Destiny

FIFTY-THREE

Israeli police detained Marcus in the Garden of Gethsemane, combed the grounds with high-powered lights and continued to question him. He repeated his story to three officers who took notes, the air crackling with dispatches from police radios.

The Inspector General moved quickly through the officers, investigators and emergency personnel. The body of the woman was placed in a black bag, zipped and positioned on a gurney to be loaded into an awaiting ambulance. The Inspector General usually didn’t respond to crime scenes. He had long since left that to his staff. However, it had come to his attention, while dining at home, that an American, someone doing encryption work for the Hebrew University, had been found with a body in the Garden of Gethsemane.

“Are you Paul Marcus?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“I’m Inspector General Aaron Cantor. May I ask what you were doing in this site after hours?” Cantor, in his fifties, wore his salt and pepper hair cut short. His chin bore a small white scar shaped like the letter V. He assessed Marcus through probing calm eyes the shade of light tea.

Marcus said, “I’d asked permission to tour the area. Sister Nemov can attest to that. I was here, in the garden, when I heard a woman’s voice. For a moment it sounded like my wife. I called out to her. There was more fog than now. I walked around the olive grove and the next thing I knew was that she had a gun to my head.”

“What did she want?”

“To kill me.”

“Why?”

Marcus thought about what Layla had said. “I don’t know. We didn’t spend a lot of time chatting. She was distracted for a second when the lights came on, and I managed to get the gun out of her hand. She swallowed a pill of some kind. It was too late to save her.”

“Would you have saved her if you could?”

“Yes.” Marcus looked beyond the inspector as the body was loaded into the ambulance.

“When she held the gun to your head, what did she say?”

“She suggested that I was prone to hallucinations.”

“Are you?”

“No.”

“You said you thought you heard your wife’s voice. Isn’t your wife dead?”

Marcus looked hard at Cantor. “How’d you know that?”

“It is my business to know these things. One can never be too careful in a place like Jerusalem. It appears you are discovering that phenomenon, yes?”

Marcus said nothing.

Cantor motioned with his hand for Marcus to follow him. “Come with me, Mr. Marcus, please.” They walked to the edge of the garden. The fog had finally lifted, the evening cool, the stars over the Old City bright and filled with a sense of antiquity. Cantor pointed toward the walled city. “To keep order and instill a sense of safety beyond those walls is not an easy job. Three days ago a Palestinian man drove a truck into an area where two of my officers were walking. One man was slightly injured. The driver jumped out of the truck and ran. He refused orders to stop. He was shot. Unfortunately, he died at a hospital. Tensions are very tight, more so as we move toward celebrating Chanukah in a few weeks.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Why?” Cantor turned to face Marcus. “Because, Mr. Marcus, we are sitting on a powder keg. It is one that could erupt at any moment for the slightest misstep. The woman who died here at Gethsemane tonight, she appears perhaps Lebanese or Iranian. She’s an agent, no doubt. We may have her identification in Tel Aviv. That’s where her body will be taken before disposal.”

“Disposal? She has a family.”

“Then she chose the wrong profession. I know you know her. Why were you meeting her here? What did she want?”

“I wasn’t meeting her here. I met her a week ago at the restaurant bar in the hotel where I’m staying. She said her name was Layla Koury. She told me that she was a graduate student. Born in Beirut and educated in the states. She was getting a doctorate in archeology from Columbia University in New York. She’d completed research in Egypt on an ancient city called Rhakotis, near Alexandria, before coming to Israel to consult for the Discovery Channel about the catacomb burials somewhere close to where we are, the Mount of Olives.”

Cantor was quiet for a moment. “The importance isn’t in what she told you about herself, we assume it’s all a lie. The consequence is what you told her about you, and what she really wanted. What is that?”

“I told her I was doing research on some old papers written by Isaac Newton and donated to the Hebrew University and that was that. Nothing more.”

Cantor stared at Marcus. “She wanted something. It will be in your best interest to tell us. She could have been working for any agency as a hired gun or a field agent on the fast track up. Why would a trained assassin be sent to kill you? What are you doing inside the university that has caused this reaction?”

“You’ve spoken with Jacob Kogen, haven’t you?”

“I have. However, he did not divulge anything beyond that which we’re already informed of — that you are, perhaps, the best in the world at encryption and decryption. You’re here to help the State of Israel with something, and that you are well known and respected for breaking some kind of human heart gene code. You’re so respected, in fact, that you’ve been selected to receive the Nobel for your work — should you decide to accept the prize. You do cast a long international shadow, Mr. Marcus.”

“It’s not my intention, I assure you.”

“What else transpired here tonight? Was there anything said that you didn’t mention…maybe a word or two she added?”

‘Love is truth.’ Marcus thought about the voice. Had someone been there? ‘You hear voices, Paul Marcus.’ He looked at Cantor and shook his head. “It all happened so fast. With a gun pointed at your head, you go numb. Has it ever happened to you, Inspector?”

“Yes.” Cantor sighed. “The old Franciscan nun will say nothing of tonight’s unfortunate occurrence. May I ask that you do the same?”

“Who would I tell? Let me ask you something. You obviously know how long I’ve been here and why I’m here. Who else is following me?”

Cantor lit a cigarette, inhaled smoke and blew it out facing the lights of the Old City. “We are. We are following you.”

“The Israeli police…why?”

“It’s for your own safety.”

“I see how well that’s working. Then how did she get to me?”

“That’s what I inquired. It is being dealt with internally.”

“I say nothing about the woman, and you drop the tail. I don’t like someone looking over my shoulder, even if, as you say, it’s for my safety. It isn’t working.”

Cantor nodded, tossed his cigarette, smashing it with his shoe. “Okay.”

“Why wasn’t I told it was the Israeli police following me?”

“Typically, we’re never spotted. Perhaps your powers of observation are equal to your skills in mathematics.” Cantor smiled and folded his arms across his chest, the moonlight casting dark shadows below his eyes. “How did you arrive here this evening?”

“Walked. But, you should know, shouldn’t you?”

“I’ll give you a ride back to your hotel. By now, whoever sent the woman probably knows something happened to her. I have a feeling she was just the beginning.”

“I have one last thing. I was raised around guns. Let me have her Beretta.”

Cantor exhaled with a grunt and shook his head. “Routinely, that would never happen. However, after tonight — after our misstep and the apparent danger you obviously are in, I will look the other way while you pocket her gun. If it ever comes up, this conversation never happened. But, you take her pistol at your own risk.”

“Thank you.”

“If you find you have to use it, Mr. Marcus, I hope your aim will be true.”