by Izak Botha
Later that evening, hoping to put the day’s disappointment behind him, Rabin had taken his wife to the hotel pier for sundowners. They had watched the last of the sun’s golden rays transmute into pastel, lavender and rose, before vanishing into the seemingly endless Gulf. Before retiring to their room, they had strolled along the jetty. Standing on the edge, he had read the name of a moored yacht. It was then that he had seen something he wished he had not: in the glow of the jetty’s floodlights he could make out the swishing bodies and tails of a school of tarpon gliding lazily through the ultramarine waters. Instead of wasting time and money on the incompetent character who had taken him out that day, he could have simply cast his line right beside the hotel.
When Jennifer eventually attempted to steer the conversation back to faith, Rabin called it a night. She was stunned. She saw it as a lost opportunity to gain insight into the question which nagged at her. He paid the bill, walked her to the street and called her a cab. Closing the door, he told her to read Thomas Paine’s The Age of Reason. She knew the book formed part of her curriculum, but through some lapse of her own, she had not read it yet.
Realizing Rabin would not recommend a two-hundred-year-old book he did not think significant, she decided to get a copy. When she unsuccessfully tried to buy it from her local bookstore, she thought of getting it from the library or ordering a copy online. Something must have come up, because she never got around to it. To her surprise though, a second-hand copy arrived via UPS. It was admittedly slightly creepy that a professor was interested enough to find out where she lived, but his note in the jacket allayed any fears she might have that he was stalking her. He sent her his personal copy; all he asked was that she read and took good care of it.
Paine’s work impacted Jennifer’s life greatly—perhaps even more so than the Bible itself. And despite her syllabus over the course of her studies including opposing views to Christianity, nothing hit home as much as Paine’s words. Her years of trying to establish the authenticity of the Bible as a truthful record of the past, had been in vain. Apart from demonstrating the impossibility of her quest, Paine led her towards a mode of reasoned belief. His way of showing how the Bible exposed itself as myth seemed ominous, yet brilliant. His clarity and commonsense approach gave his ideas a simplicity unrivalled by the theologians of his time. But in a world where religion reigned supreme and Rationalism was still in its infancy, his words had fallen only on the ears of a few freethinkers. His attack on the religious establishment had made him so unpopular that only six people attended his funeral.
No longer could Jennifer live in denial; she simply had to know more. It was one thing reading about the insights of great thinkers, another to experience them yourself. But she internalized Paine’s ideas in a moment of illumination and experienced the enlightenment of rational thought. John Cottingham’s work on reason as the chief source and test of knowledge followed. Not that she agreed with everything, but she was on a new course. Rabin introducing her to these works broadened her mind—and she quit pursuing her PhD. She gave up on her dissertation: The Authenticity of the Holy Bible. Through people like Paine, Cottingham and Professor Rabin, she learned that neither faith nor reason could authenticate the Bible; even if it were authentic, it was not authentifiable.
It only dawned on Jennifer months later that Professor Rabin’s fishing story had been an allegorical answer to her question: rather than check the charter company’s bona fide, he had taken its operators’ integrity for granted, and therein lay the lesson on faith—a person could not entrust his or her spiritual fate to blind belief. The irony, though, was that neither man nor institution could guarantee spiritual salvation.
*****
Simon passed Rabin the silver casket. ‘We’re not coming with you, Uri.’
‘Is there a problem, Shi’mon?’
‘I’m taking Jennifer to Tel Aviv. She’ll be safer there.’
Rabin nodded. ‘She can also take a direct flight.’
‘We should get going, then.’
Simon shook Rabin’s hand. He turned to leave but stopped, for not far off he saw Giorgio approaching from customs. From the deep frown creasing his friend’s forehead, it was obvious that something was wrong.
Giorgio and Rabin needed no introduction. They had met a few days before when Giorgio fetched Simon. He greeted the professor briefly, then led Simon to a less crowded corner of the terminus.
‘The gendarmes have just left Rome,’ Giorgio said. ‘I’m told they know we’ve landed here and are on their way.’
‘How long still to refuel?’
Giorgio shrugged. ‘I’m not sure. An hour, maybe. The guys here are very slow.’
Simon looked at the flight schedules across the hall. The only flight out of Turkey left around eight, which meant Jennifer’s departure would coincide with the gendarmes’ arrival. He checked his watch. It was nearly half past four, Turkish time. He was still searching for an alternative when something caught his eye. The airport bookshop stood right below the flight-schedule board. Predictably, a woman was paying for a book at the register, and a man was riffling through magazines on one of the racks, but this was normal. What was disturbing, though, was the clerk he had just seen disappear into a back office.
Simon had not considered any alternative plans, but his instincts told him to get the hell out of there. Their best bet was Adana, a two-hour drive north, where international flights departed all night. He and Rabin had flown internationally from there before, and it was a safe bet they would have an evening departure to Tel Aviv.
‘We’re driving,’ Simon said. ‘Giorgio, you and your staff are coming with us.’
‘Nono, Simon,’ Giorgio objected. ‘You have enough to worry about. I’m going to see if I can refuel in time. If not, I’ll take my people to Harbiye south of the city. I have distant family living there. Or I’ll find us a bed and breakfast to stay over-night.’
Reluctantly, Simon shook Giorgio’s hand. He would have liked to convince Giorgio otherwise, but he knew his friend’s autonomy enabled him to look after himself and his staff. ‘Thank you for bringing us this far, mio amico. If we’re still here tomorrow, I’ll go back with you. If not, see you in Rome.’
Simon did not wait for Giorgio to respond, but taking Jennifer’s hand, proceeded towards the pickup zone outside.
‘Ciao,’ Giorgio greeted, waving. ‘Take good care of her.’
Seeing Giorgio watching them leave, saddened Jennifer. Without him she and Simon would have probably been caught by the gendarmes by now. It was uncanny how quickly they had connected. Her decision not to run from Simon had been a direct result of the information he had shared with her.
Rabin took the lead and crossed the street to the parking lot in the far corner of the airport. With early summer temperatures hovering around eighty, he had parked his Range Rover under the only tree he could find. He disarmed the central locking system as the three of them crossed the tarmac.
‘You drive,’ he said, throwing Simon the keys.
Simon held open the front passenger-side door for Jennifer. This time, she got in.
Chapter 31
Simon set off keeping one eye on the rear-view mirror. He could have sworn he had recognized the person who ducked out of sight in the airport bookstore. It was the Capuchin monk named Brian Malone. Discalced and heavily bearded, Malone belonged to the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin. The order originated in 1520 when Observant Franciscan friar Matteo da Bascio sought to return to a simple life of solitude and penance as practiced by Saint Francis of Assisi.
Simon was sure he had seen Malone scurry into the back office of the bookstore. The monk’s brown tunic and pointed hood was so distinctive Simon would have recognized it anywhere. Since becoming Antakya’s resident priest the year before, Malone had shown great interest in the Antioch dig. Simon recalled meeting the friar soon after excavation started at the site. Simon had just left the council building when the fifty-five-year-old monk, lingering outsi
de, had stepped up and introduced himself. Malone’s persistent questioning had struck Simon as intrusive, but he assumed the clergyman would be naturally curious about excavations so close to the Cave Church of Saint Peter. He had presumed Malone’s interest was genuine, but the monk’s presence at the airport now made Simon think the Vatican had used him all along to monitor their progress.
Of course, perhaps Simon was being paranoid, but considering the circumstances, he could not afford ignoring Malone’s presence. He had to accept the monk would compromise their escape to Adana. Anyhow, his being there at the airport—if it was him—was suspiciously well-timed. Malone tailing them meant he was feeding information to the Vatican. As Simon checked his rear-view again, he hoped, perversely perhaps, to see the friar’s old beat-up Caravelle behind them. Knowing where he was seemed preferable to wondering.
Jennifer stared out of her window, blinking at the glare. Driving along the two-lane highway reminded her of Florida’s interstates, except it lacked the lush, green vegetation of her home state; indeed, the harsh, desiccated landscape had an unnatural rawness to it. By the side of the road, a dust devil whirled over a vineyard. In the shade, hives of bees bustled, their legs laden with sacs of pollen. Up the valley, industrial sprinklers shot short bursts of water over the rolling citrus plantations at regular intervals, and in the distance, she could see workers tending cotton fields.
When they neared the outskirts of Antakya, the rush-hour had picked up. Simon turned left at a sign saying Türkmen Bashi Cd and accelerated towards the Hacilar exit half a kilometer up the road. He crossed the Orontes River at the second of seven bridges. With the Starius and Habib Neccar mountains now serving as a backdrop the view from Jennifer’s window seemed dreamlike. Minarets rose above randomly spaced, two- and three-story Ottoman-era buildings, and she could hear the recorded voice of a muezzin ululating the ezan over loudspeakers miles away.
By the time Simon turned left onto the Reyhanli Yolu, she had momentarily lost her sense of direction. Only when he turned towards the mountain again and she read Senpiyer on the street corner post did she realize where they were going. The roar of the Range Rover’s engine deepened as it accelerated up the curved road beneath Mount Starius. At the summit, a hundred-meter sandstone cliff loomed like a sentry. Scattered along its rocky face, eerie nooks marked the entrances to hundreds of ancient hermitages. The sandstone facade atop the plateau’s jutting terrace made Jennifer sit up.
‘Senpiyer Kilisesi,’ she whispered. Then, as if awaking from a deep sleep: ‘This is the Cave Church of Saint Peter! I’m right, aren’t I.’
Simon’s eyes scanned the parking area for somewhere to make a U-turn. ‘Now if only it had a two-hundred-meter carpark in front of it like that tacky thing in Rome.’
She found his sarcasm amusing, but rather than laugh, she noticed the quickening of her heartbeat. Vatican tradition taught the Cave Church of Saint Peter marked the place where the Apostle Peter had first ministered to the gentiles. As someone who had studied religion most of her life, she had long had the church on her must-see list.
‘You work here?’
‘That I do.’
‘That’s not what I meant.’
The casket tucked firmly under his arm, Rabin got out of the Range Rover. He stopped as he passed Jennifer’s window.
‘Our site is on the plateau higher up,’ he said.
‘On?’ She leaned her head out the open window for a better view of the mountain. ‘What’s up there?’
‘We’re excavating skeletal remains buried in ossuaries, which were found in a hidden catacomb. We wouldn’t even have known they were here if a janitor at Mustafa Kemal University hadn’t got it into his head to borrow a ground-penetrating radar to look for artefacts up top. Just like in Israel, it’s usually the amateurs who make the biggest finds, but in this case, someone noticed their lab equipment was missing, and here we are.’
‘No offence, Professor, but why are you here?’
Rabin understood her question perfectly. He was a Jew exhuming bodies in a Muslim country, while just across the Syrian border, an hour’s drive away, radical Muslims were persecuting people for nothing more than not being Muslim. ‘Initially the government thought the catacombs were Muslim and wouldn’t let anyone in, but when a Star of David was found etched into one of the ossuaries, they contacted the IAA. As for the rest of it, I’m an Israeli. They’ve been trying to kill us since I can remember. You get used to it.’
‘How old are the graves?’
‘Anywhere from two thousand to about fifteen hundred years.’
His casualness was nauseating. The existence of two-thousand-year-old Jewish graves in biblical Antioch was extraordinary; the entire world needed to know about it. ‘That makes them the original Jews who fled Saul’s persecution, right?’
‘Maybe, but probably not. If you remember correctly, Jews also lived throughout the Eastern Roman Empire after Titus sacked Jerusalem.’
‘Sorry to interrupt, Uri, but we’ve got to get moving.’ Simon leaned across Jennifer’s lap to greet his colleague. ‘Best of luck, and call if you find anything.’
But Jennifer could not leave yet. She was a few hundred yards from where important work was underway, work nobody knew about, and considering the gendarmes were still after them, this could very well be her one and only chance to see the site. She was sure if the Vatican did catch her and Simon it would mean death, and whether they were caught in Turkey or Israel, would not matter much at that point. At least if she saw the dig, she could die feeling she had not been totally robbed.
She opened her door as Simon was already pulling out. ‘Wait,’ she called out. ‘I’m coming with you, Professor.’
Simon reached out to stop her, but she had already fled the Range Rover. ‘We have to go, Jennifer,’ he shouted.
‘I’m not leaving. There’s too much at stake. …’
Simon jumped out of the idling vehicle. Standing in the middle of the road, he shouted after her: ‘“Too much at stake?” Damn it, listen to yourself. You sound like some trite character from American television. What’s at stake, Jennifer. Really, what’s at stake?! You sound like a goddamned child! You, me, Uri—we can all come back here once our current situation’s sorted, but until then you’re just going to get us all killed with this idiot, nonsense urgency of yours!’
Jennifer stopped. Turning back, she stared at him. ‘Seriously, Simon? I wouldn’t even be in this mess if you hadn’t “rescued” me. What did you rescue me from, jail? Great. So, I’d call the embassy and get an attorney. Now, however, I’ve got people shooting at me for something I had nothing to do with. I mean, seriously, Simon, go fuck yourself. If I’m going to get shot—which I probably am because of you—I at least want to check one thing off my bucket list, and since we’re nowhere near the fucking pyramids, this is going to have to do.’
Simon had switched the Range Rover off and was getting out to chase after her. If she was going to see the archaeology site, she was going to have to run.
Jennifer darted towards the narrow path snaking up the side of the cliff face. The importance of the Cave Church could not be understated; Christianity had probably originated on the very spot where she was standing. Again, the Literalist ideas of her youth began overwhelming the skepticism that had driven her from school. There was, after all, no better place to prove that maybe the Bible’s teachings matched the evidence on the ground. With the Vatican coming up short in so many ways, she had had her doubts, but perhaps she was seeking her facts in the wrong place. Perhaps she—not Simon or Rabin—would find something that undeniably proved the truth of the Gospels. Even if it did not, she had to try, and this thought propelled her forward, straining her calves and thighs as she raced for the top of the plateau.
Suddenly, though, the path split, and she realized she did not know where she was going. She searched for Rabin up ahead, but he had vanished. Embarrassed and still feeling insolent, she hated what she was about to do. But, if she
was going to get to the dig site, she had no choice.
‘Are you coming?’ she shouted at Simon, who was still standing beside the Range Rover in the parking lot below.
‘You don’t even know where you’re going, do you?’
Rabin stepped onto the path halfway down, from an area she only vaguely remembered passing. ‘You’ve gone too far,’ he said. ‘It’s this way.’
Jennifer jogged down to meet him and realized her mistake: a boulder jutted into the path and, immediately past it, a small trail led to the top of the plateau at an even steeper angle than the main path. It was not exactly hidden, but neither was it obvious. To her, hidden pathways indicated the people who had lived there had wanted to hide—and considering the site’s dating and symbolism, first-century Christians would fit the mold perfectly.
‘Uri, you’re supposed to be on my side,’ Simon called from a few yards behind them.
Jennifer instinctively turned. Then, thinking better of it, she continued following Rabin up the hill.
For his part, Simon was furious. What was wrong with this woman? It was already way past four o’clock, and with the gendarmes arriving around six and getting through customs by, say, six-thirty, they were cutting it close. Part of him wanted to grab her and drag her back to the Range Rover, but another part of him could not stand the thought of hurting her. He also admired her for her strong will; it was that same character trait, he knew, that had motivated her to take on the Vatican spontaneously and alone. Not that she had any chance of succeeding, and perhaps she knew that too, but—well, call it courageous or stupid, it was a rare quality, and he hoped her rashness would not get them killed.