The Sacred Cipher (32 page)

Rodriguez and Bohannon had the good sense to remain quiet.

“Listen, Kallie,” said the reasonable Rizzo, sitting to her right, “in spite of Doc
Johnson’s inaccurate diagnosis of my capacity, everything else he is saying is right.
We don’t know what we’re getting into, honestly. But none of us are willing to allow
you to take the same risk.”

Muscling the van into a right turn at the Mevasseret Zion interchange, Kallie turned
south, on road 3965. “Yeah, you guys are scared and I’m the Queen of Sheba. I can
see it on your faces. I see it on other faces all the time. The thrill of the hunt,
the adrenalin of the unexpected, the chance to uncover treasure: you are clearly on
a mission that has your passions and your curiosity inflamed. I just want a chance
to be part of that action.”

“I’m sorry, Kallie, I really am,” Johnson said, his gentle voice nearly sucked out
the window. “But that just won’t happen.”

Silence settled in the van. They drove past a quarry on the right, then circled the
Sataf roundabout, bearing right on road 365 to the Kibbutz Tzuba. None of the men
knew exactly where they were heading. All Kallie had e-mailed them was that she had
arranged for them to stay at the Hotel Tzuba, outside of Jerusalem but close enough
to have easy access. Driving through the main gate, Kallie pulled up in front of a
quaint-looking country inn, square in the middle of a kibbutz.

“Welcome to Hotel Tzuba,” Kallie said wryly of the sixty-four-suite hotel with great
views of the Judean hills, only fifteen minutes from Jerusalem. “Whatever you guys
are up to, it’s unlikely anybody is going to look for you here.”

That evening, the Jewish Sabbath complete, four men slid into the black SUV with the
tinted windows and continued their drive down Highway 1 into the fabled city of Jerusalem.
Over her strenuous objections, Kallie had been dispatched back to her apartment. Johnson
knew they were fortunate the SUV didn’t get into a wreck or kill any civilians, because
none of them were looking at the road, not even Bohannon, who was driving. They looked
more like bobble-head dolls, bouncing and twisting this way and that, trying to see
everything at once. Kallie had wrangled them invitations to a university reception
that was to be held in the courtyard and gardens of the Citadel, known as David’s
Tower, located just south of the Jaffa Gate.

Johnson, who was now the closest thing they had to an expert on Jerusalem and its
history, was constantly surprised by how different the real thing was from the “book”
thing, or the “picture” thing, or the “Internet” thing. The group was stunned into
silence by the beauty and history, but Johnson coped with the magnitude of the city
by telling the others the history behind the sites.

“This has been the weakest point of Jerusalem’s defenses since one thousand years
before Christ,” said Johnson as they entered into the Citadel’s grounds. Johnson and
Bohannon wore light pants, open collared shirts, and light, poplin jackets—fairly
standard reception wear. Rizzo was out of character in a pair of Dockers and a navy
blue golf shirt. Rodriguez, on the other hand, had descended on the kibbutz store
and was arrayed like a fashionable Israeli . . . simple, wide-lapelled safari shirt,
kibbutz shorts, and boots.

“Every major change in government has added to, improved on, or extended this fortress,”
said Johnson as they walked through the gardens. “Herod the Great added three massive
towers; the Romans used it as a barracks after destroying the temple; it was the last
part of Jerusalem to fall to the crusaders; and it was the seat of the king of Jerusalem.
The Ottoman Turks added that dominant minaret, and the Citadel served to garrison
Turkish troops for four hundred years until the British, under General Allenby, took
control of Jerusalem in 1917. Once the nation of Israel was formed in 1947, the fierce
and feared Jordanian Arab Legion took up position in the Citadel to defend the Old
City because it had a dominant view across the armistice line into Jewish Jerusalem.
And so it continues. The Tower of David—which has nothing to do with King David—still
dominates Jerusalem’s skyline and is master of its sight lines, even more than the
Dome of the Rock.”

Turning to his friends, Johnson smiled. “And tonight, it is the best place for us
to be, with an unfettered view of the Temple Mount and two sides of the Mount itself.
Hopefully, it will show us a way in.”

Wine flowed, talk flowed, self-importance flowed all around them that evening, but
as the moon rose over the Mediterranean, the musketeers from New York remained huddled
by themselves, at the far eastern wall of the Citadel, trying not to look too obvious
as they diligently studied the Mount and its surroundings.

What had struck Johnson unexpectedly was the palpable force he had experienced the
moment the team had exited the SUV. It was more than a feeling. This was a weight,
a presence, a reality that he was experiencing mentally, physically, and emotionally—and
if he were willing to admit it, Johnson would have to say spiritually, though he wasn’t
sure what “spiritual” really meant to him. Jerusalem exuded a dominating presence,
a power of its own, as if it were a living, breathing entity.

Perhaps, because he had visited Jerusalem before, the presence overwhelmed Johnson
more completely than his three friends. He tried to shake it off at first. During
the reception, he tried to ignore it. But as he stood on the ramparts, looking out
over this ancient city, Jerusalem’s call became too insistent.

“This city is alive,” Johnson said softly. Rizzo was by his side, but his words barely
gained the attention of Bohannon and Rodriguez. “I never thought I’d hear myself say
this, but there is something living here that is spiritual and not human. Clearly,
it’s not a circumstance of history that the three religions that dominate this world,
each of which believes in a single deity, look upon that hill over there as the most
holy site of their faith. It’s not the hill that’s holy. It’s what is under the hill,
or in the hill.” Johnson shook his head, violently. “Oh, I don’t know what I’m talking
about.”

“That’s okay, Doc,” said Rizzo, more subdued than usual. “I understand where you’re
coming from.”

Johnson’s silence stretched across the roofs of ancient buildings, straining to touch
the Mount. Both Bohannon and Rodriguez turned toward the silence.

“If there is a God,” said Johnson, with an accent of reverence, “and if this God can
be known by man”—Johnson put both of his hands on the round, metal railing at the
top of the rampart and leaned far over the wall, getting himself as close to the Temple
Mount as was physically possible—“then that is where he lives.”

Self-consciously trying to look like tourists, they strolled down David Street, one
of the few straight, direct streets probing deeper into the Old City, in the direction
of the Western Wall Tunnel. The reception had been winding down, and they had done
as much reconnaissance as possible from the tower’s rampart. Evening had passed with
a cooling breeze, and the night had great promise of clear sky and moderating temperatures.
Impulsively, they decided to take a walk, with the Western Wall as their target and
espionage as their goal.

Who would notice? They were four tourists interested in the Western Wall. They would
be lost mingling among the other tourists, the shoppers, the steady flow of humanity
up and down David Street. At least, Bohannon was hoping that was true.

Levin detested night duty. With his years of service, his seniority, his connections,
he should never have to neglect his family like this. Besides, this was poker night,
and for the first time in three years, he had been on a winning streak. Levin detested
night duty.

But his senior lieutenant was in a nasty automobile accident and would be in the hospital
for at least another week. His duty sergeant was on vacation in Majorca. That left
Levin with five nights of duty this week, and he was as coiled as a scorpion’s stinger.

Captain Avram Levin had served with Shin Bet for a dozen years, carefully selected
out of the main Israeli army corps in the second year of his service. Tall, broad,
muscled—the body of a competitive volleyball player, a striker of confounding accuracy
and deadly power. A defender who once stepped into a Levin “kill” was knocked unconscious
for ten minutes and never played the game again. For many years, Levin held hopes
of gaining a berth on the Israeli Olympic volleyball team. A knee injury sidelined
him once, the Intifada sidelined him the second time. Now, his only “kills” were the
days when his team of spooks nailed a carrier. Now, it was nights, also.

Shin Bet, the domestic Israeli security service, had a tougher job than Mossad, the
international security service, though a lot less visibility and fewer accolades.
But every Israeli citizen knew, respected, and was grateful for Shin Bet, because
Shin Bet kept the streets, the busses, the cafés as safe as possible, as safe as could
be expected, when it seemed the entire Palestinian population was being trained as
suicide bombers.

One of the main weapons in Shin Bet’s arsenal was the unobtrusive surveillance cameras
that continuously scanned nearly every street in every major city in the country.
Here in Jerusalem, the concentration of cameras was even denser, the attention to
monitors more widespread and more diligent. This was Levin’s domain. He was Watch
Commander at Shin Bet’s Aleph Reconnaissance Center in the Old City. The men in his
command called him “The Hawk,” an appellation he coveted and nurtured.

With a striker’s aggression and immediate decision making, Levin was legendary in
his corps for swooping in behind a monitor, stabbing his index finger at the screen,
and demanding “target status” for someone who triggered his intuition. Levin intercepted
more carriers, terrorists intending to become suicide bombers with explosives taped
around their midsection, than any other officer. He missed once in a while, but by
experience, when The Hawk pounced, every soldier in the security station elevated
their surveillance to red alert.

There was a prowling, predatory Hawk circling the security station that night.

Bohannon and his coconspirators reached the entrance to the Western Wall Tunnel just
after 9:00
PM
. The tunnel had become an instant Jerusalem tourist must-see attraction almost from
the moment it was uncovered. But they were surprised to see that the tunnel’s ticket
office was still open (a half-dozen people bought tickets in the few minutes they
stood by the entrance), and would remain open most evenings until 11:00
PM
. Surprised, also, to read that “guided tours are available for booking at any time
of the day or night.”