Where We Belong

by Lynn Austin

  “And most scoundrels don’t have a sense of humor, I suppose?”

  “Most of the people I know don’t have a sense of humor,” Flora replied. She was thoughtful for a moment, then said, “Listen, Becky, I think we should invite Edmund to travel with us. I really don’t see what harm it could do. He can’t be too disreputable if he works at Cambridge University.”

  “You’re assuming he’s telling the truth about Cambridge?”

  “Well . . . yes, I suppose I am.”

  Rebecca laughed, then said, “I agree. I believe he’s genuine, too. After all, he couldn’t have stranded himself out there, could he? And I do like him. He’s not only intelligent and knowledgeable, but quite charming.”

  “Good. Although I suppose Thomas would be very displeased if he knew we were inviting a stranger to join us. Especially one with short trousers and hairy legs.”

  “The horror of it!” Rebecca said with a laugh. “But Thomas doesn’t have to know about Edmund. I won’t mention him if you don’t.”

  “Then please don’t tell him I rode on a camel to see the pyramids, either. I’m sure he’s imagining me in a fancy carriage with matched stallions.”

  “Aren’t you glad you’re not?”

  “Yes, but Thomas would be—”

  “Stop worrying about Thomas and just have fun. Tomorrow we’ll invite Mr. Merriday to join us and be our guide in Jerusalem. And for the record, I hope he agrees.”

  Rebecca blew out the lamp, plunging the room into total darkness. A moment later, she heard Flora’s voice from a few feet away. “Becky? This bedding is really scratchy. You don’t suppose it has bedbugs, do you?”

  “Well, if so, it will be another new experience. And we can’t have an adventure without some sort of trouble, can we?”

  Chapter 12

  Edmund Merriday looked rested the next morning as he slid his lanky body onto the bench to join them for breakfast in the inn’s courtyard. “Good morning, ladies. I want to thank you once again for—”

  “We have a proposition to make,” Rebecca interrupted. “We would like you to come to Jerusalem with us and show us the sights. Perhaps we could even add the synagogue in Capernaum to our itinerary.”

  He stared at them for a moment, his blue eyes wide with surprise. “But I have no way to pay for my expenses, and I couldn’t possibly impose on—”

  “You’re not imposing. You can earn your way by serving as our guide.”

  “We were going to hire one anyway,” Flora added. “And you seem very knowledgeable. You also have the added advantage of speaking perfect English.”

  Edmund looked from one of them to the other. He seemed incapable of forming a reply.

  “If you come with us,” Rebecca continued, “you could travel for a few more weeks instead of cutting your vacation short. And I would love to learn more about ancient artifacts and manuscripts from you.”

  Edmund raised one eyebrow. “Are you certain you’re not going to regret it? One might think me a bumbling liability, considering the sad condition I was in when you found me. What sort of reputable guide wanders around penniless and on foot, for heaven’s sake?”

  “Nonsense. We could use an interesting traveling companion.”

  “Oh, I do hope you’ll agree,” Flora said. “If so, we’ll ask Habib to hire another horse for you.”

  Edmund took a moment to consider. “Very well, but only if you promise to send me on my way the moment I become a nuisance.”

  “It’s a deal.” Rebecca shook hands with him, sealing the contract.

  Flora extended her hand in a proper, ladylike manner. “Take us through Jerusalem and the Holy Land, Edmund. Teach us everything you know.”

  They spent the following three nights sleeping in the tents Habib had packed as they made their way through the hill country to Jerusalem. The terrain became greener and more mountainous as they neared the ancient city. Rebecca’s heart seemed to skip a beat as her horse reached the top of a rise and she saw the golden walls of Jerusalem in the distance for the first time. “It’s magical!” she said. “Like a castle from a fairy tale.”

  “Perhaps from this distance,” Edmund said. “I don’t want to disillusion you ladies, but up close it’s much like all the other run-down, neglected cities in the Ottoman Empire. None of Jerusalem’s conquerors have been able to make the city thrive since the Romans exiled the Jewish people from it.”

  “Then let’s sit here and gaze at it for a moment longer,” Flora said. “I can’t believe we’re seeing the same city where Jesus walked.”

  “See that large gray dome behind the walls?” Edmund asked, pointing. “That’s a Moslem shrine built about twelve hundred years ago on the site where the Jewish Temple once stood. I’ll show it to you, if you’d like.”

  They toured the Temple Mount and the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, where Christ’s tomb supposedly stood, and visited the mission church in Jerusalem that Rebecca’s church had supported all these years. Edmund took them on a hike up the Mount of Olives, then down the other side to the village of Bethany, where Jesus had raised Lazarus from the dead. As they rode astride the squat little donkeys Edmund had hired, laughing uproariously, their skirts hiked up and their bare legs dangling, Rebecca was relieved to see the change in her sister. Flora had finally let go of all the rules that kept her tightly bound these past few years and no longer seemed concerned about her clothes or her hair, let alone propriety. Rebecca hadn’t seen her sister so relaxed and happy since they were schoolgirls. Edmund was proving to be a delightful guide, finding amusement in every situation, entertaining them with stories, and narrating centuries of history at every site they visited. She began to hope that Flora would see the differences between charming Edmund and her fiancé, Thomas, and raise her standards for a lifelong partner once they returned home. Surely there were more men in Chicago for the two of them to choose from than Thomas and Freddy Worthington.

  Edmund knew all the best places to eat, and Rebecca had never seen anyone enjoy sampling new food as much as he did. He ate each meal as if it might be his last, and the food fueled his boundless energy. He bounced around each site in his khaki shorts, curiously peering into every niche, asking hundreds of questions of the people they met using Rebecca as his interpreter. Rebecca had never met a man quite like Edmund and knew she probably never would again. She loved watching his elegant hands while he ate and as he gestured whenever he talked, as if painting each sentence with his fingers. She longed to brush her fingers across the golden hairs on his sun-bronzed arms or comb his thick, sandy hair when it fell into his eyes like a mischievous schoolboy’s. He badly needed a proper haircut and trim for his beard and mustache, which had grown full since they’d met him, but Rebecca wouldn’t change a single thing about this wonderful, remarkable man. Was she falling in love with him? She quickly dismissed the thought. They had learned that he was thirty-six, which made him fifteen years older than her, sixteen years older than Flora.

  He took them to Bethlehem to see the church built by Constantine the Great in AD 333 over the traditional site where Jesus was born. Afterward, they bought a lunch of bread, olives, cucumbers, and dates and sat on a hillside on the edge of the village to eat while their horses munched on tufts of grass nearby. Her tour of the Holy Land had barely begun and already Rebecca felt full nearly to overflowing from all she’d seen and experienced. She watched a shepherd leading a ragged flock of sheep in the distance and thought of the angels bursting through the sky with their announcement on the night of Christ’s birth. If only God would send even one angel to announce His plans for her life. She sighed and reached for another plump date as she brought her attention back to the conversation that Edmund and Flora were having.

  “So you believe the Church of the Nativity might house some ancient manuscripts?” Flora was asking him.

  “Undoubtedly. But I believe that the true gold mine for ancient manuscripts is the Monastery of St. Catherine on Mount Sinai.”

  “The same M
ount Sinai where God gave Moses the Ten Commandments?”

  “Well, according to tradition it’s the same site. But how can anyone really know for certain?”

  “I don’t suppose Moses marked the spot with an enormous sign, did he?” Rebecca added.

  “I once visited St. Catherine’s Monastery and toured their library,” Edmund continued. “It was quite disorganized with everything in disarray, nothing catalogued or sorted. Some scrolls had simply been stashed inside chests and boxes and left to crumble into dust. I volunteered my expertise to help the monks organize it all, since they didn’t seem to have any idea what they possessed, and they agreed. But I’d barely made a start when the summer ended, and I had to return to Cambridge. I promised to return and help them catalog everything the following year. But before I had a chance, the huge scandal caused by a German scholar named von Tischendorf came to a very nasty ending, and the doors to St. Catherine’s were closed to even harmless librarians like me.”

  “That sounds intriguing,” Rebecca said, scooping up a handful of olives. “I love a good scandal. Tell us more.”

  Edmund leaned forward to tell the story. “Well, it seems von Tischendorf visited the monastery and saw the large number of early manuscripts in their library, just as I had. He returned to the University of Leipzig with forty-three parchment pages from an Old Testament codex, written in Greek, which he claims the monks were about to burn in the fireplace. Scholars were astonished to realize that these pages were part of one of the oldest Bibles ever discovered. Of course, von Tischendorf wanted to get his hands on the rest of the codex. He visited Russia and got support for his research from the Russian czar. The czar and his ancestors had long supported the Monastery of St. Catherine, so the monks had to welcome von Tischendorf for the sake of their Russian patron. He somehow convinced the monks to let him ‘borrow’ the complete Bible, known as the Codex Sinaiticus, to show to the Russian emperor—but it was never returned. The monks felt robbed, of course, and so the library at St. Catherine’s has been closed to scholars ever since.”

  “Oh my. What a black mark for Christian scholars.”

  “If the Codex Sinaiticus is any example, I believe the monks may unknowingly possess more ancient manuscripts just as valuable. The library could prove to be a treasure-house if scholars ever had the opportunity to study there. Unfortunately, von Tischendorf ruined that chance for everyone.”

  “What would be the importance if someone were to find these manuscripts?” Flora asked.

  “They would prove to all the skeptics and naysayers that the Bible we have today hasn’t changed in the thousands of years since it was written. Christ’s words haven’t been embellished or altered over the years but are nearly the same as when He spoke them. Authenticating the Bible is really the goal behind all my travels and my collection of artifacts.”

  “What do you mean?” Rebecca asked.

  “My Christian faith is very important to me,” Edmund said, his eyes shining as he spoke. “It’s part of who I am. Because of that, I’ve been compiling a record of recent archaeological discoveries in this part of the world and noting how each discovery sheds new light on Scripture.”

  “Flora and I have been following the news of these discoveries, too. Please continue.”

  “Well, with the growing interest in scientific inquiry, many people in England scoff at miracles and ridicule the Bible. They don’t believe, for instance, that angels could have burst forth from heaven and into our world in a field like this two thousand years ago. Or that a virgin could bear a son as the prophet foretold hundreds of years earlier. Their skepticism is playing havoc with people’s faith in the accuracy of Scripture. But if I can show that the Bible can be believed as a historical document, accurate in every respect, then perhaps the skeptics will concede that the Bible’s spiritual message may have validity, as well.”

  “That’s fascinating!” Rebecca said. “When I read Henry Layard’s book, Discoveries in the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon, I realized that Jeremiah’s prophecy had been fulfilled. Babylon had been completely buried.”

  “Yes! Jeremiah chapter fifty-one!” Edmund jumped up from the rock where he’d been sitting, dancing with excitement as he quoted the Scripture. “‘Babylon will be a heap of ruins, a haunt of jackals, an object of horror and scorn, a place where no one lives.’ I thought I was the only person in the world who was interested in all of this.”

  “So did I!” Rebecca felt like dancing, too. “Flora and our father were the only people in Chicago I could even talk to about it.” She felt a growing excitement as she laid down her bread, too keyed up to eat. Edmund’s work combined travel and study and ancient history and faith—all of her passions! And he planned to combine them in a book—a potentially life-changing book. “How far along is your project?” she asked.

  He sighed and removed his hat to run his fingers through his hair. “I have piles and piles of notes and observations and artifacts that I’ve collected during my holidays, but each time I return home and the school term begins, I have little time to compile my findings, much less write them up in a coherent narrative. Besides, I’m a researcher, so my writing style tends to be rather pedantic. Certainly not something the general public would appreciate—and that’s the audience I hope to reach. At any rate, I don’t have nearly as much time to devote to the project as it requires, so it’s a mere daydream at this point. And there are financial considerations, as well. I must work to pay for my flat, of course, and fund my travels.”

  Rebecca knew she had the finances to support Edmund’s work. Was this how she could use the gifts and resources God had given to her?

  They gathered up the remains of their picnic and returned to their inn in Jerusalem, but the more Rebecca pondered Edmund’s book, the more intrigued she became. She couldn’t stop thinking about it, trying to figure out a way she could offer to sponsor his work without insulting him. She barely tasted her food that evening, imagining the manuscripts that may lie hidden in dark, dusty churches like the Church of the Nativity or the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, imagining how Edmund’s book could shine light into the minds and hearts of skeptics.

  “You’ve been quiet all afternoon, Becky,” Flora said as she braided her long hair before bed. “Are you unwell?”

  “I’ve never felt better. But I can’t stop thinking about Edmund’s project.”

  “What project?” It hadn’t struck a chord with Flora the way it had with Rebecca.

  “The book he described to us today.” The stones felt warm beneath her bare feet as she paced the floor of their tiny room, too excited to sleep. “I’ve been imagining how wonderful it would be to research a book like his about archaeology and history and the Bible—all of the things I’m interested in. I would love to work on it with him, and in a way I feel it may be what I was meant to do. What if everything in my life has been leading up to this—all my studies, our travels, the languages we’ve mastered, the way Father raised us with a fascination for archaeology?”

  She paused, waiting for Flora’s reaction to her excited musings, and saw a look of interest on her face. “Go on, I’m listening.”

  “Ever since Edmund told us about his book, I’ve been looking back on my life, all I’ve experienced and struggled with, and I can see all those things converging in this project—and God’s hand directing it. I feel like Paul meeting Jesus on the road to Damascus when his eyes were finally opened.”

  “Why don’t you talk to Edmund about it some more?”

  Rebecca barely heard her. “When I recall how we just happened to run into Edmund in the first place, it has to be more than a coincidence, doesn’t it? It can’t be pure chance that we took the same road on the same day. Or that our agent was honest and Edmund’s wasn’t.”

  “You believe God arranged it?”

  “I do. Just for me, Flora. I want to help Edmund with his book . . . but . . .”

  “Why are you hesitating?”

  “I’m afraid he’ll question m
y motives and think I’m trying to steal his idea.”

  “He knows us better than that by now. Just come right out and ask him tomorrow. Tell him everything you told me. The worst he can do is say no.”

  Rebecca would be devastated if Edmund did turn her down. And then what would she do? Plunge into the research herself, stealing his idea the way von Tischendorf had stolen the codex? She admired Edmund Merriday too much to do such a thing. Yet she felt she was meant to work on this book. “Yes . . . maybe I will discuss it with him,” she finally said. “Good night, Flora.”

  Rebecca climbed between the sheets and tried to settle down on the narrow bed. She didn’t know what the proprietor had used to stuff the mattress, but it poked through the sheet and the canvas ticking like millions of tiny dress pins. She spent the long night trying to get comfortable and praying that Edmund would agree to let her help with his book. Surely this was God’s purpose for her, wasn’t it?

  “What shall we see today?” Edmund asked as they drank tea together the next morning.

  “If we’ve seen everything here in Jerusalem,” Flora replied, “I would love to travel north to the Sea of Galilee.”

  Rebecca forced herself to wait, listening to the morning small-talk between Edmund and Flora, waiting for the right moment to make her proposal. When the time finally came, she shoved aside the teapot and cups and plates, careful to speak calmly so her enthusiasm wouldn’t frighten him away. “Before we begin our day, Edmund, I have a proposition for you. You don’t need to give me an answer right away—take time to think it over . . . But Flora and I are also Christians, as you know. I have a college degree in history and a fascination with the ancient world. I’ve been told by my teachers that I’m an excellent writer—as is Flora, who has a Laureate of Literature degree. I love history and I can read Greek and Hebrew and French and a little Italian. I love to travel and explore, and our financial situation allows us the freedom to do it. And so I wonder if . . .” She drew a deep breath. “If you would consider allowing me to collaborate with you on the book you’re writing?” She wished she could decipher the puzzled expression on his face as he scratched his forehead.