, which is male ... [Testimony of Truth]

  FARID EL BAZ was a worried man.

  He stood on the street corner near the Wailing Wall, smoking a cigarette and debating his next move, which was far from obvious. Next to him stood a cart full of steamed corn and a street vendor spreading his trinkets on a colorful carpet.

  A slightly built man, Farid wore a white tunic and cotton pants, with the inevitable black and white checkered kefiyyeh wound around his neatly shaped head. Not his normal western dress, but excellent camouflage for the job at hand. Farid's ancient desert ancestry showed in his beaky nose and far-seeing eyes, but his university education was modern and unconventional: he was an expert in international law and Arabic literature.

  His instructions were to search the Old City for anyone who could tell him about the Roman artifacts recently purchased by the Israel Museum. He knew their appearance well, since he had helped inventory the acquisition in his cover job as Assistant Registrar. But their exact provenance was unknown, and this information was crucial. His boss had heard rumors of a sensational find, one that would make millions for the lucky few who distributed the artifacts to the right market.

  But it was getting more dangerous. Twice already today he'd had that prickly sensation on the back of his neck that meant someone was watching. Each time, he sauntered further into the souk pretending he suspected nothing, then slipped into a tea shop, chatting with the proprietors and eyeballing the customers.

  Despite his long experience in black market surveillance, Farid failed to spot his shadow. The presence of a watcher proved that Farid and his boss were onto something. The trouble was, who was the watcher? Was he just another dealer who was interested in the same find, a member of Israeli intelligence, or someone altogether more sinister?

  Farid el Baz stamped out his cigarette and turned quickly into an alley, his unremarkable figure melting into the myriad stalls and arched streets of the souk.

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  IN A BATTERED phone booth on Jaffa Road, a stocky man in a gray business suit inserted a token and dialed.

  "Salaam. The Hawk soars ... ” he began.

  " ... And the Eagle watches from above,” replied his contact. “What news?"

  "She's here, staying at the Beit Gesher.” The stocky man fumbled for his cigarettes, phone balanced on one shoulder.

  "What about her friend, Manzur, the other American archaeologist?"

  "No contact yet. She spent her first night in Tel Aviv and then took the bus to Jerusalem. You need to find out how much she knows.” He lit his cigarette and inhaled greedily, releasing tendrils of smoke that snaked around his head.

  "She's supposed to be here at least a week. I'll get back to you."

  "Make it soon. We're running out of time.” The man crushed his cigarette out on the tan metal casing of the phone.

  "You can depend on me."

  The gray-suited man hung up and stepped outside. He adjusted his conservative navy tie, his inscrutable dark eyes checking the stream of people heading to lunch, and then he strode casually towards his favorite outdoor café.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Chapter Three

  But these lying teachers and false diviners have made devilish plots against me to exchange Your law, engraved in my heart, for smooth things for Your people ... [Thanksgiving Hymns IQH 12:8-12]

  LISA TURNED BACK to the front desk at the Beit Gesher.

  "Have you any idea who delivered this?” she asked the young hotel clerk.

  "I am not on duty long. Since ten hours. Sorry, I cannot help."

  No good. Lisa had arrived barely an hour after the clerk's shift had started. Uneasily, she remembered her conversation with the Lebanese businessman in the bus. He couldn't possibly know where she was staying, could he?

  She looked at the note again. Who was C? No one knew she was in Israel except her museum contact and the folks back in Philadelphia. And her business here was hardly a state secret. Should she call the police? What would the police do? Nothing. They would plague her with questions and delay her meeting at the Israel Museum.

  Lisa's body sagged, every bone and nerve longing for a soft mattress. Jet lag had scrambled her brain. She needed a little time and some water therapy to function again.

  She trudged upstairs, double-locked the door of her room, and took a shower. As the soothing hot water tumbled over her aching head and shoulders, Lisa's mind drifted back seven years.

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  SHE HAD BEEN nineteen, a skinny kid with stars in her eyes and hardly any money in her wallet. She'd come to Israel for her junior year to study archaeology, all because a girl in her dorm had given her a brochure about Study Abroad in Israel.

  Her first few months were full of Ulpan classes—the intensive Hebrew program—seven hours a day. Lisa practiced her new language skills every day, shopping and pretending to read the newspaper, trying to find an apartment that she could afford. Using a mixture of Hebrew and French, she finally rented a place with an Israeli landlord and another American girl, Wendy Laska.

  She and Wendy shared the front room, while their twenty-something landlord Ari shuttled back and forth between his job, the apartment, and his parent's house.

  They were comfortable, except for the penetrating damp during the winter—no central heating in this part of Tel Aviv that made studying a
blankets-and-cocoa affair. Finally, Wendy had the brilliant idea of buying a kerosene heater. After a citywide trip and a hilarious ride home in a bus, the two girls had christened their new acquisition “Rudolph” because it had a bulbous nose that glowed red when it heated up.

  Lisa, completely captivated by her archaeology classes, spent weekends touring biblical sites and museums while Wendy practiced her violin and hung out with her boyfriend, a piano major. Then Lisa met Gregory Manzur, another archaeologist, who had the enviable position of drifting from dig to dig, making his living doing hands-on excavation and traveling all over the Middle East. That spring semester had sped by in a whirl of exams, long treks into Sinai, and lovemaking in battered tents and cheap hostels...

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  LISA CHANGED THE water temperature to cool to wake herself up again. Or was it to cool off her thoughts? Her relationship with Greg was over. It was only being on Israeli soil that reminded her of those heedless days and passionate nights, all part of the grand experience of living abroad for the first time.

  Her mind jerked back to the unromantic present and the ominous message she'd received. Why should she be in danger? Lisa Donahue was a scholar, not a government agent. She was in Israel as a museum employee, arranging a loan of ancient ceramics for her museum back home in Philadelphia. Her job, as an ABD—all-but-dissertation—graduate student in Classical and Near Eastern archaeology, was that of a general assistant and slave to Dr. Valerie Albrecht, the director of the anthropology museum at the University of Pennsylvania.

  Refreshed and garbed in clean but wrinkled clothes, Lisa picked up the mysterious note and examined it more closely. The handwriting looked vaguely familiar, and that C—could it be a G?

  Greg Manzur? But why would Greg send her a message like this? They hadn't communicated for months, and he had no idea she was in Israel.

  Lisa shivered. The memories she'd had in the shower had reawakened feelings that were far better forgotten. She had no intention of seeing Greg again.

  She glanced at her watch. Still too early to call Tom Henderson. Her fiancé was a doctor, an intern, with insane hours at a Philadelphia hospital. Lisa felt a surge of longing for his fuzzy beard and reassuring bulk. She smiled as she realized she was equating her lover with her cat—both were large and comforting.