by Lynn Austin
“You see?” Shur said. “I’m sure there will be a reasonable explanation, and then Mr. Ashrawi will be free to go.”
But as Abby waited, trying to make small talk with Agent Shur, she realized that she couldn’t explain how Marwan knew about Benjamin Rosen. She was having serious regrets about getting involved in this and possibly betraying Marwan when someone knocked on her door. Agent Shur motioned for her to answer it.
“Thanks for coming, Marwan,” she said when she saw him. “Come in.”
She stood aside to let him pass, then closed the door. When she turned to Agent Shur, he had a gun pointed at them.
“Don’t scream,” he said as she gasped. “Just sit down on the bed, please, and don’t say a word.”
But Abby had already collapsed onto it involuntarily as her knees gave way. A wave of shock coursed through her like a jolt of electricity. Shur pressed the gun to the back of Marwan’s head and quickly searched him for weapons, then pushed him down onto the bed beside Abby. All the color had bleached from Marwan’s face. She prayed that Shur would question him about Ari quickly and get it over with instead of prolonging his terror. Shur consulted his watch. When he finally asked the first question, it had nothing at all to do with Ari.
“Did you drive your own car here?” he asked in a low voice. Marwan nodded. “Is it parked outside?”
“Yes.”
Several long minutes passed as Shur sat down in the desk chair again, waiting. He said nothing, but the gun pointed at the two of them was steady in his hand. Abby trembled from head to toe. She could sense Marwan’s rising fear as he waited beside her. His breathing grew ragged and shallow.
“Why—” Marwan finally started to ask, but Shur silenced him by cocking the gun with a loud snap and pointing it at Marwan’s face. As he did, Abby noticed for the first time that Shur was wearing a pair of very thin gloves.
Suddenly she knew with terrible certainty that Shur was the traitor who had killed Benjamin Rosen. That’s what Ben had been trying to tell her—not that he was sure there was a traitor, but that Shur was the traitor.
“Oh, God!” she whispered. Cold nausea slithered through her. “I’m sorry, Marwan, I didn’t know.”
“But you would have figured it out,” Shur said in a cold, quiet voice. “You would have eventually remembered the verse for Ben’s code and figured it out.” He sighed and shook his head as if he were truly sorry. “You should have gone home after we ransacked your house, Mrs. MacLeod. It would have been the wisest thing to do.”
Abby fought the urge to be sick as she stared at the gaping gun barrel. Shur planned to kill her. The thought of dying wasn’t as terrifying as waiting for it to happen, wondering how it would feel. Her throat ached as she labored to breathe. A few more agonizing minutes passed before Shur checked his watch again, then spoke.
“All right, Abby. I would like you to take off your shoes, pull back the covers, and lie down on the bed, please.”
“No—” Before the word was barely out of her mouth, Shur was on his feet with the muzzle of the gun pressed to Marwan’s head.
“Do it.” He didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t need to. She fumbled to unfasten her sandals with shaking hands, then pulled back the bedspread and lay down on the sheets.
“I’m sorry. . . .” she whispered to Marwan again.
“You’re next,” Shur told Marwan. “Remove your shoes and lie down beside her.”
“I refuse,” Marwan said. “You may as well kill me and get it over with.” He didn’t flinch, even with the gun barrel pressed to his head.
“Oh, you are going to die,” Shur said coldly, “but I will give you this choice—you either make it appear that you were her lover, or I will make you into her rapist. How will your wife and children like that?”
Marwan closed his eyes. He did what Shur asked, lying down on his back beside Abby.
Shur returned to his chair and began groping through his jacket pockets with his free hand, searching for something. As Abby watched, she wondered if either she or Marwan, or maybe both of them together, dared to make a move. Shur couldn’t possibly keep one gun trained on two people at the same time, could he? Marwan was in much better physical shape than the paunchy, round-shouldered agent. They had nothing to lose by trying, since they were both going to die anyway.
But before she could nudge Marwan, Shur removed a pair of handcuffs from his jacket.
“Raise your arms above your head,” he commanded. “Both of you.”
He locked one end to Marwan’s wrist, then slipped the cuffs around one of the brass headboard rails and locked the other end to Abby’s wrist. Neither one of them could get up.
Shur laid his gun on the desk and dug into his pocket again, removing a plastic bag containing a smaller gun. As he carefully unwrapped it, Abby guessed that it was the weapon that had killed Benjamin Rosen. Shur pressed it into Marwan’s free hand.
“Don’t be afraid,” he taunted. “It isn’t loaded—yet.” He forced Marwan to grip it and squeeze the trigger so it would have his fingerprints on it, then took it away from him again. When Shur removed a clip of bullets from his pocket and began to load it, Abby started to sob. She knew that she would die first. Shur would make it appear that they had been lovers, that Marwan had killed her, and then was stopped by Shur as he tried to flee. Abby closed her eyes and began to pray. Not for deliverance—it was too late for that—but for forgiveness. She knew she didn’t deserve it unless she forgave Mark, but she also knew that God was merciful.
Oh, God, please forgive me, she silently prayed. I’m so sorry for-
Suddenly the bungalow door slammed open as it was kicked from the outside.
“Drop it, Shur!” someone shouted.
A deafening explosion of gunfire filled the room. Abby screamed and huddled against Marwan for protection. She heard the crash of breaking glass, the splintering of wood. If she was hit, she didn’t feel any pain.
When the gunfire stopped, her eyes flew open and she saw Agent Shur falling to the ground as if in slow motion. The gun he had been loading slipped from his hand and dropped to the floor seconds before he did. Shards of the bungalow’s shattered window littered the carpet.
Ari Bazak stood in the doorway, holding a gun.
“Are you all right?” he asked them.
“Yes . . . I think so,” Marwan said shakily.
Abby was sobbing too hard to reply. Ari sat down on the bed beside her and drew her into his arms. His body trembled as much as hers did.
“It’s all right,” he soothed as she clung to him with her one free arm. “Everything is going to be all right.”
CHAPTER 22
THE GOLANI HOTEL, ISRAEL—1999
Abby stuffed the last of her belongings into Aher suitcase and flipped the top closed. “I guess that’s everything,” she said, glancing around the hotel room one last time.
“Here, let me help you with that.” Hannah leaned on the lid to hold it down while Abby zipped it shut. When they finished, the two friends gazed at each other.
“There’s so much I want to say,” Abby began, taking Hannah’s hands. “Thank you hardly seems adequate. I don’t think I could have recovered from that . . . ordeal . . . without your help.”
In the aftermath of the shooting, more agents had swarmed into Abby’s room behind Ari. They’d called an ambulance for Shur, then combed the room for evidence, taking statements from her and Marwan, piecing together the chain of events. Later, Abby had taken refuge in Hannah’s bungalow, moving her things into the empty room beside Hannah’s for the last four days of the dig. Now, much too soon, it was time to say good-bye.
“I’m glad I could help,” Hannah said, hugging her. “I’m sorry you had to witness the violent side of my country—not once, but twice. Let’s hope that your next visit to Israel will be an uneventful one. Until then, will you pray for the peace of Jerusalem, as King David asked us to do in his psalm?”
“Yes, I promise I will.”
Hannah released her, and Abby hefted her suitcase from the bed to the floor.
“I’ll be praying for Ari, too,” she said. “I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to say good-bye to him.”
“I went to see him yesterday,” Hannah said.
“How is he?”
“Still trying to recover from the shooting. It was a terrible shock to learn that his own supervisor was a traitor and a murderer. Harder still to aim a gun at his friend and fire. He’ll be all right, though.”
“I never thanked Ari for what he did. Things were pretty crazy afterward . . . and I was a wreck.”
“Who wouldn’t be,” Hannah said, “after such a close brush with death.”
Abby set her carry-on bag on the floor beside her suitcase and sighed. “They say your life is supposed to flash before you at times like that, but mine didn’t—even though I thought I was going to die. If anything has given me a new outlook on life, it has been this dig. It was like glimpsing time and history from God’s perspective, and it made me realize just how short life really is . . . how important it is. It could come to an end so suddenly. Mine nearly did.”
“Jake used to say that life was God’s gift to us. We should enjoy it and not waste a moment of it by wallowing in bitterness. He used to love the wonderful view of the bigger picture that my archaeological discoveries provided.”
“Me too. I keep thinking about all those layers of civilization, all those people like Leah and Reuben who have lived and died, leaving behind the record of their lives. They each played their part in God’s plan . . . and now it’s my turn. What I leave behind is up to me, isn’t it?”
Hannah nodded. “Have you decided what you’ll do when you get home?”
“No . . . not exactly. I know that I want to play my part in God’s design . . . and in His Kingdom. I’m just not sure what that is yet.”
“He’ll show you. In the meantime, be careful you don’t get bogged down trying to see the purpose in everything that happens to you. You may never see where your husband’s affair fits into God’s plan, for instance—just as I may never fully know why I had to lose Jake and Rachel. We’re still much too close to see the bigger picture.”
“I think I understand what you’re saying,” Abby said slowly. “When Leah died at Gamla, she probably didn’t comprehend why her nation was being destroyed and her people scattered, either.”
“Probably not. It’s only when we stand at a distance of two thousand years that we can begin to see how it was part of God’s plan to spread His Kingdom to the whole world. I can’t fathom a design on that grand of a scale, can you, Abby?”
“No,” she murmured. “It’s beyond my comprehension.”
“But you know what amazes me even more?” Hannah’s voice grew hushed. “God also cares deeply about each individual person. Two thousand years ago, He had that mosaic floor created for His purposes. Then He kept it buried all that time, waiting for Ari to discover it this summer. That’s how much God loves us. Now Ari knows it, too. He knows that finding that floor was much more than a coincidence. It was God’s gift to him, showing him that Rachel’s life, Rachel’s faith, was part of the bigger picture.”
There was a knock on Abby’s door. The porter had arrived to carry her bags to the waiting taxi. Tears filled Abby’s eyes at the thought of leaving her friend.
“Oh, Hannah . . . it’s so hard to say good-bye.”
“Then let’s not say it. Let’s say Shalom, instead.” She drew Abby into her arms for the last time. “Shalom, my dear friend. May God’s peace be with you. Arid may His face always shine upon you.”
LOD AIRPORT, ISRAEL—1999
Abby’s plane was scheduled to leave Israel shortly after midnight. She had still been crying as the taxi pulled out of the hotel parking lot for the airport, with Hannah waving to her from the front step. Now it was nearly eleven o’clock, and Abby was exhausted. She thought she might even be able to sleep on the plane for once.
Inside the terminal she joined a long line of passengers waiting to have their luggage inspected. She listened idly as the agents interrogated them. “Are you carrying any packages for another person? Did you pack your own bags? Have they left your sight since you packed them?”
She thought of Hannah and Ari and Marwan—how they had to live with this constant suspicion and fear. Abby would pray for the peace of Jerusalem.
At last it was her turn to have her suitcase inspected. The young agent motioned for her to come forward. But before Abby had a chance to lift her bag onto the table, she heard Ari’s voice behind her. “It’s okay. You can pass her through. She’s with me.” His hand rested briefly on her shoulder.
Ari showed the agent his identification badge, and the man put Abby’s suitcase on the cart with the others. Ari carried her tote bag as they walked in silence to the boarding gate. He stopped to show his badge once again as they passed through airport security. Ari then found two seats for them in a deserted corner of the departure lounge.
“How are you?” he asked at last. “Have you recovered?”
“Yes, I think so. Hannah was a big help. How about you?”
He shrugged and made a so-so gesture. “Dov Shur died on the way to the hospital,” he said quietly.
Abby laid her hand on top of his. “I never thanked you for saving my life.”
His eyes met hers for the first time. “You’re welcome. I’m glad I got there in time.”
“Are you allowed to tell me what made you come back .. . just in time?” she asked.
He drew a deep breath, then exhaled. “I went to the Agency’s archives, looking for the tape recording they made when they questioned you after Ben’s death. I thought you might have quoted the Scripture verse during the interview while it was still fresh in your mind. The tape was missing. So was the written transcript of it. There was no explanation—they had just . . . vanished! I learned that Kol, one of the agents who questioned you, had been assigned to undercover duty and couldn’t be contacted. The other agent was Dov Shur. You had misunderstood Ben when he said ‘Torah,’ so I wondered if you could have also misunderstood the rest. Could Ben have said Shur was the traitor, not that he was sure there was a traitor? I had just decided to go back and ask you when you paged me. I tried to locate Shur, but no one knew where he was, so I requested back-up assistance Then I prayed that we would make it in time.”
“Thank you, Ari.”
He simply nodded.
As Abby studied him, knowing she would probably never see him again, she sensed the struggle between the two very different men who both claimed Ari Bazak. She wondered which man would win—the archaeologist or the secret agent. Then she noticed that he was wearing a yarmulke on his head. She reached out to touch it.
He smiled sheepishly and yanked it off, stuffing it into his pocket. “I guess I forgot about it. I went to church tonight, the one that Rachel and I used to attend. I talked to an old friend of hers, Ahmed Saraj.”
“I’m glad.”
“Yes. I am, too.”
“So what are you going to do next, Ari?” she asked quietly.
“Well, I’m officially on leave from the Agency until the investigation is complete.” He smiled slightly. “Hannah says that will give me just enough time to help her publish our findings at Degania.”
“The mosaic floor?”
“Yes.” The smile spread across his face. “It’s a very unusual discovery, you know—Christian symbols in a first-century Jewish home. It will be a very important find.”
The loudspeaker crackled suddenly, announcing Abby’s flight. They both stood.
“Before you go,” Ari said, “I have something for you.” He held out a small box, wrapped in plain paper. “It’s a present from Hannah and me. Don’t open it now. Wait until you’re on the plane. Oh, and I need to return your Bible to you.” He pulled it from his jacket pocket.
“Were you able to decode Ben’s message?”
“Very easily, once we knew his verse. Here, we’re
finished with it.”
“I want you to keep it,” she said, pushing it back into his hands.
“Your Bible? Abby, I know how important it is to you. . . .”
“Please, I want you to have it. To remember me.”
Ari accepted it, then drew her into his arms for a brief embrace. “I could never forget you. . . . Shalom, Abby.”
“Shalom,” she whispered.
Abby was at peace as she boarded the airplane and buckled herself into her seat. She felt strangely calm as they prepared for takeoff, then roared down the runway and lifted off. When the plane was finally airborne, she opened the gift from Ari and Hannah, removing the wrapping carefully as if she planned to use it again.
Inside the jeweler’s box was a small green mosaic stone, hanging from a golden chain. She lifted it out and slipped it around her neck. Tucked beside it was a note in Hannah’s writing: One small piece of God’s design to remind you that His redemption is displayed to the world through us—one small act of grace at a time.
* * *
The final leg of Abby’s flight, from takeoff in New York until landing in Indianapolis, seemed longer to her than the flight from Israel to New York. She was eager to see her children again and glad that Emily and Greg were both coming to pick her up at the airport. As she stepped off the de-boarding ramp, she searched the crowd for their faces. But when she finally spotted a familiar face, it wasn’t Emily’s or Greg’s.
It was her husband, Mark.
Abby stopped walking, frozen in place. Mark saw her, too, but he also remained where he was. His face was somber, his eyes questioning, sorrowful.
Daddy has changed, Emily had insisted, and he did look different somehow—less certain of himself, more vulnerable. He reminded her of the serious mathematics major she had fallen in love with twenty-three years ago, not the smooth computer executive he had become.
Abby slowly walked toward him, stopping a few feet away. Tears brimmed in Mark’s eyes, then trailed down his cheeks. He didn’t wipe them.