The Footprints of God

by Greg Iles

  Trinity would be different.

  Fifty miles north of this facility, the first nuclear explosion on earth had turned the desert floor to glass. Robert Oppenheimer had stared awestruck into the eye of the resulting fireball, but his awe had been at himself as much as at the new machine he had built. But if the computer inside Containment reached its full potential—if every problem were solved and a neuromodel hit 90 percent efficiency—then Peter Godin’s creation would dwarf Oppenheimer’s deadly toy. For when men looked into the eye of Trinity, Trinity would look back. And it would know what it was looking at.

  An inferior form of life.

  Chapter

  29

  I came awake in a sweat-drenched T-shirt with no idea where I was. A sticky film covered my face, and a dark-haired woman lay in bed beside me. I could tell it was a woman by the shape of her shoulder. Afternoon sunlight spilled through a curtain to my left, falling across two suitcases standing on the floor. Then I remembered…Jerusalem.

  A dream had awakened me, and no normal dream. All I could see was the face of a man leaning close to kiss me. The image made me shudder, but I fought the urge to push it from my mind. Soldiers, I remembered. Soldiers with swords. I was standing in the dark, beneath a tree in a fragrant garden. Men slept around me on the ground. Their snores made me feel alone. Fear was working in me, a fear that death was approaching. I heard a commotion to my right, and then soldiers burst among the sleeping men, shouting and searching the trees. A robed man walked toward me from the shadows. With the paralysis of nightmares, I stood there as he kissed me on the cheek. His lips were waxy and cold. As he pulled back, the soldiers seized me…

  Rachel shifted beneath the bedcovers. I looked at my watch. Three-thirty P.M., Israel time, seven hours ahead of New York. I couldn’t believe it. We’d slept almost eighteen hours. I picked up the phone beside the bed, called the lobby, and requested a car and an English-speaking driver for the afternoon. The price was 130 shekels per hour, whatever that was. Rachel stirred at the sound of my voice but did not awaken.

  I should go alone, I thought, looking down at her. Then I saw an image of myself falling unconscious in the street, lost in a narcoleptic dream. I couldn’t risk that. I went to the bathroom and got into the shower.

  Israel was nothing like my dreams. From the moment we’d entered Ben Gurion airport in Tel Aviv, we were assaulted by modernity from every side. Radios, metal detectors, submachine guns, the odor of jet fuel. We rode from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem in a sherut, a hired minivan with six other people. I kept quiet most of the way, and Rachel occasionally squeezed my hand in reassurance. She could tell I was disoriented, that the scenery outside the van was not what I’d expected to find.

  As we neared Jerusalem, though, I caught sight of the Old City on its hill, pristine in the dying sunlight, and my disappointment faded. Whatever I had come for, it awaited me behind those ancient walls.

  It was nearly dark by the time we reached our hotel. We gave our passport numbers to the desk clerk and followed our bags up to the sixth floor. The room was clean but small. We’d planned to go out for food, but when we sat on the bed to catch our breath, jet lag and the exhaustion of the past two days caught up with us. Rachel had slept a little on the plane, but I had not. The warmth and silence of the hotel room were like a narcotic poured into my veins. I ate an orange Rachel had bought at Ben Gurion and fell into oblivion. Only the dream of the garden had brought me out of it.

  I shut off the shower nozzle, toweled myself off, and walked backinto the room. Rachel had rolled onto her stomach. Her bare shoulders still showed above the covers. I went to the window and pulled back the curtain in the hope of seeing the Old City, but nondescript buildings blocked my view.

  I walked to the bed and shook Rachel’s arm. She didn’t respond. I shook her again. She blinked several times, then stretched and got up on one elbow.

  “Is that clock right?”

  “Yes. We’ve got a car coming.”

  This did not seem to please her. “You still want to go today? It’s late already.”

  “I had another dream.”

  “What about?”

  “The Garden of Gethsemane.”

  She lay back on the bed and stared at the ceiling. “That’s a lot further in the chronology than you were before, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. Gethsemane begins the countdown to the crucifixion. I have to get to the Old City. It can’t wait until tomorrow.”

  She pulled the sheet around her, then stood and gazed into my eyes. “I think we should wait until tomorrow.”

  “Why?”

  “We’re safe in this room. It’s a miracle that we even got here, and I think we need some time to recover from all we’ve been through.”

  “But my dream…”

  She reached down and took my hand. “Nothing is going to happen to you, David. Not even if you dream of the crucifixion. You’re here with me, and I know how to take care of you.”

  She dropped her other hand to mine, and the sheet fell around her feet. I tried not to drop my eyes, but she meant for me to see.

  “Rachel, I have to go today.”

  “We can go. Just not yet.” She laid her head against my chest and put her arms around me. “The world isn’t going to end if we take a few minutes for ourselves.”

  She kissed my chest, then nuzzled my neck and pulled me against her waist. Her professional persona had been shed like a dead husk of skin. This new woman was a revelation to me, and I wanted her. I bent to her upturned face and kissed her. Her lips were warm and elastic, nothing like the waxy lips in my dream. A shudder passed through me at the memory.

  She drew back and looked into my eyes. “What’s the matter?”

  “I’m okay.” I leaned down to kiss her again.

  She shook her head. “You’re not. You’re not going to be all right until we put this Jesus business to rest once and for all.”

  The phone rang, startling us both.

  I picked it up. “Yes?”

  “Your car is here, sir,” said an accented voice.

  “Thank you.” I hung up.

  Before I could explain, Rachel kissed my cheek, then turned and began to dress.

  Our driver was a mustached old Palestinian named Ibrahim. His English-speaking qualification was marginal, but he understood that we wanted the Old City, and that was enough to get us to the Jaffa gate. As we approached the sun-bleached stone wall, I felt my first wave of déjà vu. Behind that wall, in that blood-drenched repository of history, lay a secret for me alone. For two thousand years it had waited, invisible to those who came with shovels, toothbrushes, files, and dental picks. What that secret was, I didn’t know, but I would know it when I found it.

  “Where do you want to start?” Rachel asked.

  “Jesus’ last day.”

  “Yes,” said Ibrahim, looking back at me. “Mount of Olives, Garden of Gethsemane, place of the skull.”

  A motorcycle honked angrily and shot past us.

  “Place of the skull?” I asked.

  “In Hebrew, Golgotha, in Latin, Calvary. Where Jesus was crucified.”

  “That’s what we want.”

  “Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Nine stations of the cross outside the church, last five stations inside. I take you there now.”

  “Why there?” Rachel asked me.

  I felt a wave of heat pass through me, and for a moment I couldn’t breathe. “I don’t know.”

  “David? What’s the matter?” She put a hand to my forehead. “You’re burning up.”

  Thirty seconds ago I’d felt fine, but she was right. “Let’s just hurry.”

  Ibrahim pulled into a parking place as a Citroën backed out. A huge tour bus blocked out the light behind us.

  “Are we stopping outside the wall?” Rachel asked.

  “Yes,” Ibrahim replied. “Is customary to walk from here. See landmarks of the city.”

  “How far away is the church?”

  “Holy Sepulch
re? On day like today, half hour to Via Dolorosa, maybe little more.”

  Rachel looked doubtful. “Can you get us closer?”

  “Is the mister sick?”

  She hesitated. “Yes. He’s come to Jerusalem in the hope that it will help.”

  “Ah. Many sick people go to Jesus’ tomb and kiss the rock where he rose up from the death.”

  “Can you help us?”

  “Of course. For a hundred shekels more I get you there very fast.”

  “Whatever it takes.”

  Ibrahim backed up, then honked his horn and stepped on the gas, earning curses from a shawled woman who had to dodge his front bumper to save her life. Another wave of heat rolled through me. I was afraid I might pass out.

  “Is it narcolepsy?” Rachel asked.

  “No. Different.”

  “We should go back to the hotel.”

  “No. The Via Dolorosa.”

  “Via Dolorosa,” echoed Ibrahim. “Way of Sadness. Christians here call it the Way of Flowers. First station Jesus condemned to death, second station the cross was forced upon him, third station he stumbled for the first time, fourth station…”

  Our guide’s voice quickly became a drone I couldn’t follow. Sweat poured from my skin, and I felt suddenly cold. As our car whipped through the narrow streets, I saw stone walls, bright shutters, market stalls spilling knickknacks from their shelves, and tourists dressed in the apparel of a hundred nations. Ibrahim rolled down his window to curse someone, and the scent of jasmine filled the car. When it entered my nostrils, I felt a sudden euphoria, and then everything went white.

  Chapter

  30

  “David? Wake up. We’re here.”

  Someone was shaking my shoulder. I blinked and sat up. Rachel was leaning in through the back door of the car.

  “Where are we?”

  “The Via Dolorosa. It’s a surrealist painting in motion. Do you still want to see it?”

  I pulled myself out of the car and stood gazing in awe at the throngs of tourists, four of whom carried large wooden crosses over their shoulder. Two of the would-be Jesuses wore white robes, the others street clothes. The crosses had wheels to ease the burden, which to me made the act of carrying them almost pointless.

  “Do you recognize anything from your dreams?” Rachel asked.

  “No. Let’s go.”

  Ibrahim led us along a cobbled street, weaving through the tourists with practiced ease. I had expected to find reverence here, but the atmosphere was more like a circus. A babel of voices reverberated between the walls: German, French, English, Russian, Hebrew, Arabic, Japanese, and Italian, and those just the languages I recognized. A man with a crew cut and an Alabama accent preached fire and brimstone to a group of Japanese pilgrims. Ibrahim talked all the way, his spiel honed to an emotionless monotone over years of guiding.

  “Wait,” Rachel said, stopping him. She turned to me. “What do you want to see?”

  “Where are we?”

  Ibrahim smiled. “Sir, up there at the blue door is the Omaria School, site of the first station of the cross, where Jesus was condemned to death.”

  “Do you want to see that?” Rachel asked.

  “No. What’s the second station?”

  Ibrahim pointed down the cobbled street to a half circle of bricks set in the street. “There is where Jesus began to carry the cross. Down the street is the Chapel of Flagellation, where the Roman soldiers whipped Jesus, set on him a crown of thorns, and said, ‘Hail, King of the Jews!’ Then Pilate led him to the crowd and cried, ‘Ecce homo! Behold the man!’”

  Ibrahim delivered this information with the excitement of a man reading bingo numbers in a nursing home.

  “Go on,” I said. “To the church.”

  Our guide continued down the street. We passed a black door set in a white stone arch, and Ibrahim said something about Jesus falling for the first time. I stared at the door but felt nothing. Perhaps what I sought lay buried beneath this warren of streets and shops and awnings. Jerusalem was probably like Cairo, built upon its own bones, a place where any new construction unearthed lost chapters of history.

  Ibrahim led us to another semicircle of bricks and started his spiel again. “This is the fifth station, where the Romans soldiers compelled Simon of Cyrene to help Jesus carry the cross.”

  Rachel glanced at me. “Keep moving.”

  A smiling boy wandered by selling thorn crowns. He took my stare as a sign of interest, but Ibrahim shooed him away. As I watched the bundle of thorns bob down the street on the boy’s arm, blackness filled my vision, and my knees went to water. Rachel slipped under my right arm, and together we stumbled after Ibrahim.

  The next few stops were a blur, the Palestinian’s words blending in a rush of strange images: Here Veronica wiped Jesus’ tormented face, at which his true likeness was miraculously imprinted on the veil…here Jesus fell the second time…here he said, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children”…

  We passed over a rooftop and through a dark chapel, and then I found myself in a crowded courtyard before a Romanesque church. Pilgrims, priests, and nuns moved under the watchful eyes of a dozen Israeli soldiers with submachine guns.

  “This is Church of the Holy Sepulchre,” Ibrahim said, waving his arm toward the building. “Built by Crusaders over fifty years between 1099 and 1149. Original basilica was built by Queen Helena, mother of Constantine, who came here in 325 and discovered pieces of the true cross in cave below the earth.”

  I looked with dismay at the line of tourists before the door.

  “This not bad,” Ibrahim said. “Tourism very bad for this time of year. The fighting scare everyone away, even in Western Holy Week. Good for you, bad for me. Do you feel all right, sir? I could get you some water while we wait.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “You can put more weight on me,” Rachel said, repositioning herself under my arm.

  I leaned a little harder on her. “Thanks.”

  She touched my cheek with the back of her hand. “I wish I could take your blood pressure.”

  “To the right of the entrance is tenth station,” said Ibrahim. “There Jesus was stripped of his clothes. Last five stations of the cross are contained within the church itself.”

  “It’s strange, isn’t it?” Rachel said quietly. “Millions of people traveling to see an empty tomb?”

  All I could manage was a nod.

  “This is only empty tomb in any Christian church on earth,” said Ibrahim. “The angel asked the Marys, ‘Whom do you seek?’ ‘Jesus of Nazareth,’ they said. ‘He is not here,’ said the angel. ‘He is risen.’”

  The courtyard suddenly faded before me, and my limbs grew less heavy. I seemed to float on Rachel’s arm.

  “David?” she asked. “Can you hear me?”

  I blinked and found myself looking at a stone ceiling. “Are we inside the church?”

  “You were sleepwalking,” she whispered, her eyes filled with anxiety. “We have to get you back to the hotel.”

  “We’re here now. We made it. I have to see it.”

  “See what?”

  And then I knew. “The tomb.”

  She turned to Ibrahim. “Where is Jesus’ tomb?”

  “This way. All the sites close together in this church.” He pointed at a reddish marble slab on the floor. Several men and women in street clothes knelt with their faces pressed to the stone. Above them, a woman poured something on the slab. A sickly sweet wave of perfume hit me.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “The Stone of Unction,” said Ibrahim, “where Jesus’ body was anointed with oils and wrapped in a shroud after he was taken down from the cross.”

  I moved closer, but I felt nothing. “Is this the original stone?”

  “No, sir. This stone dates from 1810 and replaces stone from twelfth century. Nothing certain is known beyond that time. This way, sir.”

  He led us to the
left, into the rotunda of the church. Light cascaded down from a spectacular gold and white dome. Below the dome stood a large rectangular edifice of marble that seemed to have been boxed for shipping in great metal bands. It was topped by a cupola that looked like it belonged on the Kremlin.